Mac ordered

As an alternative to MS office. Take a peek at Open Office http://www.openoffice.org And you can't beat the price either "0 quid" if you don't like it, just toss it in the bin.
 
NeilP said:
Oh and if you know anyone in full time higher education, you can save yourself up to 15% depending on their education institution's agreement with Apple.

And NHS staff.

If the Apple store is close then the 12 months education thing will be usefull - am I right that you can go in as often as you like for help/lessons?
 
I have come from a mac back to windows.

I loved my air and retina pro, but by chance got a lenovo yoga 2 pro with windows 8.1 and find myself using it ever increasingly.

I think until apple start incorporating touchscreen computing i'd have to recommend windows.

Although if and when apple do they'll prob do a better job then microsoft as win8 without a touchscreen is painful!


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My opinion about all Mac machines ( i used to have a 13" macbook air) is that it is a tablet with a keyboard. The whole operating system runs around "apps" which i didn't like to be honest.

The office suite is a must if you need it for work because like you said pages etc are just not enough for work usage. A plus of the office suite is that files are compatible between windows and mac.

Depending on your power demand/usage i would upgrade to an i7 processor because again i believe that i5's are not that strong in terms of processing power. The ram of 8g is ok for a starting point but if was going to buy an expensive machine, i would rather spend the extra money to upgrade to higher ram now before i buy it rather than later because i wouldn't want to "open" the computer afterwards if i can avoid it ( what is 75 pounds compared to the overall price of the machine anyway...)

I do believe that apple delivers in terms of quality ( i got an iphone and an ipad) but i would rather use a PC for my work for half the price and double the functionality in terms of OS.
 
ronk said:
I've also spec'd Microsoft Office as I have tried 'Pages' on my wife's iPad and am not that keen. :(

google drive all the way for me, for work and non work.

i retract my earlier comment about ram. I didn't realise the 27" ones still allowed users to change it. Since they do, you can add it later easily enough - example prices: http://www.crucial.com/uk/store/listparts.aspx?model=iMac%20(27-inch%2C%20Late%202013)&Cat=RAM

(you can do cheaper, crucial are decent but pricey, still usually less than apple)
 
As somebody who has used both extensively:

I honestly think Mac, as with the rest of Apple, is overpriced and you pay for the branding quite heavily.

That being said Macs do have their upsides such as build sturdiness, quality and they dont suffer from a loss of performance over time like most PC's will. As well as being less popular with virus designers however in recent years that is changing and macs are no longer really safe to run without an AV, or at least if you do there is more risk associated with it.

As it has been said, if you do anything to do with gaming a Mac is not the way to go, even with Steam etc making most games the sell cross-platform with a wine-based setup.

Another thing I found when owning a Mac was compatibility with work. Most companies use Windows and so some files / programs available to them do not have an OSX counterpart.

In my personal opinion I wouldn't go for a Mac anymore unless you have a specific reason too. They are more of a style icon and have the price tag to represent it. You can get identical performance from a Windows machine for much less of a price / more performance for the same price. There are good reasons to own a Mac if in graphic design etc (not sure what makes them so popular, presume the programs available on them) but other than that I wouldn't own one again.
 
I keep hearing how good a mac is but I don't really have any problems and am totally satisfied with my Windows PC, quad Intel processor, 8 GB RAM, 1.5TB disc, 21in monitor, Radeon graphics etc etc all for around a grand.

AVG Free looks after security without a hitch (so far!).

And I don't have any software compatibility issues, everything just works.

Maybe I'm missing out on something but I subscribe to the 'if it aint broke don't fix it' philosophy. :)
 
I'm a graphic designer and do use a mac at work - I also have personal iphone, ipad, macbook air, apple tv etc so am probably a bit biased, but...

Yes they are more expensive, but in my opinion you definitely get what you pay for in reliability, longevity and if necessary, resale value as well. All the programs we use are also available on PC, but having used both, they run so much better on a Mac and we have Office so can accept files from all our clients. I'd say the amount we'd save in buying PCs, we'd lose in productivity and technical support costs when the bloody things stop working...

Ctrl Alt Delete is just a distant memory.. :)
 
Disca said:
As somebody who has used both extensively:

I honestly think Mac, as with the rest of Apple, is overpriced and you pay for the branding quite heavily.

