Mac Compatibility and Higher Education

[Italchef]

Hello all college and university students;
My niece is home for Easter and while at dinner we were talking about Macs and my new Macbook. She's in the market for a new laptop and I mentioned a Macbook. She said that there are quite a few at her university but as far as she knows there are some compatibility issues.
So my question to all you students; Have you found any issues with your Mac and the resources that you have access to? If so, what are they are how difficult are they to overcome?
Thanks for your time in advance.

Mick

 

[Scuzzeh]

At my university it's currently not possible to connect to the wireless network using Leopard but Tiger and Panther are fine. Not sure what changes to the networking between them and Leopard are though.

I think they're working on fixing it now so I'd imagine by next term/semester most places who don't already have it sorted will do.

 

[SFStateStudent]

Which University?

and where is the University located?

 

[Italchef]

and where is the University located?

The university is located just outside of Toronto Canada. Fairly large and well known.

Mick

 

[SFStateStudent]

You might be on a totally different...

The university is located just outside of Toronto Canada. Fairly large and well known.

Mick

WiFi system and have compatibility issues different from what we have in the US. I'm at two different campuses and my Macs work just fine and in fact work just fine about 5 blocks from campus. The University of California, Berkeley & San Francisco State University are without compatibility issues. Sorry I don't have information for your area.

 

[Italchef]

Thanks for your quick responses. I'm not sure what the issues people have are. Are there any online resources that would work only in a Windoze environment? Aside from wi-fi issues, I can't see what problems one would have. I wouldn't want to suggest a Macbook and then have her run into problems.

Mick

 

[skins0304]

I've never had any issues in the past (with an iBook G4) or with my new Macbook on my campus.

In fact, I know plenty of people at large university's that have Macs and have no problems at all. If it's a university that has big music or art programs, Macs are very common and sometimes required.

 

[CrzyCanuck72]

The university is located just outside of Toronto Canada. Fairly large and well known.

Mick

It depends on the school. I go to Queen's and my MacBook never has trouble with the wi-fi, but when I visit my girlfriend at U of Ottawa, it can be finnicky.

Other than that, it depends on her program too. An engineering program will require some specialized software that may or may not be Mac compatible. An arts program will most likely just require Microsoft Office, in which case a Mac is great.

 

[Cave Man]

Hello all college and university students;
My niece is home for Easter and while at dinner we were talking about Macs and my new Macbook. She's in the market for a new laptop and I mentioned a Macbook. She said that there are quite a few at her university but as far as she knows there are some compatibility issues.

Yes, I have some compatibility issues, too. Here's a few examples.

1. None of the spyware for Windows works on my Mac.
2. None of the viruses for Windows work on my Mac.
3. None of the trojans for Windows work on my Mac.
4. No matter what I try to do, I cannot get the blue screen of death.
5. I cannot run Internet Explorer on my Mac.
6. As hard as I try, I never get messages about 'dll' files missing.
7. The ease of using my Mac makes me nervous around all my PC friends.

It's tough using a Mac on campus.

 

[NC MacGuy]

There could be some compatibility issues with site registrations, school interactive pages and some other made for Microsoft only pieces.

Not to be alarmed though, if need be, she can always load Windows and access w. IE if need be.

I've run into some sites that absolutely will not work w. Macs and Mac IE is so dated that you need Windows to make those sites work.

Can't understand not having net compatibility though. I've gone back and forth on many networks. Only issue I've ever had is getting the freakin' WEP passwords entered correctly. What a pain that mess is.

 

[DaBrain]

Hello all college and university students;
My niece is home for Easter and while at dinner we were talking about Macs and my new Macbook. She's in the market for a new laptop and I mentioned a Macbook. She said that there are quite a few at her university but as far as she knows there are some compatibility issues.
So my question to all you students; Have you found any issues with your Mac and the resources that you have access to? If so, what are they are how difficult are they to overcome?
Thanks for your time in advance.

Mick

I guess I don't get it! We have boot camp so in all reality you have 2 computers in one! So why would there be any issues here?

 

[wannabe07]

The only problem I have witnessed was when a friend of mine tried to present a powerpoint that he made on his mac on a windows machine using a flashdrive. For some reason, most of his pictures wouldn't show up. I don't know if it was user-error (entirely possible), but for whatever reason they wouldn't work. However, that's the only instance that I know of at my school in Portland, Oregon.

 

[Jpoon]

I live in Memphis, Tennessee, and I don't have any problems connecting with U of M, Rhodes, CBU, or several of the community colleges wireless networks.

I do occasionally have to log onto my Windows partition to use IE for an online course that only supports IE, but that's not too annoying.

Other than that, it's awesome !

The issues with the software not working on a Windows computer from a Mac are strictly the users fault.

You can't make a keynote presentation and expect it to work on PPT 2008. But, it sounds as if there was a different issue with the above post's problem.

Just tell her to get MS office 2008 and she won't have any issues porting documents from a Macintosh to a Windows computer.

But I do hate MS office so very much. <_<
I'd definitely recommend getting a MacBook though :3.

 

[Daveoc64]

Yes, I have some compatibility issues, too. Here's a few examples.

1. None of the spyware for Windows works on my Mac.
2. None of the viruses for Windows work on my Mac.
3. None of the trojans for Windows work on my Mac.
4. No matter what I try to do, I cannot get the blue screen of death.
5. I cannot run Internet Explorer on my Mac.
6. As hard as I try, I never get messages about 'dll' files missing.
7. The ease of using my Mac makes me nervous around all my PC friends.

It's tough using a Mac on campus.

I would say having that attitude is the only thing will cause problems when using a Mac on campus.

I don't preach that Mac OS is the best thing in the world, so nobody cares when I use it.