More Awesome Than You!

I know this is going to be a stupid question but I'm bored and annoyed and I gotta get this out of my system!
Can mac users also use custom created content for TS2 and its EPs? I figured there's no much use getting the game for mac if it's not possible...

Also are the boosterpacks or whatever they're called also available for mac then?

Greets and such,
Ali

Of course we can!  We can use them but not do much with them since Simpe doesn't come for macs.  There's no clean installer either and that's a pain.  Booster packs are a no though.

Ah, darnit! Yeah it sucks about that Simpe, totally forgot about that, I'll also check if the cepfiles thing is available for mac...  :-\
Thank you for the reply tho!  :)

Greets,
Ali

You can also use "dizziness" with the Mac (I think), but you'd have set up Xcode and install GTK through Darwinports (i.e. not something a Mac user would normally have to do because we are talking about compiling everything from source code).

Do Mac people still have that nasty wallpaper problem, where any custom wallpaper that has a slightly different-sized texture will not work?

Macs are now intel-based, so you can install Windows also, and have both systems on the same machine. This means that you can use SimPE and everything as well.

I'm not sure about the wallpapers problem, though, but it should be related to video card and supported chipset; I'm not sure about this because I have a Mac G5, not Intel, and I can't test it with newer chipsets.

CEP and Scriptorium etc. are ok for Mac too.

There are some differences about the use of BodyShop, but they imply only some tune-up of config files.
Another difference may be the loading time of game: on Macs the game seems to take more time to load; but it's due to different memory management on Win and Unix systems. Unix (Macs) loads everything it can in RAM, and use swap files only if physical memory is not enough, hence the longer time.

Mac Versions of the Sims can use custom content.  Like others had said before, SimPE can't be used with it since it's coded in Microsoft Devil Language.  As for expansions, you can get all of them except for those donation packs.

<microsoftdevillanguage>
There's a framework called Mono which allows for C# code to be executed on Unix machines, but even Visual Basic programs don't work with Mono.  In my opinion, SimPE should have been coded in Java instead since their speeds are similar and unlike C#, Java is cross-platform and recently became open source.  If speed was an issue, they should have coded it in C/C++ instead of a bastardized Microsoft language.
</microsoftdevillanguage>

Not anymore. One of the recent versions of mono has VB support. :)

One of the big problems though is the fact that the Windows.Forms isn't completely supported yet, so things are a still bit buggy.

And, so far as I know, .NET 2.0 is only partially supported for C# and not supported at all that I know of for VB.

So all in all, mono is not fully complete and will likely not work for many programs. I've had one of my programs tested on the mac with Mono, and even after a lot of changes to try to make it work, it still doesn't work, and so far I've not found a solution for it yet, so I've kinda given up on Mono for now. Hopefully some time in the future though, it'll work. *Shrugs*

I use an iMac with a Windows partition. I chose to do this because I already had a bunch of games for Windows PCs, and I didn't want to bother replacing all of them with the Mac-compatible versions. I really enjoy the WinMac, because I can do my gaming in Windoze, and my regular design work on the Mac. If I ever get a virus or have problems with Windows, I can just delete the partition and the Mac is unharmed. It is the best of both worlds, IMO. The best thing about owning a Mac is that, when you boot the thing up for the first time, it immediately recognises that there is a wireless connection and actually *gasp* connects to it. If you decide to do the WinMac thing, just make sure you have all of the current Mac drivers for Windows (available from apple.com), otherwise the keyboard, etc won't work properly.

Edited to correct typo.

Oh, thanx for all the great info you guys, didn't even know that a winmac combo is possible! It's too bad we lack the finance to do that atm...

*gasps at dizzy*

Is that cheesy old hippie dizzy?! The one acclaimed to be found dead dizzy?!
?!?!?!

I only took a brief vacation.  :P

And changed my avatar. http://www.unearthedfilms.com/rockandrule.htm

(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v497/mrexpert25/WindowsWireless.png)
*gasp* Windows XP does this too.  If you're talking about connecting immediately without user intervention then you've probably got an unsecure network prone to leechers(Assuming you don't have MAC addresses registered or some other scheme that doesn't require a WEP or WPA key).

