OT Secondhand Macs

Daughter has decided she must have a Mac computer.

I know little of these things except they seem bloody expensive. I'm
looking for a secondhand desktop - how much and where?

What are must haves and the tips, tricks and traps?

 

Macs hold their value, it seems. I looked into second hand stuff but
decided I'd be better off buying a new one is only a couple of hundred
quid more expensive.

There are two types of Mac. PowerPC (old) and Intel (new) - I'd
suggest grabbing an Intel based one (if getting 2nd hand) as they're
more powerful and you can install Windows on them if required using
the included Boot-Camp software.

If she's already got a display, keyboard and mouse then a Mac Mini
might be a good option. They retail brand new at £499

http://www.apple.com/uk/macmini/

That slot on the front is the CD/DVD drive. The whole machine is only
slightly larger than a PC CDROM drive. If she does have her own VGA
or DVI display then she's probably going to need to throw a
miniDisplayPort to to VGA (or mDP to DVI) adaptor in her shopping cart
unless her monitor already supports mDP or mini-DVI.

Don't bother buying MS Office for Mac, just download OpenOffice for
Mac for free from openoffice.org which is now mac-native.

Or you can get an iMac new for which are £949 for the 20" model. The
display is FANTASTIC, but if she's not doing high level photo editing
then she might as well get a Mini.

 

Don't get a PPC. Obsolete now. In fact I wouldn't even get a core single
intel.

Lovely. I have one (core single in fact) running my mail, torrents, XBMC
and so on.

Indeed. It's crap.

I'd go with the mini. AFAIK they all have DVI outputs anyway, don't
they? the adapter for that would be about £10 if whatever current
display has no DVI input.

--
Catman MIB#14 SKoGA#6 TEAR#4 BOTAFOF#38 Apostle#21 COSOC#3
Tyger, Tyger Burning Bright (Remove rust to reply)
116 Giulietta 3.0l Sprint 1.7 145 2.0 Cloverleaf 156 V6 2.5 S2
Triumph Sprint ST 1050: It's blue, see.
www.cuore-sportivo.co.uk

 

The specs on the website state that the base/cheapest new Mac Mini
starts off with a 2.0gHz Core 2 Duo

It's always nice to know that not having Windows (and not having to
run anti-spyware progs, virus checkers, etc) taking up most of the CPU
and RAM means an old Mac is still capable of a decent amount of work
and new ones just fly.

Not sure what iWork is like, but it's not as free as OOo which I use
at home and at work.

<http://www.apple.com/uk/macmini/design.html> Middle photo shows the
current setup. It has a mini-DVI and mini Display Port.

Looks like the current holes on the back are for:

Kensington lock
Mic in
Audio out
Power
Ethernet (1gb/sec)
Firewire 800 (800mb/sec)
mini-DVI
mini Display Port
5xUSB 2.0 (480mb/sec)

 

'Pages' makes MSWord look like a text editor.

'Numbers' is prettier than MSExcel, but lacks a few of the more
powerful features that a heavy Excel user might miss.

'Keynote' is a joy to work with compared to MSPowerpoint.

All seamlessly import and export from/to MS file formats.

 

It might depend on what she needs it for. My Mum is using an old 733MHz
Quicksilver model, and I'm quite impressed with how well it does most
jobs. It still manages iPhoto work quite well, and is more than adequate
for word processing, Emailing and web. You can get these for well under
£100. It still might be a good starting point if you're only trying out.
Anything over 867MHz and you can still run the latest OS and most of the
latest software.

However, yes, ideally opt for a Core 2 Duo based machine if you can.

Agreed. I got a copy from the educationamal site, and it's OK for the
£35 it cost there, but I'd have been really pissed off if I'd paid full
retail.

We also have Windows 2007 on a PC here, and that's even worse - what a
user interface!

First thing I found with the Mac version is that Word has its own print
dialogue, and it hasn't got the Duplex option on it.

Also check out NeoOffice, some prefer on or t'other.

The iMac also has a mini-display adapter for running a second monitor.

Also check the Apple Refurb site, I got my MacBook there last year for
about £250 less than a new model. I've been happy enough with it, it
came with a 0 cycles battery, and a fresh hard drive, all the standard
accessories, and a full warranty.

 

To be absolutely fair, it can't handle HD video *quite* but WTF.

Ahh well. Not exactly a big additional cost.


