WAR on Mac

[Blodgore Facefista]

So after much debate, research, and consideration I've decided to get a new MacBook Pro. I really need a Mac for my work and that outweighs a lot of things.

I'm going for the 15 inch screen with,
2.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
1440 x 900 resolution
2GB memory
120GB hard drive
8x double-layer SuperDrive
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics with 128MB SDRAM.My question is: with this computer how well will the game play, and what exactly is the procedure for putting windows onto a Mac to play WAR.

I'm not trying to start another Mac vs. PC thread; I just thought there should be a thread for Mac or future Mac users who want the same information.

[8igdave]

128mb of ram on the gpu? e id say no chance at that higher resolution, its not the screen size taht matters its the resolution and tahts far to high for so little memory. Like we all said before, macs dont come with good graphics cards and therefore dont run games. Im not sure if you may get away with absolute minimum graphics but that isn't alot of video ram to play games on. certainly wont do others. Like i said before in other posts though, ive not play mmos before so can only base my judgements on other games like RTS and FPS which i think are more dependent on the graphics card then mmo's are which are cpu and ram dependent. Your spec for the cpu and ram should be fine. But i thik the graphics card will really hold you back. I didn;'t evne know they did 128mb 8600GT.

That disk drive is really slow as well. I thought the minimums for some games were x16 speed? Also that hard drive is likely to be 5400rpm speed, which will slow you down in games .

[oakae]

Your screen resolution isn't that high., you will be fine playing around medium - low settings

[Obby]

Well, for the record, you won't be able to run WAR at all. It's a Mac, and WAR will not run on Macs. You'll need to run bootcamp, or some other program (don't know of any), that can emulate Windows on a Mac in order to run it. But, you're going to get some pretty heavy slowdown on the machine, especially once you start up WAR.

Or, if you want to mess with it, you could try dual-booting Windows on there, but with a 120GB hard drive, you're going to be cramping your hard drive a little.

[Strikenight]

So after much debate, research, and consideration I've decided to get a new MacBook Pro. I really need a Mac for my work and that outweighs a lot of things.

I'm going for the 15 inch screen with,
2.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
1440 x 900 resolution
2GB memory
120GB hard drive
8x double-layer SuperDrive
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics with 128MB SDRAM.My question is: with this computer how well will the game play, and what exactly is the procedure for putting windows onto a Mac to play WAR.

I'm not trying to start another Mac vs. PC thread; I just thought there should be a thread for Mac or future Mac users who want the same information.


2.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo: 5/5
1440 x 900 resolution: n/a
2GB memory: ?/5
120GB hard drive: 5/5 probably 8-12GB
8x double-layer SuperDrive: 5/5
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics with 128MB SDRAM. ?/5
Honestly we don't know the spec yet, so i can't really say how 8600m GT will handle WAR. But I know for sure that 8600m GT 128 can handle STALKER, on 1280x1080 on everything on high except AA/lightning enchant. The fps is around 40-60.I bet that you will run WAR smooth on medium setting on 1280x900.
Also bootcamp runs windows on native speed, so it will run as if it was a PC

[Strikenight]

double post

[mongoose]

Well, for the record, you won't be able to run WAR at all. It's a Mac, and WAR will not run on Macs. You'll need to run bootcamp, or some other program (don't know of any), that can emulate Windows on a Mac in order to run it. But, you're going to get some pretty heavy slowdown on the machine, especially once you start up WAR.


Uhhh what? Do do know that the newer Macs processors are all Intel based right? This means that for all intents and purposes it works just like a PC. Bootcamp is simply a piece of software to allow the hardware to function natively with Windows if you desire to run it instead of OS X. The days of the horrible software emulation software like Virtual PC are LONG gone /shudders :p


To the OP:

I would suggest upgrading to the better graphics card

NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics processor with dual-link DVI support; 128MB of GDDR3 SDRAM on 2.2GHz configuration; 256MB of GDDR3 SDRAM on 2.4GHz and 2.6GHz configurations.

[8igdave]

What are you lot on about? Resolution N/a?? The resolution you run games at is the one thing taht will affect your frames per second the most. With 128mb you will not be able to run it at that resolution. Although in some gamse shader quality will have a bigger effect.

Where is your source to this as well?
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics with 128MB SDRAM. ?/5
Honestly we don't know the spec yet, so i can't really say how 8600m GT will handle WAR. But I know for sure that 8600m GT 128 can handle STALKER, on 1280x1080 on everything on high except AA/lightning enchant. The fps is around 40-60.I bet that you will run WAR smooth on medium setting on 1280x900.
Also bootcamp runs windows on native speed, so it will run as if it was a PC

The 1950 XTX doesn't get tjhat high and its more powerful then the 8600m GT 128mb by far:

http://xtreview.com/addcomment-id-2058-view-Stalker-benchmark-and-hardware-requirement.html

Aniother benchmark with the 8600GT failing to run at the details you say and with alot more memory and faster clock speeds as the 8600M GT is not as powerful as the 8600 GT

http://www.hothardware.com/printarticle.aspx?articleid=956

I find it hard to beleive you can max the agme out with just 128mb. Please if you have some sources do post them.

[Ragenrok]

hehe you tell em dave. In all seriousness though he is right, 128mb of vram is patheticly small and I wouldn't be surpised if he had to play at 800x600 to get playable frames. Today you need ATLEAST 256mb, 512 recomended especially for anythign over 1024x768.

[Strikenight]

What are you lot on about? Resolution N/a?? The resolution you run games at is the one thing taht will affect your frames per second the most. With 128mb you will not be able to run it at that resolution. Although in some gamse shader quality will have a bigger effect.

Where is your source to this as well? The 1950 XTX doesn't get tjhat high and its more powerful then the 8600m GT 128mb by far:

http://xtreview.com/addcomment-id-2058-view-Stalker-benchmark-and-hardware-requirement.html

Aniother benchmark with the 8600GT failing to run at the details you say and with alot more memory and faster clock speeds as the 8600M GT is not as powerful as the 8600 GT

http://www.hothardware.com/printarticle.aspx?articleid=956

I find it hard to beleive you can max the agme out with just 128mb. Please if you have some sources do post them.

My friend showed the game, he has the low end MBP. I can ask him what settings and the frames when hes back from holyday:cool:

You got two soruces:

1 http://youtube.com/watch?v=xlRm6cs1x3E lowend mbp stalker with fraps fps on the corner.
2 http://www.barefeats.com/rosa03.html

[8igdave]

My friend showed the game, he has the low end MBP. I can ask him what settings and the frames when hes back from holyday:cool:

You got two soruces:

1 http://youtube.com/watch?v=xlRm6cs1x3E lowend mbp stalker with fraps fps on the corner.
2 http://www.barefeats.com/rosa03.html

The you tube video of that guy is not running it at the resolution you stated. Secondly it looks like they have Vsyn enabled in the settings. This settings limits the frame rate to the refresh rate of your monitor. Most monitors are limited to 60hz and theffore 60fps . Yet it is quite evidently not limited. This doesn't seem right at all and therefore im not sure i beleive it at all as it is a fact that vsync limist the frames to the refresh rate. That screen does not do 200+ hhz which was seen when lookign down at the floor.

And the second link doesn't state any other settings at all. Plus the games seem to be runnign sub 30 which is genearly considered not playerble for games.


