I'm debating whether to replace my IBM clone / WIN XP Home....with the latest offering from ******** or who ever, or go to Machintosh OSX,
along with the latest TIGER upgrade and 80gig h/d.

Price is not my main consideration...stability is though, and I am just about sick 'n tired of blue screen and GPF's .

Any one using Mac wanna chime in ?

How's about the Mac Mini....is it as good as they say ?

My primary use is running my small shop, web surfing, Ebay, and e mail. No games or music.

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[http://languageandgrammar.com/2008/01/14/youve-got-problems-not-issues/ ]

"A liberal is someone who feels they owe a great debt to their fellow man, which debt he proposes to pay off with your money."

Not much experience with Macs or Windows XP, but i've been using windows 2000 for years now and i never get any blue screens, and rarely do you get any crashes of any kind.

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1985 CA 300D Turbo , 213K mi

Either will suffice. I have a house running Panther, Win2000 and XP on the same network and each has their own strenghs and weaknesses. Maybe I should add a Linux box and see how they all play together.

I am a dedicated PC user although for your purposes a MAC might be more attractive than a plain PC. A well sorted XP machine is plenty stable and more upgradeable (As long as the components are good) but a MAC might be more eye pleasing. For comparison I have run windows 2000 machines which is the basis for XP for nearly 6 months without a restart...the restart was for a virus update patch.

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1974 240D 3.0L 4(M) - 250K -OM617.910 + 300D FW + Rajay turbo power!
1977 6.9 3(A) - 84k

Either one will work. I prefer OS X.

If you stay Windows, I'd recommend XP Pro over XP home.

If you go Mac, do NOT be among the first to get Tiger....similar thinking to not getting new cars their first years, except that OS issues are resolved much quicker.

If you go Mac Mini, buy some RAM from MacMall or OWC, install it yourself, and sell the "old" stick that came out of it after you've verified your system runs OK (you'll know in a couple of days' use).

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1990 190e 2.6 - The only one I can really call "My Car".

1987 190e 2.3 - The donor car's up and running, only mods are Euros and a Sony headunit. My Dad's runabout now.

1990 300e 2.6 - The parents' ride.

I don't think the Mac Mini will take full advantage of Tiger; the Powerbooks and G5's are Tiger ready.

The Ibooks are also very nice machines for home use, plenty of power. If you like easy to use computers get an Apple, even Jessica Simpson was able to set up an Isight camera on her Mac

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1979 Black on Black, 300CD (sold), 1990 Black 300SE, Silver 1989 Volvo 780, 1988 300CE (vanished by the hands of a girlfriend), 1992 300CE (Rescue).

I second the XP pro edition. We have many flavors here and the XP pro is winning me over from the WIN2K. Any good P4 machine will do if you load it up with ram and hd. Dell has some deals that are too cheap to believe. Just be carefull as they don't tell you what their machine does NOT include unless you ask. Avoid the non P4 Intel chips.

I looked at the Mini, but unless you need the small footprint, isn't it just a laptop without a keyboard, screen and mouse, at $499? Just as I wouldn't recommend an entry level Pentium PC, I wouldn't recommend an entry level Mac box.