OT: Apple Mac computers

[Andy Hall]

Until it breaks

Apple provides fixes for OS/X without the need to buy an upgrade. The paid OS/X versions are for complete new versions with additional software and functionality. This would be comparable to moving from Windows 2000 to XP to Vista in the Micro$oft world. So you are comparing apples with pears (or more exactly Apples with cabbages).

Then you are very lucky. In general, if a Windows machine is in heavy and daily use it is not capable of housekeeping itself. Registry management is but one example of that.

There's no need for anybody to do things to screw up Windows - it manages it by itself. Besides which, if it were a robust environment, it would not be susceptible to users screwing it up in their normal daily work.

That's an interesting challenge with Windows because much of the relevant information such as registry misbehaviour is obfuscated from the user.

All of which is untrue. It is perfectly possible to change things in OS/X. You do not pay extra for upgrades. For example, those for Tiger (10.4) are included and for several years. Purchased software such as Leopard (10.5) is a new software product with new features.

[Andy Hall]

Probably best if you sling away your crappy hardware and buy a Mac.

No serious OS is going to run effectively in 256MB.

[dennis]

So it includes office, games, etc.? Just what does it include in everything?

so? £85 ~ £99, you do understand "about"?

Not seven years then? Why do you post to argue and then backup what I said in the first place?

I am running XP on an IBM ThinkPad 386x which is a Pentium 120 MHz with 40 M or RAM try that with leopard.

Clearly you have clouded judgment, but you have shown a lot of that lately.

[Andy Hall]

With PC platforms there is always going to be risk unless they are from a well known vendor and the software is certified. I can achieve that by going to Dell, HP, IBM or whoever but I'm going to pay for it. If I were choosing a machine for a business environment, I would do just that.

For a home environment, I build my own servers, because I can cherry pick what I want. However, I then have to spend quite a bit of time checking hardware support for motherboards, graphics cards etc. against the requirements of the OSes I might want to run.

Two solutions:

- Repartition existing disk or better buy an additional one. This allows separate installation without disruption.

- Use VMWare and create a virtual machine with Linux - or just download one ready to go. This isn't going to perform as fast as the other way up - XP as a guest of Linux - but it will show functionality

[Stephen Howard]

I don't think 'pretty much true' is going to be good enough in this instance. I keep looking at Linux every now and again - haven't yet been tempted to make the switch.

Regards,

[dennis]

Some of what you say is complete cr@p.

[stuart noble]

I guess it came with a restore/recovery disk? Follow the instructions and you should get back to how it was when you bought it.

[Andy Hall]

Rather more than the base of Microsoft "operating systems":

- A better browser

- A fully functional mail program

- Fully functional and open standards address book and calendar programs

- iLife, providing Photo and web site editing and multimedia

- A working backup program that operates unattended.

It is necessary to purchase MS Office regardless or OpenOffice is free, regardless.

£85 £99

With the typical lifetime of a laptop or desktop computer being 3 years with perhaps a maximum of 5 years before new software functionality mandates new hardware, 2 - 3 releases is completely reasonable

You have a 233MHz 386?

It may run. Whether it's running usefully is something else.

Pot calling kettle black, I think.

[dennis]

So which seven year old apple OS are apple still fully supporting?

You just don't know what you are talking about, again.

You can run normal daily work for years on end. You get problems when users download allsorts of stuff from websites just to try. You would have the same problem with your Mac if you could get the stuff to try.

As I said you just don't know what you are talking about.

So I can upgrade to Tiger for free then?

Ah yes, like a new browser, the sort of features that you really need to pay for.

[Andy Hall]

I should perhaps qualify it by saying that embedded and special purpose Linux systems can do. Ubuntu and other general purpose operating systems require a *minimum* of 256MB. For the CD installer, 384MB is required, If you don't read the instructions, you can't really expect to achieve the wanted results.

[Andy Hall]

Somewhat irrelevant. The important question is the expected usage lifetime of the hardware

Unfortunately, I know it only too well.

Because the "OS" is not capable of protecting itself properly.

