[monkeyleader]

So I'm sorley tempted to ditch my desktop PC and get an iMac. I find myself playing less and less PC based games these days so now could well be the time for an iMac (24")

I was just wondering - any limitations in regards to photo processing? I know in the past the Mac has struggled with RAW files etc ..

Any advice from Mac owners in regards to photo post processing?

cheers,

Nige

[electrolyte]

Although I don't own a Mac my brother does.

He runs Lightroom perfectly fine and copes fine with RAW files. However, he is a bit of a lo-fi man and prefers film to digital and doesn't own a DSLR but has loads of film cams - eg Lomo, Holga, Vivitar Ultra Wide and Slim etc - but he gets his films scanned in when he processes them and then adjusts the scans in Lightroom as if they are digital files. He has a film scanner that he is thinking of up-grading so that it will produce RAW files from his scans so I don't think you should worry about RAW compatibility.

[Liquid101]

You'll have no problems at all with the new iMacs and Leopard is a dream to use - although it'll be better after the 10.5.2 update

Having said that - the iMac line is due an update any time now - so it's worth waiting. I've been waiting for months now With any luck they'll up the proceesing power with new Penryn line, or maybe even quad core

The GPU is also in need of replacing - the HD2600 is fine, but it's not really up to much if you ant to carry on with any serious 3D stuff.

I'd put money on a refresh in the next month or so .........at least I hope so, I can't cope with this laptop for much longer.

[Deano_uk]

I'm a guy that works in the PC industry and in my house I have 3 macs and one old old PC.

I guess that tells you that although I make my living with PC's i much prefer to use Macs myself.

I was surprised and thought when I bought my Mac book pro I would still need a PC for some tasks but over the last few months I've sold on my pcs and converted totally to Macs. I haven't found a single thing that I can do with a PC that I cannot do with my mac.

Go for it you will never look back :D

[pixelpixel]

Originally Posted by monkeyleader

I was just wondering - any limitations in regards to photo processing? I know in the past the Mac has struggled with RAW files etc ..

Forget the past......apple have moved on and improved

Also note that Apple do a good range of refurbished mac's. If I was to buy one it would be this way IMO. You can save some money

[Tobers]

Macbook Air

[richard plumb]

I thought they only updated the imacs in september last year? Do they really update them that quickly?

I'm loving mine. so much simpler than the PC was, but seemingly no less capable.

[hot-fuzz]

I have alwasy been a PC man through and through, but recently have come to appreciate the power of the Mac for photo processing. My friend has one for processing solely and swears by it.
As long as you get at least a half decent one you will not be disappointed.

Trouble is, they are a bit on the expensive side.

[geofftelforduk]

Nige

I just bought a Refurbed Macbook last week from Apple.com and I am lovin it!! Its just so nice to use and the best thing is it "just works"!!! Leopard is fantastic!! I am running VMWare Fusion with Windows XP Pro for things like IIS Web Server and a couple of other Windows specific apps!! Love it!!!

[Liquid101]

Originally Posted by richard plumb

I thought they only updated the imacs in september last year? Do they really update them that quickly?

It's 193 days since the last upgrade, and the average cycle for the iMac is 205 days.

It'll probably be a processor and GPU upgrade - but wouldn't rule out a matte screen option as well.

[Peakoverload]

I converted to the dark side about a year ago and although I still use PC's everyday at work using a Mac at home has been nothing short of a revelation.

The following statement is usually the kind of statement that really winds up ardent PC users but it's true:

Until you use a Mac you really can't appreciate what it's like to use a computer that works.

The normal process for any Mac convert is something like:

Day 1: Oooh, ahh, my new Mac has arrived and isn't it gorgeous!

Day 2: Really love this Mac, a few things are confusing me but I'm sure I'll get there in the end.

Day 3: I do really love the Mac and I love the way iLife integrates beautifully and I can see there is enormous potential but why can't I just do simple things like display the properties of a file.

Day 4: They say if you can use iTunes you can use a Mac, I guess they are right.

Day 5: I've just installed my first new program. I'm in total shock. How can it be that simple, no I mean it. You thought installing a program on a PC was just about the easiest thing you could do, try it on a Mac. Seriously.

