Question for Mac experts
 

I have absolutely no experience with Macs at all. I am an experienced C/C#/Objective C coder though and I want to start playing with Ipod development. More for fun right now than anything business related although who knows what the future might hold.

What's the best way to run up a Mac OS? Do I really need to buy a Mac or can I just buy a fairly powerful Intel based machine and run the required OS (I don't even know which OS I need)? Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance.

You will need to run OSX in some form for iphone/ipod/ipad development.

You have a few choices, buy a cheap mac (mac mini, $550) or build a hackintosh. You probably won't be able to build a hackintosh for under $550 though, and it is a pain in the ass and frankly not worth the hassle.

I'd just grab a mac mini and start developing.

Yeah, you could put together a Hackintosh, but I personally would recommend you simply go with a Mac and OS X if that's your aim. But I don't enjoy having to constantly having to "fix" PCs... including Hackintoshes... Mac's hardware works best with OS X (and Windows) :2 cents:

There are a lot of tutorials and instructions here.

I agree with area51, it's way easier to snag a used mac mini from ebay or something.

**IMPORTANT**

Make sure you buy a mac with an intel chip, older macs (if you buy used) running ppc processors will not work, has to be an intel mac.

Sorry, I just meant I don't want to spend $5000 but I am open to the $1000-$2000 range. What's the best suggestion in that market? I don't think I want an entry level machine. They've never been good for coding, in my experience.

In that case get a laptop and hook up a keyboard/mouse/monitor to it while at home, then you can just carry it if you want to travel. I'd never buy another desktop anymore.

http://store.apple.com/us/browse/hom...mco=OTY2ODExMA

+1

But you aren't going to get much of a Mac laptop with $1k - $2k
Unfortunately, quality & performance comes at a price.

You can get plenty in an iMac for under $2k

Yeah, definitely... if you (WarChild) wanna get in a Mac on the cheap, look at the iMacs for the best bang for your dollar for sure. :thumbsup

Oh, found this!

Apps, Games created with DragonFireSDK can be completely written and debugged in Windows and are also fully compliant for distribution and sales at the Apple iPhone App Store.
http://www.dragonfiresdk.com/index.htm

I have a 24" iMac and it works great. The 27" LED ones are available now for under 2K. Awesome machines and you can run Windows on them, too.

Worth it for iPod and iPad app dev.

I run Hackintosh boxes that run just as well as the overprices Mac Desktop Pro they sit next too.

With the greatest of respect and iMac is not the best bang for your buck. A refurb mac pro or a mac mini will give much more grunt per buck because you are not having to pay for the iMac screen.

A brand new mac mini plus a screen the guy already has will be MILES more cost effective.

And @the OP - TextMate is gonna be a very good friend of yours...

I do all of my development off a reasonably priced 13" Mac Book Pro. Great little workhorse for the house and on the road... Still use a PC farm for video editing/rendering.

I'd suggest a 13" macbook pro also :thumbsup