iMac - beauty *and* brains?

[allhallows]

I'm so tempted! Fed up with v. dated Dell desktop. Can't even burn a CD. Should I switch? Are iMacs worth the price?

GeekBoy - can I just ask, can you run shockwave/flash games on a mac?

yep
Just got to use the appropriate plug-in..

Second all that GeekyBoy says. I have a PC at work (and all our future development etc will be based around the PC). But for home use you can't beat it. You can do flash websites in a few minutes with minal effort. I recently did a DVD for school play with no knowledge at all (I'm still surprised how easy it ws).

pah at the "new" version of osx. "leopard" is otherwise known as OSX v 10.5. They are currently on 10.4. It is a minor release - a load of bug fixes. and Apple being Apple, they are going to charge users to "upgrade". taking the p if you ask me...

Anyway, Pruners, it is NOT TRUE that you don't need an antivirus on a mac. there are fewer viruses written for macs but they are out there. and since it's a mac, you'll pay a lot to get it fixed.

The number of Mac OSX viruses/trojans is tiny.

Six. [1]

Four are proof-of-concept and harmless. One only affects PPC Macs and relies on the user downloading an attachment from iChat to their desktop and then opening it. The last one relies on the "Safe file" setting in Safari and from what I can tell is a theoretical vulnerability, that appears to have no known actual exploit.

i.e. Since Mac OSX 10.0 was released in 2001, there have been two potentially harmful viruses, neither of which infected more than 49 computers in the entire world...

That's not to say that Macs are inherently virus free as they aren't. However, I'd guess that you are more likely to be struck by lightning...

If you want AV for a mac, then get www.clamxav.com/ as its free and ClamAV is a well respected AV engine.

Calling 10.5 a minor upgrade to 10.4 is a bit like called Windows XP a minor upgrade to Windows 2000. Whether it's worth 100 quid though is obviously debatable, but it's certainly much more than a service pack.

On Windows, if you run a good AV package like AVG or Avast and don't open unknown attachments willy-nilly then your chances of having a virus problem is fairly low too. it's all a matter of user education really.

Regards,

Rob...

[1] www.symantec.com/security_response/threatexplorer/azlisting.jsp?azid=O

it only takes one virus to kill your computer. and people write viruses all the time: the current total is meaningless.

win2000 and win xp are completely different things btw. the former was for servers and the latter for home PCs. You're thinking of Windows 98, and no, it's not really comparable. when did Apple last get around to giving out a service pack anyway?

Hi SenoraPostrophe!

I would say that the total number of viruses gives some indication of likelihood of getting an infection. I don't worry about protecting myself in the UK from Rabies for example, even though it only takes one animal to escape from quarantine and bite me.

Windows 2000's internal version number is NT 5.0. Windows XP's internal version number if NT 5.1. 2000->XP is about the same as Tiger->Leopard.

In terms of service packs, Apple has release 10 so far to Tiger since its release 2 years ago. shrug Microsoft and Apple are pretty much even on their updates from what I can tell. Both are quite good at it.

Incidentally, I like Windows XP as I think it's a very reliable operating system. I don't own a Mac, but the ones I manage at work are reliable too. At the end of the day, the applications that run on it are much more important.

Regards,

Rob...

(oops - didn't real the bit about asterisks being turned into bold!)

Rob...

Get one get one get one! I have IMac G5 and it is beautiful to look at, no nasty bulky hard drive, and soooo easy to use,has never crashed, lost anything or had a virus. About 2 odd years ago with my old one I used to have a lot of compatability issues with certain websites etc but this problem seems to have gone away in the main. My DP is an amateur photographer and wouldnt be without it now. You can also get virtual windows for Macs so can have the best of both worlds

i've had macs at home and pc at work for about 15 years. i have never got the hang of apple 'office' software, but prefer the browsers and the hardware is so good.

Okay, now I'm thinking a MacBook rather than an iMac. But I can't afford a MacBookPro, no how, no way! Any more advice? Thx!

Before we had our new iMac, we had a iBook (as was known then) we had it about 4-5 yrs. We liked it. My MIL has a new MacBook and uses it interchangeably with her iMac -- she loves it. We had a stand for it, so when not out and about, the screen was easier to use.