I haven't heard anything that a Mac can do that a PC can't that justifies the increased costs.  Maybe the Macbook series, but the others just seem overpriced(Mac Mini, Mac Pro) or look like children's toys(iMac).

Macs look nice. I am considering getting an Intel Mac, and putting Vista on it. Once Vista supports more than two sound channels.

Conversely, there's supposedly the sadistic option of installing MacOS on an ordinary PC, since they're both Intel hardware.

True, but I don't much like MacOS. I know a couple of Apple bigots though, who will no doubt recoil in horror at the idea of a Mac being exclusively used to run Windows.

Recently I've been using Rockbox (http://www.rockbox.org/) firmware on my iPod, which has already earned me the wrath of a virgin (eternal Apple nerd).

That's not as horrific and perverse as taking a standard PC, forcing MacOS to run on it, and then making the MacOS run Windoze. That's just perverse, like getting a Linux box to run Wine so you can run a Windoze Linux emulator.

I have never understood why computers have historically only been beige, white, grey or black. Colour up the world, I reckon. Bloody engineers.

Well I'm ever so glad you're alive and well  ;D I can start renaming google to "the dizzy" again! Next time leave note, hm? ;)

*kicks Pescado for making up stories*

Greets,
Ali

I've heard that OSx86 is pretty much dead, so there probably won't be a Leopard release.  I never got the thing to work on my computer without wanting me to reformat the entire drive anyway, not to mention torrents for it are a lot less common than ones of Linux.  I wonder if Boot Camp works...

It's a shame that I never got it to install, it'd probably freak people out seeing Mac OS X on a HP Laptop.

I'm not Mac-rabid, but I do have a new 24" iMac, and it is truly incredible. No way I would ever be without my Mac.

That being said, I also have a Dell XPS, my second one in about four years. I use both the Mac and PC everyday. But there is no way I would ever download email on the PC. And I do all my browsing and googling on the Mac. I only visit the known Sims 2 websites that I actually trust, on the PC.

Despite being almost paranoid about computer safety (and being armed to the teeth with industry standard antispyware stuff), I have still managed to get spyware problems on the PC. But I've never had a whisper of virus or other such problems on the Mac, and I've had Macs since 1984.

I haven't tried Vista, and I'm not inclined to do so for at least a year or two. I've got XP finally working well, and I intend to keep it that way, for now. I do hate the PC OS, though, and constantly get upset with the endless clicking necessary just to navigate the stupid thing. No wonder people get carpel tunnel. The PC OS gives my wrist at least four times the aggravation, just because it pops up so many silly windows asking me if I really intended to do what I just told it to do, or informing me for the gazillionth time that the action I just took does something I already was well aware it was doing. I feel like the PC OS treats me like a very young and extremely retarded child.

I also do a lot more saves and redundant backups on the PC, because I am never sure when some program may glitch or quit, or just freeze indefinitely. And I don't even want to talk about WinRot ...

The Mac OS, on the other hand, assumes I actually know what I am doing. It doesn't annoy me. It just works ....

Right now, I wouldn't give up either my Mac or my Dell XPS. I need and enjoy them both, for different reasons. I prefer to play the Sims 2 on the PC, and use it for other virtual life games. I work in Photoshop on both computers, although the Mac program is much better, so I only use the PC version for Sims 2 stuff that I don't want to port from one computer to the other. Music is much better on the Mac, so although I have iTunes on the PC, I rely on my Mac and iPod for my listening pleasure. I do email, browsing, and personal stuff on the Mac. The iLife suite is simply brilliant, and can't be matched by the PC.

I usually want both computers up and running at the same time, so for now it is more convenient to use the Dell XPS than using Bootcamp.  But once Leopard is out, that may change. I already have Parallels on the Mac, so non-game PC stuff can already be easily and seamlessly run in a window on the Mac. Very convenient.

Leopard is going to be one incredible OS. I've seen all the previews on the Apple site. All I can say is WOW. It beats Vista all to little bits -- especially since I've read reviews that tell me Vista is now popping up even *more* of its ubiqitous "information" windows that require a click to go away, and leave me alone.

