Should I convert to a Mac....convert me?

[KatieMac]

Over Christmas my hard drive died....virus related
I reg get annoying blue screens - that mean I turn off & start again
My dad has got a horrendous virus and been out of action for 2 days..still not fixed (and his clients pay him hundreds a day - so he has lost a fortune)

I am considering a Macintosh......but know nothing. My brother swears by them...but is in Sweden so it will cost less to ask Q here and discuss the answers with him when I have facts.

Everyone uses Word/Excell etc can they read any Mac docs? Can I read their docs?
Can I still email/mumsnet/banking?
I use MS Money....is there a reasonable alternative (its April - I need to start this yrs accounts soon - well when I've finished last years)?
I'm haveing a website written - will it still work?
How much will it cost me?
Will I need to change my ISP?

As you can tell I'm fairly illiterate when it comes to puters.....so HELP pleease

Hi KatieMac,

CAT me so we can exchange numbers and you can (1) talk to dw and (2) talk to me. I've met user Twiglett in RL (we share a mutual friend) and (3) Come with dh and you'll both feel welcome and can have a quick lesson in Mac. I repeat if you end up not wanting it, or just want to play with a Mac for a while, this is not a problem.

Before we meet I should probably send you photos of the laptop, describe the difference with a current 17 inch Powerbook, and we should agree a ballpark figure I guess.

OK: iPod - you will want one. Your dh will go mad. 110% guaranteed. See here . Enjoy. It's a music player the size of a large pack of fags which holds hundreds of CDs ! Synchs to Mac like a dream. Come play !

Very scant info on your Agfa easypix I'm afraid. I think it might be time for something funky and new. However, I wouldn't be at all surprised if it did work. Bring it with so we can test it (if you want to / end up coming).

Nasty Mustek scanner seems to have an OLD driver here . I'd recommend binning it, but you are welcome to bring it and see if we can get it to work. My canon is so tiny it can go in an A4 bag with the laptop. You might want to consider it.

"Advertising = 100's of flyers to be printed & a few A4 posters printed & laminated"

B&W flyers, if you don't want to use a professional print shop, should be done on a medium duty laser printer. You can get excellent ones now, very cheap (considering the duty rating / speed). A Linux guru friend just recommended the Kyocera-Mita FS-1020D (190GBP from Insight.com, KYOFS1020D) - 20 ppm, duplex, postscript 3. I haven't tested it on Mac, but am sure it would work. Have a google.

Hope you enjoy the birthday !

Crossedposts. Sorry, it took me that long to type my verbose message.

sorry to but in to this thread but as there are a few experienced mac users around ....

can I ask if microsoft publisher is compatible with appleworks??? We use it alot and so do people at work!!

after watching several mac threads I think we have been convinced!

I won't (enjoy the b'day) MIL & I are (or have) antipathy towards (with) each other. We accept that each of us is perfectly nice....we just don't like each other ....and (I think) both wish we did like each other (some of it is cross generational - she is the same age as my nan )
Why do you think I'm looking ofr somewhere else to go......

When you get my CAT, if you email me your number I'll ring you (if that's OK)

I look forward to the reading (&not understanding)the spec of your comp.

I very much doubt it is compatible, or if they have released a Mac version. Microsoft tend to write terribly proprietary file formats. If you output to postscript, a professional application like Quark Express (or whatever the grpahic artistes use these days) should be able to handle it. (I have NO knowledge in that space. Look on Apple's Web site for products.

Apple have a new product called iWork which contains an apparently excellent 'graphical word processor' which might do the trick. Will have a smooch / investigation.

A Mac is different to Windows / PCs. It will take you a little while to make the switch, but I am sure you will be delighted.

Hi KatieMac, I'll reply / phone when I get your mail.

Loved the (brackets).

OK. Difference between my 17 inch Powerbook and a new 17 inch Powerbook (spec wise).

