- Joined
- May 26, 2008
- Messages
- 18
- Reaction score
- 1
- Points
- 3
- Location
- Fort Riley, KS
- Your Mac's Specs
- MBP 17", 1920x1200 matte LED display, 2.5GHz, 4GB RAM, 250GB 5400RPM HDD, 512MB VRAM
First, the specs...
17" MacBook Pro
1920x1200 LED matte display
GeForce 8600M GT w/ 512MB VRAM
4GB of system memory
250GB 5400RPM hard drive
Let me start off by mentioning how amazed I am with how fast my MacBook Pro shipped. It took two days for FedEx to deliver this thing from CHINA!!! Of course I opted for the express shipping when I bought it from the Apple Store online but still two days is amazing to make it that far. It shipped Tuesday and wasn't expected to be delivered until Friday. But I was surprised when I woke up on Thursday to track the package and find out that it was on the FedEx vehicle for delivery. I was very surprised by that and extremely excited.
Anyway, on with my initial impressions of this beautiful machine. I've noticed that every single thing that Apple puts their name on is designed and engineered down to the smallest detail. They pay keen attention to making things sexy, elegant, attractive, and very sophisticated looking. And this laptop is definitely no exception at all. He11, even the packaging the MBP came in screamed "make love to me!" And the only thing that kept me from doing such a thing was the fear of a papercut in my sensitive nether regions.
So I am extremely impressed by the look and feel of OS X. All of the icons look good enough to eat. Very crisp, color, and full of detail. I am still getting use to the keyboard and all of the shortcuts, keystrokes and the absence of certain Windows specific keys (home, end, backspace, etc.). It is taking me awhile to get use to the caps lock key. It doesn't respond to quick tapping of the key, you have to press it longer than you would on other keyboards. I understand it is designed that way so you don't inadvertently hit it while typing and accidentally TYPE IN ALL CAPS WHEN YOU DIDN'T MEAN TO. But I've never had this problem (except just then) so it would be convenient if they had an option built into the keyboard preferences where you could disable this feature. But in the meantime I am giving the caps lock more love and special attention in order to get it to respond. :Blushing:
I find myself not using the mouse as much because I am learning the keyboard shortcut commands which is nice. And my god, the multi-touch trackpad! I love it! I can't believe how easy it is to navigate while just using the trackpad. Swipe two fingers to scroll, tap two fingers for secondary click, use three fingers for moving back and forth through folders, documents, etc. It is such a great innovation and so far it has been dead on, no miscommunication with how many fingers I am using, etc. So far it has responded exactly as how I wanted it.
Next I was surprised at how easy it is to install programs. I am so use to Windows where every time you install something it's an exercise in futility and wondering where Windows decided to place all the gobs of files. With OS X it is so much easier just to drag the program to wherever you want it. Then just unmount the volume whenever you're done. Everything is right in front of you, not hidden deep in some folder playing hide-n-seek.
Those are just some significant things that I am happy to have discovered while using my new Mac so far. I am sure that I will find out more wonderful things about OS X and my Mac while I continue to use it. Now for some not-so-happy things...
I didn't take too kindly to Mail, the email client that comes bundled with OS X. It kind of wreaked havoc on my IMAP account and the folder structure I already had set in place. It created some folders automatically on its own that I didn't want and later I kept getting errors alerting me that connecting to the IMAP server timed out even though my connection was fine. I tried to keep fixing the folder dilemma but never managed to find a solution that I was pleased with. I am VERY organized with my email and wants lots of control over where my messages are placed. Mail didn't seem to give me the control I wanted. It's a great application other than that, very simple with a non-cluttered interface. I am leaning towards installing Mozilla Thunderbird to handle my IMAP email needs.
I don't like how OS X handles my desktop wallpaper. Whenever I try to set a wallpaper larger than my native screen resolution it just centers on the picture therefor cutting out the borders. Not so good when you have a picture that has stuff at the sides that you'd like to see. I tried toying with the different rendering options (stretch to fit, fill to screen, etc.) but didn't find anything that displayed it just right. This was a task that Windows handled with ease. I'll try messing with it later and may have to resize proportionately some of those larger images to 1920x1200 so that it looks right on my display.
What are some good sites that have 1920x1200 wallpaper? I'd like to stock up on some good wallpaper that is sized appropriately for my display.
One other question. I understand that when you close a window for an application is doesn't actually close the application itself, it still remains running in the dock with a little blue light displayed underneath the icon. Is there a way to permanently quit the program once you close its window? Does having these applications run in the dock when you're not using them consume a lot of system resources?
I downloaded the Perian codec pack but it doesn't seem to recognize Windows Media Video (.wmv) or Real Media formats (.ram). What's a good program or codec pack that will recognize these formats, as well as .vob files from ripped DVDs?
One last thing, what's a good way to get finder to remember the size of your windows after you close them? Sometimes after I resize a window then close it then reopen the same window it will be a different and always smaller size.
I am really happy with my decision to go Mac and not got back. Despite the growing pains and small issues I am really loving how simple computing with a Mac can be. Apple couldn't be more right in their marketing campaign. "It just works." They couldn't be more right.
