Can I use a new MAC desktop on the same wireless home network as my two PC Dell laptops?

I have only worked on a wirelesss home network with PC Dell laptops and am now ready to buy a desktop. It has been recommended that I get a MAC, but I don't know if it would be compatable with the PCs. I would not want the MAC desktop to be wireless.

Public Comments

1. sure
2. If the mac is directly hooked into your router (most wireless routers allow for a couple of wired connections) via an ethernet cable, and if your mac has an ethernet card, then yes you can use the same Home LAN. The files you can share between the different computers or even the ability to share files may be affected though. If you use Dell Laptops why would you need a mac desktop? Dell Desktops are pretty sweet and usually cheaper than the new mac desktops.
3. Make sure router has ethernet Lan ports for wired connection and that your MAC has either on broad Lan or a Lan card is installed.
4. Yes it will work. If you do not want to your Mac desktop to be wireless then you will have to put the Mac fairly close to the your wireless router assuming you wireless router has a switch in it for wired connections. The other option is to run a cable from the wireless router to the room where you want to put the Mac. Look on the back of the Wireless router you should see 4 RJ-45 connection points or maybe less or more. They look like telephone (RJ-11) connection points. You'll need a straight through ethernet cable from the desktop to the wireless router or a cable run to the room you want to put the Mac in.
5. Yes you can. I run a network with 3 window systems and a linux system with no problem The only draw back on a mac is less software.
6. Ok, if you get an iMac it is WiFi ready with 802.11 B/G/N. If you hard-wire your iMac to the router then it will just go online as if it was directly connected to the cable/DSL modem, no different than a PC. I would suggest getting the Airport Extreme Base station which can accommodate multiple wireless computers and hard-wire up to 3 computers. You can also connect a printer to the USB port for wireless printing which all computers on the network will have access to or you can connect an external hard-drive to act like a community hard-drive to back-up to.
7. The answer is YES. Without going into the technical details, for an illustration, do you see people using the Internet with both Apple and Window laptops (like your Dell) at the same Coffee shop? Do you ever see the coffee shop give different instructions for Window Laptops than Apple laptops?
8. yes
9. Of course, a Mac is nothing but a PC that works. Your existing PCs will work like the Mac after about two or three more OS releases by Microsoft. Good choice, and the software is there, contrary to common belief. You can run ALL software on the new Macs even the Microsoft OSs. XP and Vista, run on the Mac..
10. yeah appletalk works with windows. I've never done it but yes it is possible.
11. yes