Ok...

Well I just drove about 3 hours to our closest Apple retail store to check out what all the fuss was about--- and boy' I have never seen fuss live up to its self like this. Apple is amazing the staff was awesome answered all my stupid 'n00b' questions and took time to walk me through the different products, we came to the conclusion the 15' inch powerbook would be best for me. Obviously not having the cash on me at the moment, I was unable to claim my prize but I went out of the story a very happy man.

I am am still trying to find someone to buy my stupid ol' Dell. Then once I get my money I am switching to mac land.

They guy was able to answer most of my questions but on the long drive home I remembered a few I should have asked him. Then I remembered this forum so I jotted a few down.

- Basically I want to know, some programs you need. For instance with windows (you download winamp, winzip, and all those other stupid programs with 'win' in them) Just so I know the tricks of the trade to save me some time and useless downloads. Pretty much any suggestions you guys got, I am into everything!

- I really can't live without MSN messenger or some type of typing program with spell check and sentence structure. I don't type any reports so all those power-point things are useless to me. But I do write a column weekly and as you can tell from this post I am not the greatest gram-a'holic in the world. But I have seen many-many post of people talking about how they dont trust the micro-mac programs. And I have heard 'horror stories' of the first. But I have a buddy list full of people that flat-out refuse to use AIM.

So, I am stuck! I really don't care nothing about msn's faces or nothing, so I wouldn't object to a mix-messenger program. Just whatever is safe and won't mess up my new computer. I also noticed microsoft was offering sometype of office program. I really don't need all that, I just need a program similar to that of Microsoft Word.

And If I am wrong about micro-mac being bad files. Don't kill me, I am just repeating what I have heard.

So to shorten things

Give me a feel of some things I need and somethings I def don't need.

Smarten me up on micro-mac issue and general tips for the long time windows user.

Thanks in advanced guys.

Fomer said:

So to shorten things

Give me a feel of some things I need and somethings I def don't need.

Smarten me up on micro-mac issue and general tips for the long time windows user.

Thanks in advanced guys.

Click to expand...

you wont need to download any of those "win" programs. stuffit expander (which handles almost any file format) is included by default, itunes is your version of winamp and is included. Plus you get imovie, idvd, ical (good replacement for outlook), mail.app (great replacement for outlook).

Microsoft software on the mac really is not all that bad. The microsoft software on my mac seems more stable than the copies of office i used on my desktop. The price is a bit outrageous, but they do offer just microsoft word if thats all you need. The mac doesnt come with office suite software to start, but you can get office v.X or another good open source alternative is OpenOffice.

Tips for long time windows users:
1. find a place like this to ask your questions.
2. use a windows mouse for a couple of weeks to get used to the system, then switch to the single button on the powerbook.
3. enjoy, OS X is a very stable and user friendly operating system, you shouldnt have too many problems, and for times you do, ask the people who have been there before ;-)

Thanks for the speedy reply, also nice to see you have the same one I am getting except I will be picking up the normal one and not the superdrive.

So basically you think it'd be safe to download the messenger from them?

And I found another post here talking about versiontracker.com. I might could pick up a type program with spell check there-- hopefully for free.

I am a money-hog, I can't believe I am spending this much on a computer. But I am sure it will be well worth it.

Apple has an application call Appleworks, which is similar to M$ office (cheaper). I believe there are word processors on version tracker and mac update.

Welcome aboard!

Switching to Mac is a very exciting experience. It is also a tough one. It took me a while to get comfortable with the way things work, and the apps that are available.

Switching my e-mail app was the biggest pain. I was using outlook, and there is no outlook for Mac. There is Entourage, which is an MS product that is sorta like outlook. Of course MS makes it hard to convert between the two, and it is virtually impossible. I ended up transfering all my e-mail over my e-mail server and retrieving them with Mail.App. There was a piece of software available to convert, but I couldn't see paying for something that should be included in the products. Mail.App uses standard UNIX style mailboxes, so if I ever want to convert out of Mail.App, it won't be too hard. Not that I want to

I have found that the Office apps for Mac aren't that great. I would suggest going with either Apple Works ( I hear there is a new version coming out soon? ) or OpenOffice. Both of which aren't "ports" of a Win product.

As far as a messenger app, there is MSN Messenger for Mac. I haven't really used it, but it is available. I use mainly iChat and Yahoo! at this point. Hopefully iChat will support multiple protocols soon.

Versiontracker is a great place to find all kinds of cool stuff for your Mac. I go there and MacUpdate almost daily to see what is new. The thing about Mac, is that OS X is becoming so popular, a lot of people are developing for it. We even have a few developers that frequent this board.

You did the right thing by coming to a forum and asking questions. That is how I started learning, and you get to meet a lot of cool people on the way.

Most Mac people are willing to help you out. All you need to do is ask. Weird, never really thought about it before, but it is really a different "culture" of people. You'll see soon enough

Fomer said:

Thanks for the speedy reply, also nice to see you have the same one I am getting except I will be picking up the normal one and not the superdrive.

So basically you think it'd be safe to download the messenger from them?

And I found another post here talking about versiontracker.com. I might could pick up a type program with spell check there-- hopefully for free.

I am a money-hog, I can't believe I am spending this much on a computer. But I am sure it will be well worth it.

Click to expand...