Some more benchmarks. I do not beleive it will do it at 1208x1024 at full settings.

http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/stalker_mainstream_3d_performance/page7.asp

[Obby]

Uhhh what? Do do know that the newer Macs processors are all Intel based right? This means that for all intents and purposes it works just like a PC. Bootcamp is simply a piece of software to allow the hardware to function natively with Windows if you desire to run it instead of OS X. The days of the horrible software emulation software like Virtual PC are LONG gone /shudders :p
I guess. Being honest, the only Mac I've used recently have been those stupid- iMac things, where it's just a monitor. My school bought a bunch of them, and they emulate Windows on it to run AutoCAD (since it can't natively run on Macs), so you can imagine how slow those things are.

[Blodgore Facefista]

Thanks for the input everyone. I'm surprised at some of the posts though. Looking at Peter Pan's Unofficial spec list a NIVIDA 8600M GT graphics card is in the second best category. Apparently that card won't play the game very well? I have a pretty average knowledge of computers, so if someone could tell me in laymen terms whats the problem that would help a lot.

Also, is Bootcamp a program that comes on Macs or is it separate? From what I understand you use that to load Windows onto the Mac and then you can switch between it and OS X.

[Strikenight]

Thanks for the input everyone. I'm surprised at some of the posts though. Looking at Peter Pan's Unofficial spec list a NIVIDA 8600M GT graphics card is in the second best category. Apparently that card won't play the game very well? I have a pretty average knowledge of computers, so if someone could tell me in laymen terms whats the problem that would help a lot.

Also, is Bootcamp a program that comes on Macs or is it separate? From what I understand you use that to load Windows onto the Mac and then you can switch between it and OS X.

There's a big rumors that may be 85% true, that the MBP will get updated today!

So keep your fingers crossed.

Apple store is down atm;)

[mongoose]

Also, is Bootcamp a program that comes on Macs or is it separate? From what I understand you use that to load Windows onto the Mac and then you can switch between it and OS X.

Bootcamp comes as part of the OS X package. So yes its basically a freebie.

The catch is however that you will have to buy a copy of XP. ;)


lol, seems that Strike was correct and you just got a mandatory upgrade to a better baseline model:

15" 2.4 GHz Macbook Pro (http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/wa/RSLID?nnmm=browse&mco=7B723662&node=home/shop_mac/family/macbook_pro)

2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
2GB memory
200GB hard drive1
Double-layer SuperDrive
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT with 256MB$1,999.00


I guess now you gotta decide weather to stick with that or go with the 512MB GFX card :mrgreen:

[8igdave]

Bootcamp comes as part of the OS X package. So yes its basically a freebie.

The catch is however that you will have to buy a copy of XP. ;)


lol, seems that Strike was correct and you just got a mandatory upgrade to a better baseline model:

15" 2.4 GHz Macbook Pro (http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/wa/RSLID?nnmm=browse&mco=7B723662&node=home/shop_mac/family/macbook_pro)
2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
2GB memory
200GB hard drive1
Double-layer SuperDrive
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT with 256MB$1,999.00


I guess now you gotta decide weather to stick with that or go with the 512MB GFX card :mrgreen:

what a total rip off! macs are so overpriced.

[Blodgore Facefista]

Wow, thanks Striker and Mongoose for the heads up. I would have never known about the upgrade. I guess it does pay to wait a little bit before buying a new comp. :p

So now the only thing left to decide is whether or not to pay an extra $500 for the 512MB card. Of course unless that card is necessary for being able to play the game, I more then likely won't get it. I talked to a friend who knows computers more then me and he said that 128 MB would be enough to run the game with good movement and pretty good graphics. He said that stuff like fire wouldn't look as good as on high end PCs but it should still be fine.

I would think that the developers would make the game not very high end because it is a MMO and their whole income comes from a large fan base, so making it only playable on super expensive comps would be a shot in the foot. They have to get as many players as possible so they need to make the game playable on most average comps. Are Mac graphics cards really that bad that even the top laptops can barely play a game like WAR?

[PeterPan]

128mb would be minimum for low end playability... they really don't even make 128mb cards much anymore.

256mb should do fine in general, just don't expect 1900x and 1080dpi

512mb only if you intend to run in maxed HD modes

Any mid ranged card should be plunty for this game. Geforce 8600 / Radeon HD2600... Even a Geforce 7600 / Radeon X1650 would probably do fine. I just wouldn't go any lower than that if you are planning on seige and battlegrounds action.

[8igdave]

Bloody helkl $500 dolars extra for the 512mb?? I simply cannot beleive macs are so overpriced. Why the hell wouyld you buy one?

8600GT 512mb, 2gb of ram 2.2ghz cpu and a 17" screen for under £650 can easly be had on a windows laptop. Or if you want a smallr screen your talking more £450-500.

For the mac price above of $2000, thats £1000 so you could get a 8800M GTS in the pc for that price instead of a 8600mGT 256mb i thinks. Well that mac spec is worth about £450 on a pc tbh so thats half the price.

[Strikenight]

Are Mac graphics cards really that bad that even the top laptops can barely play a game like WAR?


The low end Mac will do fine.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Mp9i986jO4I Call of Duty 4,

Also he got more game vidoes.

Enjoy

[Morgrim]

128 mb is a bit low for a video card, but it's satisfactory to play most games, as it fits minimal for all games out there (except maybe Crisis) for MB amount.

But from what I remember, EA will soon be making many of their games for Mac as well as PC, so WAR will eventually probably hit the Mac anyways.

Personally I don't like the Apple company, and therefore don't like Mac, but that's just me.

[8igdave]

128 mb is a bit low for a video card, but it's satisfactory to play most games, as it fits minimal for all games out there (except maybe Crisis) for MB amount.

But from what I remember, EA will soon be making many of their games for Mac as well as PC, so WAR will eventually probably hit the Mac anyways.

Personally I don't like the Apple company, and therefore don't like Mac, but that's just me.

O my :( Pc users already suffer with EA's consol ports and now they will be making them for MAC? This will either be good as it will just allow more people to play or it could be bad and lead to bugy games due to being designed for mac and windows etc. But tbh, whats the point? If macs can run windows, and they sure do love to let everyone know how much they are trying to be like a pc, then why bother coding it for a mac? Macs are a totaly pointless buy unless youi are in the video editing etc busness.

[mongoose]

Bloody helkl $500 dolars extra for the 512mb?? I simply cannot beleive macs are so overpriced. Why the hell wouyld you buy one?

8600GT 512mb, 2gb of ram 2.2ghz cpu and a 17" screen for under £650 can easly be had on a windows laptop. Or if you want a smallr screen your talking more £450-500.

For the mac price above of $2000, thats £1000 so you could get a 8800M GTS in the pc for that price instead of a 8600mGT 256mb i thinks. Well that mac spec is worth about £450 on a pc tbh so thats half the price.
Macs are a totaly pointless buy unless you are in the video editing etc busness.

/sigh

You really need to get off this personal rant of yours. I can understand that from your PoV Macs seem like a complete rip off but let me make a little comparison for you.....

We are going to talk cars for a minute.

On the one hand we have the new 08 Corvette (http://www.rsportscars.com/chevrolet/2008-chevrolet-corvette/). Its got a V8 engine, pulls over 430 hp and can top out at 190mph. Its a muscle car through and through and is definitely a beauty all for the price tag of $45,000.

Now lets look at the 07 Audi R8 (http://www.rsportscars.com/audi/2007-audi-r8/). Its a slightly older model but sports a very similar profile to the Corvette with a V-8 engine, 420 hp engine and topping out at nearly 190 mph. So its not quite as fast but imho it sure look a hell of a lot cooler. Now look at the price.... $109,000. :shock:

So I ask you, is the Audi a "ripoff" because it costs more than twice the Corvette? I mean both have the same power and both will get you where you want to go equally fast in style. But according to your standards there is no reason for people to buy an Audi right? :rolleyes:

The point is, just as in cars, people are willing to pay more for something because they like it better. PCs might be able to beat Macs on hardware costs but theres also things like the Macs design, stylish look, innovation and the OS to consider.

