Mac vs. PC....I NEED to be convinced. :)

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<p><a href="../photodb/user?user_id=760139">Patrick Lavoie</a> , Feb 27, 2009; 11:39 a.m.</p>

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<p>Finally- something worthwhile on this thread. <b>:)</b></p>

<p>Patrick, I liked the posts with the pictures better (and i don't think i was the only one).<br>

Could we please see some more????</p>

<p>You said it! From his last name, he's French. Let's keep those stereotypes alive ;-)</p>

<p>If you refer to Windows Explorer for your content, Dont buy a Mac, it will drive you wild. If you use all the shortcuts and the way the computer "dishes" things at you...Buy the Mac.<br>

I find that the Mac does a pretty good job as an interface or extension to what is underall the GUI, Everything is kinda clean. BUT, if you want to have a structure of where your files are, and I mean all the files, then I think the XP Pro is the Way to go. The Apple doesn't allow you to get within its "wall, as the PC does..I hope that makes sense.<br>

The MAC frustrates me as a user that knows his way around a computer, so file structures are KEY when dealing with thousands of images and you need to work with Metadatas, and automating resizes to send to clients....The only good the G4 does now is captuer off 1 studio cam, and even that frustrates me...so I have an auto dump of all the captures straight to the PC.<br>

I am mostly with Manakesh, but you have to consider that you need 64bit to take advantage of more than 3-4GB of RAM. If you are using a system for work, I highly recommend staging your new system with the 64bit OS, then do a clean install of SW then transfer of files, so in case you have an issue, you can always use your old system to continue work. And no, I dont find price to be the bottom line, so a tool that costs more, but makes YOUR work more effecient is the tool to use.<br>

I would surely get a 10K drive for OS, plus one for the SW install, plus one for the Scratch. They run from 160GB to 300GB and not that pricey considering....then a few TB for the files. KEY is to either RAID this as a redundent backup, or have a auto backup software like Acronis, this insures files are safe. Another thing I would get is a 30" screen, or 2. Then get a spectro for the color calibration, a G15 keyboard is almost a must. It is backlit and can macro just about anything. <br>

I am an OG Mac user from the 2c days all the way to the 9600 days and even have a g4 and powerbook now. but they barely get any use as the 4 PCs do most of the churning for edits. <br>

Mac...its mostly a badge. unless you are not computer savy. If that is the case the MAC is surely the right choice. Heck I would still love a G5...it looks so cool and does lots of things in a cool way.<br>

Vista is horrible and a hog, wait for Win7 or stick with XP Pro 32/64 if need more ram.<br>

Someone here likely knows the prices for such setups....Sorry this is likely overkill if you are considering a built in system like the iMAC, but comparing prices...thats what you can get (minus the RAID of TB drives :-) and the 30" screen...but that screen will be the best thing you did. I went from 24 to 28 to 30...and I did LED and my eyes thank me daily....You dont know an LCD flicker until you know a LED static.<br>

Take Lightroom for instance....It looks cool does certain things well, but do you need it? Bridge sorts and (ACDSEE 2.5 so far is crashing less than CS4Bridge) does lots of stuff for the property of the file auto processes and so forth...CS4 does the RAW and all the editing. Where does LR come in? I still purchased it, thinking somehow someone can make use in the workflow, but it is collecting dust uninstalled....as my G4 :-)</p>

<p>I bet Charmian wished she had never asked now , she cant be any wiser now! its 99% worse the Canon or Nikon ! the best thing is to have both she will know then !</p>

<p>I know Apple now run OS X on Intel chips, so could you build a box using PC components (Asus Mobo, Intel Quad CPU, Corsair RAM, Nvidia 9600, SATA2 drives for example) and load OS X Leopard to have a functioning 'Mac' (without the gorgeous design of course)? This is a straight load, no emulator or middleware to keep it together.</p>

<p>Or have Apple crippled the OS somehow?</p>

<p>Best of both worlds if so. High performance hardware at realistic prices and probably the best OS going.</p>

<p>Spreadsheets = PC / everything else = MAC. Its good to have both especially if you want to check how your images look on a PC but MAC rules.</p>

