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Why are macs the better choice over PC's?

A

Arkman_1411

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 12, 2003
5
0
Hello everyone,
I recently joined this post hoping to find some answers. I have been haveing a struggle between choosing a mac or a pc. The reason I am confused is because I am looking for a Laptop and the most I can really spend is $1400 in that price range is the Ibook. Now the Ibook has SD ram and 2x graphics support. Along with a smaller screen. My question is why should I go with that over say a Dell or Gateway?
 
Re: Why are macs the better choice over PC's?

Originally posted by Arkman_1411
Hello everyone,
I recently joined this post hoping to find some answers. I have been haveing a struggle between choosing a mac or a pc. The reason I am confused is because I am looking for a Laptop and the most I can really spend is $1400 in that price range is the Ibook. Now the Ibook has SD ram and 2x graphics support. Along with a smaller screen. My question is why should I go with that over say a Dell or Gateway?
Click to expand...

Choose a computer based on what you will be using it for. In some cases a PC would be a better fit for some people. In others macs are better. Do you value how light and thin the notebook is. how about what kind of optical drive it has. Do you want a smaller notebook or a larger one (smaller screen isn't a bad thing for many people) Battery life (plan on not being by a power outlet most of the time or not), ruggedness, other connections like firewire, etc. All of these things are going to be important to evaluate based on what you want to do with the computer. I wouldn't not worry purely about speed specs.
 
i agree. mac is not "automatically" better and vice versa. if you "switch" thinking that a mac will be the answer to all of your computing troubles, you are possibly setting yourself up to be disappointed.

many of us made a conscious decision on using a mac. hence we are here and generally think macs are better. but you need to make the decision yourself. without knowing your needs and desires, it's difficult for us to tell you why macs would be better than pcs for you.

go to an apple store or a compusa and play a little...
 
Right now, a new Centrino laptop (PC) can be had for approx $1400 with no problem. It will have a bigger screen, DDR, 802.11 (b and g) etc etc. Dell is offering 2nd battery for free if you like. Centrino's last 4-8 hrs depending on usage and battery options (real world usage).

iBook is older tech, G3, that can also be had for $1400 no problem. Smaller screen, SDRAM, 802.11b only, extra battery for $129. Battery usage about 4-5 hrs.

Biggest difference besides the system architecture is the OS and the warranty. Apple makes the better OS, Dell seems to have the best warranty service.

In this price range, if you are not planning on doing serious coding / gaming, I would recommend the Mac.

If gaming or coding is a priority, the PC is probably the way to go.
 
You could pick up a nice refurbished machine directly from Apple, and use the savings to buy AppleCare. Maybe wait and see if there are price drops in a few weeks. But that does depend on what you want to do. If you want to play games, hate to say it, but you should probably buy a PC. If you're doing some light multimedia, or just web surfing/work proccessing, go with the Mac. Less hassle (not NO hassle, just less). BTW, Centrino's not that great. And in my experiance, iBooks have been a lot sturder and lighter than PC notebooks. ESPECIALLY Dells. Sony has a nice one, but it's expensive (and not THAT nice).

So, yeah, what do you need it for?
 
Thank you for answering my questions, I think I have a better outlook on things now. But if I were to get a PC it would probably be a P4 or a AMD athalon. Yes I would be using it for some games, games like warcraft III or stuff like that. Other than that I am just a student who would be useing it for homework and bringing it between houses. Word Proccesing, some gaming, and digital pictures.:D
 
you can game on macs, dont let anyone tell you cant. yeah there is a greater gaming market for the pc but all the top games do come to mac. And by the way my son loves warcraft3(demo) so it will be coming his way to be played on a mac. Macs are easier,more stylish and just plain cool. Add to that the great O.S. this is why they are a better choice.
 
Originally posted by Arkman_1411
Thank you for answering my questions, I think I have a better outlook on things now. But if I were to get a PC it would probably be a P4 or a AMD athalon. Yes I would be using it for some games, games like warcraft III or stuff like that. Other than that I am just a student who would be useing it for homework and bringing it between houses. Word Proccesing, some gaming, and digital pictures.:D
Click to expand...

the iBook will handle all that very easily (depending on what games you want to play). Things like digital photos are going to be really easy with iPhoto and the like (the built in software is another thing that sets apple apart). And i personally think that when you look at everything you get, the iBook ends up being very competitively priced, with lots of features while remaining rugged and portable. you may want to go to a store and check them out and compare as someone suggested.
 