You might not be willing to pay for those "Audi" features and are quite happy driving your "Corvette" but there are others who are. So dont berate people who buy Macs for whatever reason they decide because its worth it to them (the OS alone is well worth not having to run Windows imho ;) )

[8igdave]

/sigh

You really need to get off this personal rant of yours. I can understand that from your PoV Macs seem like a complete rip off but let me make a little comparision for you.....

We are going to talk cars for a minute.

On the one hand we have the new 08 Corvette (http://www.rsportscars.com/chevrolet/2008-chevrolet-corvette/). Its got a V8 engine, pulls over 430 hp and can top out at 190mph. Its a muscle car through and through and is definately a beauty all for the price tag of $45,000.

Now lets look at the 07 Audi R8 (http://www.rsportscars.com/audi/2007-audi-r8/). Its a slightly older model but sports a very similar profile to the Corvette with a V-8 engine, 420 hp engine and topping out at nearly 190 mph. So its not quite as fast but imho it sure look a hell of a lot cooler. Now look at the price.... $109,000. :shock:

So I ask you, is the Audi a "ripoff" because it costs more than twice the Corvette? I mean both have the same power and both will get you where you want to go equally fast in style. But according to your standards there is no reason for people to buy an Audi right? :rolleyes:
The point is, just as in cars, people are willing to pay more for something because they like it better. PCs might be able to beat Macs on hardware costs but theres also things like the Macs design, stylish look, innovation and the OS to consider.

You might not be willing to pay for those "Audi" features and are quite happy driving your "Corvette" but there are others who are. So dont berate people who buy Macs for whatever reason they decide because its worth it to them (the OS alone is well worth not having to run Windows imho ;) )

So your willing to pay "£500 ($1000) for an os when you will be using windows on it to run your games anyway? If it was like £100 then year perhaps. But how can you justify £500 extra over the ciost of the windows version when you wioll run winodws on it anyway.

Tis madness... this is sparta... i mean errr.

If you wana be totaly ripped off buying your mac with its crappy graphics card and stupidly high price tag to play windows on it because fgames dont run on it fine but i was just trying to make you aware of the price differences your paying because you want a mac. There is over priced then there is just stupidly over the top. But hey if you gto the money to burn then fine.

The 512mb may not be worth the money on the smaller resolution. really its for 19"+ resolutions and yours will be under that. So save your self some money. 3gb of ram would be a nicer upgrade, though id ont know how macs use ram.

[mongoose]

So your willing to pay "£500 ($1000) for an os when you will be using windows on it to run your games anyway? If it was like £100 then year perhaps. But how can you justify £500 extra over the ciost of the windows version when you wioll run winodws on it anyway.

Tis madness... this is sparta... i mean errr.

If you wana be totaly ripped off buying your mac with its crappy graphics card and stupidly high price tag to play windows on it because fgames dont run on it fine but i was just trying to make you aware of the price differences your paying because you want a mac.

Well Im not the OP but I can pretty much guess that he isnt buying his Mac just play WAR on it. If such was the case then you are correct, it would make a lot of sense. I would be willing to bet that he needs it for work and/or he likes doing all his computer things on/with OS X rather than XP or crappy Vista.

Im sorry you cant understand the concept of liking the Mac OS enough to justify the extra cost but that was why I chose the analogy I did. Things can perform very similar functions but one can cost more and people WILL still buy it.

This happens all the time and a prime example is in the clothing industry........do you really think a pair of the latest Nike Air Jordans are worth over 300 bucks when I can walk into Wal-mart and buy a pair of shoes for literally 1/10th the cost that will last almost as long? or what about paying 5,000 bucks for a designer dress when a 500 dollar one can be JUST as stylish and functional but a hell of a lot cheaper.

And Im also fairly sure the OP is aware of the relative costs. You cant read even this forum without being aware. You would have to live a pretty sheltered tech life to only know how much Macs cost and not PCs. ;)


(also Dave I have two words for ya.........spell checker :cool:)

[Blodgore Facefista]

I appreciate all the input but like I said in the first post I'm not making a new Mac vs. PC thread. I just wanted a place for people like me, for what ever reason, who had Macs could have their questions answered about playing WAR on Macs.

I personally need a Mac for work and after the upgrade the MacBooks got today am definitely getting a MacBook Pro, which I believe will play WAR just fine for my standards. If it doesn't work I will look into a cheap PC that can handle it; I just wanted to try and kill two birds with one stone.

[Morgrim]

The only issue you would have is if/when it will release on Mac, unless you plan on getting the Windows OS. What you had should handle it fine, but you would want to try to up to 256 mb or 512 if possible for your video and you should be set. 128 will probably handle it, just not as well as you would like.

[Blodgore Facefista]

Thanks for all the help and advice everyone. The purchase has been made. A MacBook Pro is on the way. And I even saved $300 with a student discount. :mrgreen: Now we play the waiting game and see who gets to say the "I told you so"s.

[Strikenight]

Thanks for all the help and advice everyone. The purchase has been made. A MacBook Pro is on the way. And I even saved $300 with a student discount. :mrgreen: Now we play the waiting game and see who gets to say the "I told you so"s.

Gratz!

The 10% discount is nice, if you're student.

[PeterPan]

MAC could at least try to be competitive... but they cost 3x what a PC in the same power range do.

MAC ftl... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEAGmBRC1dc

[mongoose]

MAC could at least try to be competitive... but they cost 3x what a PC in the same power range do.

MAC ftl... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEAGmBRC1dc

Ah yeah, that was cute and I loled but more about how absolutely stupid the idiot commenting was. You know all those problems happen to me on my PC but its about 5x more infuriating because of how windows functions (or dosent :rolleyes:)

Could you get any more exaggerated though? 3x the cost. :roll: Im not disagreeing and do think Apple needs to be more competitive but hows about throwing out some realistic numbers and not blowing your position COMPLETELY out of proportion. ;)


Also this thread was not started to Mac bash and there is no need to come in and derail the thread with your PC bias and Mac hate. The OP got his system and Im very happy for him and in the end thats all that really counts. :cool:

[PeterPan]

Im not being unrealistic, a real MAC desktop costs over $2000, you can build a PC of similar power for about $700.

[8igdave]

Ah yeah, that was cute and I loled but more about how absolutely stupid the idiot commenting was. You know all those problems happen to me on my PC but its about 5x more infuriating because of how windows functions (or dosent :rolleyes:)

Could you get any more exaggerated though?


mongoose if you are building your own pc you can build it for at least 3 times cheaper then a mac which you cant build. And i cant say ive ever experianced any problems with windows. mac people claim they crash all the time but the fact is they actually really dont. And its their answer to everything, ooo my mac is more stable. How is it more stable? I doubt macs crash but my opc doesn't crash either. O they are more stable because they dont allow other companies to make drivers for things, the result is you cant use anything which needs drivers on it which mac dont agree to or make. yeah great one!

a new one :) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZSr89b4EoA&feature=user

BTW i am mearly replying to your comment doig just what you did and not doig a "mac vs pc war"


MAC could at least try to be competitive... but they cost 3x what a PC in the same power range do.