Day 6: I'm really loving this Mac, I've found that installing a program is stupifyingly simple and uninstalling it is just as easy and I now know I don't have to worry about leaving a mess in my registry and I'm getting used to the fact that to copy something I don't do a Ctrl+C but I effectively do an Alt+C but, I dunno, it still feels a little over complicated to me.

Day 7: OH MY GOD! It wasn't over complicated. It was simpler. For years I've been doing things the long way around i.e. the PC way. Now I can do things the Mac way i.e. the quicker and simpler way. I REALLY love my Mac now.

As for Mac's and RAW? Mac's LOVE RAW which is why Leopard supports them in the OS. You can view thumbnails of them in Finder (Windows Explorer to you ) and you can even preview them without opening them in any photo editing tool by using QuickView (just press the Spacebar). Welcome to the world of Apple Mac's, your life just go easier!

Seriously. Buy One. They are nothing short of stunning.

Oh and for the record, I was/am a long time PC geek (built dozens, supported hundreds professionally) who always ridiculed Mac's in the past. I doubt I'll ever buy a PC ever again and as the Mac will run Windows (better than a PC does as well for that matter!!) and Linux I'll never need to.

[Radiohead]

I'd never go back to a PC now.

[Gizmo 76]

I've been using a Mac for about 4 and a bit months now, and I would never go back either

The whole integration aspect that Peakoverload mentioned really is superb, and makes the Mac more of an experience rather than a chore. If you embrace this integration aspect, use iLife, .mac, itunes etc... and you'll wonder how you ever went about things in another way before.

Two of the OS features really stand out for me, and that I would never want to live without now are - Time Machine and Spaces. Time Machine saved my butt once, and Spaces is like having loads of screens (kinda of), no more having to move windows to get to others, you can actually assign programs to certain spaces, works really well.

You'll get updates, but you won't be as bombarded with them as your on a PC, 10.5.2 was released last week with some nice little changes.

Installing software like has been mentioned is a breeze, slightly different (except for Adobe, and Microsoft software, which is the same as you know) to what you're used to, but it's pretty much a case of just dropping the program file in to your application folder, that's it.

I use iPhoto as my main image browser/importer, then I edit my shots in Photoshop. Also Photomatix works great on it as well I'm trying out Aperture 2 at the moment, so I may invest in this in the coming months if I get on ok with it.

I haven't heard any rumours of a new iMac yet (Apple are good at keeping things under wraps until the product is pretty much ready to launch), but it might be worth waiting a 3/4 weeks after what Liquid has said.

Go onto the apple site and watch a load of their videos showing off the OS and software, you'll more than likely be impressed.

Anyways i'm off to bed now, and iMac will wake me a 10am with some music

[T0MAT01]

Originally Posted by geofftelforduk

I just bought a Refurbed Macbook last week from Apple.com and I am lovin it!!

Is apple.com the best (read cheapest! ) place to buy from? As I'm also considering a switch to Mac...

[Peakoverload]

Originally Posted by T0MAT01

Is apple.com the best (read cheapest! ) place to buy from? As I'm also considering a switch to Mac...

Sometimes they are, sometimes they are not. To a certain extent it depends on what you are buying i.e. if it's an off-the-shelf system or a custom build.

When I ordered my iMac I had a custom configuration and also ordered new speakers and an external hard drive (an iomega 640GB and very nice too). I phoned two Apple dealers and got them to quote me on the spec, I then phoned Apple and told them the spec I wanted and without me prompting they gave me a healthy discount that brought it to something like £50 less than what I was quoted elsewhere and I think that also included more RAM on the graphics card than I had asked the other companies to quote on too. So for me Apple where the cheapest, however I know of others that have had the reverse experience. Get them to quote, it can't hurt.

[Gordon @ Convergent AV]

Well just to dampen the enthusiasm a bit. My wife went to an iMac two years ago. In that time it's crashed, hung, had to have OS re-installed, had to go back to the supplier and now with leopard it is doing flaky things again. While I agree it is a lovely thing to look at and when it works she finds it wonderfull, there is no doubt that it is not plain sailing.