<p>@ Phil<br /> I used and still use Explorer for years. There not a lot of difference in using the finder in the mac. You create and set up folder heirarchy's on a Mac for your images almost exactly like you would in Windows. What I don't do is import the images into a Library for programs like iPhoto, Lightroom or Aperture. The latter allow you to import your images from where you place them and maintain them in that place so they are available to any other editing program. Their library's or catalogues as some call them only contain the overlain adjustments. The images are always available. I'm not sure what you're talking about.</p>

<p>At others sniping about mac users never building there own computers is based on what??? That's just silly. Not true, and not relevent.</p>

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<p >I know Apple now run OS X on Intel chips, so could you build a box using PC components (Asus Mobo, Intel Quad CPU, Corsair RAM, Nvidia 9600, SATA2 drives for example) and load OS X Leopard to have a functioning 'Mac' (without the gorgeous design of course)? This is a straight load, no emulator or middleware to keep it together.</p>

<p >Or have Apple crippled the OS somehow?</p>

<p > </p>

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<p >It's certainly possible. The result is what computer geeks call a "hackintosh". I think there is some crippling, but it's not all that hard to work around if you know the right tricks. A bigger issue is getting the right subset of hardware the system supports. Since MacOS is designed to run only on the relatively few computers Apple markets, it supports far fewer combinations of hardware than Windows.</p>

<p><em>I know Apple now run OS X on Intel chips, so could you build a box using PC components (Asus Mobo, Intel Quad CPU, Corsair RAM, Nvidia 9600, SATA2 drives for example) and load OS X Leopard to have a functioning 'Mac' (without the gorgeous design of course)?</em></p>

<p>Most definitely. Google "OSx86". There's a few forums dedicated to the project as well. Tutorials and walk throughs are all available at Insanely Mac.<br>

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/</p>

<p>Grab a parts list, go to newegg and get busy!</p>

<p>@ David & Garrison</p>

<p>Thanks for that guys. I'll go check. I know Apple would lose revenue if they just released OS X to the public domain for PC install. I'd imagine Dell would have a line raring to go the minute release date came around - but if they truly wanted to take on M$ then this is the route they should take. I'd imagine a lot of people would buy into that scenario.</p>

<p>I think I'll go and put some time into research.</p>

<p>Cheers again.</p>

<p>people buy Macs because they love Steve Jobs. and you do have to give him credit a mac is a pretty graphically and artistically cool looking computer.. I mean that one that looks like paper.. really great product. <br>

but, as great as mac's are.. they are overpriced. mostly because of this:<br>

- there is NOTHING a mac can do that a PC can't do<br>

- performance wise a PC can match a mac,, maybe even beat it some days.<br>

- after a year or two and both computers arent' worth the mug of coffee you set on it, you will still have that extra money you saved by going with a PC in your bank acct growing at .02% , IF your bank is still in business.</p>

<p>some legitimate arguements for the mac. .. viruses on the internet. .. .. defense: don't be ignorant and try to download every file you find,, use Firefox, get scriptblocker and adblocker, and get a decent virus program,, and pay for it.. you will be fine. the reason there are more viruses on the PC is because they make up the lions share of the market. so if you were a virus writer,, what platform would you target to cause the most problem.. well the PC with internet explorer of course.</p>

 

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<p>Thanks for that guys. I'll go check. I know Apple would lose revenue if they just released OS X to the public domain for PC install. I'd imagine Dell would have a line raring to go the minute release date came around - but if they truly wanted to take on M$ then this is the route they should take. I'd imagine a lot of people would buy into that scenario.</p>

 

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<p>Not necessarily: then they'd lose of the main advantages MacOSX has over Windows — it's a far simpler OS internally, since (unlike Windows) it doesn't have to support every conceivable combination of hardware currently being manufactured. That's the big reason OSX has a reputation for being much easier to install than Windows.</p>

 

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<p>people buy Macs because they love Steve Jobs. and you do have to give him credit a mac is a pretty graphically and artistically cool looking computer.. I mean that one that looks like paper.. really great product. <br />but, as great as mac's are.. they are overpriced. mostly because of this:</p>

 

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<p>Oh, please, not this [expletive deleted] again. I buy Macs because they are worth it <i>to me. </i>Period. Just because the benefits of the Mac aren't worth the extra cost to you doesn't mean the whole world shares this belief.</p>

