Switched to Mac

[David Wright]

I am not sure Vizio's 4K televisions that are out now have smaller than 50" but in May they are releasing an "M" series with
a 4K 43" tv for $600. Not that I intend to use it as computer monitor.

 

[Andriy]

More funny is that a 5K iMac is $2500.00...
you can't even get close to pricing a similarly spec'd PC
with a 5K monitor... C'mon man, a 5K Dell monitor
is 2500 bucks for pete's sake.

You could buy a 5K iMac, get Windows, and you technically
have a free computer (if you are paying for a 5K monitor)
PLUS you can add another 4K monitor for a few hundred bucks more.

So all this cr@p about Macs being 2-3 times more money
is lame. When it comes to a 5K iMac, seems to me a Windows
machine with the same hardware is close to twice the price.

http://www.macmall.com/p/HP-Monitors/product~DPNo~13471426~pdp.jaidihb


You can buy 2 of those, and have $1,100 left to buy a slightly better video card for the resolution, same processor and other things to add up to what he paid for his.
For roughly $400-$500 of what he paid, you can have 2 pretty monitors with better specs

 

[synergy_jim]

Never thought of that, but it seems it would work just fine.

tons of companies out there making matte screen appliqué pieces for the mac. I like my glossy screens though.


BTW..... my Retina MacBook Pro edits HD video and doesn't even break a sweat. That and the best customer service in the business is what makes them worth it.

 

[MichaelAlmand]

I just bought a brand new iMac 5K Retina Display. Went with i7 4.0GHZ, 1 TB Fusion Drive, AMD R9 295X 4GB DDR5 GPU, and 32GB of RAM. We are switching our graphics department from PC based to Mac based slowly and this was the first purchase (besides our Mac Mini that runs Caldera). We are also going to switch for the most part from using CorelDraw to Illustrator. This new iMac has such a gorgeous display and it is so freaking fast I can't believe it. I'm coming from about a 6 year old PC that had pretty good specks when I built it and had upgraded to an SSD about a year ago but it needed some new parts and the boss said go ahead and make the switch now if I want. I couldn't be happier with my decision.

How does it work with illustrator and photoshop CC? Any performance issues?, lagging?

 

[rjssigns]

How does it work with illustrator and photoshop CC? Any performance issues?, lagging?

They rock! Only issues I've noticed with CC have been software/cloud/network related.(no hardware issues) All student projects use Ai, Ps and Id.

 

[MichaelAlmand]

They rock! Only issues I've noticed with CC have been software/cloud/network related.(no hardware issues) All student projects use Ai, Ps and Id.

I heard there was lagging because of the 5K screens.

Thanks

 

[oksigns]

I've come from both Mac and PC.. heck, design school pushed apple products down my throat, but at the end of the day, I will stick with a windows machine. The main reason why we upgraded with a custom built pc was that it beat the newer mac pros by cost and performance- repairs and future upgrades are negligible because it can all be done in-house.

 

[JAMEY]

I have a Mid-2015 MacBook Pro Retina with a 512GB SSD and the dedicated AMD 2GB video card. It has 16GB or ram and the i7 processor. It chews up anything I throw at it including 4K video in Final Cut Pro. The thing don't even get hot! I have Paralells Desktop 10 and run Windows 10 (bought 7 and it forced an upgrade...grrrr).

The only issue I had running Parallels 10 was that my zoom to cursor was not working correctly in CorelDraw X7. So I traded my Magic Mouse in towards the Logitech MX Anywhere mouse. Awesome mouse, but the zoom to cursor in Corel was still clunky.

I got got so mad that I actually uninstalled Paralells, Office, and Corel. Then I installed Windows on a Bootcamp partition. That cured the zoom to cursor problem. It just sucks having to reboot in and out of Bootcamp to switch from OSX to Windows and visa versa. I recently got rid of the Bootcamp partition because I just upgraded my Paralells Desktop 10 to the new 11. I haven't installed it yet because I have to find my Windows CD. I will soon. I am hoping that the new Paralells will cure my zoom to cursor issue in CorelDraw X7. If it don't, I may upgrade to X8 or see how well Signlab works with Paralells Desktop 11. I have no interest in Flexi whatsoever and don't really know much about SignCut Pro.