[belfastblitz]

One thing I noticed recently when having to use a PC for work ( I have been a Mac user for 10+ years) is that the OS is just so bloated with settings and programs that 99.9 % of users will NEVER need....

The beauty of the MAc OS is that you have the ability to change the things you have to - and leave the rest to the OS. The OS X user interface is so good that Microsoft tried to copy many of its functions and ideas for Vista - but in typical Microsoft way they overengineer and overcomplicate everything.

The GUI ( what you see on screen ) is simple, clean, you can preview most items without even having to open them... installations are unbelieveably simple and with the whole iWork suite ( Spreadsheet, Powerpoint type app and Pages - for word processing ) available for the ridiculously low price of around £70 you have access to really great software.

Pretty much everyone I know who has ever moved to a Mac has loved it - and lets face it would you get people enthusing over Vista the way they do over the Mac?

In Apple you have a company who control everything from the OS to the hardware so in a few rare exceptions everything WORKS - I do laugh sometimes when I see PC guys tearing their hair out over some Viseo card compatibility driver issue... remember even brand name PC's can contain components from dozens of suppliers - leading to big probs down the line with software patches and drivers. I know some people still using 10 year old macs and getting along just fine.

Buy a Mac and I guarantee you'll love it!

[Radiohead]

Originally Posted by Gordon @ Convergent AV

Well just to dampen the enthusiasm a bit. My wife went to an iMac two years ago. In that time it's crashed, hung, had to have OS re-installed, had to go back to the supplier and now with leopard it is doing flaky things again. While I agree it is a lovely thing to look at and when it works she finds it wonderfull, there is no doubt that it is not plain sailing.

Sounds like a dodgy machine to me - there's clearly something amiss there.

[craig777]

Originally Posted by Radiohead

Sounds like a dodgy machine to me - there's clearly something amiss there.

I'd agree with Radiohead on that. Must be a duff machine if it's had endless problems.

I've been using Macs at work for about 18 years and over the last 4/5 years, Macs have become seriously stable bits of kit. Our Macs at work are on 24 hrs a day, 7 days a week - they nearly NEVER need to be restarted for anything. As for the Xserve we use, that thing is bullet proof!

[Liquid101]

Originally Posted by Gordon @ Convergent AV

Well just to dampen the enthusiasm a bit. My wife went to an iMac two years ago. In that time it's crashed, hung, had to have OS re-installed, had to go back to the supplier and now with leopard it is doing flaky things again. While I agree it is a lovely thing to look at and when it works she finds it wonderfull, there is no doubt that it is not plain sailing.

A hardware failure for sure. We had something similar 4 or 5 years ago with a G4 in the first few weeks of running it - I insisted on a replacment machine, and thats what I got.

Originally Posted by craig777

I've been using Macs at work for about 18 years and over the last 4/5 years, Macs have become seriously stable bits of kit. Our Macs at work are on 24 hrs a day, 7 days a week - they nearly NEVER need to be restarted for anything. As for the Xserve we use, that thing is bullet proof!

I have to admit, I did kill an Xserve RAID a year or so ago - I had one Xserve running 2 raid arrays, 1 and 4TB's. One afternoon the Xserve sounded like it was about to take off, followed by the smaller array throwing 2 disks at once. It wouldn't rebuild and had to be completely rebuilt from scratch. It's been fine ever since.

I've run macs workstations for about 10 years at work, about 20 in total, and apart from the G4 I mentioned above, I can't remember having any other issues that we couldn't be resolved without a simple OS reinstall - something that is no where near the painful experience of reinstalling windows

As for the cost - you get what you pay for. These are very well engineered machines - not to mention the ability to run OSX, which is what it's all about for me. We're all happy to pay top dollar for the best lenses (some of which will give only negligible improvements in performance) - why not the same for our computers?

[jonandjen]

Loving both my Macbook Pro and 24" iMac. Wouldn't be without them now, and will never go back to PC's again. Perfect for the 'photography hobby' Currently playing with the Aperture 2 trial and quite impressed so far. iPhoto is very good and I'm also using photoshop elements. Apple OS and other Apple software is a joy to use. As they say - "it just works"

Go for it !!

