Making the switch from PC to Mac-Mini

pseif1 · November 28, 2005 6:02PM

Since owning an ipod I was impressed with the design and simplicity and smootheness of using a ipod; which made me intrested in make because of hearing how they are the BEST for media which is what I use computers for. So I have decided to buy a mac mini with these specs:

Mac mini 1.42GHz Z0CG

80GB Ultra ATA drive \t065-5899 \t

Mac OS X - U.S. English \t065-5894 \t

Accessory kit \t065-5893 \t

Internal Bluetooth + AirPort Extreme Card \t065-5908 \t

1GB DDR333 SDRAM - 1 DIMM \t065-5913 \t

Combo Drive \t065-5902 \t

Wired Keyboard & Mighty Mouse Set - U.S. English

Totaling in at $777

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I would appreciate your opinions on Mac OS X Tiger and your opinions on Mac Minis as well on Apple it self.

All input would be greatly appreciated!

Pseif1

igrant · November 28, 2005 6:14PM

Quote:

Originally posted by pseif1

Since owning an ipod I was impressed with the design and simplicity and smootheness of using a ipod; which made me intrested in make because of hearing how they are the BEST for media which is what I use computers for. So I have decided to buy a mac mini with these specs:

Mac mini 1.42GHz Z0CG

80GB Ultra ATA drive \t065-5899 \t

Mac OS X - U.S. English \t065-5894 \t

Accessory kit \t065-5893 \t

Internal Bluetooth + AirPort Extreme Card \t065-5908 \t

1GB DDR333 SDRAM - 1 DIMM \t065-5913 \t

Combo Drive \t065-5902 \t

Wired Keyboard & Mighty Mouse Set - U.S. English

Totaling in at $777

-----------

I would appreciate your opinions on Mac OS X Tiger and your opinions on Mac Minis as well on Apple it self.

All input would be greatly appreciated!

Pseif1

That is a good setup, espcially for someone who is just switching to Mac. I switched back to Mac again this past Janurary, I had been a Mac user and then because of where I went to high school, I become a Windows guru but I got really tired of all the bugs and crashing.

I would say you should get the Super Drive for your mini. The ability to burn dvds is AWESOME and the Mac OS makes burning dvds simple and easy so that anyone can do it.

The only other thing you might want to get would be a .mac account. You might want to wait to see if you like the Mac OS, however I use my .Mac account everyday for backing up my data and my .mac email account had been the single email account I have ever used in my life (Been online since about 1991 or 1992).

I use mac minis here at college all the time and I love them, and I can say that the macs are way more reliable than the Windows machines.

Hope this helps, send me a pm if you want to know anymore information.

-iGrant

pseif1 · November 29, 2005 7:08PM

Is the super drive really worth the extra 100 dollars?

P.S.- I love old beetles, and old VW anythings. Your car and website is awesome.

pyrix · November 30, 2005 2:51AM

Simple put, OSX and Apple hardware are awesome for one reason, and one reason only. They dont break. They just work.

I dont actually own a .mac. I use them for F&TV at school and whenever I can erm... perform maintenaince... on my sisters G3 iBook loaded with panther - i however have to live with my second hand PIII which breaks bloody constantly - atm I have to use an old bloddy 233mhz DELL laptop to type this becuase the RAM is dead in my desktop. I mean come on, windows is bad enough, but windows 98SE? with 64mb of RAM?

End of Rant, i promise.

Anyways, if you do a lot of media stuff, you mught want to consider splurging/saving and getting one of the iMacs. Nice as the mini's are, the slow spinning hard disk kind of limits them. If your not in the mood to spend $2000, get an OSX compatiable hard disk enclosure and stick a nice big, roooomy, zoomy hard disk in it.

Have fun now u lucky bastard.

igrant · November 30, 2005 9:08AM

Quote:

Originally posted by pseif1

Is the super drive really worth the extra 100 dollars?

P.S.- I love old beetles, and old VW anythings. Your car and website is awesome.

Thanks man, I really appreciate the feedback, but yeah the super drive is really worth the money, I don't have one but my dad does and I use his all the time, I just bought and external dvd burner but I really wish I had a superdrive, and I will on my next mac!!! But yeah the super drive is totally worth the money.

aquamac · November 30, 2005 1:36PM

Congrats on your choice of a Mac mini. Buy an external firewire ~250Gb Hard-drive and get 1-Gig ram. A 7200-rpm firewire drive is noticeably faster then the internal 4800-rpm. With the system on the firewire drive and the 1-Gig ram you will get peak performance from your mini. If your comfortable with opening it, buy the 1-Gig separately and install it to save a bit of money. Then eBay the 512-Meg.

