Apple iMac?

Mark Morb

Mark Morb

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Mark
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Hi,

I'm considering replacing my PC with a new 24" iMac. Does anyone have any experience of these machines and could offer any advice as to their suitability for Photo editing?

Cheers,
Mark Morb
 
Well I work in IT, supporting Wintel environment, and have had PC's at home for years......but about 8 months ago, I got myself a Mac Pro with decent screen........takes a but of getting used to, but have really grown to love the Mac.....but to be honest it does the same..Photoshop is Photoshop...does not matter if it's running on an Intel PC or Intel Mac.....if you run a good monitor, calibrated.

I find the Mac is less annoying to use than a PC, it does not have loads of apps all trying to run their update software when you boot up, you will be subject to less spyware/adware and virus attacks (how long that lasts however is up for debate). But other than that there is not a lot to point out by way of differences.
 
Agree with Everything Daft Togger says. I have recently moved to a Mac from a PC and yes they do take some getting used to. The only thing that i have noticed and this may not be a big thing for you, is that alot of the free plug-ins that you find are the web are not always available for Macs.
 
jamesward93 said:
Agree with Everything Daft Togger says. I have recently moved to a Mac from a PC and yes they do take some getting used to. The only thing that i have noticed and this may not be a big thing for you, is that alot of the free plug-ins that you find are the web are not always available for Macs.
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Yes, but you can usually get equivalents.
 
andrewc said:
and you can now run XP on a mac via boot camp, vm ware or parallels
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Thanks for the replies :)

What's Parallels? I have heard of Boot Camp and thought that might be useful as a couple of the Sony Apps I use are not available for the PC. Is Parallels included with Leopard?

Cheers,
 
Parallels isn't included with the Mac OS, Boot Camp is however. It might be worthwhile sticking with Boot Camp for the time being seeing as it is free, any boot camp partition can be used with Parallels at a later date if you needs its functionality.
 
I'm another convert from PC to Mac and wouldn't go back as I love the windowless panes of OSX, one tip I would say is don't buy your Ram from Apple.

4Gb from Crucial is £105 yet Apple try and charge £540 :eek:
 
Thanks for the Boot Camp advice.

I was wondering about RAM as the model I am looking at has only 1Gb and they want about £100 to upgrade it to 2Gb!!! Is it easy to install extra RAM. I'm good with building PC's but the iMac doesn't look easy to get into/upgrade!!!

Cheers,
 
Hi Mark,

Here's my two pence worth mate:
Despite most things being rather expensive for apple systems and their peripherals I will never go back to PC's.

After owning PC based systems for seven years or so and spending countless hours trying to persuade them to do the task's they were supposed to be doing in the first place, I bought an intel imac in January 2005 and I have had an extremely reliable performance, the only time it has ever crashed was during the processing of 90GB worth of dv film.
Also, I have never had to invest in anti virus software, not once has my computertater come down with any virus of any kind.

There are a few things that will take a little getting used to but you'll be dandio in no time at all.

I'm quite sure there are many folk out there who use PC's and have no problems at all but after my own frustrating experiences, the gnashing of teeth and pulling of hair and wasted cash I'm not going to risk it.

My advice in buying one is buy big, don't buy the cheapest system if finances will allow it.
Also, don't buy the extra RAM from the apple store, it's obscenely expensive, I bought mine from crucial memory (www.crucial.com) and saved a couple of hundred quid. It's easy to install, there is a small plate underneath the screen normally, just unscrew and replace the sticks. Make sure there is no risk of a static charge or else 'bad things' will happen.

The time is getting nearer for me to look at buying a faster system with a larger screen and that's not going to be cheap but at least I know that I will have reliability and excellent performance.

All in all, I couldn't recommend Imac more.

All the best and Merry Christmas.

T.
 