--
Catman MIB#14 SKoGA#6 TEAR#4 BOTAFOF#38 Apostle#21 COSOC#3
Tyger, Tyger Burning Bright (Remove rust to reply)
116 Giulietta 3.0l Sprint 1.7 145 2.0 Cloverleaf 156 V6 2.5 S2
Triumph Sprint ST 1050: It's blue, see.
www.cuore-sportivo.co.uk

 

I really don't think the price differential makes economic sense unless
you're *really* strapped for cash.

Oh aye. Company paid, though.

As a not very power user of Office type stuff I've not really noticed.

Good deal. Luckily for me, the company gives me a MacBook every so often

--
Catman MIB#14 SKoGA#6 TEAR#4 BOTAFOF#38 Apostle#21 COSOC#3
Tyger, Tyger Burning Bright (Remove rust to reply)
116 Giulietta 3.0l Sprint 1.7 145 2.0 Cloverleaf 156 V6 2.5 S2
Triumph Sprint ST 1050: It's blue, see.
www.cuore-sportivo.co.uk

 

The same single core Intel processor running Windows would have more
trouble playing HD video when one factors the excessive OS overheads
and virus checker, etc.

I think the miniDisplayPort to VGA connector for my MacBook Pro cost
me £15 from the Apple Store. My HD TV has a VGA connector on the
back.

 

Most of what Nick wrote is fine, bar this.

If she's at college or uni, and must submit documents, then get Mac
Office. It's the only way she can truly know that what she's creating
is what her tutors will see. Open Office is good, but not good
enough.

And students get MS products for pennies.

 

I don't get this, at college (and with the OU) we handed in printed
copies of assignments. Have the rules changed to allow files to be
submitted now?

 

I'd have thought so, it's been a while, but there's also collaboration
aspects to consider.

 

Christ I would hope so. I did some OU postgrad stuff about ten years
back and all the coursework was expected to be in electronic form.

The exams were a pita - arm, that is. First course I did, Software
Engineering, was mainly essay-type questions. It must have been 20+
years since I'd had to write that much by hand, and my hand-writing's
not great at the best of times. Got 94%, mind, so at least it must
have been legible.

 

I agree, although I hadn't assumed any budget needs, just that an older
Mac is a usable machine if that's all you can afford.

IME, such a machine might be just as usable (in terms of performance),
as a similarly priced Windows box.

My Brother-in-law actually got my Mum's old G4/400 Sawtooth, and loves
it compared to the 1.3GHz PC he was using.

Git! ;-)

FWIW, I'm trying to find a way to change to an iMac at the moment. For
one, Emily's iBook needs updating, so she can have my MacBook. For
another, I hardly use mine mobile now, so putting up with the slower HD,
and poorer graphics doesn't make sense anymore.

 

Many universities have gone down the electronic submission route as they
can check it against a database for plagiarism.

 

Actually for photo editing you don't want the 20" one either, because
(unless Apple fixed that recently) it has a similar restriction to the
number of colours it can display that the older/smaller Intel MacBooks
have had (over which Apple got sued).

<checks>

Looks like the spec for the 20" one now also says "millions of colors"
(which was the statement they got sued over because the MacBook in
question could only display 262000 different colours).

OK, so I'll partially retract that statement - back when I bought my
iMac you still have to watch out for this.

 

Crap is probably a bit strong. I do have it and I do use it, but 2008 is
missing an important feature for Windows compatibility (VBA). OTOH Excel
occasionally has some funny ideas about printer output so I generally
use OO for PDF output.

Mini-DVI. So you'll need an adapter for it anyway. Yes, you can use a PC
keyboard (I do in a sense, but that one has a switchable "Mac mode") but
from the way the Mac Mini has been developed (or rather hasn't) I would
think an iMac might make more sense secondhand.

 

OpenOffice is rather good at creating PDF's that will display unchanged
wherever.

 

Andy Hewitt wrote:

Would it make you feel any better if I said they'd happily give me a
Pro, but that doesn't fit as well in my pannier

Why not a Mac Mini?

--
Catman MIB#14 SKoGA#6 TEAR#4 BOTAFOF#38 Apostle#21 COSOC#3
Tyger, Tyger Burning Bright (Remove rust to reply)
116 Giulietta 3.0l Sprint 1.7 145 2.0 Cloverleaf 156 V6 2.5 S2
Triumph Sprint ST 1050: It's blue, see.
www.cuore-sportivo.co.uk

 

Not properly seamlessly, though. K wrote her CV in Pages, butthe
formatting is all fucked up when viewed by Office 2003 or 2007 on a
PC. And of course, headhunters don't want CVs in PDF format (which
does maintain intended formatting), so she's doing her CV on my PC.