Cheers!

ps. The 1.5 Ghz is replacing the 1.42Ghz but there is no way to tell what you will get before you open the box. Sadly they have the same part number. Hope you get the extra little boost.

mike fishcake · November 30, 2005 4:49PM

I'm a very recent convert to Macs (at work anyway, at least). I got a Mini, and it's doing me just fine (even if one of my colleagues did put pentium 4, athlon xp, MS Windows, celeron and gigabyte stickers on the front of it whilst I was off)

Saying that, if you're using it for media, I'm not sure how responsive the 2.5" HDD would be, even if you get the 5400RPM version like I did. A fierwire 7200RPM drive would be better, but the internal SATA drive in the imac would be a lot better.

Obviously it all comes down to budget though. If I was buying for myself, I'd probably get an imac, which i will hopefully do when I get enough money.

I've seen the light, but I just can't afford the bulbs

applehaus · November 30, 2005 5:30PM

Quote:

one of my colleagues did put pentium 4, athlon xp, MS Windows, celeron and gigabyte stickers on the front of it whilst I was off)

Hahahaha, that's hilarious. Meanwhile, you didn't say what screen you got so your total is def. not $777 (You knew me, you would know I'm freaked out by all the 7's). A screen can def. make all the difference.

pseif1 · November 30, 2005 8:34PM

I have an old 17 inch CRT that I would use

alliancep.s.i · November 30, 2005 8:53PM

i got a pretty similar machine for the same purposes. get a superdrive...i didnt and am pissed now. getting ram from somwhere else could save you some $ and you can sell the old stuff.

pseif1 · November 30, 2005 9:08PM

I just read the article about the Mac Mini DVR and I am now wondering if I should wait to buy that. If it is at the same price with better features I would wait. But would it have a different OS because I wouldn't use it for a DVR. All I want is a mac under a thousand dollars

pseif1 · November 30, 2005 9:26PM

The cheapist price for 1 gig of mac mini ram I found was $131 on froogle and the most I found 512 going for was $60. I am a little hesitant on popping the case on a mac mini because of the complexity although aparently memory is easy to get at and I am familier with memory on windows machines. and I have an 80 and 120 gig detachable HD on my network so should I buy a new HD for my mac?

flounder · November 30, 2005 9:44PM

Quote:

Originally posted by pseif1

I just read the article about the Mac Mini DVR and I am now wondering if I should wait to buy that. If it is at the same price with better features I would wait. But would it have a different OS because I wouldn't use it for a DVR. All I want is a mac under a thousand dollars

Unless you REALLY want your mac now, I would wait until after MWSF (early January). There are often product updates at this event, so I think it probably behooves you to wait.

psziel · December 1, 2005 10:08AM

hi all, just wanted to say that i also made the switch recently, when i did it i was using both and said that was stupid and gave myself 1 month to stop depending on my PC and it only took me 1 week! OSX is so much nicer, not having to worry about crashes anymore and i also have replaced ALL my PC program with MAC programs that i needed on a daily basis. My PC after the one week sits on the other side of the room totally headless hooked to a tv running a DVB card. IT had to be good for something. BUt the main reason that i'm writing this is that i been reading reading this forum weeks before i bought the mini and felt very comfortable about the switch. You guys are great and a much friendlier commuity then windows users. So riddens to windows, bring on vista and i will be laughing my ass off after it will need a huge service pack 1 month after it comes out. sorry about the rambling but i have to post something!

and im now looking to order a imac 20" or G5 within the next 2 months (im addicted)

pseif1 · December 3, 2005 6:59PM

I think I am going to wait until the new mini is unveiled then buy a mini like I wanted before. Then I would buy a LaCie mini

ext 160 gig drive

nj tom · December 4, 2005 4:49PM

Quote:

Originally posted by pseif1

I think I am going to wait until the new mini is unveiled then buy a mini like I wanted before. Then I would buy a LaCie mini

ext 160 gig drive

That's what I'm going to do. Although I need to buy a monitor as well.

ricksbrain · December 4, 2005 6:16PM

I got a mini to add to my stable of macs. It was a spur of the moment buy to ward off what appeared to be a hard drive disaster on my tibook. The tibook never melted down, but I kept the mini anyway and have been impressed with what this tiny little thing is capable of. It's not the speediest, but for most uses, it's not slow either.

There are good times ahead for mac users. Hope you enjoy whatever you choose.

Making the switch from PC to Mac-Mini

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