Oh yeah, I also run an Apple wireless keyboard while keeping my MacBook Pro on a Rain stand. I use my Retina display only as a secondary to my 42" 4K Ultra HD Sony TV that acts as my main monitor. I tried the Thunderbolt and it blacked out the first day. So hello Sony!

This is my home office setup. I use a Windows PC at the shop for the XC-540. I just picked up a Roland GS-24 for the home office. Does anybody know if CutStudio will work with Paralells? I do want to print and cut with it.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

I have a Mid-2015 MacBook Pro Retina with a 512GB SSD and the dedicated AMD 2GB video card. It has 16GB or ram and the i7 processor. It chews up anything I throw at it including 4K video in Final Cut Pro. The thing don't even get hot! I have Paralells Desktop 10 and run Windows 10 (bought 7 and it forced an upgrade...grrrr).

The only issue I had running Parallels 10 was that my zoom to cursor was not working correctly in CorelDraw X7. So I traded my Magic Mouse in towards the Logitech MX Anywhere mouse. Awesome mouse, but the zoom to cursor in Corel was still clunky.

I got got so mad that I actually uninstalled Paralells, Office, and Corel.

Every now and again there are problems with some virtualization software. Sometimes they can crop up if you use coherance mode or full screen mode etc.

I know some people that run the same digitizing software that I do have have it running through that same program, but can't run it in coherance mode (Unity Mode or Seamless mode if talking about VMWare or Virtualbox, no problems with that issue with Virtualbox in Seamless).

Then I installed Windows on a Bootcamp partition. That cured the zoom to cursor problem. It just sucks having to reboot in and out of Bootcamp to switch from OSX to Windows and visa versa.

I am not a fan of dual booting, but it is more troublesome dual booting between Linux and Window systems though. Especially with the new UEFI, so that could make me slanted and it not be the same issue with dual booting between a Mac and Windows.

But the other reason is that, it's far more efficient to just run the OSs side by side. It's at times nice running 3 OSs at one time, each one on their own monitor (Zorin, Win 98 and Win 7). I do have a Vista VM as well on this computer and sometimes Win 7 will switch with Vista.

This is my home office setup. I use a Windows PC at the shop for the XC-540. I just picked up a Roland GS-24 for the home office. Does anybody know if CutStudio will work with Paralells? I do want to print and cut with it.

CutStudio is a very basic, basic program. It should work in a VM, I know it does within Virtualbox, but in all honesty, I would just get the plugin that works within the software that you have on a Mac and print/cut directly out of that software. If there is no driver for the Mac, then install that driver on the Windows side, get Inkscape and also the InkCut extension and that would be far more capable then CutStudio.

 

[oksigns]

More funny is that a 5K iMac is $2500.00...
you can't even get close to pricing a similarly spec'd PC
with a 5K monitor... C'mon man, a 5K Dell monitor
is 2500 bucks for pete's sake.

You could buy a 5K iMac, get Windows, and you technically
have a free computer (if you are paying for a 5K monitor)
PLUS you can add another 4K monitor for a few hundred bucks more.

So all this cr@p about Macs being 2-3 times more money
is lame. When it comes to a 5K iMac, seems to me a Windows
machine with the same hardware is close to twice the price.

For that kind of money, I can easily meet or exceed those specs both in terms of expandability and capabilities. The build below includes a "fusion" drive that is nothing more than a hybrid SSD/HDD, a 4k display, more cuda cores and available system memory right off the bat. All on a copy of windows 7 pro to boot. Being on skylake and using the 1070, you can enjoy the efficiency of both chipsets as a max pull on the PSU would be ~588 watts

 

[myront]

Holy crap! I'd be out the door in a heartbeat if we switched to mac and/or killustrator. I'm too old to deal with that mess.
Like choosing a BMW over a Mustang. Mustangs are thousands cheaper (parts & maintenance) For those of us on a tight budget, you can upgrade mustangs way easier and cheaper than a bmw. You're just paying for the name. A better display! Are you kidding me! Nobody cares about how anything looks on your screen. It's the print that counts. And your computer has nothing to do with that.
You don't need a school or online tutorials to learn coreldraw. I tried many times to learn killustrator and every time I beat my head against a wall. One has to have it in this business but I only use it to convert files.

 

[JAMEY]

I don't care for Killustrator either.

