To iMac or not to iMac?

[Eagle51389]

I currently have a Dell Inpriron E1505 with Vista and Ubuntu. Vista is busting my balls and never really quite lives up to my expectations. It isn't terrible, and it does everything I want, but sometimes it just really pisses me off. Ubuntu is a ton of fun to play around with but there are still things that I cannot do with it that can only be done in Windows.

My dilemma is that I have some $$ hanging around (lol big problem right?!? ) and I'd like to Mac it up. I have a 20" Dell monitor that is wonderful. I would get a mini but I feel it is too underpowered to be a desktop machine.

Please help me justify the purchase of a 20" iMac. I get the student discount and they just opened a new store by my house. It is so temping just to get one, but my laptop is decent and does most things I need fairly well (its a year old). Help a brotha out..

Eagle

 

[amac4me]

So how much do you have to spend?

My suggestion ... get a MacBook or MacBook Pro because they can do all the an iMac can do (note however that the MacBook has integrated graphics). Some advantages:

- You'll be mobile with your Mac
- You'll be able to connect to your external monitor
- You'll be able to boot into Windows either via Boot Camp or virtually with VMware Fusion or Parallels

You could then sell your Dell E1505 so the cost of your Mac will be some what reduced because you'll get something back. Overall, you'd have a single computer that will meet most if not all your needs.

 

[ChrisA]

You asking about what kind of computer to buy but not talking about what you do with the computer or what software you want to run.

If you have a high definition video camera and want to edit using FCP the Mini is not for you. but if you just need to read email even the Mini is total overkill. No one can give you informed advice unless they know more about how you will use the computer.

So how much do you have to spend?

That's pretty much how people decide what to buy. It works for cars, computers and cameras. It works great because you don't need to read up or understand any of that technical double talk about "mega-whatevers". If you have $600 buy the $600 computer and if you have $1200 buy the $1200 one. It's easy.