Since my computer died when I moved back with my parents, I've been without a decent computer for ages, and now my work has decided to start carry Apple products.

The one that really cought my eye was their G4 iBook

14" Model
1.42GHz PowerPC G4
osX 10.4 Tiger
60GB ATA/100 4200 rpm HD
ATI Mobility Radeon 9550 with 32MB of dedicated DDR SDRAM

All for $1256 Canadian. And since I work for them, I can get it on a credit play and pay 56 dollars a month for 2 years, no interest (Just have to pay the taxes up front). This is a really sweet deal, and is well with in my price range.

Now, I can also get a really sweet PC rig for almost 500 dollars cheaper (3ghz AMD Athalon 64, 1gig ram, 80 gig drive, 256mb nVida graphics card), but I'm going to be starting College in the fall (Hopefully), and I may need Mobility, and the labtops (Windows Based) at my work suck royally.

I've used Windows since V3.11 was brand new, so you can guess that making this switch would be a big jump off the deep end (Although, using Non-Windows OS's is nothing new to me, my last computer was dual boot [Windows XP pro/SlackWare Linux V10])

What my point is, I want to ask those of you who have used PC's in the past, but have since switched to a Mac, what were the Pros/Cons, problems and so on you had when switching.

Well, I use PC, but if I had the money, I would have a Mac. I say go Mac.

I suggest staying pc. why? its a lot easier just to upgrade than to buy a new one. stay PC!

Well may I ask what exactly you would be using the computer for besides worok for classes? I mean I like macs but I've always had a PC laptop and yea well unless you're gonna be doing a lot of imaging work like hardcore as in taking a lot of photography courses or like video editing courses or things of that nature I really don't see why you should switch.

I hate macs.. . . they always screw up on me and practically no software (specifically games) are compatible with them

Mmm i really want a mac but for some reason cant stop getting pcs... i mainly just watch movies and play with music editing software (excluding homework) so a mac doesnt seem like itd be bad for me, but meh...

Well may I ask what exactly you would be using the computer for besides worok for classes? I mean I like macs but I've always had a PC laptop and yea well unless you're gonna be doing a lot of imaging work like hardcore as in taking a lot of photography courses or like video editing courses or things of that nature I really don't see why you should switch.

I'm going to be doing graphic editing and class work. But mostly surfing the net and listening to music. I already use iTunes (Used to be a loyal Winamp user but I've fallen in love with iTunes) for my iPod shuffle

i hate macs.. . . they always screw up on me and practically no software (specifically games) are compatible with them

There are alot of games out for the mac, like UT 2004, The Sims 2, Sim City 4, almost any blizzard game.

i suggest staying pc. why? its a lot easier just to upgrade than to buy a new one. stay PC!

I will always have a soft spot for PC's. I have alot of PC games that I love dearly (KotOR, KotOR 2, NFS Underground 1 and 2, and alot of Anime games ^__^;

If your going to do graphics i say get the mac thats what i used in art class and i fell in love with it...
though i would get one with a burner so you can keep your work from hogging all the memory.

I say get a PC

I don't see why Macs are supposedly so much better for graphics-related work. That used to be the case 15 years ago, maybe, but not now. I wouldn't say this is your deciding factor. Performance is not really an issue.

On the other hand, get a Mac if you like the OS.

Well, I would just get a Mac because its so preeeeeetttttty.
On top of that, they also have user-friendly programs.

Also, if you are in the design/graphic occupation...its better to get one because all designers use Macs

I had to make the same decision about a year ago when i transferred. i couldn't find any pc laptops that i liked so i got a mac instead. i think having both makes the best of both worlds. i bought a g4 powerbook and do all of my work on it. my pc at home is more like a server now... to store stuff.

go mac. :)

I just switched to Mac a few months ago. I've been using PC's for > 10 years. I've built my own pc's countless times, and built them for other people. I can't imagine ever going back to PC's now.

My pc was near the end of it's life, and I needed a new monitor as well. Adding up costs to get something modern and nice got me to about $900.. for an additional $300 I could get an iMac with a built in monitor. It's tiny, takes up no space on my desk. 17" widescreen BRILLIANT bright and constrasty monitor. It's almost completely silent unless I'm doing something real intensive like a big PS batch or dvd encoding.

There's a few reasons why I switched.

1) I was tired of dealing with random PC problems. I've dealt with a lot of pc's so I've dealt with a LOT of problems. Hardware, software, combinations, incompatibility, etc. Mac's pick a very small set of hardware to use, and write software ONLY for that hardware. You end up with a much more stable and efficient system because you don't have 2000 other drivers for things you don't use, and you don't have to check compatibility between all your components--it's been done for you.

2) MacOS X. Wow. Just.. Wow. Even taking away all the prettyness, it's still wow. There's so many little features that make using the computer easier. I hit a key and it "zooms out" and moves all my windows so I can see them all without overlap, then I click the one I want and it goes back to normal view, with that window on top. I can hit another key and it brings up all the PS windows in that fashion. I hit another key everything zooms off my desktop so I Can get to icons there.. hit again, everything goes right back where it was. I could go on for hours.

3) Much better at design/print. Apple's are designed for people who do design. Sure, you have most of the same software on PC now, but the computers and operating systems themselves have you in mind. Colour matching profiles are at your fingertips, and most apple monitors are calibrated to match. Widescreen is nice, though it's also available on PC now. There's a lot of small differences in the apps (PS, Flash, Dreamweaver) that are hard to describe, but useful.

I highly recomend you try one first. An ibook will be even quieter than my imac, plus portable. They are expensive, but it's one of those things where "you get what you pay for." Sure you can compare apple to mercedes, you're paying a premium for luxury. Is it worth it to you? That's up to you to decide. For me it finally was, and there's no way I'm going back. I work at a PC doing programming during the day, and it's actually kind of soothing to use my mac at night to check email or work on photos ;-)

Try to find a local apple store so you can play with them a while, you'll be hooked.

If you got the money, go mac
but keep in mind that some of your programs that you used to use on pc might not work
so if you don't want any compatability trouble... it might be best to stay pc

Mmm... i say go with the mac...cuz you can do better imaging with it compare to a pc... ^_^