Hi,
I have a decent PC but ever since I got rid of my Psion PDA, my organisation is all over the place. For that reason, I'm considering a maxed out MacBook Air 11: it's tiny, so doesn't get in the way. But I can hook it up to a large screen and use it as my main machine when required.
I would use it for the following purposes:
For the organisational bit: my administration is currently in a horrible state. The amount of administration is currently increasing as taking up more freelance work. In the late '90's, I used to have a Psion 3mx, a 5, then a 7 that were perfect for this sort of work. They were really easy to use and instant-on. Sounds like a MacBook Air could work in the same way. I still need to figure out which programs I want to use for all this, but I'll start with the standard MacOS X ones + Numbers and see where I get from there. Some sort of linking between the programs would be nice (e.g. link a spreadsheet to a contact for facturation).
Work: I currently use mainly Word, OpenOffice Writer or Scribus if I need to do some more lay out work. The issue with Scribus is that it's not compatible with Word. Pages sounds like a very nice application. Suppose I switch to Pages, how compatible is that when doing lay out work (simple brochures with some graphical elements around the page) ?
Photography: I need a DAM solution to regain control of my photography. My collection is small (maybe 1000 photos, RAW+JPEG of max 12MP cameras), but I frequently have many duplicates of the same photo. The way I work is this: on the road, I copy my SD card to a portable storage device (Nexto) that doesn't do incremental backups. So, I end up with several directories that are nearly identical, but with different time stamps. The Nexto's advantage is that it is pocket sized, so it is much easier for field work than dragging a Mac everywhere (I usually have no need to process & publish photos the same day). But I do need a solution to clean up the duplicates. When I have that, I will need to start organising. I was considering Aperture for the organising part, particularly at the price in the AppStore. Would it also help me with the clean up of the duplicates, or is there another program that's better ?
Backup: I have a NAS that I will reconfigure to have a TimeMachine partition. I found a few articles on how to do this. Will this copy the Aperture database as well ? How much space would I need to foresee for that partition ?
Having had to live with my current admin & photo mess for a few years, I'm not particularly in a rush to start reorganising my life. But it is exciting to read about the Mac. The first Mac I ever touched was a friend's Mac SE around 1988. I loved HyperCard, it had a large influence on the way I think about documentation. Print quality was also an eye opener, even though I don't think my friend was using a LaserWriter. Back then, there was no way I could afford such a setup. Now that I am looking to buy one, I want to think carefully about which one to get. I have read about the possibility of Sandy Bridge MBAs in summer, which would be close to the Lion release. Those two together would be quite an upgrade (faster Mac + no Lion license to buy) and I will have to consider if I'm willing to wait until then to get in.
Thanks,
Peter.
I have a decent PC but ever since I got rid of my Psion PDA, my organisation is all over the place. For that reason, I'm considering a maxed out MacBook Air 11: it's tiny, so doesn't get in the way. But I can hook it up to a large screen and use it as my main machine when required.
I would use it for the following purposes:
- Organisation: the Mac would become my main machine that I use to organise everything. All address data, calendar info, family budgets, planning for my freelance activities, and so on would go on there.
- Work: I mainly write documentation & sometimes do some minor lay-outing for brochures and the like.
- Fun: surfing, playing a game of go online (Java client), ... from the couch
- Photography: mostly organisation of my current mess, a bit of processing, probably some web publishing
For the organisational bit: my administration is currently in a horrible state. The amount of administration is currently increasing as taking up more freelance work. In the late '90's, I used to have a Psion 3mx, a 5, then a 7 that were perfect for this sort of work. They were really easy to use and instant-on. Sounds like a MacBook Air could work in the same way. I still need to figure out which programs I want to use for all this, but I'll start with the standard MacOS X ones + Numbers and see where I get from there. Some sort of linking between the programs would be nice (e.g. link a spreadsheet to a contact for facturation).
Work: I currently use mainly Word, OpenOffice Writer or Scribus if I need to do some more lay out work. The issue with Scribus is that it's not compatible with Word. Pages sounds like a very nice application. Suppose I switch to Pages, how compatible is that when doing lay out work (simple brochures with some graphical elements around the page) ?
Photography: I need a DAM solution to regain control of my photography. My collection is small (maybe 1000 photos, RAW+JPEG of max 12MP cameras), but I frequently have many duplicates of the same photo. The way I work is this: on the road, I copy my SD card to a portable storage device (Nexto) that doesn't do incremental backups. So, I end up with several directories that are nearly identical, but with different time stamps. The Nexto's advantage is that it is pocket sized, so it is much easier for field work than dragging a Mac everywhere (I usually have no need to process & publish photos the same day). But I do need a solution to clean up the duplicates. When I have that, I will need to start organising. I was considering Aperture for the organising part, particularly at the price in the AppStore. Would it also help me with the clean up of the duplicates, or is there another program that's better ?
Backup: I have a NAS that I will reconfigure to have a TimeMachine partition. I found a few articles on how to do this. Will this copy the Aperture database as well ? How much space would I need to foresee for that partition ?
Having had to live with my current admin & photo mess for a few years, I'm not particularly in a rush to start reorganising my life. But it is exciting to read about the Mac. The first Mac I ever touched was a friend's Mac SE around 1988. I loved HyperCard, it had a large influence on the way I think about documentation. Print quality was also an eye opener, even though I don't think my friend was using a LaserWriter. Back then, there was no way I could afford such a setup. Now that I am looking to buy one, I want to think carefully about which one to get. I have read about the possibility of Sandy Bridge MBAs in summer, which would be close to the Lion release. Those two together would be quite an upgrade (faster Mac + no Lion license to buy) and I will have to consider if I'm willing to wait until then to get in.
Thanks,
Peter.