And the MAC v PC battle continues.

So, I keep struggling with the possibility of switching, as I’m not happy with my PC continuing to lock up. Is it a power issue? Is it heat? Who knows. I’m simply tiring of dealing with it.  And to add insult to injury, my Real Estate office PC – which is quite important to me to have running – happened to take the opportunity to absolutely die in the middle of a Win10 update.

As in died so badly that I need to take a day and re-install everything from scratch.

So, one PC down hard. One ailing enough to require attention. Something has got to change. The question is… to what?

My current configuration is (roughly)  as follows…

CPU: AMD FX-8350
MOBO: Gigabyte 990FXA-UD3
RAM: 16gb DDR3 Ram
Video: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970
PS: Corsair HX650  (circa 2012)
Plus, 2 optical drives, about 5 Hard Drives, and a SATA add in card.
And for monitors, a 28 inch Samsung 4k UE590 and a 27 inch Samsung SynchMaster T27B350

It could be I’m asking too much of that 4 year old 650 Watt power supply, but regardless, it leaves me facing the question of whether to put $500 – 1000 into a PC that I’ll have to build for an i7 CPU, or do I drop $1800 into a MAC (including Apple care). I do have my eye on a refurbished MAC with the following specs..

Refurbished 27-inch iMac 3.2GHz Quad-core Intel Core i5 with Retina 5K display (Originally released October 2015)
27-inch (diagonal) Retina 5K display with IPS technology; 5120‑by‑2880 resolution
8GB memory
1TB hard drive
AMD Radeon R9 M380
Built-in FaceTime HD camera
(and I think I can hook my 4k monitor into the MAC for use as a second monitor)

As a PC guy, I’ve always looked at MACs as underpowered, but there’s something to be said for just working.  If I go PC, I’ll probably start largely from scratch, with the exception of the video card and some useful parts. If I go MAC, it’s a whole other story.

I had my finger on the “buy” button today for the MAC, but…. jeez. That price….. And those specs.   That’s what I was running 4 years ago!

But, those machines are pretty dominant in the graphic art industries.

10 thoughts on “And the MAC v PC battle continues.”

  1. I was a PC guy since my 486-33, but I liked my iPhone so much that we made the the switch to a Mac about 2 and a half years ago. No regrets. The best thing about a Mac is no fiddling, just turn it on and it works. I’ve had zero issues.

  2. You know you want the MAC. Just buy it and get it over with.

    My only reservation about MAC’s are the people who tend to buy them. Yuppies. Wannabe losers. People who try to hard to be cool or trendy. People who care too much about status and talk all the time about it.

    1. I’ve been PC since I bought my 286 with new vga technology (set me back $3k back then), but I’m sorely tempted like never before.

      I did ask my daughter who is going to DSU for animation what she thought. She offered that “MAC’s suck.”

  3. Because I became highly dependent and liked my iPhone and iPad, I decided almost two years ago to go to an iMac and haven’t looked back.

    Pros: Absolutely trouble free. Not only does it always work, I’ve never had to restart/reboot it except when I am updating the software. The seamless integration is nearly perfect with one exception: I’ve upgraded one of my devices (iPad,iPhone, or iMac) and for a day the integration is spotty until I get notified to update the other devices. I absolutely love how all my music is easily on all devices, my passwords are available on all devices.

    Cons: My only frustration is I can listen part way through a podcast on one device and it doesn’t show I’ve listened to it on another device (pretty petty) and there are some applications which just work better on a PC (excel for one) which on occasion cause some discomfort but when compared to the convenience of the Pros, small price to pay.

  4. :-). First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win. Welcome to Mac world PP. Next thing you know you’ll be voting for Democrats. 🙂

    1. Actually, I’m leaning towards the PC solution. And I’ll spend what I saved on having my kitchen tiled.

      1. Maybe Mac Pro’s in SF will give you one for ad space and promotion?

        How many Mac products could the number one blogger in SD sell?

  5. I have had a Linux box running for over 3 years, no problems. I had only one reboot when the power went out.

    That is not to say Linux isn’t without a few challenges, however I have always been able to make it work.

  6. With all that being said, I bit the bullet. I have 30 days to return it, so we’ll see how this experiment goes.

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