Help on buying a new computer

[realisticphish]

alright, basically, my poor old emac is running out. She helped me through the first two years of college, but its close to retirement time.

So i have a couple questions.
1.) can "windows" hardware such as hard drives, and video/sound cards be installed into a G5 tower (i know they cant in an iMac)

2.) can "windows" monitors be used w/ a g5 tower

3.) Which should i go for, iMac or g5 tower?

4.) what are some good places to find new cheap computers (besides ebay)


thanks!

[alfredo]

1. I will see what I can do

1. Any hard drive will work. I use Maxtor. Make sure the Video card is Mac compatible. I believe the sound card in the Mac is just fine. If not you would hear the audio geeks complaining, and you would see a lot of third party sound cards for the Mac.

2. Any Standard Monitor will work with the Mac. I use ViewSonic.

3. iMac or Power Mac depends on what you are doing. If you need to push a lot of polygons, go with the Power Mac dual. PhotoShop loves duals.

4. Try Small Dog. http://www.smalldog.com/

[realisticphish]

2. the issue with imac/powermac

is that i could maybe get a cheaper tower, and then upgrade the HD, cards, monitor, etc for much MUCH cheaper. (assuming i'm correct in assuming that imacs cant be upgraded easily)

[alfredo]

3. What do you do with your computer?

That can determine what you can get.

You can get a PowerMac starting at $1,499. It seems to be spec'd pretty good.
$1,499.00


1.8GHz PowerPC G5
600MHz frontside bus

512K L2 cache
256MB DDR400 SDRAM
Expandable to 4GB SDRAM
80GB Serial ATA
8x SuperDrive
Three PCI Slots
NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 Ultra
64MB DDR video memory
56K internal modem

Now here is the similarly priced iMac.

$1,499.00


17-inch widescreen LCD
1.8GHz PowerPC G5
512K L2 cache
600MHz frontside bus
256MB DDR400 SDRAM
NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 Ultra
64MB DDR video memory
80GB Serial ATA hard drive
Slot-load SuperDrive

Of course you do get the 17" display

On both you must add RAM.

[realisticphish]

4. hmm, thats true

and, i'd have to add maybe 200 for the monitor.

but other than that, its about the same. i never actually noticed that :dunce:

and really, i do some video stuff, and some gaming, but nothing that would need more than what is included.

the imac is sounding good at the moment

[alfredo]

5. If you are not a power user, or need the power of a Dual

the iMac with a bunch of RAM will do the trick. 512 is the minimum.

[realisticphish]

7. i already have 640

in my emac; could i transfer that memory to the new imac?

[alfredo]

9. Not sure if

that would be a good idea. Go ahead and get new RAM.

[realisticphish]

10. ok, thanks nt

[PBR me]

6. my opinion on #4

i usually check dealsontheweb.com and dealmac.com daily for deals and such on peripherals and ram - i personally purchased a refurb dual 1.8 g5 from the apple store - their refurbs carry the same one year warranty as new machines - the refurb selection is updated and changes often

[realisticphish]

8. i didnt even think about refurbs

i'll check that out, thanks

[alfredo]

11. My Dual 450/G4 is a refurb.

I haven't had a lick of trouble with it in all the years I have used it.

[emulatorloo]

12. Another Place that tracks deals on imacs or G5 towers - www.lowendmac.com

This site tracks best deals our there too:

http://www.lowendmac.com/ppc/g5deals.html

http://www.lowendmac.com/imac/deals.html

______________________________________________

To reiterate what others have said. yes "windows" drives will work in your G5. Needs to be serial ATA.

With video cards, it must be a card that has a Mac Driver, so Windows cards are out.
ATI offers serveral Mac Cards.

Try newegg.com's mac section at

http://www.newegg.com/mac/?DEPA=8

As far as RAM goes, you need new ram - can't reuse emac ram. I highly recommend this RAM vendor - good prices, lifetime warranty, know about Macs, great people.

http://www.datamem.com/AMM.asp

I don't work for any of these people -- I am just a mac user like you trying to get the best deals. So please check these things out.

[bullimiami]

13. imac or tower

for me it depends on if you need the pci slots, if you will be satisfied with the built in imac monitor and video, if you want the internal space to add addl drives.

if you dont need any of that, imac is cool.

[Poiuyt]

14. With a tower, you can upgrade the computer or the monitor separately...

with the iMac, they would need to be upgraded together. This might come into play if you decided you liked the computer but wanted a larger monitor, or liked the monitor, but the computer was getting old. That said, I really like the new iMacs.

I second what one person said about smalldog.com. They are a reputable dealer and they advertise on liberal talk radio.