Re: Compter recommendations
- From: Alan Browne <alan.browne@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 08 Jul 2008 14:56:15 -0400
Al K wrote:
I am ready to purchase a new laptop computer. I would be interested to hear about other people preferance between the PCs and Apple systems and why. I would also like opinions on screen size for editing and other considerations.
Mac Pro Core Duo 2.5 GHz. For photo editing, the largest Mac is the 17 in. (there is a 15 and a 13 inch v. as well). Regardless of screen size, you can also hook it up to a DVI capable monitor for whatever size you want. Get an Apple monitor for this. The resolution and color are great.
(I don't believe the 3 GHz v. is available as a laptop)
You can load these to 4 GB (2 standard). 250 GB HD. (I'd add an IOMega external terrabyte drive to take advantage of Time Machine).
If you have PC apps., then add VMWare Fusion and install (eg) WinXP as well. With VMWare fusion you can run XP in parallel and drag and drop between OS X and WinXP.
I run Photoshop CS3 on my 2.8 GHz Mac and it is FAST compared to my 2.6 GHz Dual Core WinXP machine. (the speed difference is more than the clock difference would suggest).
Why? Windows is a moribund, overweight system. Vista is a huge letdown that DEMANDS a powerful processor just to do what it promises. WinXP is still available in ever difficult ways. (eg: I believe of you order a Dell you can still get WinXP).
(Recent article in The Economist (and or the NYT) suggests that if MS don't rebuild Windows from scratch, it will just become too ungainly, period).
I'm not a Mac fanatic, but just the lack of the hard disk nattering away is a great advantage over Windblows. Much smoother system (I rarely re-boot; just auto-sleep at night... comes out of sleep in a few seconds). Apple s/w 'patches' cause more required re-boots than anything else.
Also Mac OS X Leaopard recognizes most raw formats natively and you can browse (in "Finder" the Mac directory tool) your raw photos as if they were JPG's. In one of the modes you just 'rifle' through as if it were a stack of photos... very nifty/fast).
If you have a Windows v. of photoshop, Adobe will be happy to transfer the license to the Mac (the process is a wee bit tedious).
You may see a few recommendations to build a Linux box. Don't listen unless you're Linux savvy or really enjoy tinkering with computers and a _whole new_ vernacular.
I've gone through 4 different distros of Linux (and 1 Solaris) and they are a pain in the butt. Photoshop will not run natively under Linux. When you add new peripherals (say a scanner) then it can take a while before somebody comes up with support for it in Linux. Installation of s/w is quirky, IMO. GIMP (de facto photo editing standard for 'nix) is not a very good photo editing tool where 16 bit/color is concerned (there is a full 16b/c version, but it is way behind in tools/filters compared to the 8b/c version).
Cheers,
Alan
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