MAC ftl... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEAGmBRC1dc

I put that link in the mac vs pc thread lol. Pikey :p Found it hilarious!

[Blodgore Facefista]

If the Germans and Jews can get along I hope one day Mac users and PC users can too.

[mongoose]

Im not being unrealistic, a real MAC desktop costs over $2000, you can build a PC of similar power for about $700.

1) If you are going to compare products you need to compare laptop with laptop (since thats what the OP was buying)

2) Its unfair to compare a self built system with a pre-built. Of course its going to be cheaper because you are doing all the labor, troubleshooting and get no general warranty. If you **** it up and the computer melts, you are SOL. A prebuilt system should come plug and play which it seems a lot of people desire (even in the PC world) because most arent tech savvy enough to do it themselves.


So yes, you are trying to compare apples with tomatoes. ;)

[Aes]

Ah yeah, that was cute and I loled but more about how absolutely stupid the idiot commenting was. You know all those problems happen to me on my PC but its about 5x more infuriating because of how windows functions (or dosent :rolleyes:)

Really? If you know the basics a windows crash isn't very difficult to handle, and it's not very difficult to prevent them from ever happening either. Not to mention how easy it is to recover, unlike the Apple OS and storage format that can cause you to lose entire files occaisionally when you try to back them up.

Could you get any more exaggerated though? 3x the cost. :roll: Im not disagreeing and do think Apple needs to be more competitive but hows about throwing out some realistic numbers and not blowing your position COMPLETELY out of proportion. ;)

Baseline model, it'll be about a 30-40% markup. Add all the trimmings and it' is 3 times the price, a fully kitted out Mac Pro costs 10,000 Pounds Sterling, you can build the equivalet for around 3,000, there is absolutely no justification for the mark up on the hardware side.

Also this thread was not started to Mac bash and there is no need to come in and derail the thread with your PC bias and Mac hate. The OP got his system and Im very happy for him and in the end thats all that really counts. :cool:

If the OP is buying a Mac, noting the cons are definitely relevant. He went with a baseline model, it was a work related purchase and he got a discount so overall it was a good buy, doesn't mean it would be a good purchase for everyone though.

[zer]

MAC def. has its strong points. To be honest, they also arent 3x as expensive when you take into accoutn the actual hardware they now use. Sure you could built a cheap AMD or Intel system, but the new macs do have C2Ds and they do have decent GPUs too. Compare them to most OEMs and mac pretty much stands out in term of superior quality and built. So yeah; they are a bit more expensive but heh, some of us spend more on our custom systems.

To each their own choices, no need to bash Apples... They have also made tremendous gains in the last few years, so I dont really get were your comming from in terms that they need to me be competitive???

[8igdave]

Really? If you know the basics a windows crash isn't very difficult to handle, and it's not very difficult to prevent them from ever happening either. Not to mention how easy it is to recover, unlike the Apple OS and storage format that can cause you to lose entire files occaisionally when you try to back them up.



Baseline model, it'll be about a 30-40% markup. Add all the trimmings and it' is 3 times the price, a fully kitted out Mac Pro costs 10,000 Pounds Sterling, you can build the equivalet for around 3,000, there is absolutely no justification for the mark up on the hardware side.



If the OP is buying a Mac, noting the cons are definitely relevant. He went with a baseline model, it was a work related purchase and he got a discount so overall it was a good buy, doesn't mean it would be a good purchase for everyone though.

well writen and agree fully.

If the Germans and Jews can get along I hope one day Mac users and PC users can too.

hahah :) I dont have a problem with macs when they are used for what they are ment to be used for really. But what really gets me going is when ive got people like a guy named mike in colage who kept trying to boast he was gettign a mac and how good it was and i kept tellin him you wont be able to play your games on it and he enver listerened. Now he has a laptop he cant use for what he wants, even with windows on it its not powerful enough graphics card to play them well.

Whats so annoying is alot of people get macs because they beleive the crap from the BIASED apple funny adverts and they cannot actually give any reasons for why they paid twice the price for a laptop/pc which cannot do much. Why do so many people watch those adverts and think ooo look all pc's have virus's, all pcs crash every day, all pcs cant do any video editing because obiously they have no video editing software, all pcs are boring so.

Find memthign a mac can do which a pc cannot. Everything a mac can do a pc can do. A pc can do video editing etc. yet a mac needs windwos to play games and they cant play them well because they pack bad graphics cards and you end up paying twice as much to get a semi decent one and people cant aford them.

[8igdave]

1) If you are going to compare products you need to compare laptop with laptop (since thats what the OP was buying)

2) Its unfair to compare a self built system with a pre-built. Of course its going to be cheaper because you are doing all the labor, troubleshooting and get no general warranty. If you **** it up and the computer melts, you are SOL. A prebuilt system should come plug and play which it seems a lot of people desire (even in the PC world) because most arent tech savvy enough to do it themselves.


So yes, you are trying to compare apples with tomatoes. ;)

how dare you call my pc a tomato! Id say its more of a err... mmm..orange?

Evenn if you compare pre-built to pre-built (as i have been with the laptops) the apples are at least 2x the cost. You seem to find it hard to beleive that your mac's are actually total rip offs for the hardware they pack?

[zer]

Most laptop cant play games very well anyways, that is unless your willing to dish out over 4k. Trust me when I say you dont want to do that. You cant upgrade then much and they usually overheat alot (friends XPS comes to mind and thats using a mere 7900GS Go).

Get a desktop for heavy application and games, use the laptop for games and work. Thats what I do:) MACs, become in that case a VERY good choice:P

[Obby]

2) Its unfair to compare a self built system with a pre-built. Of course its going to be cheaper because you are doing all the labor, troubleshooting and get no general warranty. If you **** it up and the computer melts, you are SOL. A prebuilt system should come plug and play which it seems a lot of people desire (even in the PC world) because most arent tech savvy enough to do it themselves.
I don't know what parts you've been buying, but almost all computer parts you buy online have a 6 month to 3 year warranty automatically included in the price from a manufacturer except maybe for cooling fans. So you don't need to send in your whole computer and have it be out of commission for 3 weeks while your company tries to fix it, you only need to send one specific part in (which usually can be replaced with an older model you have laying around from your last machine to keep your functionality) and get it back within a week.

[8igdave]

I dont know of any pc hardware wuith under a 1 year warrenty. If you buy OEM you get 1 year warrenties. if you buy the retail version of it which comes with cables/fancey box etc. Thwen you usualy get 3years to lifetime. My ram has a lifetime warrenty, my cpu has a 3 year, my graphics card has a lifetime and my hard drives have 3 years. My mobo is also 3 years i think.

The warrenties are also alot faster then your retail pc ones. Have you ever had a pc go wrong? you can be without a pc for weeks as they take it all away and ship it off. if my pc dies i can nget replacements within days. If it dies in the first year then i can get a 48hour replacement from the shop i bougth it from.

Also because i bougth a custom pc with good quality parts. Genearly it wont die. Retail pcs die loads vbecause they use cheap parts, custom pc's tend to last the years.

[zer]

Umm, melting computers... Anyone have this happen to them lately (this isnt the XP days anymore were you could botch both CPU and MOBO). Anyways, pretty much all parts that one buys have limited warranties and ALOT of the RMA services offered are quick. Besides, if your OEM break... What then, same thing. You got to get it repaired one way or another and no "service" will make it work any faster really...

[8igdave]

ive had to reinstall parts for friends when their retail pc went wrong and some cowboy got sent round by mesh and they totaly ed the pc up. The man was like "errr think we are going to need to take this back to the warehouse" and my friend told him to shove it lol.

