Final Suggestions Before Switching?

Before I go to deep, let me just say I’ve been a lurker here for almost a month now, and I absolutely love this place. I’ve been in the market for a laptop, and almost all my questions concerning Macs have been answered through searching.

I’ll be traveling to Atlanta tomorrow to pick up my first Mac ever! I’m very excited. I would order it from Apple.com to avoid the labor cost associated with upgrading the memory, but I just can’t afford to be without a laptop any longer. I’m purchasing the 15” MacBook Pro and having the memory upgraded to 2GB. I’ll be getting “Office for Mac” through my University at a much cheaper price than Apple offers.

I do have a few questions concerning first time use, transfer of files, etc.

1. Every time I sit down at a Mac on campus and plug in my SanDisk U3 Cruzer Micro, I can’t get it to work. The Finder shows the U3 system files, but I can’t seem to access the drive. Thoughts?
2. What’s the most efficient way to transport files from my PC to Mac? Can I just hook them together with a network cable, or share a file on my PC and access it through the Mac over my network? This is only a serious concern because of the fact that I can’t seem to make my flash drive work on a Mac.
3. I’m planning on picking up "Mac OS X Tiger Edition - The Missing Manual". Is there anything else I should pick up at the Apple Store while in Atlanta?
4. Are there any suggestions for first time use/order of operations? I read in another thread that it’s as simple as pushing the power button, watching OS X boot up, entering in personal information and boom.

Thanks so much for the help!

gtg622r, WELCOME! You are entering the exciting and rewarding world of Macs. You won't look back, trust me.

To your questions:

1/ What format is the file system on that Cruzer? It should work just fine if it is a recognized file system (FAT32, NTFS, HFS+). If it is something else, you may need to reformat it. The Mac Disk Utility will do that handily.

2/ Probably the two easiest ways are to burn your stuff onto a CD or DVD and take 'em across that way, or use an external USB hard drive. Connecting the computers together on a network ought to be simple in principle, and for two Macs it is, but Windows really makes this difficult. Steer clear of this for now, until you are fully up to speed on your Mac. Unfortunately, it takes a bit of tap dancing with both Windows and Mac to get the two play nice with each other.

3/ Excellent, excellent choice of book. I read it myself when I switched (about 10 months ago). It was hugely helpful. About the only other thing I bought when I got my new Mac was a larger external hard drive for backups, since my new Mac had almost 2x the disk space of my previous PC.

4/ It is pretty much as simple as that!

Enjoy!!!

1) Your SanDisk should work perfectly on your new Mac (may need to check the format)... Have you been able to connect other drives to your Univ's Macs??? If not, they may have the mac set to Not allow additional drive connections (though I don't know why they would do this???)

2) This Link (HERE) will help you greatly... When I "switched" I just used my iPod (in Disk Use Mode) to transfer over my Contacts, Cal., Photo's, and files. It's beyond simple that way.

3) The Missing Manual is a phenomenal resource!.. and yes, there are LOTS of other things you COULD pick-up at the Apple store... but NO, nothing else you'll need, with what you've stated you'll be fine.

4) Just Turn it out... and... "It just works". Take a few weeks just with the basics, and force yourself to learn the "mac way" of doing things (Shortcuts, spotlight, drag/drop, etc.) Then start looking into the Plethora of amazing 3rd party apps.

You have found (as you know) a great resource here at Mac-Forums.

Welcome!!!

EDIT: Mac57 is a fast typer

mac57 said:

gtg622r, WELCOME! You are entering the exciting and rewarding world of Macs. You won't look back, trust me.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the warm welcome! It's great to be received into a new forum with "open arms." You guys are so helpful with every "newbs" questions, it's amazing! Hopefully, I'll have the ability to find the answers to future questions through a search result rather than cluttering the server with another, "Help me" thread!

mac57 said:

1/ What format is the file system on that Cruzer? It should work just fine if it is a recognized file system (FAT32, NTFS, HFS+). If it is something else, you may need to reformat it. The Mac Disk Utility will do that handily.

Click to expand...

It appears the thumb drive is in a FAT format. On the attached screen shot, you can see that Windows creates two drives (the F and G) when the flash drive is connected. Whenever I connect to a Mac the U3 System (F) is the only thing that shows up. With a Mac, would I have to install a driver?

mac57 said:

3/ Excellent, excellent choice of book. I read it myself when I switched (about 10 months ago). It was hugely helpful. About the only other thing I bought when I got my new Mac was a larger external hard drive for backups, since my new Mac had almost 2x the disk space of my previous PC.