1. Mine is American. It does not have a '£' sign on the keyboard. To get a pound sign you press OPTION 3 which is zero problem at all (IME). The power supply has a UK socket and is international voltage (they all are). If you buy a new laptop your keyboard will have a pound sign. The laptops are otherwise identical in terms of international differences.

2. My laptop has a 1GHz G4 processor. New ones are 1.67 GHz.

3. Mine has a 60GB hard drive. New ones are 100GB.

4. New ones have a 9700 Mobile Radeon chipset (mine has some other chipset). New ones can drive the 30 inch Cinema Display costing 2 grand. If you can afford that, you should probably buy a new laptop.

5. My laptop USB port is specced at USB 1.1. New laptops are specced to 2.0. This is a faster port. I do not think you will notice much of a difference in use although in theory downloading from a USB 2.0 scanner will be faster, and certain digital cameras (generally the SLR / more expensive ones) are USB 2.0 capable.

6. My laptop bluetooth chip is specced to bluetooth 1.0 standard (I think) and new ones are specced to 2.0 standard (I think). I have no idea of the imapct of this change / what this means to a user. My bluetooth will still allow voice calls / pairing with a bluetooth headset or phone (yes you can synch the phonebook on your mobile with your address book on your mac ! Without wires ! Post model if you have a mobile I'll tell you if it's compatible. dw's Nokia 3650 is. I dont have a mobile cos I is stubborn (dw wants one for 'when she goes into labour as otherwise how will I contact you ?')

7. My laptop has 3 year Applecare warranty (from time of purchase). Will have to check how much is left and if it is transferrable. It gives you free telephone support and free parts and labour to fix it if it goes wrong (this is valid internationally). With a new one this costs £280.

8. New laptops have a sudden motion sensor. When you drop it it parks the hard drive. Mine doesn't. And I haven't dropped it.

9. New laptops have a scrolling trackpad which lets you use two fingers to scroll a page. Mine doesn't (it has an 'ordinary' trackpad. You can download a driver to give it 'scrolling capabilities.' but I haven't and wouldn't.

10. A new laptop would come with OS X 10.4 (Tiger - the latest operating system).

11. A new laptop would be sparkly new. Mine has been used. The little plastic feet have fallen off the bottom and I've been too lazy to order new ones (I think they're free !). As a result the bottom of the laptop and battery have spots where the paint has rubbed off. A new laptop comes with a new battery, and mine is no longer holding the charge for as long (I think when new it lasted about 2 - 2 1/2 hours and my one seems to go after about 1 - 1 1/2 hours). A new battery costs £89.

12. A new laptop might have dead pixels on the screen, within the acceptable number allowed by the manufacturer. From what I can see (and I am very pernickety), mine has none. I made them turn it on in the store to check it wasn't DOA and didn't have a single dead pixel as I said I'd reject it if it did !. A new one shouldn't, but might suffer some hardware failiure. My one has been tested extensively (in use) and seems 110% fine. TBH, I love it to bits. I will not give a stuff if no one buys it !!!!

Finally, I am not sure if the two laptops take different memory and I am not sure of the spin speed of my hard drive (these two things are pretty much irrelevant, but useful to know).

Hiya - will check out that printer thread. Thanks. To explain, having spent all blooming day talking to various people at HP and Apple, it appears my HP PSC 2110 won't function fully wirelessly - too old? Although I can't really understand why. The more I think about it, the more I think I should just get the airport do-da and pc usb thingy and give it a go. DH can bring his powerbook home and try it out. I can try out our pc and see if that still works. If it doesn't we can buy a new fangles one.

So - while it might print - it wont scan and copy properly.

poor you Willow...

Hi Willow2, all-in-ones do tend to be a bit of a mare driver-wise (on Windows AND Mac but there are fewer compatible models for the Mac to be sure).

I've googled this printer and read a few reviews. From what I've read this printer does NOT have any wireless / WiFi capability (unless you've got the model number wrong or I'm being a dunce).