Originally posted by Dont Hurt Me
you can game on macs, dont let anyone tell you cant. yeah there is a greater gaming market for the pc but all the top games do come to mac. And by the way my son loves warcraft3(demo) so it will be coming his way to be played on a mac. Macs are easier,more stylish and just plain cool. Add to that the great O.S. this is why they are a better choice.
Click to expand...
Oh yeah sure... 3-6 months later. By then the market has shifted to something else.
 
Originally posted by mrjamin
new macs smell really nice too, pcs don't have a smell.
Click to expand...

THANK YOU- I've been saying that for a while now. Nothing like the smell of a new iBook :)

And for dealing with digital photos and all that, nothing beats a Mac. Photos and such look smooth and sexy with Quartz Extreme, and it comes with iPhoto. I can't honestly see using XP to manage my digital photo collection.
BONUS: in the finder, you can setup views so that the icons for the images are little previews- without having to click on them. In XP they only show as generic icons.

What you are aiming for would be great on a Mac, in my opinion. Head to an Apple store and play around on one.

Hope that helps...
 
By the time you add in software costs that Dell charges extra for, youre talking 150 dollars that you save by getting the Mac. Sure DDR RAM is nice, but its over rated IMO. Plus, 2x AGP wont make a damn bit of difference for alot of the cards put into Dell's "discount" PC's. Sure, it has a 4x AGP interface... but the card doesn't take advantage of it, or it does no good because the card sucks.
 
Originally posted by yzedf
Right now, a new Centrino laptop (PC) can be had for approx $1400 with no problem. It will have a bigger screen, DDR, 802.11 (b and g) etc etc. Dell is offering 2nd battery for free if you like. Centrino's last 4-8 hrs depending on usage and battery options (real world usage).

iBook is older tech, G3, that can also be had for $1400 no problem. Smaller screen, SDRAM, 802.11b only, extra battery for $129. Battery usage about 4-5 hrs.

Click to expand...

i would just like to say, the ibook is not only 802.11 b. it depends on the airport card you place in the iBook. and naturally, it also would depend on the base station, if the base station can only utilize 802.11b, then your "g" card, won't matter, you'd still get the "b" power.
 
<hipnotize> listen to me... listen to me... see my words... buy a mac... buy a mac... it's better than crack... it smells better than crack... buy a mac...</hipnotize>

;)

btw: i don't do crack. just can't find a word that rhymes with mac ;)

anyways... maybe we will here a new switcher story...
 
Originally posted by mrjamin
new macs smell really nice too, pcs don't have a smell.
Click to expand...
I still crack open my 12" powerbook box and take a whiff from time to time. They should make a new mac fragrance for men, or maybe to spray in your car.
 
i own a first generation titanium g4 laptop, and a 600mhz g3 ibook. i can watch about 2 movies on a single battery on both, and the ibook is ded silent. i mean it's QUIET! my friend's dad has a dell, and it sounds like a frieght train everytime it turns on. as far as gaming goes, i can play wc3 just fine on both. it runs MUCH better if you reboot to os9, but on the g4 it runs fine w/o rebooting.

dunno. it's up to you really. i use ps7 frequently and it runs very fast on both.

for a quick comparison, that friend dad's laptop is 1.6ghz something (p4/athlon...dun care) and my lil ibook runs ps7 just as well. then again, he only has 256mb of ram, whereas my ibook has 384, and the ti-pb has 512....but anyways. the main concern is your OS preference. i think you should go to a store and toy with xp and osx just to see which you like better.
 
i would save your cash for a month or two longer (school doesnt start for months, some of us are in finals still) and get the 12in powerbook. With the price drops and a student discount it is definatly worth it. And remember to get your ram third party, apple rapes on ram prices. If you can stretch you budget to 1699.00 (educational discount) get the super drive. Right now they have a rebate going with laptops and the ipod, $200. That makes the 10gig $69.....

PS you can always ebay the ipod to help fund the laptop..
 
i would just like to say, the ibook is not only 802.11 b. it depends on the airport card you place in the iBook
Click to expand...

I don't know what you have been sticking in your iBook but, the ones we have at work will only accept the regular 802.11 b airport cards. That reminds me of something my wife once said, "baby please dont stick THAT in THERE right now because it wont fit"

They should make a new mac fragrance for men, or maybe to spray in your car.
Click to expand...