Note: As far as cost, don't let the PC hype fool you. In order to get iMac functionality on the PC, it actually costs me *more* to buy a PC. I just looked into it, because I was thinking of updating my PC in the next few months. I realise if I built my own PC instead of buying a ready made box, I could do better. But I'm not into building hardware or financing my own repair and replacement costs. So for someone who wants a ready built box with a reasonable warrenty, and if you wish to duplicate function for function, the Mac is actually cheaper (as well as being all-around more elegantly designed and executed). Depending on how Leopard runs Bootcamp, and how the Sims 2 runs on it, I may just "upgrade" to a Mac for my PC use.

amjoie, I bought a macbook almost week ago, and I was thinking the exact same things! (Well, not the same, I haven't been using mac since 1984, and stuff like that).

I wanted a laptop for work and school, and got carried away trying to find one that could play the sims2 better than my desktop pc, that was pretty stupid, considering that I was aiming for a small model. How is that going to be fun, I need a large screen for my Sims! I realised that I would be paying the same money for a laptop that would be more expensive than my self-built desktop PC and have almost the same specs (actually, lower), so I dissed the HP Pavillion I was considering, and started researching macs.

I was pretty informed about what I should expect, but it is sooo much better! It seems (I'm no computer pro) MacOS X is a very straightforward operating system. Unlike windows, it doesn't do things on its own or when installing a program. Everything is easy to find, and easy enough to remove without creating a total mess of your system. I just can't stop reading stuff about it, trying to figure it out more. And I love the beautiful design. I admit, I'm sold. I cannot look at any PC the same way ever again. :) *sigh

They've made it even worse in Vista with something they call User Account Controls, or UAC for short.  This time, they darken the screen and it pops up with a "Are you sure you want to do this?" dialog even when you're copying files to say your Program Files directory.  COPYING.  EVEN NOT OVERWRITING.  Luckily, you can turn this thing off but then there goes the "security" that Vista was supposed to give you.  This idea was just as retarded as hiding the Program Files and Windows folders to make you safer.

Sure, Linux has this sort of thing going on with sudo but there you require a password so you're aware what you're doing has some importance(Well, assuming you didn't put your password in 5 seconds before, then it won't ask you).  Whenever I used Vista RC1, I wasn't asked for my password by UAC to edit settings.  I believe Mac OS X does this too, but only for installing certain software (from my experiences with OS X, I was able to install browsers but I needed the admin password for Photoshop).

Running Linux in Windows in Linux is all the rage for developers. It's perfect for developing Linux solutions for Windows users.  ;D

My ex did that one time. I asked him why. 'Because I can' he said.
Ran like a dog of course.

Is there a hard limit to how many VMs you can have running inside each other at once?  I'm guessing the one I'm using now can handle 6 nested XP's but I'm not bored enough to try it.

I'm confused on why you'd seriously want to nest them unless you wanted to see if a Virtual Machine would work in a Virtualized environment or something.  Either that or you're paranoid and want to have many layers of OSes protecting your host OS(I don't even know if this is possible).

Yeah, well, you know how it is. See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil, right?

The thing with frivolous security popups is that users quickly get into a habit of ignoring them if you insist on asking them too many stupid questions, and dismissing them becomes an automatic reflex, thus undermining their value.

Presumably not a greyhound ...

I actually have almost the same exact setup as amjoie.
I have a Dell XPS and a 21" iMac....(yeah, amjoie is better)
They both have their merits.....
Acutally, the only biggest merit I've found that keep me using a peecee is the Sims :)It simply doesn't run as well on mac...not that I've found, but then again, I don't have a top of the line video-card like I do on my pc. I guess, the availability of software and compatibility of different applications is another good reason.  You can do everything on a mac, but there are less choices in software to get you there.
The fact is though, even though there are less choices for software, the quality of these choices (imo) is far better and most of the really important apps such a Photoshop and the like, come out at the same time the pc apps come out.
Games, on the other hand, you have to wait awhile for, which is another reason I like using my pc.

Anyway, aside from how gloriously beauteous they are, they are very stable machines and the security alone (lack of viruses) would most likely save you the money from having to buy all of the security applications!  It would likely make up for the difference in price with that issue alone.

