i know you can use it on the mac but i dont think that right out of the box it is mac compatible. as far as stores go it sounds like the retail stores like bestbuy and circuit city have stopped selling them. you can get them from ecost.com and some other sites for under $300. check out misticriver.net for pretty much everything you need to know about the iriver players. i personally think i will hold out until they come out with another competing 20GB player for the ipod, which sounds like it will be in early june or july.