4/ It is pretty much as simple as that!

Enjoy!!!

Click to expand...

I'm really looking forward to my new purchase. There is no other way to say it, but I'm pretty much a geek, and am willing to admit it. While I love tinkering and repairing, lately whenever I'm on my PC, 50% of my time is spent troubleshooting, rather than accomplishing school work.

RIDE said:

1) Your SanDisk should work perfectly on your new Mac (may need to check the format)... Have you been able to connect other drives to your Univ's Macs??? If not, they may have the mac set to Not allow additional drive connections (though I don't know why they would do this???)

Click to expand...

In all honesty, the way our University computers are restricted, I wouldn't be surprised if they prevented additional drive connections (although they allow it on the PCs). One thing I haven't thought of mentioning was that I always plugged it into the keyboard USB port. It's an eMac (I think; the CRT type monitor with the computer built in). Would that have any adverse effect?

RIDE said:

2) This Link (HERE) will help you greatly... When I "switched" I just used my iPod (in Disk Use Mode) to transfer over my Contacts, Cal., Photo's, and files. It's beyond simple that way.

Click to expand...

Great link, RIDE! One thing they touched on, but didn't go into much detail about was e-mails. Office '04 for Mac doesn't include Microsoft Outlook; I'm presuming everyone uses Mail? My problem here is that I have archived mail going all the way back to August of 2004. This document goes into more detail about transferring large quantities of e-mails, but it doesn't say anything about *.pst (file extension of an archived Microsoft Outlook file). Thoughts?

gtg622r said:

In all honesty, the way our University computers are restricted, I wouldn't be surprised if they prevented additional drive connections (although they allow it on the PCs). One thing I haven't thought of mentioning was that I always plugged it into the keyboard USB port. It's an eMac (I think; the CRT type monitor with the computer built in). Would that have any adverse effect?

Click to expand...

That would not adversely effect your Flash Drive.. I think you'll see that it connects just fine to the MBP... In fact, bring it with you to the Apple store and have them connect it.

gtg622r said:

Great link, RIDE! One thing they touched on, but didn't go into much detail about was e-mails. Office '04 for Mac doesn't include Microsoft Outlook; I'm presuming everyone uses Mail? My problem here is that I have archived mail going all the way back to August of 2004. This document goes into more detail about transferring large quantities of e-mails, but it doesn't say anything about *.pst (file extension of an archived Microsoft Outlook file). Thoughts?

Click to expand...

I'll have to look into the .pst transfer to Mail.app. I know there is a way to get the .pst to Entourage... So I would think there must be a way to get them into mail... Worst case might be load them to Entourage, then move them to Mail.app.

Mail is the app. I prefer, I love it! It's integrated very well into OS X (obviously)

Again.. Welcome!

P.S. You might want to downsize the image you posted... to say 800x600.. it makes for better viewing of the entire thread. Just a thought

So, here we are. Just a few days into it, and I'm loving it!

So easy to use, everything flows together. Logging onto existing wireless networks is a breeze. At this point I havn't had any major challenges, but I can't wait 'till one occurs!!

Congrats on the Mac!!!! Great picture as well... May want to resize it though for the forums.. maybe 800x600

RIDE said:

Congrats on the Mac!!!! Great picture as well... May want to resize it though for the forums.. maybe 800x600

Click to expand...

Hmm, I thought I resized it to 800x600 using iPhoto. Thoughts?

Oh, I got my flash drive to work. In order for me to access the files stored on it, I had to remove the password protection it offered when plugged into a PC.

gtg622r said:

Hmm, I thought I resized it to 800x600 using iPhoto. Thoughts?

Click to expand...

It is currently 1200x900....

I'm glad your drive works for you, I figured it would... Enjoy your Mac!

If you're still looking for a way to bring your Outlook data over to your new Mac, check out Outlook2mac:

http://www.littlemachines.com

It runs on your Windows machine and exports mail, contacts, and calendar appointments into files that can be easily imported into Mail.app or Entourage. I've used it recently to move most of my wife's stuff from her failing Vaio laptop to her new MacBook and it seemed to do an excellent job. I believe they have a demo version that's limited to some number of items, but it's only $10 (!) if you want the whole thing.

Good luck!