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Originally Posted by Crompsin
Dunno, ask me next year when the machine you listed above is obsolete.
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That was Willravel's point - as long as you're not gaming, the machine WON'T be obsolete! I have a PC downstairs that I don't use to play games. It's four years old and is still very effective at doing all of the things that I bought it for: surfing the web, writing papers, letting the kids play educational programs, even watching the occasional online video! Maybe it's BECOMING obsolete now that Vista is here - it certainly can't keep up with the size & memory requirements of that OS....but four years is a lot to get out of just about any consumer product!
I came to a conclusion about a year ago: with the exception of MMORPGs, if I want to game, I'll use a console. I don't see the point of spending hundreds of dollars a year on the PC upgrade rat race to be able to play games...especially when my console hooks up so nicely to my 46" 1080p HDTV! Yes, so will my PC, but that involves taking it downstairs & actually hooking it up on a regular basis.
Once I came to that conclusion re: gaming, it became a no-brainer to buy a Mac...and I'm EXTREMELY happy with my purchase!
As a fairly recent convert, and a 20 year PC user, I can tell you the following:
1. The iMac is the best piece of hardware I've ever purchased. It's slick-looking, compact, QUIET, fast, and when you compare machines on an even playing field, is
just a little bit more expensive than its more poorly-designed PC brethren.
2. I have had not a single WHIT of problems finding quality mac software for what I do. For work, I have Microsoft Office or any of its quality free alternatives. I actually went out & purchased iWork 08, and its a very good product as well - and compatible with Office, to boot! For surfing the web, Safari is pretty good, but Firefox (free, again!) is where it's at on ANY platform! For editing home movies, iLife is good for the amateur (like me) and there are certainly higher-class products in that field.
3. For those windows programs that you absolutely can't live without, I wentout and bought the $79 parallels product, transferred the windows license from my old PC, and I run XP in a VM.... Ok, now I have a couple of caveats for you: You need a crap-load of memory in the machine to do this effectively...so you still need to buy that. Also, 3d support isn't the greatest, so the newest games don't work well. HOWEVER, it still runs older games quite acceptably!
4. There *IS* a bit of OS-shock to get over when starting out. I initially thought that the worst of this would be getting over the window controls being on the upper-left of the window instead of the upper right...but it's a bit more pervasive than that. Nothing you won't get over in about a week, but some things still get me when switching back and forth (home/end key behavior differs, for example....it gets me EVERY time!) from my work-issued PC laptop.
Everyone here has made some good points - on both sides! I think what it comes down to is: what do you WANT to buy? If you are in college, or in a field where Apples are more pervasive, then by all means buy an Apple! If not, weigh the pros and cons AS YOU SEE THEM...and come to a decision.