I'm starting to like the idea of getting Mac

[W1GUH]

And put away my animosity for Apple that came from the Mac/Amiga battles 20 years ago. R.I.P, Amiga. :(

The information I've recently gained about Macs lately make it sound very attractive.

I understand it's PowerPC architecture (Yea!), not Intel (Boo!). I've also heard that development tools, e.g. compiler(s), are free for the Mac. True or not?

And...last night I was looking to see if Ultra-Edit (outstanding text editor...use it all the time at work) had a linux version, and the website says it's coming soon. The website also lumped Mac and LInux together, as in Mac/Linux version. Does that imply that Macs run Linux underneath their gui? If so, that'd be a huge reason to consider spending the extra bucks for one.

Bye-Bye Wintel...may you rot....

[W4GPL]

The Macs have been Intel for quite some time now. The only real difference between PC hardware and Apple hardware is the BIOS (or lack their of). Most all the hardware is interchangeable too -- hard drives, video cards, RAM, etc.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh# ... _Intel_era (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh#2006_onward:_Intel_era)

[W1GUH]

The Macs have been Intel for quite some time now. The only real difference between PC hardware and Apple hardware is the BIOS (or lack their of). Most all the hardware is interchangeable too -- hard drives, video cards, RAM, etc.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh# ... _Intel_era (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh#2006_onward:_Intel_era)

Oh...thanks, guess my info was old. But, "Intel" is a world better that "Wintel!".

[n2ize]

And put away my animosity for Apple that came from the Mac/Amiga battles 20 years ago. R.I.P, Amiga. :(

The information I've recently gained about Macs lately make it sound very attractive.

I understand it's PowerPC architecture (Yea!), not Intel (Boo!). I've also heard that development tools, e.g. compiler(s), are free for the Mac. True or not?

And...last night I was looking to see if Ultra-Edit (outstanding text editor...use it all the time at work) had a linux version, and the website says it's coming soon. The website also lumped Mac and LInux together, as in Mac/Linux version. Does that imply that Macs run Linux underneath their gui? If so, that'd be a huge reason to consider spending the extra bucks for one.

Bye-Bye Wintel...may you rot....

I see it predominantly a matter of software. Yes there are lots of free compilers and interpreters for Intel based systems. If you run Linux on Intel there is GNU C/C++, there is Fortran, Assembly, Java, Perl, Python, Lisp, countless GUI APi's, etc. On the Windows side there are also loads of free compilers/interpreters, matter of fact most of those I've mentioned above have a Windows version.

My favorite set is Lisp, Assembly, and C and sometimes Perl, Plus I use the Qt toolkit for most GUI building. I particularly like Lisp as it is the ideal tool for attacking the types of problems I occaisionally encounter in my fi. Further, many things that require 10 lines in C or Java only require 1 short line in Lisp.

From what I hear the Mac is a good system but I have yet to see any reason why I would need to migrate there. For the kind of things I do a Mac would probably serve me no better than what I am using now.

[kf0rt]

Macs these days: PC's built by Apple. :stirpot:

[n2ize]

Macs these days: PC's built by Apple. :stirpot:

That about sums it up these days.

[N2NH]

Macs these days: PC's built by Apple. :stirpot:

That about sums it up these days.

Bingo. They even get viruses. The newest OS ("snow leopard") ended up losing a lot of data - none of it recoverable. Whoops!
:boohoo:
Lost Apples LINK 1 (http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-10373064-260.html)

Lost Apples LINK 2 (http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2142272)

I'll say this. My friend has a Mac and when he came over and saw how my OLD computer was working (it had hyper-threading), he was very impressed. I hate to see what he'd think of the new one which is a Quad-Core and has an upgraded cable line. Needless to say, he's going PC this time. It's cheaper and a lot easier to upgrade. One thing he wants and can't afford - a download manager. Mine cost $25. He claims he'd have to pay over 10x times that for the Mac. :naughty

[n2ize]

Macs these days: PC's built by Apple. :stirpot:

That about sums it up these days.

Bingo. They even get viruses. The newest OS ("snow leopard") ended up losing a lot of data - none of it recoverable. Whoops!
:boohoo:
Lost Apples LINK 1 (http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-10373064-260.html)

Lost Apples LINK 2 (http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2142272)

I'll say this. My friend has a Mac and when he came over and saw how my OLD computer was working (it had hyper-threading), he was very impressed. I hate to see what he'd think of the new one which is a Quad-Core and has an upgraded cable line. Needless to say, he's going PC this time. It's cheaper and a lot easier to upgrade. One thing he wants and can't afford - a download manager. Mine cost $25. He claims he'd have to pay over 10x times that for the Mac. :naughty

Mine still has hyperthreading. it does the job for me.