So, I presume what you're trying to find out is 'can I plug it into an Airport Express and print wirelessly to it' and TBH, I have no clue at all.

There are OS X drivers on this page . If you goggle "PCS 2110" "OS X" perhaps you can find people who have or haven't made this work.

If the driver does work, you could always connect it to one of the computers and print to it as a shared resource, but I obviously have no clue about your network, what computers you have, if this is convenient etc.

HTH.

Willow 2 - Go to the Apple UK store, click printers, and you get a list of Mac-compatible printers including multifunction.

here

(Not sure that link will work for you, might have embedded chocolate chip cookie etc.)

HTH

h2d - what would you advise about buying a second hand mac? Don't know if we want to do for a full blown Mac or a Powerbook or something, probably the best offer we can find, but we have to look secondhand due to being poor [pouty emoticon]

All I can say is (1) find an honest vendor (2) if you want to buy secondhand get to know the product range. (3) Stick to your budget. I wouldn't get a G3 processor as they're getting old now.

Sorry, I don't really have expertise in the second hand area.

Ebay always seems to have loads of adverts.

If you want a laptop, iBooks will be cheaper than Powerbooks.

An older (domed / goose-necked) iMac should be available at reasonable prices now and they are fast with nice screens.

KatieMac - my battery might be better than I thought - I'd guess 2ish hours in the real world of continuous usage (wireless network on) judging by my little battery icon.

Macs are too quirky.
Over priced and underperform.
Anyone remember the cracking cube?
Overheated so much case cracked! Crappy.

Theya re suitable in some places but not many.
THey are better than PC's for graphics work, but
have limited appeal elsewhere. As for viruses dont believe what people say about PCs. If you have AV software you'll be OK. everyone said unix was secure and virus free. But that's not the case.

PC's have more virusses cos there are more of them. People will write viruses for whats popular. OS2 has virtually no viruses, nor does Beos, but nobody uses them either.

Less support for Macs. Plethora of software and help for XP. Why not wait for longhorn to come out....

Yeah, why not wait, and then install all the patches and service packs. Yeah, good idea. I think I'll do that. I just loved my experience of Windows 3.1, 95, 98, ME, 2000, NT etc. and I expect Longhorn to fix all the problems with XP.

Whatever.

What do you expect?
Do you know howm any lines of code are in XP?
Theres gotta be some mistakes.

People want computers to be easy to use and have all the bells and whistles. GUI's stink. Be they mac, any unix distribution, OS2 and all the MS offerings. However off them all, XP is the easiest to use and looks the best.

Absolutely. I'm gonna run outside right now and find a 24 hour Dixons (maybe at Heathrow) and I'm gonna get me XP so I can finally run Windows and understand how to use the best GUI there is.

katiemac, if Shazzler's wise words haven't dissuaded you, I've e-mailed you photos of the laptop / Applecare dates etc.

I went to the Apple store today - didn't buy anything but plan to. I think they might be a cult. They were really lovely though - chap I spoke to spent over half an hour going through stuff with me.

PMSL @ Willow.

Mac users are slightly cult-like in that they are a small group with a passionate message they're trying to communicate.

I'm really glad the chap spent the time with you.

Hope you mvoe to the dark side goes smoothly and swiftly !

I've got one of each and they talk to each other - where does that leave me?

Macs are definitely better for graphics. Hope I'm not repeating anyone. My nephew is crazy about macs, wouldn't use anything else. He does some type of computer programming for a living (I'm too computer illiterate to know the details )

I'm a mac lady, wireless 14" iBook. 12" iBook. 17" iMac, 14"iMac21"Powermac and 12 " poweertbook, 4 ipods and so on.

I am interested in your 17" powerbook Hub2dee, what is the spec, and ballpark figure price?

katiemac, I do my childminding accounts in Filemaker on my mac takes me 3 hours on a sunday afternoon to do the whole year and that is about 500 entries!

I love macs!