They could call it "Mackin"
 
Re: Why are macs the better choice over PC's?

Originally posted by Arkman_1411
Hello everyone,
I recently joined this post hoping to find some answers. I have been haveing a struggle between choosing a mac or a pc. The reason I am confused is because I am looking for a Laptop and the most I can really spend is $1400 in that price range is the Ibook. Now the Ibook has SD ram and 2x graphics support. Along with a smaller screen. My question is why should I go with that over say a Dell or Gateway?
Click to expand...

The answer is on:

http://www.macvspc.info/
 
Originally posted by yzedf
Oh yeah sure... 3-6 months later. By then the market has shifted to something else.
Click to expand...

This could be a problem if you can only find enjoyment in being "the latest thing", which leads me to wonder which part of the word "gaming" you actually enjoy.

I don't like to condone poor performance, for example - Apple thinking they can charge top dollar for top tech. I think until Mac users decide that paying 3x as much for "game" is a good thing, we shouldn't expect top tech in the form of game software. Until we get to about 25% market and developers can develop on a Mac at half the cost of a PC, then we should just buy a PC to play games on, or any other "one trick pony" console for that matter.
 
Originally posted by kettle
This could be a problem if you can only find enjoyment in being "the latest thing", which leads me to wonder which part of the word "gaming" you actually enjoy.

I don't like to condone poor performance, for example - Apple thinking they can charge top dollar for top tech. I think until Mac users decide that paying 3x as much for "game" is a good thing, we shouldn't expect top tech in the form of game software. Until we get to about 25% market and developers can develop on a Mac at half the cost of a PC, then we should just buy a PC to play games on, or any other "one trick pony" console for that matter.
Click to expand...

The performance issue has to do with optimization. The processor on the Macs are plenty capable of outperforming any PC at a comparable price. The problem is developers who don't understand how to utilize altivec for their benefit. That site http://www.macvspc.info/ discusses which has better performance, and given the right optimizations, Macs are 4 to 5 times faster than a comparable PC. If your software developer isn't giving you the full speed you expect, send them to

http://www.macdevcenter.com/pub/a/mac/2002/04/05/altivec.html
where they can learn how to optimize for the G4.
 
Originally posted by redAPPLE
i would just like to say, the ibook is not only 802.11 b. it depends on the airport card you place in the iBook. and naturally, it also would depend on the base station, if the base station can only utilize 802.11b, then your "g" card, won't matter, you'd still get the "b" power.
Click to expand...
*sigh*

I suppose you know that the current iBook has a internal Airport card, of the old style that is 802.11b only. The new Airport Extreme 802.11g cards are mini-PCI (different physical connector). There is no PCMCIA port on the current iBook so you can't go that route either.

http://www.apple.com/ibook/specs.html

http://www.apple.com/airport/specs.html

Gee whiz... the b card still runs at b speeds on a g router? Who'd of thunk dat?!
 
You dont need to get a p4 in order to do gaming unless you're hard core - and if you are you wont be getting a laptop nor be using a small budget like that.

For wordprocessing, we have office - it's great.
iPhoto is like the best app in the world for digital photos.
I play warcraft 3 all the time and it runs great, i'm sure it will run perfectly fine on an ibook.
 
Don't forget many Mac retailers offer 6 months same as cash, and up to 5 years financing to purchase a Mac. You don't have to limit yourself to a $1400 Mac if you can afford over 6 months more computer. Visit all these dealers and ask them:

http://www.macprices.com/
 
Altivec isn't optimization

Originally posted by gopher
The performance issue has to do with optimization. The processor on the Macs are plenty capable of outperforming any PC at a comparable price. The problem is developers who don't understand how to utilize altivec for their benefit. That site http://www.macvspc.info/ discusses which has better performance, and given the right optimizations, Macs are 4 to 5 times faster than a comparable PC.
Click to expand...

Really? I'd be astonished if any Mac was 4 to 5 times faster than a comparable PC at any task! It's been a long time since I've seen any benchmark that claimed this.

And Altivec isn't a "fix all" solution, it only accelerates a select group of tasks (generally, repetitive operations on large vectors/arrays), though it does accelerate them greatly. For a lot of software, Altivec just isn't an option; it's not poor optimization, it just isn't suitable for the task.

Mike.
 
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