Software Recommendations

Joined
Jan 11, 2008
Messages
38
Reaction score
0
Points
6
I was wondering if you guys can help me find alternatives to Windows software for the Mac i use regularly:

- Word
- Excel
- Outlook
- Quicken
- Quickbooks
- SmartFTP
- uTorrent (recommend any good torrent sites?)
- Backup software
- Drive defrag software (dont know if macs need this)

This is it at the time...
 
Joined
Dec 3, 2006
Messages
9,383
Reaction score
417
Points
83
Location
Irvine, CA
Your Mac's Specs
Black Macbook C2D 2GHz 3GB RAM 250GB HD iPhone 4 iPad 3G
For Word, Excel, and Outlook, there's Office for Mac. Some finance software was just released, don't know the name, but I'm sure somebody else will pipe in with the answer. For FTP, check out Cyberduck and for torrent software, check out Transmission.

There is a variety of backup software, it really depends on what sort you want. There's drive mirroring software like SuperDuper, or the simpler and easier to use, not to mention built in, Time Machine. And no, you don't need defrag software.
 
Joined
Nov 2, 2006
Messages
476
Reaction score
9
Points
18
Your Mac's Specs
24" 2.8ghz IMAC, MB Pro
I was wondering if you guys can help me find alternatives to Windows software for the Mac i use regularly:

- Word
- Excel
- Outlook
- Quicken
- Quickbooks
- SmartFTP
- uTorrent (recommend any good torrent sites?)
- Backup software
- Drive defrag software (dont know if macs need this)

This is it at the time...

- Iwork or NeoOffice
- IWork or NeoOffice
- Mail or Entorage
- Not sure
- Not sure
- Transmit or Cyberduck
- Transmission (www.youtorrent.com)
- Time Machine or SuperDuper
- They do not need this.
 
Joined
Jul 16, 2007
Messages
43
Reaction score
2
Points
8
Your Mac's Specs
2.33 MBP, 3gb ram, not enough disk space, iPod Classic, iPhone, techno-addiction
Depends on your uses, but like already mentioned Office for Mac is a universal solution for your past Office usage. I also use Pages for word processing and light page layout, Keynote for way better presentations than Powerpoint, and Numbers for spreadsheets (all bundled for $70). I enjoy Numbers but it doesn't suit your needs if you're an advanced (i.e. Macro-centric) Excel user. You can also get NeoOffice on the cheap (shareware) which is a pretty slick open source version of Office. I use Interarchy for FTP. For disk maintenance/optimization try Cocktail for $30 or download Onyx from the Apple site for free. Both do an excellent job with disk optimization and maintenance tasks.
 
Joined
Feb 13, 2005
Messages
1,186
Reaction score
73
Points
48
Location
New Orleans, LA, USA
Your Mac's Specs
13" Macbook Pro 2.26Ghz Unibody 4G RAM 160G HDD Superdrive
I was wondering if you guys can help me find alternatives to Windows software for the Mac i use regularly:

- Word

Word, or NeoOffice, or Pages (part of iWork)

Excel or NeoOffice which has a spreadsheet, or Numbers (part of iWork)
- Outlook

Outlook (or exchange, or whatever MS calls the Mac version of this) but mostly mail.app.
- Quicken
Quicken. Though I've heard that Quicken Mac is not as...uh, I dunno good?
- Quickbooks

Think there's a Quickbooks for Mac. Not sure though.
- SmartFTP

Cyberduck. Free, very good, probably as good or better than SmartFTP from what I can recall of my use of SmartFTP.

- uTorrent (recommend any good torrent sites?)

Azureus. www.the[something like a]pirate[where they would go, like a]bay.org

- Backup software

Time Machine. Comes with Leopard. Buy USB or firewire external drive, Time Machine will take care of the rest.

- Drive defrag software (dont know if macs need this)

Not necessary. At all. Don't even bother with the brainpower to research it.
 
Joined
Nov 2, 2006
Messages
476
Reaction score
9
Points
18
Your Mac's Specs
24" 2.8ghz IMAC, MB Pro
Depends on your uses, but like already mentioned Office for Mac is a universal solution for your past Office usage. I also use Pages for word processing and light page layout, Keynote for way better presentations than Powerpoint, and Numbers for spreadsheets (all bundled for $70). I enjoy Numbers but it doesn't suit your needs if you're an advanced (i.e. Macro-centric) Excel user. You can also get NeoOffice on the cheap (shareware) which is a pretty slick open source version of Office. I use Interarchy for FTP. For disk maintenance/optimization try Cocktail for $30 or download Onyx from the Apple site for free. Both do an excellent job with disk optimization and maintenance tasks.

When he refers to pages, numbers, and keynote he means IWork. Which is a Apple made office suite selling for $70. When he refers to NeoOffice as shareware what he actually means is open source Freeware.

The programs he mentions Onyx and Cocktail aren't really relevant to the defrag question but are useful for system troubleshooting.
 

Shop Amazon


Shop for your Apple, Mac, iPhone and other computer products on Amazon.
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon and affiliated sites.
Top