40 cross-platform systems

[LaRetta]

I know nothing about MAC's and I need to find about 25 staff's MAC systems, to determine whether they will need to upgrade (?) to run FM Pro 6. What questions do I need to ask each person about their specific computer to be sure they are compatible. Do MAC's have the same needs as PC's? I know what a PC needs (RAM, Windows vs. etc) but I'm in the dark on MAC's. Do they need OSx? RAM size? Some staff will be accessing through web from home, so I need to be able to tell them if they have to upgrade in any way.

[Kurt Knippel]

A Macintosh is still a "pc" which is a personal computer, and has the same kinds of specification as a pc made by Dell. Filemaker Inc can provide the published requirements for Macintosh systems, so make sure that those are met.

Basically for Filemaker 5.5 or 6.x you can run either MacOS 8.6 or higher, or MacOS X. You'll need at least a PowerPC processor (same vintage as early Pentiums) and ideally you'll want a G3 or G4 processor (however as RISC processors they will not have anywhere near as high of clock speeds as a Pentium for the same or better performance). RAM requirements are typically lower than on a Windows OS pc, but more is always better, use your Windows judgement as a guide and you'll be fine. Same advise on harddrive.

[Anatoli]

In another words -- any iMac will do the job, G3 or G4. The faster the better.

These days almost anything 2-4 years old will run successfully the FM.

If you think about further upgrade -- FM7 will not support Mac OS; only the Unix based Mac X.