Daft Togger said:
Nice to see so many mac fans.....I mention Mac at work and I get pelted with abuse !
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:eek:)

same here, although those who spout the most abuse are usually the ones that have either never actually used one or haven't used one since OS6!
 
Thanks again for the quick and helpful replies. I've asked a couple of people I know who have or use Macs and they have said go for it.

Looks like Memory is cheap enough if bought from Crucial and fitting it looks easy.

The Model I'm looking at comes in at £1149 !! Not cheap but I'm just fed up of years of problems one way or another with PC's.
 
had an imac 20" for a few months - not going back to windows anytime soon.

and don't get the ram from apple, get it from crucial, takes 10 minutes to put in if you're a novice.
 
Daft Togger said:
Nice to see so many mac fans.....I mention Mac at work and I get pelted with abuse !
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Ha ha! Be patient my good man, Time your retaliation well and wait for them to experience a big PC problem and then swoop in for the kill!
 
I have been a PC user for donkeys years now, just bought a Macbook Pro, cant believe how easy a transition its been to be honest, havent found the Mac particularly hard to get used to either, couple of things in different places but soon found them :)

Main reason i changed was i work in IT and got so sick of fixing other peoples problems to then find i was having a load myself when i got home ! not much fun.

Will never go back now.
 
Hi Mark Morb. I was in your excact position 3 months ago when my 3 year old pc was grinding to a halt and I had a bit of money to spare. After using a macbook pro in work for so long I learned to love mac.

I went on to buy one of the new 24" models with 2 extra gigs of ram from a third party company. It took me 2 mins to install the ram and away it went. Go for it, you won't be disapointed
 
Well I think I've been convinced...now just trying to determine if it's worth the extra £160 to get the 2.8Ghz processor instead of the 2.4Ghz.....
 
Must admit I'm thinking of replacing my desktop pc in the near future. The iMac is a strong possiblity but I have so many questions (some which may seem daft!). I must admit to drooling over the iMacs when I see them in PC World.

I know some people say about the glare given off by the screen on them.

How easy is it to run a wireless network with an iMac but a pc laptop?
 
Clearly most people on here will have a half decent monitor, what about Mac Pros then ! I have a Quad Xeon Mac pro with 6Gb of Ram and after buying the Ram from Dabs and using a student discount on the Pro it cost around £2000 (£1699 for the Quad core plus £170 for video card upgrade minus discounts then about £300 for the other 5Gb of ram - The Mac pro is 10-15% quicker if you use FULL banks of 4 Dimms ie 4x.5Gb+4x1Gb). I know its more than the iMac but not much more and so much more expandable! Without the student discount it would be about £2000 without the video card upgrade!
 
andrewc said:
I've got a huge 21" CRT monitor but it takes up most of my spare room! The nice thing is that the imac its integrated, but for the same reason its also its biggest flaw.
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I know the problem! I had a DEC 24" wide screen CRT! I weighted so much that I had to get an extra leg on my desk and took up 1/3 of it! The Mac pro route will still take up the same space though with the system unit on the floor. It is faster, has space for another optical drive plus 4 hard drives (with time machine you will want at least one extra one straight away)
 
its only recently I've become convinced that an affordable TFT LCD is a true match for a CRT which is why I've held of replacing it for so long.

When it does get replaced, my posture will go back to normal as my seating position is somewhat skewed at the moment.
 
Did see an HP pc in PC World the other day which had 3gb ram and a 1tb hard drive!
 
9 out of 10 pro (photo)graphical artists use Macs. I've got 3: 2 iMacs and a MacBook Pro, on an Airport Extreme WiFi network (by far the fastest on the market; 802.11n) with 1.3TB online HD storage.

And with Bootcamp, Parallels, or VM Ware, you can run all your Windoze software on your Mac. Side-by-side with MacOSX, drag & drop. Vista and XP. But you can run Linux too, if neccessary. Try that on a Wintel box! So when you buy a Mac, you effectively get 2, 3, or even 4 computers for only one price!

