Sorry for all your troubles, Kane.

As for the Mac vs PC thing, you guys do know that Bill Gates owns a controlling interest in Apple, right?

Ahhh.. A fellow MAMEr....
Can't get enough of the classic stuff....

If you're into emulating.... try .... Taipan runs smooth as silk.... Unfortuanately Wasteland doesn't work.... But some of the other RPGs (Wizardy, Might & Magic, Ultima, Bard's Tale) do....

BTW, your Mac will run MacMAME probably.... I used to run it on my G3...

I appreciate the fact that there are Mac and Windows users here and no bashing is intended, but I always like to set the record straight when I see these rumors.

Of course the greatest bottom line is the user experience, and having used both I must say that the Mac is preferable by a mile.

Check out some decent analysis of the Mac vs. PC price debate:





re: viruses



These are just a few articles that cover the debate. For what you get, the Mac is a much better deal all around: price is close enough, what is included, and the Mac OS X user experience can't be beat!

All that said, I guess to each his own. No viruses or spyware, easier to use and a greater pleasure, longer ownership, fewer problems *sigh* I love my Mac!

It's nice to see the MAC line finally catching up in the Graphics Card catagory. I see they are not just ofering the "light" version of the popular NVidia and ATI cards now. Good news! (I assume most of the reason for the lag behind the MS_PC is that it was mostly 3d gaming that is/was pushing that)

The very last time I've ever debated in favor of the Mac, I was told by some die-hard Micro$oft IT guys that I should stop yelling from over on the Island of Mac.

For the time being, I see the uses & merits of both. I just wish I could afford to keep them both up-to-date. I think a Mac Portable and a PCTower would be optimum for my needs.

PHATZ:
Yeah I use MacMame. Works well for most of the old stuff. Newer stuff requires it to be Windowed (very tiny windowed). Speaking of mame. I've had to have a hard drive dedicated to nothing but Retrogaming Flyers, Booklets, Screenshots, Titles, Images, etc. Sheesh.I use an Apple emulator when I am in the mood for the original version of Karateka. Otherwise I jsut pay C64Emu for that and BruceLee, and Racing Destruciton sEt.

-Floyd

I was planning on saving some money and switching to Mac, but then two things happened. First, I realized how many games I play, second, my iBook power cable fritzed out and very nearly fried the thing. Apple never recalled them for my model. Only the NEWEST model. So a $70 replacement part for something Apple messed up. Not happening.

Wow, this thread has gone way OT...

Anyway, to help further that:

I've used both Macs and PCs. It's been a few years since I've used a Mac, but I used to really like them. I found that they tended to be a bit more stable, and for quite a while their abilities in digital music and recording were unmatched (used to do a lot of electronic music and sequencing).

I haven't bought a brand-name computer since my Commodore Vic-20. My parents got a PC (I think it was a Packard Bell), but every system I've actually owned has been one that I built. I can get a lot more performance out of something custom built at the same price point for either Macs or PC machines.

Now, though, I use Linux 90% of the time. The only time I do boot into Windows (have my box dual-boot capable, with both Windows and Linux installed on it; for a while I had OpenBSD on there, too) is to play games that I can't live without, and those are becoming fewer every couple of weeks.

As for the whole virus/spyware thing, all I have to say is that Windows can be fairly safe if you don't use IE (too many tie-ins to the OS), and don't download random stuff, and make damn sure to keep up on any security patches. Macs can get them, too, but they do tend to be much rarer; I'm expecting that's even more true with the newer OS X variants of the Macs, since that's a Unix-based system. As for Linux and other Unixes, there aren't that many instances, historically, of actual viruses for those. Not to say that they can't happen (they can), but because of the way the OS is designed, they're much harder to get going.

As much as I love Linux, I wouldn't mind owning a new Mac, either; they're just so pretty.

"Mac OSX: Because making Unix user friendly was easier than fixing Windows."
-anonymous wallpaper on my iBook

I started with a Mac IIsi way back when my 80 MB hard drive seemed like it'd never be filled.

I still have to use a peecee for work, but I'd rather use my Mac for just about anything.

As far as software goes, Microsoft just put out a new version of Virtual PC 7, with XP. That way, you can use anything you can't get native on a Mac.

For games? Man, you can't beat a console. Sure, Half-Life 2 and Doom 3 are computer only, but you've got to spend thousands to upgrade your system just to be able to play at a decent frame rate.

Consoles just work. My Mac just works. My PC makes me work.

In the end, it boils down to what you do, and how you like to do it!