[phillyag]

my wife and i are going to purchase an imac very soon to replace our 5 year old dell. we're looking for a system that works and is reliable. too many conflicts with the pc, and we've had it. i have a few concerns that some of you may be able to address (hopefully):

I noticed that the imacs have been upgraded a little, but i'm wondering about the OS - is it a good time to buy with Jaguar, or wait until Panther is released? Is there really going to be a big difference (at least one we would notice)? We are casual users - email, internet, some business use.

My wife has a 1.5 year old ibook with Office installed. Will this version work reliably with a new imac?

[BrunoBruin]

Welcome! At this point it makes sense to wait just a bit longer; it's possible that a ship date for Panther will be announced next week at Apple Expo Paris. If Apple follows its usual course, anyone buying a Mac after the announcement will be able to upgrade for $20 or so. You can decide then if you want to wait until it is preinstalled (so far Apple has only said it will ship "before the end of the year").

There are threads in the OS X forum where people discuss the improvements in Panther over Jaguar; it definitely sounds like a worthwhile upgrade.

If you have Office v.X for Mac OS X on the iBook, it should work fine on your iMac.

[beverson]

I've been waiting for months to buy an iMac, and now that the money is in place and the speed bumps just occurred, I'm waiting just a bit longer. As BrunoBruin just said, IF Apple announces a ship date for Panther next week and IF they follow previous procedure, anyone buying a new Mac or a copy of Jaguar after then will get to upgrade to Panther for $20, which they say is how much it costs to produce the disc and ship it.

My own approach is going to be to wait till the 16th, and then order my iMac after that regardless. My hope is that Apple will announce a ship date and have an OS X Up-To-Date program once again, but even if one or both of these don't happen I'm ordering anyway. If you can wait another week, I recommend doing so as it could save you over $100 if you were going to buy Panther separate.

Speaking to that, Jaguar is very capable, but from everything I've read Panther will be worth the upgrade, even at $130 (which again is an assumption -- it could be more or less, but this is what Jaguar cost and probably approximately what Panther will cost). Personally, the fast user switching option would be worth the upgrade price alone for me if I were in a household where two or more people were using the same Mac as you are. Everyone gets his or her own login -- keeping prefs, settings, and bookmarks separate -- and best of all you don't need to close documents and quit programs to switch to another user. Any of the other users can remain logged in and their processes still running (files downloading, etc.) while someone else logs in and works for a while.

(And because I'll get flamed super-fast if I don't include this disclaimer, there is of course no guarantee that Apple will announce a ship date for Panther on the 16th, and just because they've done an Up-To-Date program in the past doesn't necessarily mean they will this time, and no one outside of Apple really knows how much Jaguar will cost yet, blah-blah blah. Personally, I think everything I've said is at least fairly likely, but as I've been told recently "don't come whining if things don't happen the way you expected." Unfortunately, some folks around here are incredibly negative and assume the rest of us have the maturity of a Twinkie, which takes some of the fun out of the speculation that happens around here.)

In review: buy the iMac, but wait till next week to see if you can score Panther for $20.

[Centris650]

I agree with the above. Buy the iMac but wait until next week. See what happens on Tuesday morning and then, w/ or w/o Panther buy the iMac. Even if Panther isn't released next Tuesday we will have a little better idea of it's release date.

[Manimac]

I have also been planning on getting an iMac. Now that they have been updated it is even more tempting. As the others have said, since the Paris Expo is so soon, I think it is worth waiting to see if any Panther announcements come out of that. Afterwards, go ahead and get yours. I'll be getting mine afterwards. Enjoy!