[zer]

Also because i bougth a custom pc with good quality parts. Genearly it wont die. Retail pcs die loads vbecause they use cheap parts, custom pc's tend to last the years.

I have to disagree with you m8, plainly put "higher end" stuff doesnt mean it always lasts longer. The reason is simple, most users that buy the good stuff, then to push the equipement beyond spec and that usually lead to premature wear. Also, the reason why you seen soo many damn OEM breaking is simple, numbers... There alot more OEM around than DIY systems out there and people dont care about them and usually dont take too much care of them. The quality of the parts usually can play a role in this but most OEM spends load of time testing for stability when they design a tower. When you buy OEM, you buy stability reliability and cheapness coupled with ok service. When you DIY your own system, you have complete control over what you buy and do with it. You usually trade reliability for performance and stability. I prefer the latter, but thats a personal choice...

[Obby]

I have to disagree with you m8, plainly put "higher end" stuff doesnt mean it always lasts longer. The reason is simple, most users that buy the good stuff, then to push the equipement beyond spec and that usually lead to premature wear. Also, the reason why you seen soo many damn OEM breaking is simple, numbers... There alot more OEM around than DIY systems out there and people dont care about them and usually dont take too much care of them. The quality of the parts usually can play a role in this but most OEM spends load of time testing for stability when they design a tower. When you buy OEM, you buy stability reliability and cheapness coupled with ok service. When you DIY your own system, you have complete control over what you buy and do with it. You usually trade reliability for performance and stability. I prefer the latter, but thats a personal choice...
Except that you can buy OEM parts just like you can buy an OEM system...

[zer]

Also, a little side benefit from making your own system is that your learn the ins and out of your computer and that makes problem solving a real peice of cake if something does indeed arise.

I remember a lad not too long that had loads of BSOD on his own little laptop and the guys @ future shop wanted like 50 buck to examine his pc to see whats wrong, I told him it might be his ram and gave him a memtest86+ cd to test. Guess what? His fist pass was full of errors. So we got him some nice RAM and everything was solved (the ram we got on special cost him like 70 buck for 2Gigs/including taxes) So you can end up saying money this way too:)

[zer]

Except that you can buy OEM parts just like you can buy an OEM system...

ummm, what are you trying to say here?

[8igdave]

I have to disagree with you m8, plainly put "higher end" stuff doesnt mean it always lasts longer. The reason is simple, most users that buy the good stuff, then to push the equipement beyond spec and that usually lead to premature wear. Also, the reason why you seen soo many damn OEM breaking is simple, numbers... There alot more OEM around than DIY systems out there and people dont care about them and usually dont take too much care of them. The quality of the parts usually can play a role in this but most OEM spends load of time testing for stability when they design a tower. When you buy OEM, you buy stability reliability and cheapness coupled with ok service. When you DIY your own system, you have complete control over what you buy and do with it. You usually trade reliability for performance and stability. I prefer the latter, but thats a personal choice...

what are you on about again? You get both OEm and retail graphics cards dvd drives etc. i was not talking about retail desktop pcs. i was talking about retail parts you buy, that is a total differnt thing. The retail ones are things like evga/bfg etc. OEm usualy costs about 5% cheaper then its same retail version but comes with less things tahts all. Same product.They are no differnt to the cheap no branded oem ones because they are all the same card.

However when it comes to something like a power supply. Paying more = better quality and less chance of dieing. Its the same with most components. And it is impossible to push more comonents to their limits with out phase change coolign etc. Very few have that therefore overclocking it a bit doesn't effect it hardly. Weve already had this discusion, do not go there again. Besides it still has nothing to do with the fact that you buy quality parts you get better reliablility full stop. The retail pcs do not have quality parts. Thats why every retail pc ive ever had or a friend has ever had has always died before its warrenty has run out. You expect it to, my last retail pc when i was like 10 died 3 times! I would expect this custom pc to run the 3 years fine.

[zer]

When I say OEM systems I mean DELL/HP etc.. Not the actually seperate parts, sigh...

[Obby]

When I say OEM systems I mean DELL/HP etc.. Not the actually seperate parts, sigh...

... Do you know what OEM means?

[zer]

Original equipment manufacturer, you can consider OEMs as Dell in the computer industry as you can as Airbus in the airline industry... I apolozige for the confusion. I will refer Dell and HP or w/e as major compagnies? ok?

[8igdave]

... Do you know what OEM means?

No he just looked taht up on the internet which is why its in bold because it was a copy of a title probably lol! he has no idea of what OEM means, what it ships with etc. If he did he wouldn't have bothered trying to tell me i was wrong as he went totaly off track and talked about something totaly differnt. is taht what the 3rd time now youve tryed doing this and fell flat on your face? Seriously. give it a rest its getting tiresome.

[zer]

Ever heard of [b]??? or should I also put it in italic?

[8igdave]

explain...

10... tis a magic number

[mongoose]

Really? If you know the basics a windows crash isn't very difficult to handle, and it's not very difficult to prevent them from ever happening either. Not to mention how easy it is to recover, unlike the Apple OS and storage format that can cause you to lose entire files occasionally when you try to back them up.

Funny, I can say the exact same thing about Macs. If you know the ins and outs of the OS you can do wonders. The fact is OS X is a lot easier for people to understand on a deeper level than XP (I dont have a clue about Vista though).

Ive also never lost a single file in all my 16 years using Macs (unless you count the countless number of floppies that went bad on me :mad:)


Baseline model, it'll be about a 30-40% markup. Add all the trimmings and it' is 3 times the price, a fully kitted out Mac Pro costs 10,000 Pounds Sterling, you can build the equivalet for around 3,000, there is absolutely no justification for the mark up on the hardware side.

Again its unfair to compare something home built with something you cant home build.


If the OP is buying a Mac, noting the cons are definitely relevant. He went with a baseline model, it was a work related purchase and he got a discount so overall it was a good buy, doesn't mean it would be a good purchase for everyone though.

I dont consider calling it a "rip off" to be a constructive argument against something. All that is is trash talk.


hahah :) I dont have a problem with macs when they are used for what they are ment to be used for really. But what really gets me going is when ive got people like a guy named mike in colage who kept trying to boast he was gettign a mac and how good it was and i kept tellin him you wont be able to play your games on it and he enver listerened. Now he has a laptop he cant use for what he wants, even with windows on it its not powerful enough graphics card to play them well.

Whats so annoying is alot of people get macs because they beleive the crap from the BIASED apple funny adverts and they cannot actually give any reasons for why they paid twice the price for a laptop/pc which cannot do much. Why do so many people watch those adverts and think ooo look all pc's have virus's, all pcs crash every day, all pcs cant do any video editing because obiously they have no video editing software, all pcs are boring so.

I know PLENTY of people who buy PCs that are incapable of doing what they would like them to do. You talk as if this dosent happen on the PC side. :rolleyes:


Find memthign a mac can do which a pc cannot. Everything a mac can do a pc can do. A pc can do video editing etc. yet a mac needs windwos to play games and they cant play them well because they pack bad graphics cards and you end up paying twice as much to get a semi decent one and people cant aford them.

EZ, run OS X. Its a better OS hands down than either XP or Vista.

And I wouldnt say Macs have bad GPUs. They just arent as up to the minute because Apple has to write all the drivers for them so there is unfortunately some lag time.

ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MB (Two dual-link DVI)
2 x ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MB
NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB (Two dual-link DVI)
3 x ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MB
4 x ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MB
NVIDIA Quadro FX 5600 1.5GB (Stereo 3D, two dual-link DVI)

So all those are "bad" cards huh? I agree the ATI cards could be more recent but that GeForce card is the same damn card everyone and their dog wants in the PC side of things. ;)


how dare you call my pc a tomato! Id say its more of a err... mmm..orange?

Evenn if you compare pre-built to pre-built (as i have been with the laptops) the apples are at least 2x the cost. You seem to find it hard to beleive that your mac's are actually total rip offs for the hardware they pack?

Ok I would like to see you match this system for 1400.00:

Two 2.8GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon “Harpertown” processors. (no not a typo)
MB with: PCI-E 2.0, Eight FB-DIMM slots on two memory riser cards (four slots per card) supporting up to 32GB of main memory 256-bit-wide memory architecture,two FireWire 800 ports (one on front panel, one on back panel) two FireWire 400 ports, five USB 2.0 ports, three open full-length PCI Express expansion slots (One PCI Express 2.0 x16 slot and Two PCI Express x4 slots). All slots provide mechanical support for 16-lane cards, Two independent 10/100/1000BASE-T Ethernet (RJ-45) interfaces with support for jumbo frames, Bluetooth 2.0 + Enhanced Data Rate (EDR) up to 3Mb/s
2GB RAM (800MHz DDR2 ECC fully buffered DIMM (FB-DIMM) memory)
320GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MB (Two dual-link DVI)
16x SuperDrive with double-layer support (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)
Apple Mighty Mouse
Apple keyboard (Two USB 2.0 ports on included keyboard)
Mac OS X (PC equivelant = Vista Ultimate)
Stylish case with a GOOD cooling system (fans arent free :D), Four 3.5-inch cable-free, direct-attach hard drive bays with built-in independent 3Gb/s Serial ATA channels; four internal hard drive carriers included, front-panel headphone minijack and speaker Optical digital audio input and output TOSLINK ports Analog stereo line-level input and output minijacks.Remember no skimping on things like $5 mouses and crappy keyboards.

Plus dont to forget to include things like the cables, adapters and whatever it will take to turn the system on. It all costs money and these are all part of Apples package. The little things do add up ;)

Hope I didnt miss anything. If you want to research what the Apple Specs are click here (http://www.apple.com/macpro/specs.html).

So have at it and post what you come up with for what price.

I don't know what parts you've been buying, but almost all computer parts you buy online have a 6 month to 3 year warranty automatically included in the price from a manufacturer except maybe for cooling fans. So you don't need to send in your whole computer and have it be out of commission for 3 weeks while your company tries to fix it, you only need to send one specific part in (which usually can be replaced with an older model you have laying around from your last machine to keep your functionality) and get it back within a week.

Which is why I specifically said "general" warranty and not warranties on parts. Personally Ive had a of a time trying to get replacement parts from manufacturers.

Also if any one of your parts goes bad the computer isnt going to work anyway so its about the same as having the whole thing out of commission. And I dont know of anyone who just has a MB or HD or RAM or GPU just lying around that you could plug into a new machone. Usually the older parts arent compatible. You really need to stop thinking that everyones basement is filled with recent old machines :rolleyes:


And Dave?

Holy **** get a spell checker! its exceedingly difficult to decode your bad spelling. Theres even a spell checker built into the posting system here (upper righthand corner)

[8igdave]

Of corse apple do pack good cards. But you ahve to pay such a high amount for them its not worth the cost nor can most afford them. A good card in a mac will cost you a substantial amount. A £800 retail pc, not custom built, can have a 8800GTX 2gb and a q6600. Find me that on an apple and ill be amazed. You are bending the truth so badly and ignoring facts to try and make your points that your arguements are becoming incredibly flawed. Plus they write their own drivers which i guarantee you will not be as good as those from nvida and ati as if you wernt aware, the PC drivers get updated about every 2-4 weeks to make them better.


One thing a mac can do that a pc cant, gee it can run the mac os. Do i need to start naming programs that the pc can run taht the mac cant? because its gona get long. Yes the mac can run windows, but many programs will still require drives taht the mac will not allow.

The fact the mac can run the mac os doesn't hinder a pc in doing any of its work. A mac can run some of its mac software, a pc has its own software to do the same thing. When i said give me something the mac can do a pc cant i ment things like mmm a pc can play games well and a mac has to suffer with crappy overpriced hardware and fail. Of corse this doesn't apply if you want to spend £5000 on your mac.

Pc's can be made with the skull trail motherboards (i beleive that is their true name, weird huh?) but their price is not worth it. The reason they are not is simply because its not needed for anything other then decoding. I will agree with you, if your profesion is decoding then buying the dual quad core mac is an excellent buy. However its no use to anyone other then decoders and no programs or games will make use of two quad cores and the graphics card they have are low end because they are not gaming pc. The point still stands that for any desktop or laptop the pc equivilant will be at least 2x cheaper and more like 3/4x cheaper if built custom. However the exception is the dual quad cores which are excellent buys but only for decoding. Therefore i can hardly see it being used as wow macs can come with 2x quad cores which a very small fraction of people will ever need as its useless to all but encoders. Therefore you have picked what is tbh an unfair mac to try and "prove" that they arnt overpriced. Because taht is just 1 mac and is not a very common one because it is only for decoders. If it was a desktop with a good graphics card etc which could do all these thing a pc can do and be of a similar price then yeah would be a good buy. But the fact is taht this is a specialized pc which none of you will ever need and is useless to you. Therefore tis a pointless comparison because it is not aiming to do the same thing as the pc equivilant.

You dont consider rip off to constitue as an argument? o bloody hell come on! You are so blinded by the mighty apple that it is pointless continuing this any further. You are what is know as a fanboy. You can argue it as much as you want but you argue blindly against anythign without anything but... ooo macs are nice. You cant even admit they are overpriced. how rediculas! YOu dont need to know anything about hardware, you just need common sence. You look at two prices of a pc and a mac with the same spec and you see the pc is 2x cheaper. MMM nope not a rip off, cant use that as an arguement because its unfair because its errr... TRUE.


o and i call on your stories about how you ahve had a of a time getting warrentes for PC. The reason is because you have never built a custom pc and yet you are using the fact taht a retailer gave you a of a time on a warrenty and trying to use that as an arguement agaisnt the fact taht on custom pcs we can get a 48hour warrenty pick up. Blastixs ram do that in england. You fail here.

Your arguements are twisted and you do not adress what was pointed out. You do what is called making a straw man. Instead of tacklig the arguement, you recreate what looks to be it but is easyer to prove wrong. it is infact similar but not the same.

Secondly i call because you asid youve used macs for what was it, 15 years. You love them so much there is no reason for you to ahve owned a pc in that time. You can argue this but i simply do not beleive it. Why would you own a mac and a pc unless you are willing to admit the mac cannot do what a pc can and you needed both.

Sorry your bluff has been called. Simply a lier.


o and lastly. my spelling is not difficult to "decode" you are the only one you complains and you are mearly doing it to try and get at me as you are running out of things to say. The truth is that you only need the first and last letter to be in the right place to infact read a word. i have a hard time spelling, its not my fault and im not going to use a spell checker on every word i type just to make some spelling nazi happy when he can read it fine anyawy.

If you wish to try make more digs at this then you can argue it with a moderator instead. Ive had a hard enough time with it as it is, i do not need you ahving a go at me as well.

[PeterPan]

MAC needs to consider the budget market...

For $600-$700 you can get a solid desktop PC with average processing power prebuilt, from Dell, HP, Compaq, ect. The same $600-$700 gets you a MAC about the size of a CD player which is completely un-upgradable and about as powerful as a PC from 1998.