Hah ? What is he still on dialup ? What does he need a download manager for ? These days with today's inexpensive high speed broadband connections a download manager isn't really necessary. besides, a "download manager" sounds suspiciously like what we used to call an ftp program with scheduling. There are plenty of "download managers" for free. Some can even be installed as browser extensions absolutely free. paying any kind of money for a download manager these days sounds like highway robbery to me.

[kf0rt]

Macs these days: PC's built by Apple. :stirpot:

That about sums it up these days.

Bingo. They even get viruses. The newest OS ("snow leopard") ended up losing a lot of data - none of it recoverable. Whoops!
:boohoo:
Lost Apples LINK 1 (http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-10373064-260.html)

Lost Apples LINK 2 (http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2142272)

I'll say this. My friend has a Mac and when he came over and saw how my OLD computer was working (it had hyper-threading), he was very impressed. I hate to see what he'd think of the new one which is a Quad-Core and has an upgraded cable line. Needless to say, he's going PC this time. It's cheaper and a lot easier to upgrade. One thing he wants and can't afford - a download manager. Mine cost $25. He claims he'd have to pay over 10x times that for the Mac. :naughty

Mine still has hyperthreading. it does the job for me.

Hah ? What is he still on dialup ? What does he need a download manager for ? These days with today's inexpensive high speed broadband connections a download manager isn't really necessary. besides, a "download manager" sounds suspiciously like what we used to call an ftp program with scheduling. There are plenty of "download managers" for free. Some can even be installed as browser extensions absolutely free. paying any kind of money for a download manager these days sounds like highway robbery to me.

Some downloads force this on you these days. I've seen it with Microsoft and Adobe. You first get the manager, then the manager handles the download. No other way to get the download.

[N2NH]

There are plenty of "download managers" for free. Some can even be installed as browser extensions absolutely free. paying any kind of money for a download manager these days sounds like highway robbery to me.

Depends on what you want. There are certain features that you can't get with free download managers. The XYL tried one of those before throwing her hands up and using the one I use (I had the foresight to get 2 licenses for $5 more). The freebie was dropping downloads midstream. She hasn't had any problems since. She also says that the dl times are much faster.

You might want to check the FF site. There are a number of programs, including free download managers, that they're advising against using. Some are causing FF to freeze.

[W4GPL]

I think Apple would make more money if they released Mac OS for "PC", but they obviously feel otherwise. There's a "Hackintosh" movement out there.. sans some very specific audio apps that are offered for Mac, I can't see paying the premium to run Mac OS. We'll see how it plays out, but for now, I'm not paying for a label and a proprietary OS.

[kf0rt]

I think Apple would make more money if they released Mac OS for "PC", but they obviously feel otherwise. There's a "Hackintosh" movement out there.. sans some very specific audio apps that are offered for Mac, I can't see paying the premium to run Mac OS. We'll see how it plays out, but for now, I'm not paying for a label and a proprietary OS.

I've got OSX running on a PC here. What a trip into the bowels of PCdom that was! The "Hackintosh" movement is huge, and you're right... If Apple opened this up just a bit, the world would change a lot, particularly in the world of iPhone and iPod Touch development.

Buy a Mac just to do ordinary stuff? Don't think so. I'm far from a Linux guru (OSX for that matter), but if you play with Linux, OSX and Windows from the standpoint of typical grunt (me!), it's clear that Windows is leading the pack.

[N1LAF]

There is a reason why Wintel has the majority of the market share, while Apple doesn't. However, I thought it was a shrewd decision to have the Apple OS built on top of UNIX...

[n2ize]

There are plenty of "download managers" for free. Some can even be installed as browser extensions absolutely free. paying any kind of money for a download manager these days sounds like highway robbery to me.

Depends on what you want. There are certain features that you can't get with free download managers.


Like what kind of features ?




You might want to check the FF site. There are a number of programs, including free download managers, that they're advising against using. Some are causing FF to freeze.

I've never had any problems with any of them. Most of the time I use the built in Opera
download manager which enables me to start/stop/pause downloads midstream and has a built in bittorrent client, ftp client as well.

But, getting away from the browsers I can generally schedule a download via ftp, ncftp
or wget. Never had any problems, downloads are fast, can be recovered, and, can handle multiple downloads in parallel.

I've never seen a need to purchase a download manager. Perhaps if you're downloading hundreds of files per day and need to have a really specialized manager with organizational and bookkeeping and database access, filtering and scheduling rules, etc. At that point I'd hope the manager is user customizable and fully user programmable with a full featured interface. But for average or even well above average downloading needs I've yet to see anything free tools can't handle.