EDIT: And one other thing. I was surprised that when I connected my Windows NTFS formatted external hard drive up to my MacBook it mounted the drive and I was able to easily copy over all my documents from my Windows machine. I didn't think that Mac recognized NTFS formatted volumes but I guess it does. Sweet.
17" MacBook Pro
1920x1200 LED matte display
GeForce 8600M GT w/ 512MB VRAM
4GB of system memory
250GB 5400RPM hard drive
Let me start off by mentioning how amazed I am with how fast my MacBook Pro shipped. It took two days for FedEx to deliver this thing from CHINA!!! Of course I opted for the express shipping when I bought it from the Apple Store online but still two days is amazing to make it that far. It shipped Tuesday and wasn't expected to be delivered until Friday. But I was surprised when I woke up on Thursday to track the package and find out that it was on the FedEx vehicle for delivery. I was very surprised by that and extremely excited.
Anyway, on with my initial impressions of this beautiful machine. I've noticed that every single thing that Apple puts their name on is designed and engineered down to the smallest detail. They pay keen attention to making things sexy, elegant, attractive, and very sophisticated looking. And this laptop is definitely no exception at all. He11, even the packaging the MBP came in screamed "make love to me!" And the only thing that kept me from doing such a thing was the fear of a papercut in my sensitive nether regions.
So I am extremely impressed by the look and feel of OS X. All of the icons look good enough to eat. Very crisp, color, and full of detail. I am still getting use to the keyboard and all of the shortcuts, keystrokes and the absence of certain Windows specific keys (home, end, backspace, etc.). It is taking me awhile to get use to the caps lock key. It doesn't respond to quick tapping of the key, you have to press it longer than you would on other keyboards. I understand it is designed that way so you don't inadvertently hit it while typing and accidentally TYPE IN ALL CAPS WHEN YOU DIDN'T MEAN TO. But I've never had this problem (except just then) so it would be convenient if they had an option built into the keyboard preferences where you could disable this feature. But in the meantime I am giving the caps lock more love and special attention in order to get it to respond. :Blushing:
I find myself not using the mouse as much because I am learning the keyboard shortcut commands which is nice. And my god, the multi-touch trackpad! I love it! I can't believe how easy it is to navigate while just using the trackpad. Swipe two fingers to scroll, tap two fingers for secondary click, use three fingers for moving back and forth through folders, documents, etc. It is such a great innovation and so far it has been dead on, no miscommunication with how many fingers I am using, etc. So far it has responded exactly as how I wanted it.
Next I was surprised at how easy it is to install programs. I am so use to Windows where every time you install something it's an exercise in futility and wondering where Windows decided to place all the gobs of files. With OS X it is so much easier just to drag the program to wherever you want it. Then just unmount the volume whenever you're done. Everything is right in front of you, not hidden deep in some folder playing hide-n-seek.
Those are just some significant things that I am happy to have discovered while using my new Mac so far. I am sure that I will find out more wonderful things about OS X and my Mac while I continue to use it. Now for some not-so-happy things...
I didn't take too kindly to Mail, the email client that comes bundled with OS X. It kind of wreaked havoc on my IMAP account and the folder structure I already had set in place. It created some folders automatically on its own that I didn't want and later I kept getting errors alerting me that connecting to the IMAP server timed out even though my connection was fine. I tried to keep fixing the folder dilemma but never managed to find a solution that I was pleased with. I am VERY organized with my email and wants lots of control over where my messages are placed. Mail didn't seem to give me the control I wanted. It's a great application other than that, very simple with a non-cluttered interface. I am leaning towards installing Mozilla Thunderbird to handle my IMAP email needs.
I don't like how OS X handles my desktop wallpaper. Whenever I try to set a wallpaper larger than my native screen resolution it just centers on the picture therefor cutting out the borders. Not so good when you have a picture that has stuff at the sides that you'd like to see. I tried toying with the different rendering options (stretch to fit, fill to screen, etc.) but didn't find anything that displayed it just right. This was a task that Windows handled with ease. I'll try messing with it later and may have to resize proportionately some of those larger images to 1920x1200 so that it looks right on my display.
What are some good sites that have 1920x1200 wallpaper? I'd like to stock up on some good wallpaper that is sized appropriately for my display.
One other question. I understand that when you close a window for an application is doesn't actually close the application itself, it still remains running in the dock with a little blue light displayed underneath the icon. Is there a way to permanently quit the program once you close its window? Does having these applications run in the dock when you're not using them consume a lot of system resources?
I downloaded the Perian codec pack but it doesn't seem to recognize Windows Media Video (.wmv) or Real Media formats (.ram). What's a good program or codec pack that will recognize these formats, as well as .vob files from ripped DVDs?
One last thing, what's a good way to get finder to remember the size of your windows after you close them? Sometimes after I resize a window then close it then reopen the same window it will be a different and always smaller size.
I am really happy with my decision to go Mac and not got back. Despite the growing pains and small issues I am really loving how simple computing with a Mac can be. Apple couldn't be more right in their marketing campaign. "It just works." They couldn't be more right.
EDIT: And one other thing. I was surprised that when I connected my Windows NTFS formatted external hard drive up to my MacBook it mounted the drive and I was able to easily copy over all my documents from my Windows machine. I didn't think that Mac recognized NTFS formatted volumes but I guess it does. Sweet.