Its complete and utter to be honest, I might actually buy a MAC if they would even ATTEMPT to be competitive. But they don't... and the way its looking they probably never will.

[8igdave]

yeah i agree. Id love to get like a mac for my sister or something, they would suite her nicely. But the price far outways it so i just build her pc's instead for like £350-400.

[PeterPan]

Also on the MAC book... they start at about $1000 and come with 1gb of ram a 1.5-1.8ghz duo core processor and an Intel integrated card.

The same $1000 can get you a Dell XPS gaming laptop with 2GB of ram, vista home premium, Geforce 8400M and at least a 2ghz duo core processor.

[Obby]

Also if any one of your parts goes bad the computer isnt going to work anyway so its about the same as having the whole thing out of commission. And I dont know of anyone who just has a MB or HD or RAM or GPU just lying around that you could plug into a new machone. Usually the older parts arent compatible. You really need to stop thinking that everyones basement is filled with recent old machines :rolleyes:

You don't know anyone who has a spare computer around they don't use anymore? A lot of my friends are into upgrading their computers and building it themselves, so they all have parts and scraps from old computers all over the place. One friend has an entire desk drawer filled with RAM sticks. I realize it's not true for everyone, but I think you need to stop thinking that no one has spare parts around. A lot more people than you think are into computer hardware. Plenty of people have spare hard drives or RAM around (I'm looking at an old CD drive and 2x 256MB RAM sticks right now).

[zer]

XPS lappy for $1000... Link please?

[PeterPan]

XPS lappy for $1000... Link please?http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/xpsnb_m1330?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&~tab=bundlestab

[zer]

You don't know anyone who has a spare computer around they don't use anymore? A lot of my friends are into upgrading their computers and building it themselves, so they all have parts and scraps from old computers all over the place. One friend has an entire desk drawer filled with RAM sticks. I realize it's not true for everyone, but I think you need to stop thinking that no one has spare parts around. A lot more people than you think are into computer hardware. Plenty of people have spare hard drives or RAM around (I'm looking at an old CD drive and 2x 256MB RAM sticks right now).

Its funny isnt it, but you and your friend are in the vast minority when it comes to the totality of pc comsumers... Realitys a isnt it...

[zer]

http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/xpsnb_m1330?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&~tab=bundlestab

The only one that has a standalone video card being a 8400M GS is $1399, on top of that its a card...

[PeterPan]

The only one that has a standalone video card being a 8400M GS is $1399, on top of that its a card...Intel's X3100 performs about on par with a 7200M.

[8igdave]

Its funny isnt it, but you and your friend are in the vast minority when it comes to the totality of pc comsumers... Realitys a isnt it...

The arguement was about the factr that custom buildign means far faster RMA's and he asid well your still without a pc. But if you custombuild you are likely to have spare parts. But because he relised he couldn't beat this he then deviated it onto arugign about retail pcs while not making it obious he was infact talking about them.

You see the effect is a small change which has thrown the arguement the otherway but it is about the wrong thing?

i would not expect a retail pc owner to have spare parts. But a retail pc owner would also not get the fast rma service. So as you can see its no longer relivent?

As i said in my post, the key poinst keep being twisted to suite him. Clever manipulation.

However, a retail pc owner should never sell their old pc. I always keep a spare pc. I have my 3 year old retail pc upstairs in a box. Sure its a pile of crap but i can use it to do work and use msn on it.

:EDIT:

actually it has 1gb, a 3200+ and a 6800GT which is still considered caperble of gaming lol.

[PeterPan]

Even retail pre-built PC's you are still saving much more money than buying a MAC.

[8igdave]

what is a 7200M equivilant to in power in desktop cards. I know you could say a 7200. But i mean like the 6800GT was moer powerful then the 7600GS, or was it the one above the GT? i cant remeber. Anyway, is it equivilant to a 6800GS etc as considering the 7600GS was slower, id imagin the 7200M would be also.

[PeterPan]

In desktop cards?

Mmm...

Probably a bit above a Geforce 6200 or FX5700... but a little under a 6600. About the same as a Chrome S25. Could probably run WAR at 1024x768 with settings turned down and keep a stable FPS of 20+

[8igdave]

In desktop cards?

Mmm...

Probably a bit above a Geforce 6200 or FX5700... but a little under a 6600. About the same as a Chrome S25. Could probably run WAR at 1024x768 with settings turned down and keep a stable FPS of 20+

mmm ouch lol.

[mongoose]

Of course apple do pack good cards. But you have to pay such a high amount for them its not worth the cost nor can most afford them. A good card in a mac will cost you a substantial amount. A £800 retail pc, not custom built, can have a 8800GTX 2gb and a q6600. Find me that on an apple and ill be amazed. You are bending the truth so badly and ignoring facts to try and make your points that your arguments are becoming incredibly flawed. Plus they write their own drivers which i guarantee you will not be as good as those from nvida and ati as if you wernt aware, the PC drivers get updated about every 2-4 weeks to make them better.

Wait a sec, it was you who claimed Macs "packed bad cards" did you not state that? I was just showing you that wasnt true.

Also to get an upgrade to an 8800 GT costs +200.00 putting the card somewhere in the 280.00 range. Thats a bit higher than what buying the PC version costs (~250.00) but its not outrageously so.

So I dont know how I bent any truth or ignored any fact considering I didnt claim they packed bad cards. They are neither bad or terribly overpriced.


One thing a mac can do that a pc cant, gee it can run the mac os. Do i need to start naming programs that the pc can run taht the mac cant? because its gona get long. Yes the mac can run windows, but many programs will still require drives taht the mac will not allow.

Well thats funny, I dont know of any commercially available piece of PC software that wont run on a bootcamped Mac. Ive not had any issues personally. Im not saying they dont exist, just that Im not aware of it so its not out of the question. The only software I am aware of that might have issues would be proprietary "in house" programs but I really dont know if that counts for a lot. If you are using highly specialized software written specifically for a certain platform you should probably be using that platform to run it.

And you dismiss being able ot run OS X like its really no big deal when its one of the BIGGER deals. OS X is one of the main reasons why people like using macs so much (including myself)


The fact the mac can run the mac os doesn't hinder a pc in doing any of its work. A mac can run some of its mac software, a pc has its own software to do the same thing. When i said give me something the mac can do a pc cant i ment things like mmm a pc can play games well and a mac has to suffer with crappy overpriced hardware and fail. Of corse this doesn't apply if you want to spend £5000 on your mac.

Well thats not what you said. If thats what you meant you should have said that. ;)

And you are really talking about different markets here. All of what I will call the "all in one" Macs I would not recommend for avid game players like us, they dont have the capability to run the more demanding PC games regardless of being able to run Windows. (they can and do run many games just fine however) Thats not the market Apple is going for.

I also think its one Jobs bigger oversights and there should be an option for a more gaming oriented Mac. Of course this gets into the typical catch 22 argument. Apple dosent want to make Macs that are more gaming friendly/affordable until there are more PC games available and PC game companies dont want to port their games to the mac because there arent the machines to run them. Someone has got to freakin budge in this Mexican standoff and I hope Jobs will eventually pull his head out of his behind in time to realize it.


