Bong! . . . :-) . . . Welcome to Macintosh!
In keeping with the spirit my previous
Welcome to Macintosh article, where I asked for ideas to make
Low End Mac better from our readers, I'm sharing the emails I've
received. (If you have more ideas on how to make LEM better, drop
me an email at thomas (at) lowendmac (dot) com.)
Our first email comes from Eric, who told of his memories of Low
End Mac in the most recent Welcome to Macintosh article:
"Hey Tom, how are you? Thanks for printing my
memory on your site. :)
"I saw the writing for idea submissions and I had
a few right off of the bat. Why not split the site into two; one
being Low End Mac while the other being Mid-End Mac? I'd hate to
think of a Mac mini (pre-Intel) as being considered as low-end. It
shouldn't be that the latest and greatest machines that come out of
Cupertino render all models before it as obsolete, or 'low end'.
The low-end site could focus on models up to a certain type of
chip, chip speed, or those supported (with or without XPostFacto)
under a certain OS; while the Mid End site could focus on the same
or models that were released X number of years or so ago. This
would benefit the low-end users (myself included) who don't want to
have to drudge through articles and reviews related to higher-end
machines - and the same goes for the mid-end users who have no need
for info on older Macs. Not only that, but it might entice the
low-end users to switch or upgrade to a higher model than what they
already have.
"The Mid End Mac site could also have reviews of
possibly newer gear and software that the machine can support (or
vice versa). In addition, there can be lists of add-on hardware,
both external and internal, that the machine could still use. Even
if a machine is listed as being mid-end, there could be sections
relating to audio and video showing the more expensive hardware
that can be run on those machines. Basically this would save the
user from having to go out and get a better Mac simply for one or
two main applications. For example, there are older version of Pro
Tools professional audio recording software out there. One could
purchase this along with an older Mac and still have strength and
stability without having to suffers from LAGS (Latest-and-greatest
syndrome)."
Editor's reply: One of the mottos we used to help
people understand why we have profiles of the latest Macs on Low
End Mac was "...because sooner or later every Mac becomes low
end". And over the 10 years we've published LEM, the low end has
moved from things like the Mac IIci and Quadras to anything that
isn't Intel-based. "Low end" is a moving target, so dividing
content between two sites doesn't make sense.
There are a lot of different ways of dividing
Macs. At LEM, we call any Mac with a Motorola 680x0 processor a
"vintage" Mac, but some of them are architecturally almost
identical to PowerPC models and run the same OS versions and
software. We could arbitrarily divide based on SCSI vs. IDE vs.
SATA, 680x0 vs. PowerPC vs. Intel, NuBus vs. PCI vs. PCI Express,
supported vs. not officially supported to run OS X, bootable
or not bootable into the classic Mac OS, etc.
The problem is, all of these are arbitrary
divisions, and in reality there is a continuum of Macintosh models
stretching from 1984 to the present. There are plenty of websites
that concentrate on current hardware; our focus is on the value
found in Macintosh computing, and that's generally greater on the
low end than the high end. dk
The next email comes from Steven:
"I switched to Mac on July 8, 2004, after being an
Apple fan since the iMac came out,
although back then I didn't know it was a different operating
system. That being said, the thing that drew me to Mac in the first
place was their simplistic yet beautiful design. Although now my
favorite thing about Apple computers is the way they actually work
and get the job done right, the design factor is still very high on
the list.
"I'm probably one of the only people who thinks
this is a good idea, but I would like to see a photo gallery
section under the computer specs, rather than just a small
thumbnail. Maybe users could send pictures of their computers to
Low End Mac to post. Whenever I want to admire a computer that I
don't yet have, I find it is very hard to find good pictures of
older Macs.
"Also, although I have never seen a Mac design
that I didn't agree with, I think some people who want to buy an
older Mac that still looks nice would benefit. Just an example:
When the original iBook switched from blueberry to indigo, they
switched from the Power Mac G3-style plastic, which was somewhat
translucent in places, to the Power Mac G4-style plastic, which was
solid shiny white, dubbed 'snow' by Apple. I personally like the
look of the later design, although I didn't even know there was a
difference until about 2 weeks ago, after some random web browsing.
If Low End Mac had a photos section, if nothing else, it would help
some people decide which variation of a certain model to get. Just
a thought."
Editor's reply: We have the same problem. There
aren't a lot of good photos of older Macs available to us; most of
what we have were scrounged where we could find them. The drawback
to soliciting reader photos is image quality: A lot of people just
don't know how to get good product shots, and it would be a
disservice to publish low quality images.
If you have good photos of older Macs available
and would like to see them used on LEM, please email them to
low_end_mac(at)yahoo.com along with written permission to post
them. dk
Here's an email from Normann:
"Hello there,
"I'm a professional sound engineer and I often
visit your site. I really like it, and I often find useful
information there.
"Having read your invitation to send in ideas for
LEM, the following came to my mind: It would be nice to have lists
of Mac models sortable by features or benchmark tests. For example,
sort by:
- 3D benchmark
- other useful benchmarks
- or even other tests like: most silent Mac ever (being a sound
engineer, this would be my favourite)
or sort by features like:
- graphic card model
- graphic card RAM / highest monitor resolution
- number of monitor ports (DVI, VGA, etc.) 2 screens (expanded or
mirrored desktop possible)
- number of FireWire 400/800 or USB ports (or even the old serial
ports)
- hard disk controllers onboard (SCSI, IDE, how many of
them?)
- many other features possible...
"Of course all this information except my
favourite 'most silent Mac list' is already on the site in the Mac
specs, but it would be more convenient to be able to search for
specific parameters. (Means a lot of work of course to put all this
info in a searchable database)."
Editor's reply: A good suggestion, and something
I've wanted to implement for years. Problem is, I'm not much of a
programmer. I barely know enough about PHP and MySQL to get by, and
that's with a lot of reference works handy. If someone would like
to help us implement this, I'd love to do it. Please email
low_end_mac(at)yahoo.com.
I also know of no resource on how loud or quiet
various Macs are. dk
Our last email comes from Joseph:
"How about allowing readers to comment on the
articles on Low End Mac? I have frequently had questions that I
would have liked to ask of the writer of the article or have found
conflicting information on other sites and wanted to find out if
the article here was correct or the article elsewhere by putting it
to the writer that his information is in dispute."
Editor's reply: We already do our best to include
an email link so you can contact the writer, and we'd like nothing
more than to add the ability to comment on our articles online.
This is another instance of wanting to add a feature to LEM but not
having the technical know-how to do it. And then there's the
problem of moderating content to keep spammers and troublemakers
out....
Still, it's something I'd like to do, as I believe
it would increase the sense of community among our readers. If you
know of a good comment system that can be implemented with PHP and
MySQL without endangering our server, email me at
low_end_mac(at)yahoo.com. dk
These are great ideas. Very well thought out. Let's see what
happens.
If you have an idea to make Low End Mac even better, send your
ideas to me at thomas (at) lowendmac (dot) com. Be sure to let me know if I
have your permission to publish your idea in a future Welcome to
Macintosh article. 