Who said Macs are expensive....?
 
I have heard that there are some white balance and colour issues on the imac screens though. Can anyone shed any light on this?
 
michaelho said:
I have heard that there are some white balance and colour issues on the imac screens though. Can anyone shed any light on this?
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If it doesn't bother the pros, should you be worried?
 
Well, I was all set to order the iMac last night but during my extensive reading through various Mac forums I discovered that Macworld the big Mac show is on Jan 15th.
No one is expecting a new iMac to be launched but there are rumblings that they may increase the power of the current range due to Intel's new chipset and/or lower the price slightly.
For the sake of three weeks I think I'll hang on a bit....:|
 
I have a Dual 2.8 Core Duo Mac Pro, 8GB RAM, twin 23" screens and 2.5TB storage in there (250GB,750GB,750GB,750GB). I upgraded it to 10.5 recently and have to say it's FANTASIC.

I've been a Mac user about 2 years now. I started off with an iMac 20" which was fine, but I found it didn't have the grunt for my applications. It did look great though!

I splashed out and bought this system on a whim really (I didn't tell her indoors how much it actually cost :naughty:) however the ease of use and power of the Mac is just out of this world.

I've recently started doing a bit of sound recording. Bought myself an M-BOX2 with Pro Tools LE and an SE2200A mic - plug it in and away you go. I tried installing it on the PC and you need to do this, and that, disable this service ...

I LOVE MAC :LOL::LOL::LOL::LOL:
 
I've used Mac's and PC's . To be honest I could happily use either. Most applications such as Lightroom and Photoshop run similarly.I've even got a Beta of Safari on my PC ( but to be honest I've yet to find any advantage over Firefox) Only draw back is switching to a Mac after a PC you keep looking for the right mouse button.
 
I'm a Windoze refugee as well. Started with the Vic20, had umpteen machines, crashes, virii,re-installs and rebuilds, finally dumped my PC and dipped my toe in the Mac waters with a Macmini.
Amazing performance and reliability from a lunchbox sized computer, running CS3 so smooth, have 3 external drives so acres of space,and SuperDuper back-up to guard against drive, not system, failure my only regret is no ProShow Gold but I still have a PC laptop for that.
Hope Apple will continue to upgrade the Macmini which keeps the system and the monitor separate but that might be an old man's PC brain scarred by Windoze thought!
Seasonal Greetings to all
Tom
 
tomstorey said:
I'm a Windoze refugee as well. Started with the Vic20, had umpteen machines, crashes, virii,re-installs and rebuilds, finally dumped my PC and dipped my toe in the Mac waters with a Macmini.
Amazing performance and reliability from a lunchbox sized computer, running CS3 so smooth, have 3 external drives so acres of space,and SuperDuper back-up to guard against drive, not system, failure my only regret is no ProShow Gold but I still have a PC laptop for that.
Hope Apple will continue to upgrade the Macmini which keeps the system and the monitor separate but that might be an old man's PC brain scarred by Windoze thought!
Seasonal Greetings to all
Tom
Click to expand...

I started with a VIC20 too. In fact I am a collector of vintage computers and still have:

VIC20 (with tape and floppy drive!)
C64 as above
Spectrum (rubber 48K & plus)
Amstrad CPC 464, 664 and 6128
Amiga
BBC model B

Anyway back to the present. I hope they resurrect the Mac (not pro or mini) but something at maybe £800-£1000 that it similar to the PRO but with one processor socket, normal Ram, 2 hard drive bays, 1 optical bay. The Mac mini is OK (I have one connected to my TV and acting as a file server and print server) but then you have a MASSIVE jump up to the PRO which is OTT for most home users UNLESS you want to go down the iMac route which I do not. I want to pick my own monitor. Yes the Apple keyboard and mouse is fantastic and I would choose one of those but I like the DELL 2407 and 3007 monitors better than Apples and you cannot buy a 30" iMac.
 
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