My old grandmother of a G4 is still kicking like you wouldn't believe....Never even had a hickup from her.
And, lastly, there is my Sony Vaio windoze machine which I use for all of my internet use because, well, I simply don't care about it.

Sony sucks but since I installed a BareBones version of Windoze, it runs like a dream...Took out all of the Sony crap, used driver genius to get the essential drivers that I needed, and boom, the machine is better than it was brand new.

Sorry to bore you all. My point is that Mac is amazing, but it's handy to have a good pc around....;)

Yes, BootCamp works. AFAIK, that's the only way to get a Windows partition on a Mac, or at least it's the easiest. I'm not sure about vice versa, though.

@Pseudonymous: The beauty of having a Mac is that hackers mostly target Windows users. Secure or not, Macs just don't get the same trojans and other crap that Windows machines do. That justifies the expense, IMO.

My mother, a photographer, insists that Mac is the only type of computer that will A) run her software (Photoshop  ??? and then I guess she uses Quark occasionally for layout stuff?) and B) run the resolution she needs (she has a better computer than I do because she wrote it off as a business expense, including dual processors and a huge screen so she doesn't understand why I can't make her website into a 6-column layout with the huge photo files she sends me, because it looks just fine on her screen).

and apparently it has some mysterious color options and better control over the color tweakings for her monitor than a windows machine could give her, so her photos won't look distorted color-wise when she prints them.


all of which sounds like a hardware issue to me.

I'm a print production artist - which is to say, a mac person ;) I love my mac but it was very frustrating in Sims 1 days not to get the EPs for a cow's age and not to be able to use the user-created tools to make my own stuff.

When Sims 2 came out I let my husband talk me into the PC he and the kids had been wanting for ages for games - the idea being that PCs are not so expensive also - ha! A cheap PC (which is what I have) won't run games. You need a good one with a good video card and lots of ram and you need to update the parts lots more often than we've ever needed to update the mac to run new games on it and such-like. It costs the same, or perhaps a bit more for the PC.

But I'm still glad to have both, and still hate the PC interface. Macs are user-friendly. :p And your mother is correct, macs are better for art/print.

That part is because - I think - of different gamma correction of screen; also, Mac manages color calibration profiles in a different way, to match screen and print results together; after all Macs were aimed to art/graphic professionals, so it make sense that those issues are maybe best supported on Mac systems.

So, this part it's a software - not hardware - issue; anyway, the rest sounds to me like the regular artist/graphic designers interpretation of web usability concept - lol  :D - if you had ever discussed with an artist who wants his webpage background in a specific - mandatory - PANTONE color, you may understand what I mean.

Try matching some person's idea of 'salsa' in screen, vinyl, and digital print from 'do it like my web background - oh and use that image but print it 72" x 54" also'. You'd give anything for a PMS match and so would they because it'sa nota gonna match - the one pixel visible after blowing up a 2"x2" 72 dpi square is going to be the wrong color.

I had to teach her how to find the hex value in photoshop, can you imagine? she spent years getting an art degree and she doesn't know how to find the hex value... finally I had her send me a swatch of her preferred background color.

Then I had to explain why she can't have all her text in her special, elite font she purchased that not even I have on my computer that she used for her logo. For a time half the headings on her site were image files so she could have her fancy font.


then she said, "Make it like the Martha Stewart site."  ::)

Macs are no better for design than PCs, this "color advantage" as you call it doesn't matter.  If you're designing for print, you'll use a sample sheet for the color and not the color of the monitor since they're very different..  If you're designing for the web, there are so many different ways that someone can see something due to their Gamma settings and monitor type that it doesn't matter if your Gamma is slightly different.

As for software?  It's all available on Windows and currently runs faster than it would on Mac OSX (x86).

a sample sheet hm? The company that makes that very fancy piece of equipment that calibrates all 3 rip stations and the 15 macs (the only macs in a fairly good size office btw) will be happy to know they can be replaced by a sample sheet - and that just for digital print. The ink dept., and the 100s of test samples (and 3 months of time) to provide the proper curve from the film output company for screen will as well, I'm sure.