<p>Ha. This thread is hilarious. First, all computers are annoying. I have used Apple II's, Simons, Commodore 64s, TRS-80's, Compaq's, PDP's, MiniVAXs, DEC Rainbows, DEC Alphas, XT, AT, Apollo's, HP's, Sun's, Linux boxes, running DOS, CPM, Unix, Linux, Apple OS, Windows, and bunch of others. Yeap, all computers are annoying. At work I have Mac's, Linux boxes, and Windows boxes. Amusingly, the fastest windows box is a Mac running windows, but I digress. The truth is the best computer for you is the one you are comfortable with. However, for me, and I get to pick, I have a Mac on my desk at work, and a Mac at home. I log into clusters (ok, now we call them grids) of Linux boxes remotely to run jobs. Occasionally, I use windows boxes just because they are there. For me the Macs just work a little better. They can be annoying too, but they work a little better. The lack of viruses on the Mac is nice too. I have found that the worst software out there is the virus checking software (you know who you are). It can be worse than the viruses. If you know much about computers, then you want to get a Mac because its really Unix underneath. If don't know much about computers, then the Mac is easier to use. Still, if you are comfortable with a windows box, then get a windows box. And now my rant is done. :-)<br /> P.S. I can't believe that I added to this thread. I feel so dirty...</p>

<p>12 meg files; ie interesting.<br>

<br />The computer here I am on today at home can rotate a 12 meg file 90 degrees in 0.2 seconds.<br />It takes 0.5 seconds with a 35 meg file.<br>

<br />One of our Phase One 35 megapixel 105 meg files rotates 90 degrees in 2.2 seconds.<br>

<br />A 4x5 scan that is 290 megs tends to bog the machine; it only has 1 gig of ram; thus a 90 degree rotation takes 48 seconds.</p>

<p>All this is with a old IBM machine bought off of ebay eons ago for 65 bucks; it just has a Pentium III 1 Ghz CPU; 1 gig of ram.<br>

Its cost of ownership is about 10 bucks per year.<br>

It is used with out 35 megapixel scan back with a 5 buck SCSI card. The motherboard is from about 2000; it has a 133 Mhz Bus; a 16 meg Number 9 Video card; win2000.<br>

<br />The tests above were with 13 Firefox windows open; and 2 Opera plus I was uploading some scanned images to our FTP site at my print shop. For gaming the 16 meg card shows artifacts on planes with flight simulator; for ultimate tournment 2004 the men have less details; abit crummy.<br>

<br />For scanning with the 35 Megapixel scan back; the machine is TOTAL overkill; the CPU is at 1 to 3 percent during a scan; the recommended cpu is a pentium 166Mhz. With a PPro box from 12 years ago and 512 megs ram; rotating a 105 meg file takes 9 seconds; 7 with dual CPU's; ie 200Mhz Ppros.<br>

<br />For major editing; stitching together; or major filters or bathcing the big 105 meg files are justs moved to a more modern box; one that holds at least 2 gigs; ie more ram headroom. The FTP box at work is just another ebay junker; a Prescott 2.8Ghz box with win2000; 2 gigs of ram that I cobbled together a few years back for roughly 150 bucks.<br>

<br />Using older boxes or home brew computers; or building your own stuff for chump change is not for everyone; nor is everyone going to build their own birdhouse; fence; doghouse; ham radio antennas; or repair ones own plumbing.<br>

<br />Their is nothing wrong with buying a complete Mac or PC from another too.<br>

<br />It is not in many folks DNA to build one's own stuff; replace a button on a shirt either.<br>

For amateurs chasing then lastest computer and wasting money doesnt really matter; their is no actual business; no actual clients; no actual return on investment to consider. It is also like that with government and school stuff; thus the Pentium III 1 ghz unit was just several from a state auction on ebay we bought. One has a 65 buck computer doing 10 to 20K woth of scans after it is declared obsolete.</p>

<p><em>You mean 32nm later this year. 45nm has been out for some time now. 65nm was before that and the first E and Q series were 65nm. The newer ones are 45nm. The i7 is 45nm too. But we're moving on to 32nm this year.</em><br>

<em>I seriously doubt iMac's come with old 65nm E series. The six different core 2 duo's that newegg sells are all 45nm.</em><br>

