Switch Advice

Hi,

I'm about to switch from my P4 3ghz 1gb ram to an Imac 20" 2ghz duo 1gb ram.

Firstly, has anyone made a similar switch and have any advice on performance?

The other thing I need help on is applications. For the most part I use the PC currently for Dreamweaver, Photoshop, Picasa and Firefox. Obviously these I can all do on the Mac with the exception of Picasa for which I will have to substitute iPhoto.

The other stuff I do relates to usenet binaries and downloading .nzbs, watching movies (.avi), mounting images (.img, .iso).

I currently use Grabit for .nzb, Windows Media Player or VideoLan for .avi or .ts movie files and Daemon Tools for mounting images.

What apps are available on the Mac for these applications? Once I am happy I have suitable alternatives I am ready to jump ship!

Thanks in advance

Damo

Some images Mac OS Xcan handle natively, and these can be mounted directly in the OS. For others (oen's that you are unable to just mount) you can use Roxio Toast.

More about disk images: http://www.kamu.ch/switch/index.php?page=art&artid=4

VideoLan or VLC is available for Mac and plays virtually anything. Quicktime is a good video player, too, but you oughta get the pro version or use it via Front Row.

Hey Damo, first off congrats on finally deciding to switch.

I just switched recently from 2.64Ghz (overclocked) AMD 64bit, 2GB RAM computer etc to a 1.83GHz 1.5GB MacBook Pro, and I don't notice any bit of a performance issue at all. It's hard to compare because of the fact that I'm running XP vs OS X, but I plan to give BootCamp a try sometime soon and then I'll have a better comparison base for feedback.

I'd say that you can find an application to do EVERYTHING you were doing before. There's a few great websites that have software links on them:

www.opensourcemac.org
www.macupdate.com
www.versiontracker.com

There's obviously more, but that's all I can think of for now.

I think www.coolosxapps.com is one too but I can't remember entirely.

Easiest way to find replacements for those programs, IMO: search for the file extensions that you obviously seem to know. MacUpdate/VersionTracker will pick 'em up and find you related programs.

Good luck w/ the switch, let us know how it goes for you!