<p>Macs are wonderful machines for college. A Mac with MS Office does everything a student would ever need. The best part is that Macs are more secure, and given that college networks are a hotbed of viruses and hacking, it's wonderful never to have to worry about that.</p>
<p>No, really, colleges are bad. Here at Penn they tape a warning label over every Ethernet port warning you not to go online until you have properly secured your computer an an ITA approves it (unless you have a Mac in which case, plug right in).</p>
<p>Business majors who REALLY want Macs will get them and when they need to run specialized business apps, they go to a computer lab with Windows machines.</p>
<p>windows-based systems had to install psu's special antivirus programs and check with rescom to ensure all windows updates were in place to protect against viruses</p>
<p>macs just plugged right in</p>
<p>and because I am too stubborn to change, I still went the Windows route!</p>
<p>I've never had anything but a Mac, and wouldn't use anything else. Easy to use, no viruses (never had a single one, never had antivirus software)</p>
<p>The tech people at DePauw said it simply doesn't matter--just choose whatever you want. THey did say, though, that the econ/english/science majors etc. tended to have PC's and the art and comm/media people tended to have Mac's.</p>
<p>I had an ibook. I loved it. I'd always brag about how fast it was compared to PC's and cool and easy to use. Then it died last week. I was not downloading anything or opening emails from strangers; in fact I was finishing a project on PowerPoint. The computer just stopped responding so I restarted and it wouldn't start. I need a new hard drive. Now, although I seem like I'm just *****ing about macs, I actually still do love and miss my computer and I'm still planning on getting a new hard drive and taking it to college. I consider it really really bad luck, since I've never had a PC crash, but hopefully my mac was an anomoly.</p>
<p>Weird....the only part I've ever had go bad on a mac was the fan. And that was way back in like '95 (Performa 550, oh baby). Cost me $20 for the new fan and the actual repair.</p>
<p>Now my dad has had 1 hard drive replaced in his PC desktop, and the hard drive in each of his PC laptops he's had (same models, screen cracked on the first one). </p>
<p>Mac's are simply designed to be sturdier. The PowerBook I'm getting is made of metal, the PC model DePauw offers is, of course, cheapo plastic. If anything happens, a Mac has a much better chance of "surviving" than a PC.</p>
<p>Yeah, it's late. High School is over, wooohoo.</p>
<p>I guess it's just different luck for different people. I've been using cheap, plastic Dells for a while now. Still no problems. (Of course, I use a computer for only two years and then chuck it because I hate slow items :-) )</p>
<p>I got it in january and it was just under a year old, barely used. I've been looking into things that could have happened,but I really don't know. I think it was a fluke though -- statistically that is much less likely to happen to a mac and I was very unlucky -- and I really did like the computer better while I had it.</p>
<p>You can't really blame Apple for the bad hard drive, since they didn't make it. In fact, the same hard drive is probably found in many PCs.</p>
<p>The only exception would be if the iBook had a poor thermal design that caused the HD to fail, but if that were the case, there would be more reports of it.</p>
<p>I say, powerbook is the way to go. Ibooks are also well made
For PCs, IBMs have historically been the best-made windows laptops. But recently, IBM sold their computer division, so we'll see how that pans out in the near future.</p>
<p>dpm,
for general use, macs are considerably more reliable. (Occasional fluke, as 1 or 2 posters mention; but otherwise, one just doesn't get regular & recurrent problems, or crashing.) The person who made the pt. about PC virus vulnerability is totally correct. Also, macs are <em>so</em> easy to use for word-processing, (& guess what you'll be mostly using a computer for?) Also, great for graphics.</p>
<p>The only thing I'd say is that for anybody with specialized software needs such as med/pre-med, they might need a PC in addition, if they can possibly afford both. I have friends in the medical field who need a PC even at home to do their after-hours work --downloading med. stuff. The problem is, their home PC computer gets a lot of use, & so it's often crashing when they need to use e-mail & word processing. What a nightmare it would be to have a college paper due just as your computer is crashing, or to find that your data is being infected.</p>
<p>I'm no tekkie, but even I have found great deals on reliable used macs. If I felt I really needed a PC for certain applications, I would get a used mac for daily use & a PC for specialized. (Or a Mac Mini -- affordable! -- plus a PC with a service contract)</p>
<p>Well, since Macs are more based on UNIX than Windows PCs are, I would say they are better fit for engineering. Finance and business software should work equally throughout all operating systems. It's numeric- and graphic- intensive programs that require hardware and operating system power.</p>
<p>Yes, unix is DEFINEITLY more reliable. I think you'll probably find PC's dominating engineering, however.</p>
<p>I just don;t understand how some companies can operate and rely on PCs to work ALL the time! I'm a video clerk/checker at a groecery store, and our whole video department relys on a Win98 machine!! Last saturday I was going along doing returns and all of a sudden my computer locked up without warning! It took nearly 10 minutes to bring the system all the way back up. I'm also doing an internship sort of thing at KMOX radio this week and next. All of their on-air software is WINDWS based....I wouldn't want to rely on Windos for that.</p>
<p>I sure hope air traffic control systems are Unix based!!!!!!!!</p>
<p>How's the 2GHz imac? Could somebody tell me what would be a comparable pc powerwise because I dont know much about macs. It looks pretty sweet and it comes with a flatscreen lcd monitor which I assume presents better picture quality than the digital flatscreen monitors pcs come with.</p>
<p>The only thing I'd say is that for anybody with specialized software needs such as med/pre-med</p>
<p>I'm sorry, thats not true at all. Be more specific than "medical field" please. I can think of absolutely nothing that you'd need specifically a Windows PC for in med school, let alone undergrad pre-med. Med students have medical software on palm pilots (a lot of them on Windows-based palms), but I don't know of any they use on home computers that don't run on macs.</p>
<p>DePauw uses a Windows only app called DyKnow, but still wants Mac users to be able to function. So, every mac you buy from them comes with Virtual PC</p>
<p>I just checked back on this thread, and I'm really leaning towards a Mac now. I really like the laptops made by Apple and I'm sure I would be happy with either a PB or iBook. If that means occasionally working in a computer lab, I really don't care, that's just one more place to meet people I guess, my school has a pretty nice library with plenty of PCs to use so that won't be a problem. Also, as long as the programs aren't to super-memory intensive, I could use my current computer for them- my high school has a laptop program so I could bring my 3-year old IBM Thinkpad and use that only when necessary, I would probably have to buy a battery for it but that's not too bad.</p>
<p>I'd say it all depends on the school. Penn uses a LOT of Macs and I pretty much never touch a Mac so it took some getting used to. I will always prefer Windows and its set up.</p>
<p>As for me, I will not probably buy a Mac, but the considerations are always there. I prefer a dual-boot system with Enterprise Linux (or UNIX) of some sort, and a Windows NT/2000/XP system (I don't really like Windows systems, but hey-- most of the software market is for Windows- you need it one way or another).</p>
<p>Windows XP seems pretty stable to me. I realize the old versions like ME and 98 may have scared off lots of customers but I have yet to run into that dreaded blue screen of death since switching to XP.</p>
<p>There are a bit more precautions to take with a Windows machine (spyware, updated virus protection, etc...) but all in all, I feel more comfortable using one than a Mac. The ratio at my school (PSU) was nearly 10:1 in the computer labs. Something to consider if you are going to a predominantly non-Mac school!</p>