Apple has a spell checker included as part of the operating system, and some programs use it, others dont. Text-Edit which comes with OS X does use the spell check system.
I felt the same thing when i spent $2800 on a laptop, but i have found in the past 3 months, that it was well worth every penny. I do web development as well as C++ development on my machine and use my laptop to administer a linux lab from anywhere. Its an amazingly versatile machine and worth every penny. I havent used MSN messenger but i would believe that its fairly stable for the platform. Ichat doesnt support it just yet, but they are working on it. There are a number of instant messaging programs on versiontracker, so that would be a good place to start looking for MSN clients if the mac version does not suit you. versiontracker is a great website as others have said.

Thanks for the more replys.

Well so far I doubt I will need any type of office program. My main thing was just a spell checker, but now that I know the already installed text program comes with it I am set.

There are several mac programs that have me very interested. Apple Works, and possibly the program that lets you run windows programs, and a few others.

Where would be the best place to download a copy of these for free. Limewire has spyware and seems to be unstable (atleast on my windows system). Does anyone have any exp with Neo, I have heard a few talking about it. I was wondering if that would be the better one to download.

Hmm.. well I will speak for myself and a whole lot of mac users out there, according to macdev, macaddict, machome, mactoday, macworld, scriptsoftware, etc etc us mac users are great at registering products. We're quite an honest bunch and try to keep the mac community prospering and making even more software.. and the way to do that is by purchasing whatever you use. Feel free to use the software until you realize ok.. Im going to continue using it and then please please register it, or if you're not going to, then uninstall it. It's just nice to support your fellow users, your fellow programmers, etc etc we're all in this together and if we support each other, we become a richer community because of it.

I just had to say my two cents worth..

Cheers!

I understand that. I try to buy most things the honest way, but things like Photoshop I don't have 599 to chuck out. But for the most part I'll do my part aswell when I join the mac world.

Ah congrats at the mac eye opening!

Fomer said:

I understand that. I try to buy most things the honest way, but things like Photoshop I don't have 599 to chuck out. But for the most part I'll do my part aswell when I join the mac world.

Click to expand...

Hmm.. yeah no kidding.. photoshop is insanely expensive. Do you really need it? If so then I would buy it with a student discount, once they have you that way, you'll just keep upgrading from then on at the normal price.. and I do think their main concern is to keep you as a life long user, so they do not mind you purchasing with a student discount.. Or go take a class at your local community college, pay $20 bucks a credit and save $400 when purchasing photoshop

That the was I get my software, through my wife student discount.

Next Question....

What is konfabulator?

Does Ical, Iphoto, Itunes, etc.. all that come preinstalled?

What does the little purple face do in everyones docks?

And.... is there away to have no icons on the desktop, I have seen everyone have one with like Mac Harddrive icon... that sounds important, but I really don't want any icons on my desktop. Am I screwed or is there away to show no desktop icons and still get to that file that looks oh so important.

Thanks.

Fomer said:

Next Question....

What is konfabulator?

Does Ical, Iphoto, Itunes, etc.. all that come preinstalled?

What does the little purple face do in everyones docks?

And.... is there away to have no icons on the desktop, I have seen everyone have one with like Mac Harddrive icon... that sounds important, but I really don't want any icons on my desktop. Am I screwed or is there away to show no desktop icons and still get to that file that looks oh so important.

Thanks.

Click to expand...

konfabulator is a program that allows you to put interactive widgets on your desktop. I use it for a battery meter and a countdown timer.

all of the Iapps are included with the OS X installation when the machine arrives.

the purple face is the finder, its basically the explorer for the disk.

I do not have a clue if you can take the macintosh hard drive icon off the desktop, it would be one thing, so you could just push it off the edge of the screen. it doesnt bother me, so i havent tried, maybe one of the senior mac users can help on this one.

You can remove the hard disk icons from the desktop. It is one of the dock options. I am not in front of my mac at this time. Will have to check later. Once you have remove the hard drive icons, you can access it through the dock or, one of the pull down menus.

To remove icons:
Go to your finder (purple face) go to preferences, or "open apple + ," then on the very top of the window, you will see, "Show these items on desktop" (or something like it) click out "Disks" make shur any files on your desktop are moved into a disk first dont trash them. (unless they are aliases (or u dont want them) I would suggest leaving the other two checked.. its just handy. But what ever makes ya happy.

Thanks for the replys, I believe I won't touch any of that just yet. Because this will be my first apple computer.... so I believe you can call me a a mac-n00b. Don't wanna mess it up.

I wouldnt worry about breaking your mac. they are pretty indestructible. If there is a problem with anything unlike windows it wont bring the machine to a screeching halt. OS X is a pretty user friendly operating system and the features are fairly well tested before the release of the operating system. 10.3 is going to be awesome, and id suggest waiting until the powerbooks are available with 10.3 so you dont have to pay $130 to upgrade. If you are dying to get a powerbook, like i was, $130 a little later wasnt enough of a reason to wait.

Question.

How long before Panther comes out? And when it comes out will they auto add them to the powerbooks and if so will the price of PB jump? My plan was to the buy it next Saturday or maybe the Next. Hopefully by then.

Fomer said:

Question.

How long before Panther comes out? And when it comes out will they auto add them to the powerbooks and if so will the price of PB jump? My plan was to the buy it next Saturday or maybe the Next. Hopefully by then.

Click to expand...

There have been rumors of the middle of september for the panther release, but SJ guaranteed it to be released by the end of the year. If you are going to order it next weekend, go ahead, and just get panther when it is available. Im not sure how apple upgrades operating system software on newly shipping machines, so I cant be of more help on that.