Pc's can be made with the skull trail motherboards (i believe that is their true name, weird huh?) but their price is not worth it. The reason they are not is simply because its not needed for anything other then decoding. I will agree with you, if your profession is decoding then buying the dual quad core mac is an excellent buy. However its no use to anyone other then decoders and no programs or games will make use of two quad cores and the graphics card they have are low end because they are not gaming pc. The point still stands that for any desktop or laptop the pc equivalent will be at least 2x cheaper and more like 3/4x cheaper if built custom. However the exception is the dual quad cores which are excellent buys but only for decoding. Therefore I can hardly see it being used as wow macs can come with 2x quad cores which a very small fraction of people will ever need as its useless to all but encoders.

Decoding? What are you talking about? The Desktop models are specifically targeted at Graphics professionals and Artists as are the GPUs offered and their configurations would make excellent gaming machines but not for the price you would pay. You dont buy a Mac just to play games (at least not high end req games) and I have never said differently. This is more like an added bonus if you already are going to buy a system anyway, similar to what the OP was doing with his MacBook Pro.


Therefore you have picked what is tbh an unfair mac to try and "prove" that they arnt overpriced. Because taht is just 1 mac and is not a very common one because it is only for decoders. If it was a desktop with a good graphics card etc which could do all these thing a pc can do and be of a similar price then yeah would be a good buy. But the fact is taht this is a specialized pc which none of you will ever need and is useless to you. Therefore tis a pointless comparison because it is not aiming to do the same thing as the pc equivilant.

<blink><blink> Not a common Mac? Its the base desktop model! You said you could build an equivalent PC for half the price, I show you the specs for the base desktop model (you were talking about building a desktop model right?) and now you are balking? If you are going to match the Mac then you need to be willing to at least have the balls to actually match it. Claiming that you can build something similar for half the price but not willing to have the same features dosent sound very fair to me.

And no I could get a LOT of use out of that system because I am A Graphic Designer ;)

I do agree though that the desktop model is not for everyone. Now if you want to talk about matching one of the lower end Mac then we would have to get into the discussion of you being able to build a fully integrated PC with monitor or being able to build a PC the size of a large ashtray.

Again one of Apples bigger failings is not having a lower end customizable Mac that could match a customized gaming PC. You either get the upgradability to turn your computer into a Cray or you get zilch, no in between. As a gamer this has bugged the hell out of me.

So the reality is you cant build a similarly priced desktop Mac because there isnt really a Mac to use to compare with. The Mac comes with features you arent willing to put in your custom PC and the Mac dosent have a model with less features. So really the argument and comparison are both rendered moot.


You dont consider rip off to constitue as an argument? o bloody hell come on! You are so blinded by the mighty apple that it is pointless continuing this any further. You are what is know as a fanboy. You can argue it as much as you want but you argue blindly against anythign without anything but... ooo macs are nice. You cant even admit they are overpriced. how rediculas! YOu dont need to know anything about hardware, you just need common sence. You look at two prices of a pc and a mac with the same spec and you see the pc is 2x cheaper. MMM nope not a rip off, cant use that as an arguement because its unfair because its errr... TRUE.

I dont consider it a ripoff because of the reasons I stated above. And Im hardly a blinded Apply fanboi. Im just tired of PC fanbois making the claims you have is all, but that doesnt mean I think Macs are the end all be all computers, especially if you are a dedicated game player.

So are Macs overpriced? That answer really depends on what you are using them for.

If you want to buy a Mac just for a good gaming machine then I would say HELL YES! There is no way I would recommend paying 3000.00 just for that.

If you are buying a lower end Mac for non gaming intensive purposes and arent interested in real upgradability (i.e. you use it as is until is dies) then yes they are a decent buy, especially if you are primarily interested in running OS X. This category fits most people and the reason why those models are popular. You cant beat the stylish "all in ones" or a computer so small it dosent look like it could be a computer.


o and i call on your stories about how you ahve had a of a time getting warrentes for PC. The reason is because you have never built a custom pc and yet you are using the fact taht a retailer gave you a of a time on a warrenty and trying to use that as an arguement agaisnt the fact taht on custom pcs we can get a 48hour warrenty pick up. Blastixs ram do that in england. You fail here.

lol, how can you call what I have personally experienced BS? Because I have had VERY bad experiences trying to get equipment replacements on a lot of computer components over the years. Maybe its just been my bad luck but they are the truth. Hell I remember trying to get my Monitor replaced a couple of years back (a good 1000.00 NEC). It took the idiots 5 separate shipments before I got one that worked correctly.


Your arguements are twisted and you do not adress what was pointed out. You do what is called making a straw man. Instead of tacklig the arguement, you recreate what looks to be it but is easyer to prove wrong. it is infact similar but not the same.

Well I think we covered this above


Secondly i call because you asid youve used macs for what was it, 15 years. You love them so much there is no reason for you to ahve owned a pc in that time. You can argue this but i simply do not beleive it. Why would you own a mac and a pc unless you are willing to admit the mac cannot do what a pc can and you needed both.

Uh, where did I ever say I loved Macs? I might have said I loved the Mac OS but that was it. I also said however that I was, and have always been a frustrated game player. It always sucked that I could hardly ever play any of the "cool" games my friends were playing (except Blizzards games :cool:). I always stuck it out though because my work was more important so it always won out. Then came 5 years ago when I was introduced to MMOs and I finally broke down and said screw it. I went out and had a custom built PC made for me, just to play DAoC. So for the last five years I have had both a Mac and PC sitting not 3' apart from each other both plugged into the same monitor. I cant say as Ive enjoyed learning the ins and out of Windows XP but I have done it. I have managed to strike a coexistence between the two worlds and as a gamer see the good and bad sides of both.

(And the reason why I didnt buy a Mac at that time was because the Intel Mac was a much more recent devlopment. so all I had was Virtual PC /blech.)

Of course Im now faced with the exact problem you describe. Ive upgraded my PC as far as it will go so I am left withthe choice of spending 3000.00 that I dont have right now or spend 1000.00 and buy yet another dedicated gaming machine to play WAR on. The PC is going to win because I want to play WAR.....NOW, but this wont always be the case. I hope to one day soon have the funds to blow 5000.00 on an outrageousely upgraded desktop Mac. :mrgreen:


o and lastly. my spelling is not difficult to "decode" you are the only one you complains and you are mearly doing it to try and get at me as you are running out of things to say. The truth is that you only need the first and last letter to be in the right place to infact read a word. i have a hard time spelling, its not my fault and im not going to use a spell checker on every word i type just to make some spelling nazi happy when he can read it fine anyawy.

Sorry if you thought this was some sort of dig at you but it wasnt. It was just some friendly advice that wasnt said out of meanness. If you saw my posts before I ran them through the spell checker you would understand. With spell checking at the click of a botton though its merely and excuse and a courtesy I do so others dont have to read my horrible typing. :D

MAC needs to consider the budget market...

For $600-$700 you can get a solid desktop PC with average processing power prebuilt, from Dell, HP, Compaq, ect. The same $600-$700 gets you a MAC about the size of a CD player which is completely un-upgradable and about as powerful as a PC from 1998.

Its complete and utter to be honest, I might actually buy a MAC if they would even ATTEMPT to be competitive. But they don't... and the way its looking they probably never will.

Yes, they do need a budget model. As I pointed out above I think this is where Apple really falls flat by not offering a more reasonably priced Mac that can be upgraded. You could cut out a LOT of the features of the desktop model and still make me happy (I mean when am I EVER going to use 5 USB ports and 4 Firewire ones, or 8 RAM slots or all those drive bays? :p) I think there is a market there but Im not Jobs so what do I know :roll:

[zer]

Dave, if you read my previous post youll noticed that we agree on faster RMAs, etc.. However saying that everyone that builts their own pc has lots of spare parts doesnt hold true.