You are absolutely correct! the 32nm is the latest and is coming out this year.</p>

<P>Having folks doing stupid stuff and getting disguntled with PC's makes a great buying spree for a hard core PC user. </P>

<P>One gets decent PC's for free or real cheap; ie a trivial price. </P>

<P>Often all is wrong is the exPC user just filed up the HDA; its bloaded; full; no room to work thus it crashes; giant temp files are left; there is even less room when rebooted. </P>

<P>Thus a friend gave me their old tired obsolete PC that had XP Pro ; a SATA 160 gig hda with CS2 and illustrator; feeling abit guilty about the deal I gave them all the image files that I could find. </P>

<P>One places the HDA as a slave and just does housekeeping; the unit would not even boot up with just about 30 megs free on a 160 Gig unit. </P>

<P>One searches on the slave and deletes a couple years worth of temp files an now one has many gigabytes free. Then you delete all the movies ones friend has already and now you attempt to defrag. In a way it is like my uncles friend in New Hampshire that passed away and had every Wall Street Journal saved since many decades; they had to rent a building demo dumpster and use wheelbarrows to haul away many tons of the crud. </P>

<P>On the friends old PC then I located their images and burned CD's in waves and deleted the stuff on the HDA. After cleaning out the impacted PC it is a lean machine; no program or OS was reinstalled. The Friend and client is happy too with their iMac 24" unit and buying CS3; plus happy with preaching how Macs are better than PC's. I am happy because I got another free PC; one thats got XPPro; 3 gigs ram; 3.3Ghz. I am also happy to help a friend and client recover images lost on a computer that would not boot anymore; since it was full. </P>

<P>It is also an educational excise in understanding why some folks love macs due to a full computer. </P>

<P>Now if I could only get a few free sports cars because they have their parking brakes on; or are out of gas; or have lead weights in their trunks!</P>

<P>This DOES happen in camera repair too. An as is "broken" Kodak Retina is "fixed" by adding film; a box full of broken P&S film and digital  cameras had most just "dead" due to no batteries; foam gone on film tell tale window; or no memory cards. One "fixes" broken self powered meters with an eraser to remove corrision on the cell.</P>

<p>These Mac vs. PC posts have been going on for as long as I have been a member of photo.net (over 10 years) and they are still completely unhelpful. We have 6 macs amongst the 5 members of my immediate family. I use PCs at work, and a very slick Aspire One 2.2 pound netbook running XP for when I travel. I am the former CIO of a very large cardiology practice with 400 or so employees spread througout SE Michigan.</p>

<p>There is no question that a well configured PC or Mac can handle photo work very well. You should try out both systems for more than a few minutes and see which one you are most comfortable with, and then buy that system. I am asked this question all of the time (Mac vs PC). What I tell people is that at home they are not going to have the tech support team that they are used to at work. So if their PC starts to crash or behave bizarrely, it is going to be a big pain in the butt for them unless: 1. They are pretty knowledgable about Windows and the problems that typically occur using Windows, or 2: They have a kid, or brother, or cousin who is a computer geek who can bail them out. My experience as a person who has been responsible for hundreds of Windows machines and all of our families Macs through the years is that Windows machines develop more frustrating problems more frequently than Macs do. Neither is perfect, however. If you have a Windows PC and are compulsive about performing all of the required updates as well as using effective anti-virus software you can stay out of trouble most of the time. But, some knowledge of how Windows works "under the hood" goes a long way. Macs seem to function more reliably on a day to day basis with less active intervention on the part of the user. I also think that adding peripherals is less frustrating and more seamless. Since most home users are mainly interested in email, internet, photos, movies, and Microsoft Office-I think they are usually happier with a Mac (in any case, they call me less with problems).</p>

<p>For photography work, however, I don't like iMacs. Unfortunately, Jobs and company have gone to all glossy screens on their laptops and iMacs. I think those screens are pretty awful for sensitive photo work because of excessive reflections. Because of this I use a matte screen Apple Cinema display for PS work at home. The trouble is that Apple has gutted the middle part of their desktop line. If you don't want the integrated iMac (all of which now have the shiny screens) your only choices are the Mac mini, or the very expensive (and powerful) Mac towers. I chose the Mini, because it runs PS just fine for my needs and drives the Cinema Display fine for PS work. I also can buy 5-6 Mac Minis for the price of the tower. I think that Apple is mistaken in their market strategy of assuming that all "consumers" will want the iMac and all "pros" will want and will pay for the expensive towers. There are lots of us who want the choice of a separate monitor and would like to have a more expandable computer. I hope that they will realize this soon, and once again sell moderately priced towers. In any case, if you do color sensitive photo work or if reflections really bother you, be sure you actually work on an iMac before you buy it.</p>

