Buying a new Power Mac ($1500 budget)
Okay, here's the story. My cousin is making the switch from his HP to a Mac. He's turning 15 this week and has a budget of $1500 (assuming he can sell some Everquest account or something). 
The kid has been saving up by washing dishes at his parents' restaurant for the last year with the goal of buying this machine. It was a comination of his iPod and the fact that his HP is a POS that made him look into getting a Mac, and after waiting so long, he is ready to buy.
I've tried to get him to wait until the Power Macs with the 970 come out but he doesn't want to wait. He says his HP is getting worse by the day and he wants to switch now. I guess I can't blame him.
He has used my new 1 GHz PowerBook G4 a few times and he says that he thinks it is fast enough for what he wants to do. Unfortunately, I think he is going to want to play a good amount of games on the machine. I've tried talking to him about this but he insists that he is done with Windows and that if he ever really want to play a game, he'd drag out the old HP.
He likes the idea of buying a tower so he can upgrade the machine later instead of being stuck. His younger brother got the iMac G3/500 for Christmas about 2 weeks before the 15" LCD iMacs came out (despite all of my warnings to my aunt) and the machine is definitely showing it's age in many applications and games like Warcraft 3.
I explained to him the differences between 'new' and 'refurbished' and he said he'd take either one. He doesn't really know about FireWire 800 (and probably won't need it) and he doesn't have a wireless network so Airport/Airport Extreme is not a factor.
He'd like to get a monitor to go with the machine but it's not neccesary as he already has an old HP CRT. The monitor can always come later.
So from what I've looked at, it seems to be down to either:
Brand new 1 GHz G4 tower - $1499 from the Apple Store and Apple retailers.
Brand new Dual Processor 867 MHz G4 tower - $1499 from MacZone.
Does anyone else have a suggestion I could pass along to him? Any deals are also appreciated. I'd really like to help him pick a good machine and have a general idea of what he should get, but I thought I'd ask for opinions on what AI members think.
The kid has been saving up by washing dishes at his parents' restaurant for the last year with the goal of buying this machine. It was a comination of his iPod and the fact that his HP is a POS that made him look into getting a Mac, and after waiting so long, he is ready to buy.
I've tried to get him to wait until the Power Macs with the 970 come out but he doesn't want to wait. He says his HP is getting worse by the day and he wants to switch now. I guess I can't blame him.
He has used my new 1 GHz PowerBook G4 a few times and he says that he thinks it is fast enough for what he wants to do. Unfortunately, I think he is going to want to play a good amount of games on the machine. I've tried talking to him about this but he insists that he is done with Windows and that if he ever really want to play a game, he'd drag out the old HP.
He likes the idea of buying a tower so he can upgrade the machine later instead of being stuck. His younger brother got the iMac G3/500 for Christmas about 2 weeks before the 15" LCD iMacs came out (despite all of my warnings to my aunt) and the machine is definitely showing it's age in many applications and games like Warcraft 3.
I explained to him the differences between 'new' and 'refurbished' and he said he'd take either one. He doesn't really know about FireWire 800 (and probably won't need it) and he doesn't have a wireless network so Airport/Airport Extreme is not a factor.
He'd like to get a monitor to go with the machine but it's not neccesary as he already has an old HP CRT. The monitor can always come later.
So from what I've looked at, it seems to be down to either:
Brand new 1 GHz G4 tower - $1499 from the Apple Store and Apple retailers.
Brand new Dual Processor 867 MHz G4 tower - $1499 from MacZone.
Does anyone else have a suggestion I could pass along to him? Any deals are also appreciated. I'd really like to help him pick a good machine and have a general idea of what he should get, but I thought I'd ask for opinions on what AI members think.
Comments
for 1500 though if he wants to play games...why not just build ur own PC...u can get quality HW then and a blazingly fast machine!
Nick
He never wants to deal with Windows again. I guess it's that simple.
[ 03-10-2003: Message edited by: Paul ]</p>
Trust me, I know that. But he doesn't want to play the waiting game. He and I have talked about it already. I've tried to explain about the Power PC 970/'G5' and how it will be out in 4 months.
But he says that even if he waits, the machine is not guaranteed to be released at MWNY and that even if it is, the machines might not ship for months after that.
I'll keep trying to convince him that he should wait, especially since he needs to finish selling an EQ account before he buys a new Mac. But it definitely won't be an easy sell.
windows is the OS u want for gaming, i was just saying if u want a gaming system PC is it...all biases aside
i would recommend the dual though...it will be faster and cooler
Well I guess I should be a little clearer. He's definitely going to want to do some gaming. But this will probably be Warcraft 3 and Shadowbane for now so there isn't a problem there.
He also likes Apple's software. He likes iTunes, he likes iChat, he likes Safari, and most importantly, he likes the OS.
I'm actually thinking now of ways to get him to hold off until July to buy the machine. But I think he is convinced to go out and buy a machine (like next week at the latest).
<strong>
But he says that even if he waits, the machine is not guaranteed to be released at MWNY and that even if it is, the machines might not ship for months after that.
</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yeah, but the 7457s are guaranteed to ship soon after introduction, and they will make the cost of 7455s drop like a stone.
list add at least 512MB DIMM to the cimputer Mac OS X on 256MB RAM....well it chokes.
G3 500mhz is getting long in the tooth? HA I am on a Beige G3 266, and will be lucky to upgrade in 18 months at best.
Now only if more people would visit my site (losts of Mac OS X articles),then I would make enogh money to get a new computer. I am on perminent disability, and can't work.
Tell him to bookmark <a href="http://www.new2mac.com"; target="_blank">www.new2mac.com</a> the site is launching this June, and should be a good resource for learning Mac OS X.
If that doesn't work out, I wouldn't get it from Apple because at least you can get free ram or something from macmall or whatever.
I did find a good deal on a DP 867, though, so I'm passing that along to him to see what he says.
Any other deals like this that people know about?