Should I make the switch?

G'day Captain,

Have you had a look here http://www.irchelp.org/irchelp/mac/, http://www.pure-mac.com/irct.html, http://macslash.org/article.pl'sid=04/09/07/178217 - a quick google on "mac irc free" turned it up.

Just saw this thread, and I agree totally. Bl**dy sick of coming home after working on / with computers all day, just to stuff around with the b*st*rd things all weekend trying to get it to work properly :-(

Current problem with mine is since I reinstalled XP a few weeks ago the sound keeps cutting out (but only when no other sound is playing). I get a very loud staticky sound from the speakers and then no more sound - if I try to play any movies with sound they jerk around like they're trying to get access to the sound drivers but are denied.

You'd reckon it'd be a hardware problem - except all I have to do to "fix" it is logout and login (no reboot required). In fact even when I'm logging out I get the logout sound! So obviously there's a program playing funny buggers somewhere, but I'm stuffed if I know what it is... it was doing it straight after the re-install *sigh* So now I guess I'll try re-installing again :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry:

So far I haven't brought up the energy, and it's certainly curbed me playing games & / or watching vids on the PC I can tell you.

When I get to Oz I'll look seriously at getting some sort of Mac, even if they are Intel based by then... I doubt Apple will let it run on just any sort of config, and I'm pretty darn sure they'll continue with their own case design etc.

Besides Mac OSX is "just" FreeBSD or OpenBSD with a pretty front end - damn good choice of OS if you ask me [img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif[/img]

Quote:

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Originally posted by Grizzly_Adams

Current problem with mine is since I reinstalled XP a few weeks ago the sound keeps cutting out (but only when no other sound is playing). I get a very loud staticky sound from the speakers and then no more sound - if I try to play any movies with sound they jerk around like they're trying to get access to the sound drivers but are denied.

.

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Sounds like you've got more than one driver on the job.
Try control panel-system-hardware-device manager - sound, video game controllers. You should only have one unless you are running multiple sound cards or motherboard sound plus a sound card. uninstall them, reboot and install again. That should fix it.

Yeah, right.

hth.

Simon.

Quote:

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Originally posted by abaddonxi
That should fix it.

Yeah, right.

hth.

Simon.

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[img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/laugh.gif[/img]

Thanks Simon, unfortunately there's only 1 sound card (onboard) and 1 driver loaded (that I can see). I've also tried updating the sound driver, uninstalling / reinstalling the sound driver but all to no avail :evil:

Good idea though and thanks for trying to help [img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif[/img]

Quote:

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Originally posted by abaddonxi+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(abaddonxi)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteBegin-Grizzly_Adams

Current problem with mine is since I reinstalled XP a few weeks ago the sound keeps cutting out (but only when no other sound is playing). I get a very loud staticky sound from the speakers and then no more sound - if I try to play any movies with sound they jerk around like they're trying to get access to the sound drivers but are denied.

.

---

Sounds like you've got more than one driver on the job.
Try control panel-system-hardware-device manager - sound, video game controllers. You should only have one unless you are running multiple sound cards or motherboard sound plus a sound card. uninstall them, reboot and install again. That should fix it.

Yeah, right.

hth.

Simon.[/b][/quote]
The thing that astonishes me is that windows and pc architecture forces people to go through this all the time... that don't work in computers for a living. It mus be really traumatic for them [img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/sad.gif[/img]

note my white beard---- :roll: [img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/laugh.gif[/img] [img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/laugh.gif[/img]

I had a friend who writes some very specialised software. For something like ten years it's been on unix.

A couple of years ago he had a go at moving it to Windows.

Gave up, because whenever anything went wrong he had to wipe and start from scratch.

He said he'd had unix computers that had never needed to be reinstalled running for years at a time.

My only recommendations are:

Make a bootable ghost of your system when it's running well.

Back up everything - oh have I been caught out by that one.

Don't get a new computer until you absolutely can't stand to use the old one. I reckon it takes a full-time week minimum to get a new system up and running and all of the guff transferred from the old system.

Oh I love computers.



Cheers

Simon

Quote:

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Originally posted by abaddonxi
Don't get a new computer until you absolutely can't stand to use the old one. I reckon it takes a full-time week minimum to get a new system up and running and all of the guff transferred from the old system.

Oh I love computers.



Cheers

Simon

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You're right about that one.. The mac has been different though... it comes all ready to go... it's just my time in learning a totally new thing [img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/ohmy.gif[/img]

Your mate should go mac too... it is based on BSD linux which is a flavou of UNIX [img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif[/img]

Ah, no, code freaks, not interested in pretty interfaces. I think they're moving it all to web and ajax.

Reckon I hate them all about equally.

Cheers
Simon

Hi folks, I’ve gone the other way. After 18 years of using Macs, I’ve switched to PCs and to be very honest, I wish I had changed over 4 years ago.

Up until OSX came along, Macs were pretty well rock solid and left PCs for dead. Because of the types of programs I need to conduct my business, not long after buying my first Mac in 1987, I had to get a PC because of the type of CAD programs I needed were not available for a Mac or were up to 6 or 7 times the cost of an equivalent PC program.

I avoided using the PCs for anything but jobs that absolutely had to be done on the PCs.

Then along came OSX and ( back then ) being a Machead, I started to swap over to the new machines. Two for the office and one for my daughter to use at Tech.

One of the office OSX Macs was bought with the idea of finally doing something I have wanted to do for nearly 30 years and that’s to make amateur films ( videos now days ) so I spent up big and poured close to $19,000 over two and a half years it to this one machine. Over this period we spent a total of around $30,000 on new Mac equipment and and it’s been a total waste of money.

We did nothing but spend hours, hundreds of hours downloading upgrades and so called fix its trying to get this crap to be of some use for the business. NEVER HAPPENED.

By December last year I had had enough of OSX and Apple’s pro video applications and by this time my daughter had had battled on for a year with her Mac-crap at Uni, so I bought two cheap PC laptops with the idea if they don’t workout, I haven’t lost too much MORE money.

I’m now sorry I didn’t get bigger PCs and ( also sorry I didn’t know dave sold PC gear ). So far the only downloads needed have been for printer drivers to allow us to swap our printer over from the Macs to the PCs.

If you intend to use the Macs at home as toys, they are great but don’t waste your money buying Apple’s pro video programs. They are intended for people who are working at it full time. Just ask camo what he thinks of Final Cut Pro 5.

The free video programs that come with new macs, iPhoto iDVD work well but there are heaps of free programs for PCs to so there is, in my opinion, now, no great advantage to having a Mac over a PC.

Just my two bobs worth, and by the way, I still have two Mac G3 Desktops running OS8.6, working in the office. They never miss a beat.

That's bad news Drivesafe. It's interesting that a mate of mine is a pro photographer (He's even had a photo on the cover of Time) , and he won't touch anything else.. claims his apple is the best thing. He's just ordered aperature too.

I was just sick of PC's in general.. viruses... hackers... spyware... endless patches.. crashes, and hit-and-miss hardware. I'm fortunate that my apple didn't cost to much, and I'll be doing pretty mainstream stuff so I hope I'll be ok [img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif[/img]