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<p>Thanks for that guys. I'll go check. I know Apple would lose revenue if they just released OS X to the public domain for PC install. I'd imagine Dell would have a line raring to go the minute release date came around - but if they truly wanted to take on M$ then this is the route they should take. I'd imagine a lot of people would buy into that scenario.</p>

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<p>You can't just put OSX into any old Intel PC that will run windows. There are some hardware incompatibilities.</p>

<p>http://www.macworld.com/article/133028/2008/04/building_mac_clone.html</p>

<p>Yes, let's get this thread to the 300 posts milestone! :)</p>

<p>I just hope the OP still checks back once in a while to read the latest 10 posts or so. She probably didn't fully anticipate that computer-related Culture Wars run even deeper than the eternal Canon/Nikon skirmishes (I use neither - yay Sony!)</p>

<p>Having used both Macs and PCs for respectively 10 and 25 years now, I've resigned myself to the conclusion that neither will ever really live up to my hopes and expectations, so it's mostly a question of finding the lesser evil. I've had better experience overall with Macs in terms of system stability and component reliability, but they do also occasionally hang up mildly or suffer serious hardware failure. And I usually go for low-budget systems on the PC side, which no doubt contributes to a higher frequency of problems.</p>

<p>I do happen to think that (for me) Macs are on the whole better-designed in terms of having a more consistent interface, and I happen to like some particular software that doesn't exist for PC (am typing this right now while browsing in Camino). I don't seriously miss any software that only works on PC, but I do scan negatives from an old SCSI film scanner to an equally old PC pentium III.</p>

<p>Macs are definitely a bit overpriced brand new at regular retail, but if you keep your eyes peeled then you're likely to find good deals that narrow the price gap with similar-spec PCs. Educational pricing is 10-20% below regular retail, and if you don't qualify for that then you can keep your finger on the pulse and plan to be first in line at the door for Apple's clearance deals, whenever the new models are about to arrive (usually happens twice a year).</p>

<p>Most of us who use computers a fair amount of time will find ourselves owning several of them pretty quickly. So if your own experience hasn't caused you to really make up your mind already in terms of which machine to spend $2000+ on, then one possible thing to do is to get a low-spec user of the unfamiliar kind for something like $300-400, and really find out for yourself whether you like or hate the other side's GUI and apps. It won't substitute for a 4GB RAM quad machine with multiple 1Tb drives, but it will serve you in ways that the big desktops cannot, eg mini macs are great for home entertainment, while tiny PC latops like asus eee or acer aspire one are great for travel and for photo backup on the fly.</p>

<p>And remember, the longer you hesitate before you buy, the better the specs-for-your-bucks will be by the time you do finally decide!</p>

<p>I can't be bothered to convince you. I'm too busy enjoying my MacBook Pro.</p>

<p>@Howard/ heres a quick retouching tips that could help you; when you bring details out of the shadow and the pant glow in the dark..use a hue saturation over it to lower this effect, it will look more natural : )</p>

<p>In that particular case, shadow didtn need to be because it was more a mood shot, ambiance..and sometimes, its OK to have shadow with no details; its was a artistic decision..not a mistake ; )</p>

<p>@Joe/ I dont know much about the techical part of computer building, and i dont really care, as when i buy something i just want it to work..so i can dedicated myself on what i know best..<em>playing</em> the retoucher on nice body ; ) But after reading Kelly post, it seem that i was not that far about a Pentium III for a 12meg image..im not that bad after all technically LOL</p>

<p> </p>

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<p>I just hope the OP still checks back once in a while to read the latest 10 posts or so.</p>

 

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<p>good point. heres something to help make the OP make a good decision if only the last 10 post are read.</p>

<p>buy a mac</p>

<p>buy a pc</p>

<p>buy a big mac</p>