I know it may sound..weird but yeah I've used MS Dos for a couple of years and Windows for about 10 years after that. I've never used MAC and dont know a single thing about it. Can you tell me what it is? Is it just another OS. Is it specifically designed for office use or home use. Is the speed of mac computers faster/slower than windows etc Thanks

The Mac (not MAC) is a computer platform (hardware/software) developed by Apple Computer. It has features that appeal to home and office users, just like Windows. It runs an OS developed by Apple called Mac OS X. It resembles UNIX in its technical aspects, but has a very nice, easy-to-use GUI. Up until recently, the Mac used a different processor architecture than PCs (PCs used x86, Macs used PowerPC), but recently, Apple Computer discoverd that the PC processor (x86) is more powerful than the PowerPC, so Apple is currently in the process of moving the entire Mac line over to x86 (developers who have the x86 Macs say that OS X is much faster than it was on the G5, so this is a good sign for people interested in purchacing a Mac in a year or two). Head over to Apple.com to read more about it, but DON'T buy a Mac until it has a Pentium, or other Intel processor... you'd be putting your money into and arcitecture that Apple is trying to kill... and of course, you could always wait for Windows Vista to come out in late 2006. :-) -MikeG Dell Dimension 8200 / iMac G3 350MHz 2.53GHz Pentium 4 w/533MHZ FSB 768MB PC800 RDRAM GeForce 6600GT 128MB 120GB HD

Everything above is correct except the comment about x86 being more powerful that would be like saying Apples are sweeter then Oranges it had to do more with the fact that the power PC chip ran hotter and heat kills laptop and Apple has been talking about moving to Intel chips for years now. You can also buy a Mac now and use it for years the new mechines will be cross platform just like they are now OS 9 And OS X and if you still feel the need to see a BSOD you can install Virtual PC and watch a Blue Screen until you get tired, save state and go back to your Panther , Tiger or what ever they will call the next OS

C'mon pumpnethel, that wasnt very nice. I am Windows user and I have only had a BSOD when my harddrive crashed and that was hardly Windows' fault. Anyway since I am not a Mac user I cannot tell you much. People tend to prefer Macs when doing artistic stuff like video editing, Sound editing and "Photoshopping". For office you there is no real diffrence. Gaming wise Windows computers win hands down. Many people have problems with PCs becuase a PC is much more complex and more popular. Its popularity has cuases people to develop viruses and spywar efor it while Macs rarley dea lkwith suck problems. Although I have never gotten a virus for my PC I know that there are many more KNOWN holes in Windows than OS X. To the average person Macs are much easir to use and are exremly simple compared to Windows Pcs.

ah right. so there really isnt much difference if u'r an average user except that its simpler. the thing is my girlfriend wants to buy a laptop soon and she seemed to like the apple laptops. personally i like windows but i havent ever used apple so i cudnt really say if she shud go for it or not. she's not a heavy user and she'll just be using it for writing, printing, listening to music etc so wud mac be better for her if its simple? (and if the powerpc chips arent slower than the inter chips in windows pcs)

key word is different not superior or lesser the cpu may bench mark on some things slower but on other aspecs they benchmark higher plus os x has supported 64 bit up until now windows didnt... only the posix based systems. what makes the mac so nice is the fact that they do control the hardware so that the os is optimized for that hardware.. its like the differnce between a generic linux kernel you download and one you compile with all the uneeded stuff dropped... the optimized kernel loads way faster macs memory management is the most impreeive ive seen so is the gui interface though linux is catching up fast.. with looking glass tech and kde.. the real nice aspec of os x is most of the old compatibility issues that used to exist with macs is gone often os x works better in a windows enviroment then windows boxes.. the one exception is the release of os x labeled 10.4 it was a major revision to the os and broke some networking but with additional patches 10.4.2 most have been resolved the thing that you have to take note with os x is to drop all preconceptions of how a computer should work remember the first time you tried to remove a program under windows you assumed you simply deleted the folder and that was it... well it turned out to not be that easy most things in windows gui didnt flow towards natural tendencies of novice users.. mac took those aspects and incorporated them into their user interface gues how you install and uninstall programs drag and drop just like you thought it should be the first time with windows... a year ago i would only have told you that os x had alot of potential but in the past year linux and os x (plus bsd) have way outstripped windows in technology many of the aspects prommised in longhorn (vista) have been dropped because microsoft couldnt figure them out like the revolutionary file system well mac didnt rewrite the files system they use but they did put a supplimentary app that allows such contextual searches.. most of the other promises that microsoft dropped osx and linux allready deliver its a shame that the most expensive of the three (not off the shelf but when you take licensing into account) is the worst of teh lot 3rd party software asside (since if developers wanted it they could develop for mac just as easilly) looking at the os functionallity ,stability and ui os x does stand out quite a bit though im still partiall towards my linux when free is so darn close in comparison its hard to nock it