As a longtime Mac fan I have to say this:
Macs are more expensive to buy. There's no way around it.
They are, however, far cheaper to own, unless you enjoy spending time tinkering with your box, removing spyware, etc. etc. In general, Macs last 1.5-2x longer than PCs. (I'm currently playing World of Warcraft on my 2.5y old Mac; it gets the same framerates as my wife's 1.5y old Dell -- both were one notch behind cutting edge when new.)
As for best graphics -- you can use pretty much the same video cards in Macs and PCs, assuming you buy a Mac with slots (not an iMac). With an iMac you will probably be far more restricted -- iMacs aren't aimed at folks like us. Unfortunately, that means paying $1700 or so for a headless G5.
Or you can get an iBook -- it won't run as fast or have the niftiest video card, but it will run pretty fast, and now you have a laptop unix box to play with. Oddly enough, iBooks are the cheapest new Macs you can buy.
Macs are more expensive to buy. There's no way around it.
They are, however, far cheaper to own, unless you enjoy spending time tinkering with your box, removing spyware, etc. etc. In general, Macs last 1.5-2x longer than PCs. (I'm currently playing World of Warcraft on my 2.5y old Mac; it gets the same framerates as my wife's 1.5y old Dell -- both were one notch behind cutting edge when new.)
As for best graphics -- you can use pretty much the same video cards in Macs and PCs, assuming you buy a Mac with slots (not an iMac). With an iMac you will probably be far more restricted -- iMacs aren't aimed at folks like us. Unfortunately, that means paying $1700 or so for a headless G5.
Or you can get an iBook -- it won't run as fast or have the niftiest video card, but it will run pretty fast, and now you have a laptop unix box to play with. Oddly enough, iBooks are the cheapest new Macs you can buy.