susanne
dB
I import and open text documents and other files created on PC into Mac page layout programs every day. Word and other text programs, Excel, Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Adobe Acrobat, Pagemaker are no problem whatsoever. And if you have the same application on your Mac that you had on your PC, (such as Word), you can just open it, no importing necessary.
Different versions of software can be problematic, but if you're buying a new unit with new software, chances are you won't run into any problems. Occasionally one of my clients will update their software before I do, but even then, there is almost always a work-around. (I've opened some unbelievable files at 2am when the project is going to print the next day.)
About the only Windows application that has given me fits trying to open or import is Powerpoint, but I finally wrote into my contract that anyone sending Powerpoint files will die, so for some reason I haven't seen any lately. They may have improved that -- I don't know.
Different versions of software can be problematic, but if you're buying a new unit with new software, chances are you won't run into any problems. Occasionally one of my clients will update their software before I do, but even then, there is almost always a work-around. (I've opened some unbelievable files at 2am when the project is going to print the next day.)
About the only Windows application that has given me fits trying to open or import is Powerpoint, but I finally wrote into my contract that anyone sending Powerpoint files will die, so for some reason I haven't seen any lately. They may have improved that -- I don't know.