Thanks for the info Wild West. I will check out that Virtualbox. I design in CorelDraw X7 so I'd install that on the Windows end. The only rip I have for this new GS is CutStudio. I don't know if I can use my Versaworks with it. So if I got Inkscape and that plugin, how would suggest I go about my workflow?

 

[WildWestDesigns]

I don't care for Killustrator either.

Thanks for the info Wild West. I will check out that Virtualbox. I design in CorelDraw X7 so I'd install that on the Windows end. The only rip I have for this new GS is CutStudio. I don't know if I can use my Versaworks with it. So if I got Inkscape and that plugin, how would suggest I go about my workflow?

In all honesty, I have exactly the opposite problem. I prefer Ai over DRAW. I have a digitizing program that directly interfaces with DRAW. Don't even have the DRAW program installed and I have the interaction button disabled. Not saying that DRAW is a bad program, just saying that I have the opposite problem with it compared to others.

As to the workflow. You have two choices. One get the driver and do everything out of DRAW. If you are doing complex work, just remember that it cuts in the layer order. That may or may not have to be manipulated manually to get a more efficient cut sequence. If you are just doing letters, probably not going to be a problem.

Choice two is that you design everything in DRAW, export into a vector format that Inkscape .91 will read and use the extension to get other functionality such as offset, overcut (I use this a lot for rhinestone templates), force, etc. Not all do work for every cutter, so you have to experiment (oh the joys of an open source program). That's the trade off for using Inkscape versus a commercial cutting program. Not even CutStudio has those options, at least not that I have found. I think if you were to buy CutStudio, it's around $60 or so (at least it was when I got my first cutter that it was bundled with), I would say it's right at or still under $100 now.

Technically, there is a third option and that's using Inkscape for everything. Inkscape is a good capable program, but there are just some things that I don't prefer, although they may not bother the next person. So if you are used to DRAW, just for your workflow, I would stick with that and just use Inkscape if you are able to get more functionality from your cutter through it's extension.

 

[MikePro]

I've actually used matte laminate on friends' laptops because they were getting sick of the glossy-glare. works great!

edited: lol, I was still only on page one of this thread. anyhow, HUGE plus-one to either dual-booting or running virtualbox/parallels to have both OS's available at same time. So nice to be able to run rip/cnc software designed for PC's on my Mac.
I just recently built my first hackintosh for personal use, and it outperforms the MacPro (bigtime) with only 1/3 of the cost from the AppleStore.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

edited: lol, I was still only on page one of this thread. anyhow, HUGE plus-one to either dual-booting or running virtualbox/parallels to have both OS's available at same time. So nice to be able to run rip/cnc software designed for PC's on my Mac.
I just recently built my first hackintosh for personal use, and it outperforms the MacPro (bigtime) with only 1/3 of the cost from the AppleStore.

Be careful with what is in bold, especially if running Win 10. Some dual booters (now this is dual booting with Linux) have had issues with the recent anniversary update and that is has hosed their Linux partitions.

Now, I don't know if it's a true bug or if certain setting conditions have to be met. Some just say that it messes with the bootloader. But this would be another reason for a VM over dual booting, especially with Win 10 as updates on that are non negotiable if you keep it connected.

 

[Gino]

Well, here's a little bit of a sidebar question......... Now that you're a switch hitter, can you go into any restroom of your choice without feeling violated ??

 

[Andy D]

Totally ignorant question, my only experience with a apple product was with my Iphone..
I really liked the phone, but I absolutely refuse to buy a product that the manufacturer thinks
they can tell me how I can use it. Apple's tight controlling grip on who could make apps for their phones,
and what programs I can have on it really pissed me off... Are Mac computers at all the same way?

 

[greysquirrel]

APPs through iTunes Store is different then software running on you Mac. Macs will handle graphics better than a PC in terms of processing 4K video, large Photoshop files etc...
Going Mac comes at a premium...Their hardware will cost you more...however...I am running (I believe 7 years old now) original 13" unibody MacBook Pro...ran every OS up until now...still purrs...not bad for a $1300 purchase...I have a 27" iMac and just added a Mac Pro...

 

[JAMEY]

CutStudio has over cut and the ability to change offset.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

CutStudio has over cut and the ability to change offset.

That is good. That was not available in the version that I have, but that version is 6 yrs old now.

I would look into getting the CutStudio for Draw plugin then and just go from Draw to CutStudio.