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Apple iMac MC508B/A
by missgroovychick
Coming from a consistent PC user, I first thought that the Mac was more style over substance. My university forced me to use a Mac for my digital graphics course and well, my complaints are subdued.
The screen that I have is HD and 21 inches and well needed for doing a heavy graphics course such as my own. Although I do admit ... that if the sun is on it due to the glossy screen you cannot see a thing, so the computer lab at uni always has curtains drawn. A matte screen would have been much easier but there is not even an option for this.
So editing images becomes more detailed and easy to do pixel by pixel and so tabbing through various footage can be done easily with a cheat button on the keyboard which no windows computer has had so far in my opinion unless you do a fancy Ctrl+something+something.
This computer has dual core processors which is fantastic for dealing with heavy media so the computer can deal with two streams of data at once, which means I can be rendering a film with one program and streaming on the internet with another... the machines at uni have 3.2 GHZ processor which is just enough, I dislike it greatly when the pinwheel comes up and then I'm stuck scratching my head because Ctrl+alt+delete does not work on macs! It has 4GB Ram but so does my PC laptop and sometimes that freezes too. Technology needs to keep up with the media.
The machines at uni come with a "Superdrive" but its a DVD burner/rewriter. To open this you have to press a button on the keyboard instead of on the drive itself like most computers. My biggest worry that my cd gets jammed in there and there is no way of opening the drive itself.
Regarding ports, there is a USB port on the keyboard which is handy for pen drives at uni however it is not strong enough for DSLR camera data transfer so the four USB ports at the back of the CPU have to be used.
I do not know much about the software that comes as standard I just know that we are running on
Mac OS X 10.6.x and it makes it very hard to get viruses and malware on a mac. iLife suite is included as well but for uni we use the Adobe Creative Master Suite 5 and these sometimes can put a strain on the system because when rendering Flash video, it has frozen on me a couple of times and I have lost my work!
Also being a PC user mainly, all the shortcuts I am used to become totally redundant... and I have had to get used to "My Computer" being called "Finder" and various little nuances that I am not accustomed to. I do not think macs are particularly user friendly unless you have been taught how to use them as I am never sure if a program has fully shut down or not as they are always jumping up and down in my task bar at the bottom of the screen.
You have to buy the windows office suite seperately and annoyingly the font sizes seem to be incredibly different opposed to the windows run office. Size 12 on a windows comes out like size 10 comparatively to the mac and this has frustrated my lecturers immensely. Though this is a software problem, not a mac problem.
The cost of this machine for me to buy at home is just short of £1000 and that is far too much for a student to be spending, despite getting a 15% reduction just before term resumes, it still is too much. I think it is great that the university provides a suite for us to use.
A nice touch is when the networked macs have been linked, the main computer linked to the projector in the lecture room can show work from other computers by "screen sharing" which I find is so much easier than to upload your work on a usb and then give to the teacher and then faff about, sometimes films do not fit on a USB so screen sharing is the best revelation for teaching media.
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Apple iMac MB952B/A
by elharvman
I first switched to apple OSX in 2007, and since then couldn't have been happier with it's stable, easy to use operating system. As a musician who also does a fair amount of video editing I realised that I needed a computer that could keep up with me. The imac is a very fast machine and does not struggle with any software. I've never ... seen a computer uncompress files and process audio at this speed. Games also run very smoothly, a problem I have had in the past with lower powered machines.
The speakers built in to the computer are very high quality for built in speakers, however I would still recommend buying external speakers for a fuller sound as they can be a tad tinny.
The screen is incredibly bright and I find I can often get away with having it on the lowest brightness setting without anything being too dark.
All of the prepackaged software is fantastic. The iLife suite is great fun for kids but is also surprisingly powerful once you get to know it. The app store makes finding reliable new software very easy and you can get your software from anywhere else if you prefer to.
There are a few downsides too. I find that if I am doing too many things at once, for instance, filming in photo booth and recording sound in garageband, then the machine begins to rapidly heat up and is almost painful to the touch. The machine hasn't broken as a result not can I see any damage or decrease in performance. My other main issue is the price, as apple computers aren't the cheapest of things. That being said, when you buy a mac you are paying for the seamless operating system, so I was happy to pay.
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Apple iMac MC508B/A
by LastLine
As someone who bought his first Mac 5 years ago as an experiment - to see what it was like - I'm a relatively experienced Mac user, and this review is written as such.
The reasons for my purchase of this iMac were simple.
* I knew my existing Macbook Pro wasn't cutting it any more for my purposes, I needing something ... with more 'oompf'
* I found a good deal (at Comet incidentally)
* I no longer needed portability.
Now onto the review of the machine itself.
The machine, and the 'siblings' in the range pack Intel's i3 (or in the higher cases i5/i7) processors. These are dual core chips and some of the latest mobility range available from Intel. Now while I'm not the most technical person when it comes to such thing I would like to pass some observations.
**Hardware**
Dual core processors essentially allow two streams of information to be dealt with at once, as opposed to the traditional one. The easiest way to explain this is to compare it to a leaky bucket (bear with me) whereby a single hole lets a small amount of water through at once, creating another whole however allows twice as much to come through. It's not impossible to overload (indeed, there are four, six and I believe eight core chips in production on bigger machines) but it does mean that you've got a good amount of data bandwidth available. My machine came with a 3.2Ghz processor as opposed to the 3.06 here, a minor difference as both will give you the ability to manage any everyday processing functions. In fact mine quite happily handles video encoding, programming, office programs, mail clients, twitter and iTunes - all running at once without too much hassle.