That being said Macs do have their upsides such as build sturdiness, quality and they dont suffer from a loss of performance over time like most PC's will. As well as being less popular with virus designers however in recent years that is changing and macs are no longer really safe to run without an AV, or at least if you do there is more risk associated with it.

As it has been said, if you do anything to do with gaming a Mac is not the way to go, even with Steam etc making most games the sell cross-platform with a wine-based setup.

Another thing I found when owning a Mac was compatibility with work. Most companies use Windows and so some files / programs available to them do not have an OSX counterpart.

In my personal opinion I wouldn't go for a Mac anymore unless you have a specific reason too. They are more of a style icon and have the price tag to represent it. You can get identical performance from a Windows machine for much less of a price / more performance for the same price. There are good reasons to own a Mac if in graphic design etc (not sure what makes them so popular, presume the programs available on them) but other than that I wouldn't own one again.


++++1
 
z4lincs said:
I'm a graphic designer and do use a mac at work - I also have personal iphone, ipad, macbook air, apple tv etc so am probably a bit biased, but...

Yes they are more expensive, but in my opinion you definitely get what you pay for in reliability, longevity and if necessary, resale value as well. All the programs we use are also available on PC, but having used both, they run so much better on a Mac and we have Office so can accept files from all our clients. I'd say the amount we'd save in buying PCs, we'd lose in productivity and technical support costs when the bloody things stop working...

Ctrl Alt Delete is just a distant memory.. :)

+1 What he said
(currently working on a full fat works Macbook Pro Retina, sat in Starbucks, 4th coffee and after 5 hours of solid use and still have 11% battery life!)
 
As pointed out in the last few posts they do have their strong sides as well.

Can't deny that.

At the end of the day they are both computers and have similar functionality nowadays, the rest is just fanboy opinion :D
 
Disca said:
As pointed out in the last few posts they do have their strong sides as well.

Can't deny that.

At the end of the day they are both computers and have similar functionality nowadays, the rest is just fanboy opinion :D

The force is strong in this one.
 
inkey$ said:
Disca said:
As pointed out in the last few posts they do have their strong sides as well.

Can't deny that.

At the end of the day they are both computers and have similar functionality nowadays, the rest is just fanboy opinion :D

The force is strong in this one.

No emote with a lightsabre so I'll settle for a cactus :( :tumbleweed:
 
Disca said:
No emote with a lightsabre so I'll settle for a cactus :( :tumbleweed:

"What you talkin' about, willis"

5472.gif
 
Its called the internet, my son. :P

Find your emoticon, get the url and post it in some IMG tags. Job done.
 
After having bought a Apple powerbook for my Niece to use at uni way back in 1999 (G3 Lombard model). Then having the school tell her that they were windows centric. So I ended up with it. and I haven't looked back. I still have that powerbook & run my OS9 based astronomy program on it. As a non-power user I preferred the Apple for two reasons. The virus issue (which of course is not the advantage it used to be) And the longevity of the OS. Until recently I was still using an Imac G4 football desktop that I bought in 2002. The thing still works fine. But the change to the Intel chip set rendered it more & more obsolete. So I'd say that 10 years of use was and is pretty darn good. So yes, it was more to buy than a PC but I didn't have to buy a new OS nor machine every year or two like the PC platform of those days. Prior to the Imac & powerbook I was using a 386 PC machine & windows 3. The change to an apple was like going from a Yugo to a Rolls-Royce. I certainly didn't miss having to mess with the MS-DOS command line. :sick2:
 
inkey$ said:
z4lincs said:
I'm a graphic designer and do use a mac at work - I also have personal iphone, ipad, macbook air, apple tv etc so am probably a bit biased, but...

Yes they are more expensive, but in my opinion you definitely get what you pay for in reliability, longevity and if necessary, resale value as well. All the programs we use are also available on PC, but having used both, they run so much better on a Mac and we have Office so can accept files from all our clients. I'd say the amount we'd save in buying PCs, we'd lose in productivity and technical support costs when the bloody things stop working...

Ctrl Alt Delete is just a distant memory.. :)

+1 What he said
(currently working on a full fat works Macbook Pro Retina, sat in Starbucks, 4th coffee and after 5 hours of solid use and still have 11% battery life!)

5hrs and only 4 coffees? You really must try harder!!!!


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