Well, I got one from MacTown and, I'm glad to say, it exceeds my expectations. I got the 1.42/80 model and upgraded the RAM to 1 gig.
In addition to the "you can have it now" aspect, and the competent and friendly way that my several questions were addressed, another advantage of doing business with local guys is that they're delighted to work out win-win accommodations, even if they're a bit odd. For example, I did not like the price that Apple demanded for the memory upgrade (nearly 3X the OWC price) so MacTown offered to do the installation in exchange for the 256 module if I supplied the 1 gig unit. Win-win ... they can get a few bucks off the 256, I don't worry about messing up the insides of the machine on its first days home, and my pocket suffers a couple of hundred dollars less. Now, consider that what I'm accustomed to is a G4-500, upgraded from a G3 mini-Tower. That said, the performance of the mini is very nice. DVD playback is smooth at full screen - as compared to jerky at half screen. Safari is so responsive I'd call it snappy. The Filemaker Pro project I've been working on since about the dawn of time runs much quicker, I'd guess by a factor of five in the processor intensive situations. Pretty impressive for such a low cost machine. I still have a G3/4 operating and actually use it as my main unit. The mini is my test server. But I mention this so I can also mention the switching. Dr. Bott sells a usb/monitor switch, in several configurations, which allows you to choose which of up to four computers will use the keyboard, mouse and monitor. Belkin also sells such a unit - for less than half the price - so I'll leave it as an exercise for you to figure out which one I'm using. The Dr. Bott unit is, per the pictures, much prettier ... and may have some technical advantage that I don't appreciate ... but the one I got work just fine. The router, also from MacTown, came with a set of comic bool-like instructions, which were all that I needed. Overall, it was hooked up and operating before I had a chance to get a headache. That's fast. Overall, so far, I'm more please with this purchase than with any I've made since my original Mac in March of '84. For comparison, this was less that $1k with all the bells and whistles I added. My original 128k Mac, with printer, 300 baud modem, and a copy of MultiPlan, was over $3k. Same credit card. Much less pain. Bill Holt | The next meeting of the Louisville Computer Society will | be April 26. The LCS Web page is <http://www.kymac.org>. | List posting address: <mailto:macgroup at erdos.math.louisville.edu> | List Web page: <http://erdos.math.louisville.edu/macgroup>