[pixelpixel]

I have used both systems for many years and each system is just like the other............... it has issues. Take the new mac air nice bit of kit, it already has issues.

Apple also confirmed that MacBook Air users who want to install Windows XP or Vista in a Boot Camp partition must have an external USB optical drive, like the £65 SuperDrive the company sells. Windows can't be installed using the Remote Disc CD/DVD-sharing software bundled with the MacBook Air, said Apple. "Be sure to connect your external USB optical drive to your MacBook Air before starting the Boot Camp Assistant," the company warned.

Here

Not a big issue, but still not as big as the random battery charge status.

I remeber the early days of Apple on system 6 and system 7, its a shame that any OS thats had some tweaks via a 3rd party still gets the flack pointed back to the owner.

If money no object I would have a mac pro again......:Thats 8 cores, a cheap price for a tank

I would still run both and get the best of both.

Enjoy whatever you buy

[monkeyleader]

So I reckon I'm pretty sure I'm going to move to the iMac - not until we get back from vacation, and hopefully by then we will have a clearer picture on any new iMacs coming down the line ...

Going to go through the other PC tasks I do day to day and see what alternatives are out there for the iMac.

Cheers for the all the tips out there - be assured there will be plenty of questions, updates and photos as I step on board the Boom train !

Nige

PS: now just assure me ... once I buy this iMac, I won't be tempted to go out and buy any tight fighting black pants to emulate Mr Jobs ?

[Gizmo 76]

Originally Posted by monkeyleader

Going to go through the other PC tasks I do day to day and see what alternatives are out there for the iMac.

This is one area I thought I might struggle with a Mac, I use to download loads of programs on my PC to do little jobs, but i've been so surprised by the amount of little apps on the Mac, and the quality of them is superb as well.

I don't know why I had this vision of the Mac being more restrictive in this way, but now I have a bit of software for all my needs (Photography needs, DVD ripping, file converting, flickr uploading, superb MSN replacement, DVD collection logging, etc...) , and it all works great

[richard plumb]

same here. I bought parallels to run windows XP on the mac because I had some apps I used that didn't have mac verisons. But there are plenty of equivalents, and I've found myself hardly ever using parallels.

I'd be tempted to remove it to free up the 30GB of space its using, but I think its worth it for those occasional IE only or XP only apps.

[Bristol Pete]

I switched to imac about 3 weeks ago and, yes I love it.

However, its not self explanitory and there are lots of things that I never knew were there. My friend came over on Friday and set up some cool features like corners, spaces and so on. Apparently the missing manual is an in house joke with mac dealers and may be worth buying. I expect there are lots of cool websites to learn from. I only learnt how to rename a folder on Friday!

I like things like dragging a raw or jpeg onto the icon on the tool bar which activates the suite super fast, no lag, no delay etc.

For me, the big difference is image quality. Though I suspect the panels are not that good, the picture quality has depth, super colour and contrast and something like a cross between a good CRT and a good LCD.

Pete.

[baldrick]

Originally Posted by electrolyte

He runs Lightroom perfectly fine and copes fine with RAW files.

Lightroom was primarily developed for Macs hence why there was no Windows Beta, similarly Aperture is an Apple product and therefore Mac only.

Both are developed by photographers, for photographers!

Traditionally Macs have always been for graphics and creative work so are great for photo processing.

I've been running Mac for a couple of years now and I'm just looking to buy an iMac, but I think I'll wait a couple of weeks and see if there are any announcements!

http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#iMac

[tomson]

I've been using macs for 10+ years day in day out. 90% of my working day is using photoshop for design and photography, I rarely have any problems with hardware* or software and can't say i've ever needed or wanted to run Windows on it.

As for handling raw files - never had a problem. I hardly ever buy new mac hardware - usually used or end of line models - and even the old G4 processors run CS3 and Lightroom at a decent speed.


*actually - I did break my powerbook by dropping it down the stairs not too long ago. Something I wouldn't recommend.

[monkeyleader]

Originally Posted by baldrick

http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#iMac

Awsome link mate - cheers

[pixelpixel]

Remember the forums has its own mac section: Mac Hardware, OS and Software