If you don't have a pretty good idea what color you're printing before you start running expensive backlit, wallpaper or enough vehicle vinyl to wrap a van, you've got some problems. If you don't have a pretty good idea what color you're going to get before you've ripped and saved the files (large enough to wrap a bus, for example) at several hours worth of expensive art time (we bill out at $75 an hour, which is pretty cheap for the market), you've got some problems. A sample sheet does not cover what it takes to provide adequate color match in the print world. Even with decent PMS colors (not 'specific company's specific flourescent orange logo' which is not a PMS color), it's a lot more complicated than that.

Monitor colors do not match real world colors no matter if what you're a PC or a Mac.  I guess you could say, adjust the colors but you can do that on Windows with Adobe Gamma and/or Graphics Drivers.

When I did some print work, the color was always different on the monitor than it was printed.  If we went by the colors shown by the Macs and not by the sample sheet, we would get something completely different than we wanted.  This was a newspaper type publication though.

I have a friend who is a professional geek (ie it is his bread and butter). For years we bantered back and forth about the merits of Mac vs PC. He was a diehard PCer. Note I said "was."

For almost two years he has used a Mac as his main computer, reserving the PC for only mandatory testing, etc. He told me when he switched that there is a quiet revolution of professional geeks. They are making the switch in droves to the Mac. Once they do, they don't look back. And they talk amongst themselves, in their own geeky way. At first it was whispers, but now it is open talk. The upshot of the whole thing is that the Mac, once the object of abject derision, is now more than "respectable." It is well on its way to being a status symbol within the geeky set.

He also told me that a lot of the newly switched geeks are gamers -- and that this trend has not gone unnoticed by the gaming community. The waiting time for games to port to the Mac is getting less and less. He expects simultaneous releases in the near future. He may be right. Look how quickly Pets was ported to the Mac. It used to take a year or so. Pets was released in mere weeks after the PC version went on sale.

You can argue all you want about particulars, but it won't change the facts. The Mac market share is gaining at a steady rate. Apple stocks, on average, are head and shoulders above Microsoft, and have several times nearly equalled IBM. That means the business community is also legitimatizing Apple's status as a company for the future.

When the iPhone is offered by Cingular in a few months, it is going to take off much like the iPod -- and if you don't know what I'm talking about, visit the Apple website and take a glimpse at the future of cell phones.

And you just have to see the latest Mac commercial about Vista. In view of the discussion in this thread, it is hillarious! Click on the "Security" ad under "see the latest ads." ROTFLOL

http://www.apple.com/getamac/

I agree, I've noticed mac games coming out faster and faster. I was really surprised about the release of Pets so soon after it was out on windows. It used to take many months, and in some cases, years for mac games to come out.
With the advent of the iPod alone, Mac usage is taking a turn toward the upside.

There's a programme currently under development, called Cider, that allows Mac games to be developed at the same time as Windows games, without porting. I believe it's in beta testing at the moment, but it looks like it could possibly revolutionise the gaming industry if it actually works.

http://www.transgaming.com/index.php?module=ContentExpress&file=index&func=display&ceid=24 (http://www.transgaming.com/index.php?module=ContentExpress&file=index&func=display&ceid=24)

Transgaming also has Cedega for Linux, which if it and Cider both work....why have anything else but a linux box or a Mac?
 My B-I-L was a Beta Tester for Microsoft for Vista and even he's not sure he wants Vista on his machine. Think he's staying with XP and Ubuntu Linux. Vista has the "eye candy" which as one tech on another BBS said was like they just discovered 3D and went nuts with it. It's slower to navigate, has endless pop ups asking if you really wanted to do that and my B-I-L made a comment that when you first install it does not set up an Administrator Account or password. However if you want to change things, then it wants an Administrator password, which of course you don't have. I don't need that.

Then there are the hardware requirements. At least 2 gig of ram if you actually want to do more than load the OS and a video card that can handle all that "eye candy".

The thing about Cedega and Wine is that they are lacking in Direct3D support, so at the moment you have to use Windows for Sims. Rather ironic since TS2 doesn't even work that good in Windows.  :P

I have to admit, Direct 3D is easier to program in than OpenGL but that just makes life harder in the long run (encourages laziness in driver support and coding, etc).