You can. The difference is that generally Mac software is well produced using Apple's development environments and the operating system protects itself properly.

Registry errors create all kinds of insidious problems and happen even when running office MS applications. While it may be possible to repair them given plenty of time, expertise and some paid tools, it is normally faster to rebuild the machine.

No. You can't upgrade from XP to Vista for free either.

Around 300

[Steve Firth]

Yes.

Yes, you could run MS Office on the Mac just as you can on the PC. Microsoft don't port Access to the Mac, but all your other documents will open OK.

If you really, really must have a PC then you can run Windows on the Mac either dual-booting or using a virtual machine side by side with your Mac applications.

Depends. It depends mostly on what mood Apple are in. You get all the Unix tools that you would expect and if you are mean you can use Macports to download, install and manage freeware packages. Usually the installation is a simple as typing "port inkscape" to install a drawing package for example.

Mine came with iLife and iWork bundled as standard. That's photo editing and indexing, download of images from digital cameras (including RAW formats), MIDI music and sound editing in Garageband, DVD authoring, Movie editing, Web design, word processing, page layout, spreadsheet and presentation packages (compatible with MS Office files) and the much overlooked but very useful Comic Life which is designed to create comic books but is very,. very useful for creating handbills, flyers and magazine advertising.

Apple sometimes change their mind about what they give away free, but in general give away much more than Microsoft and what they give away is more useful/works better than the MS equivalents.

For example the iMovie package is a cut down version of FinalCut which is used in Hollywood for editing movies. iMovie simply compromises on formats because it's aimed at home users.

Most of the negative comments, here and elsewhere, come from people who have never used one, are too resistant to change, talk crap. Choose one or several from that list.

[stuart noble]

Oh FFS. The bloke has screwed up windows, like most beginners. That's why they provide recovery disks. Why complicate things?

[Huge]

[Gotde T Shirt]

On a point of information: most people would take '386' in this context to mean an Intel 386 series microprocessor chip, which is two generations earlier than the Pentium chip. Intel 386 chips were late-1980s, whereas Pentium 120 MHz would have been mid-1990s-ish.

Microsoft specifies the minimum hardware requirement for Windows XP thus: "PC with 300 megahertz or higher processor clock speed recommended; 233 MHz minimum required (single or dual processor system);* Intel Pentium/Celeron family, or AMD K6/Athlon/Duron family, or compatible processor recommended"

- which implies Pentium II generation (or equivalent) chips of the late

1990s.

[Stephen Howard]

I must be extremely lucky then. This 'old banger' has been running this installation of W2000 for years now - and sees daily use in word processing, DTP, audio editing, music scoring, media burning, web publishing, accounts, client databases, graphics editing, email, usenet, ftp etc. It handles numerous USB devices, secondary hard drive caddies, basic audio mixing, midi devices, printing and multiple displays. The only housekeeping that goes on is an occasional virus scan - I don't even bother to defrag the drive. What I don't do is fiddle about trying to eke the very last drop of performance from it - I set it up the way I want it and leave it alone.

My home laptop is similarly reliable, as are the kids'.

I also have a 600Mhz system running XP SP2 that's been in service now for at least 4 years running a security cam. The only time it goes down is when the power fails and the UPS runs out.

It's precisely for these reasons I'm reluctant to shift to Linux ( software and hardware issues notwithstanding ) - my computers are productive, which is exactly what they need to be, and I'd still be running W98 if I didn't need the hardware/software compatibility that W2000 gives me.

Regards,

[Stephen Howard]

It's the simplest option, but not one I've ever made use of - I tend to chose a mo'board that fits my needs then build the system around it.

I have a dual boot setup ( via XOSL ). I've found it's more useful to have XP as the secondary system.

Regards,

[Rod]

In my experience, Vista is the slowest booting operating system I have ever used. Including ICL mainframes of the 1980s.

[Andy Hall]

Yes you're right....

[stuart noble]

The mention of Apple agitates the drones with such predictability and, as usual, the sum total of their contribution if SFA