fritz_sean

I have my fair share of PC's and Macs, I like both. He just said he was thinking about getting a Mac mini I just simply told him I liked the Mac products I owned, sorry if that makes me a "fanboy".

j_syk

I use 19" imacs at work. We run photoshop, illustrator, and other adobe products. We also had a mac mini that was connected to our plotter (42" wide roll printer). All of these computers are less than 2 years old. The mac mini is slow as molasses. Takes several minutes to open photoshop CS2 files and a long time to render and print. I'd say at least twice as long as our imacs. I don't know the stats off hand, but I've been less than impressed with the macs i've worked on for the last 3 years. The OS is good. The price is not. For the money- I'd rather have a windows system. I'm not sure what the mac mini performance is on the latest models, but don't hold your breath for them to be too surprisingly great.
Just my 2 cents from someone who has used a variety of windows and mac products. If you want a light weight system not for gaming, go linux. Then you can still build your own computer, and not even have to pay for an OS at all. This article shows some linux versions that are very much like the Mac OS.

windows: build a good system relatively cheap > pay for windows > heavy OS
mac OSX: pay for the name and logo > lower end system (for budget price macs) > semi-lightweight OS
linux: build a good system relatively cheap > download a linux version free > lightweight OS

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fritz_sean

Photoshop is kind of a monster of a program though. Since you are using it to print fairly large images as well. If he feels up to getting Linux installed and running that would be a great alternative to OSX. Would be a money saver for sure.

sLowEnd

Mac minis aren't too great

They haven't been updated in a really long time. Wait till Apple refreshes if you want to get a mac mini

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ChrisB17

Why not build a mini shuttle type PC and run windows and OSX? Like dual boot,

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Humanfactor

Apple made a law type thing that makes OSX Apple computer exclusive, so that would be illegal.
OT: Linux is a very good alternative to almost any OS. I would suggest Linux Mint cause it has most of your usual programs like an office suit, music/dvd player, codecs and drivers preinstalled. BTW if you haven't ever built a PC on your own then this would be a great for a first time as linux is free and you won't have to activate anything in case you accidentally format your HDD. =]

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DarkNite

Unless size is a must I dont see too much of a reason to go with a mac - better hardware for the same price, or equal hardware for less....

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Deano12345

Lots of good arguments in here,guess I'll add my opinion in here,the mini really appeals to me because of it's size and that fact that it is super quiet.As far as the speed go's,anything would be an upgrade from my sig rig,I think a 2.0 GHz C2D will do me fine for speed

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ChrisB17

Alot of people own and use hackentosh's.

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pioneerisloud

Just keep in mind, you can build the EXACT same hardware for MUCH cheaper. And you could build it to be as small and quiet as you want it to be. Use a Shuttle case if you want it small.

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