[singleminded]

I'm a senior in High School, and have been a PC user my entire life. Next year I am going to the engineering school at Columbia and wanted to switch to Mac for the stability. I have several questions that need answering. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

1. Is a powerbook g4 powerful enough to do 3d graphical editing, and heavy mathematical simulations?

2. If i purchase a g4, should i purchase it now, so i have time to get used to OS X before college, or are there any new advancements or changes that are coming out over the summer?

3. I know that Tiger was just set for release, if I purchase a powerbook now, will I be able to get Tiger at no additional charge even though it will come out after the purchase date?

Thanks for your time

[osxisfun]

1) Yes.

(But you should look into the math software you want and post to their forums and ask some other people how they like running on a PB. But I am almost positive it will be fine for you.) + Apple has a science section you should check that out to see if they have spotlighted someone using the software you want to use.

2) ??? But probably no.

3) Yes.

[SpaceMonkey]

Like osxisfun mentioned, it is very important that you first check to see that the editing and simulation software that you will need to run will work in OS X. Otherwise, you'll be stuck doing your work in a computer lab (which defeats the purpose of having a laptop), or you'll be forced to use Virtual PC (which isn't guaranteed to work with everything, and can be slowwwww...).

[singleminded]

Thanks so much, I have one more question. If i were to order soon, how do i go about getting Tiger for 9.99 and also extra RAM preinstalled is pretty expensive, so how easy is it install aftermarket RAM into it?

[osxisfun]

the ram is super easy. there is a door on the bottom you unscrew and pop the ram into one of two slots.

and for tiger, you will download and print a pdf from the apple site and mail in 10 bucks.