Korean Job Discussion Forums

[nzbradly78]

I'm very seriously looking at getting a Mac in the next little while. I've just gone through three harddrives in the past seven months with this Dell POS. I used Mac's at work in NZ and they're awesome, though pricey.

Has anyone bought a Mac in Korea? If so, does the warrently only work in Korea and can the OS and programmes be converted to English? Any funky Korean doo-dads that they stick in there and don't EVER come off? I ask that last question because a Korean homestay student of ours (high school kid) put a crap load of Korean chat and media software on our home computer and nobody could get it off.


Cheers!

[JBomb]

I brought my mac from home here and still had applecare. Applecare is world wide and allowed me to get my dvd combo drive fixed for free while I was here. The only issue I had was that although there are now plenty of apple stores, finding technicians are few and far between. Most people at the stores know though. Only took a matter of days to get my stuff fixed as well. Other issues I have had is with my mac doing evil things to my net connection in my apartment when I would use skype or watch streaming video online. The connection would just die and in order to reconnect, I would have to reboot the comp. Many Korean sites hate mac as well. ActiveX is a way of life here.

[Illysook]

Whatever you do, do not buy a Samsung PC. I have had all kinds of problems with mine. When I needed service in the states, I had to send it to Texas for 10 days and when I needed a new hard drive here in Korea, they replaced my English operating system with a Korean one and refused to change it back.

[Gnawbert]

Bought a mac mini a few weeks ago as a media PC / WoW system for my TV. Bought straight off of the Apple Korea website (although I did have to change payment to bank transfer) and had no problems. The reps on the phone spoke excellent English and, as others have said, everything's covered by Apple Care.

The OS language is chosen at start up and it supports multiple input languages. The only thing to consider is the keyboard will have English and Korean characters on it, which was fine with me as I'm practicing my Korean.

Prices are a bit higher than stateside, at least for the new Mac Mini. If you're going to get an iMac I'd hold out a bit as supplies are very limited and they're about ready for a new model to come out.

[nzbradly78]

Thanks for the input everybody. I was in the Apple outlet here in Daegu looking at the Macbook Pro I want yesterday, and the sales rep showed me how to change the language to English on the system. I'll have them do that for me when I do buy it. I don't mind the Korean characters on the keyboard. They're pretty discreet, and it's not a major issue for me. As far as prices go, I figue that if I add the tax and the shipping to my relatives and then the shipping from the States to here, I'll be saving quite a bit. They're a little cheaper here than they are in New Zealand, which sucks. WHY DOES NZ HAVE TO BE SO FREAKING EXPENSIVE! A rant best saved for another topic! At we have the All Blacks, so there.