Don't know where to start

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Ok I have been working on windows pc's for the last 10 years. I am employed as an IT tech and know pc's farely well. I'm not saying I am a know it all but I just wanted to give some background. I know next to nothing about macs and would like to learn. My girlfriend has an older model G5. I would like to buy maybe a mac mini to understand how the os and applications work. Where can I get guides on loading the os and making a back up? Thanks.
 
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20" Intel iMac 2.4 Ghz/3G Ram/320HD, Snow Leopard. PBook G4, 1.5Ghz/1.5 Ram/250 HD, Leopard 10.5.6.
If you but new it will come with the OS installed, and with the discs should you ever need them, but installation is so easy anyway, you won't need a guide.
As for back-ups, well, time machine will take care of that for you provided you have an external drive to back up too. Again, it's so easy to set up, and it's automatic from there on.
Sorry if that seems vague, but it really is very easy, you'll have no problems.
 

cwa107


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Ok I have been working on windows pc's for the last 10 years. I am employed as an IT tech and know pc's farely well. I'm not saying I am a know it all but I just wanted to give some background. I know next to nothing about macs and would like to learn. My girlfriend has an older model G5. I would like to buy maybe a mac mini to understand how the os and applications work. Where can I get guides on loading the os and making a back up? Thanks.

Installing OS X is a trivial matter, requiring very little technical knowledge - see this article. Backups are equally trivial, you just need a good backup program like SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Cloner. Alternatively, if you're running OS X 10.5 (Leopard), backups are automated through a feature called Time Machine.

Assuming you are technically savvy and have a grasp of UNIX-based operating systems, I would recommend:

Amazon.com: Running Mac OS X Tiger: A No-Compromise Power User's Guide to the Mac (Animal Guide): Jason Deraleau, James Duncan Davidson: Books

This book is based on the older version of OS X 10.4 (Tiger), but the basic information applies to all of OS X and is an excellent read, without being too basic.
 
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Thanks guys. Now I can't wait to get one. And cwa thanks for the link I will be ordering that shortly.
 
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21" iMac * 2.8 Ghz Intel Core i7 * 16GB 1333 Mhz DDR3 * 1TB HD *AMD Radeon HD 6770M 512 MB
The Apple website has lots of tutorials. Here are some Mac basics:

Apple - Find Out How - Mac Basics

and iLife tutorials:

Apple - iLife - Find out how to use iLife applications on the Mac.

There are lots of other books you can buy to delve more deeply, but these are good to get set up and going. There are also lots of tutorials on YouTube. If you need me to, I can make a short video answering any questions you might have. It's often easier to show than to tell someone how to do something.
 
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Ok I have been working on windows pc's for the last 10 years. I am employed as an IT tech and know pc's farely well. I'm not saying I am a know it all but I just wanted to give some background. I know next to nothing about macs and would like to learn. My girlfriend has an older model G5. I would like to buy maybe a mac mini to understand how the os and applications work. Where can I get guides on loading the os and making a back up? Thanks.

Welcome to the Mac. I switched a few years ago after many, many years on PCs. I got a chuckle out of the fact that your first two questions were how do I install the OS and how do I backup. Windows has really taught you well.....

I use SuperDuper for weekly full disk backups. I use Crashplan for daily backups of my data. I also keep really important stuff (photos, videos) on DVD.

My wife has an iMac and I set her up with an external USB drive and Time Machine just because it is so seamless. I no longer have to worry about whether her computer is backed up.

Most of my backup concerns now are over potential hard drive failure. I have very little concern about the OS messing things up or viruses killing my computer.

I have been using Macs for over three years and have only installed an upgrade from Tiger to Leopard. Never had to reinstall the same OS.
 
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Thanks guys. Now I can't wait to get one. And cwa thanks for the link I will be ordering that shortly.

and i like some of the tutorials on this site here and these guys have some very useful packages too see these
 
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rsmithgi is right, Jack. Installing the OS and backing up is nothing like in Windows. I've only ever had to reinstall the OS once when I put a new hard drive in, and it was pretty simple. Just pay attention to what the install assistant is asking you and you'll be fine. I screwed up one option and had to do it all over again which was my fault, but at least I got to see the cool intro video that appears when you install.

Backing up a Mac is WAY easier than backing up a Windows box, which involves getting the startup disk, downloading the backup utility, and going 3 levels deep into files just to get started. With Time Machine, you just select the drive (and the files you want to save to it) and the frequency and that's pretty much it. Even if you don't have it backing up continuously, it's easy to just plug in your external drive and quickly access your Mac's previous states (which in itself is pretty neat to see too).

You're gonna love it.
 

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