Of course backing up this processor is a healthy 4gb of RAM. RAM is vital for effective multi tasking in a computer. These days I would advise that nobody buys a computer with any less than 2gb. Modern operating systems require more and more RAM as they develop more advanced features, now it's a reasonably common knowledge fact that Mac's require less RAM than Windows to perform the same task equally, as the Unix based operating system that is Mac OS X is more efficient in these terms than it's Windows counterparts, so believe me when I say that with 4gb of RAM the machine is quite capable of holding it's own. As I type this review I've got iTunes streaming video to my AppleTV, Google Chrome running a couple of tabs, Twitter, Mail and a video encoding piece of software running with no slow down what so ever. Whilst the machine supports up to 16gb of RAM I would say that even running 8gb should secure you for any but the most intensive software tasks.
The machine comes with a standard Apple Slot loading 'Superdrive' - put simply it's a DVD burner/rewriter. Nothing flashy, but it's there. Also on the removable media front there is an SD slot on the side of the machine, tidily hidden next to the superdrive slot. A first on this generation of machine I do believe, but nice for the photographers.
Regarding ports, round the back there are four USB, one firewire, one ethernet and a minidisplay port adapter. These provide plenty of connectivity to devices or a second monitor. That said with the Wifi and Bluetooth built in you'll generally not need these for mice, keyboards or internet connections, unless you choose to break from the standard gear (more on that later) there are also audio in/out ports. The biggest trouble with all of these ports is that they're all around the back - nice aesthetically but a flaming nuisance when you're trying to insert a USB stick, USB hubs are a necessity if you ask me.
Regarding graphics ability the card included isn't 'high' end but is certainly on the 'mid to good' range for the size display included. The computer comes with a 21.5" screen throwing out an impressive display resolution of 1920 x 1080 which can display HD film at full resolution happily, as well as handling many games at medium to higher settings at native resolution. The gloss on the screen is lovely on the whole, but if you dare catch the sun on it you're going to have a hard time seeing anything. Apple's recent obsession with glossy displays is somewhat frustrating and to be honest, I'd rather at least have the option of a matte screen. Though given this is my biggest problem with the machine I'd have to say it's not a deal breaker.
The included bluetooth keyboard gives a decent battery life, lasting for about a fortnight of my typical use on 2 AA batteries, the only thing that I didn't like was the lack of a number pad as I used one regularly for programming, those I have quickly adapted to this. The 'Magic Mouse' included is something of an interesting beast though. It's got a nice, simple Apple-esque design to it, no visible buttons to it. What it does have though is multi touch capabilities, similar to that of the iPhone or iPod Touch. It contains only basic controls, but the ability to swipe your finger to go back a page in the browser for example is really nice. The only minor complaint here is that you can't have a left and right click at once which as a gamer can be frustrating, I simply use a different mouse but for most the included mouse will be quite ample I'm sure.
**Software**
Of course with the hardware comes software. Mac OS X 10.6.x is included - known commonly as Snow Leopard. An evolution of a software line that has developed over a decade Snow Leopard is fast, minimalistic, efficient and secure. The unix code base makes it very hard to crack without a users explicit permission so viruses and malware whilst not impossible, are very rare and generally fall to user error rather than a security flaw.
Talking to Windows users? Consider the dock your start menu, finder your Windows Explorer, and system preferences your Control Panel. Beyond that there's not much to learn.
Included as standard is Apple's iLife suite of software. Put simply this includes iPhone (a Picasa like photo organisation suite), iMovie (powerful movie editting software), and Garageband (music creation and editing software) all of which give the user a good experience out of the box with a good range of tools at their disposal. Of course should you wish to run Microsoft Office or other 'PC' software you usually can, but you will likely need to purchase a different version to run (though certain games for example are Mac/PC compatible now, World of Warcraft being a prime example)
Software can be expensive for a Mac if not bought carefully, that said the Mac App Store (available on OS X 10.6.8 and higher - a free software update) contains easily purchasable software that you can download over the internet, and in case you're one of those who still avoids online purchasing, simply purchase an iTunes gift card at most high street retailers and use that to top up your account, it's really that simple - the only limitation is your bandwidth.
The built in iSight works nicely with Facetime - a video calling solution that can be used to call someone's iPhone or iPod Touch (4 or 4th Generation) for free, that said it's equally at home with Skype or many other VOIP programs. Take your pick.
**Cost*
Ranging from just under a thousand pounds the iMac's don't come cheap, that said with a new display included every time along with a solid, fast and tidy hardware set they're definitely offering value for money. Prices range up to around £1600 for a 27" model so pick carefully, the bigger machines house a bigger screen, but also more powerful hardware so but the best you can - remember as an all in one you're going to have a job upgrading much more than the RAM.
Whilst I'm sure I could ramble on about this machine for some considerable time more, I feel that to do so would be 'geeking out' so I'll leave it at that. The Advantages and Disadvantages below provide a good summary of the machines high and low points but ultimately, if you're looking for a new machine you could go a damn sight worse than an iMac.
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