Categorized | Announcements & News

Tags : Apple

Switching to Mac OS?

Posted on 09 January 2007 by


Both Chris Spera and Mitchell Oke recently got Mac Power Book pros, and by the sounds of things – they are very pleased with their choices. So in honor of them, and because Joe of bookofjoe fame sent me this eye-opening link, I give you Confessions of a Teenage Fanboy‘s Ten Things I Wish I Had Known Before I Switched to OSX.

Here is one excerpt, you’ll have to read the entire list for more…but it is well worth the read.

5. You will no longer dread turning off your computer. – Nearly every Windows user I know cringes at the thought of shutting down a PC. They hate the idea of waiting five minutes before the computer loads into a state of usefulness. I am sure everyone reading this knows what I am getting at. First, you go through 2 minutes of a Windows XP logo with a little loading blue bar. Next, you log-in. Done, right? Hahaha, you couldn’t be more wrong. Useless applications start loading out of no where. AIM followed by MSN Messenger and Yahoo! EZ Web Chat something or another. Who the hell needs that many messaging clients? Why do they assume I want to use them when I start my computer, causing another 5 minutes of load time? On my Mac, I see a short load screen followed with a prompt for my user password. I am then loaded and ready. Start up literally takes less than 20 seconds.

There are nine other points meant to help make the transition easier for those that are contemplating it. Did it convince me to get a MBP? Nah…I am still happy with Windows and my upcoming Tablet! ;-)

Won’t it be fun to see and hear about what is announced at MacWorld tomorrow, though? Any guesses?? :-D

This post was written by:

- who has written 1699 posts on Gear Diary.

I started Gear Diary on September 30, 2006, and my goal was that this not be an easily labeled site. We all have gear that we use daily – some of it electronic and some of it organic. I think it is fascinating to explore the equipment that makes our lives easier, more entertaining, more productive, and more manageable. My hope is that Gear Diary visitors will find this site to be a comfortable and friendly place to discuss interesting topics – and not only those that are tech related, as well as a location to discover various types of gear – whatever that term may end up implying – that they never knew existed. My specialty is in-depth reviews written in a layman’s terms, because everyone can understand technology, sometimes it just takes a little translating. +Judie Stanford

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  • http://www.astraware.com Alsicole

    There’s a lot of it about. Doug at Daily Gadget just joined the ranks of Mac owners over there too! He’s discovering all the stuff that Teenage Fanboy already did.

  • MitchellO

    So far I am extremely happy with my MacBook Pro :D I’ve only had it for 3 weeks, but its just so good!!

    Just a quick snapshot of my MBP:
    http://img441.imageshack.us/my.php?image=p1010005ee5.jpg

  • MitchellO

    I would like to point out thought that I find my MacBook Pro excellent for gaming. While the X1600 isn’t the fastest chip on the block, its still very good. I play Call of Duty 2 natively in Mac, and I get awesome framerates at the screens native 1440×900 res!! And coupled with Boot Camp and Windows XP, you can run any PC games as well!! So far I have played on my MBP:

    * Call of Duty 2 (Mac)
    * Counter Strike Source (PC)
    * Age of Empires 3 (PC)
    * FlatOut2 (a racing sort of game for PC)

    They all run fantastically!

  • Kismet

    OM-FREAKING-G..

    iPhone
    Please
    Be
    Mine
    asdfaslfjkadfjaldfpiouasjnda;senvnxcjknwehrnsdfn
    I can’t stop salivating.. I need a bib.. quick, Brando make a usb-powered bib that’ll turn this drool into drinkable water..

    GAH! it’s still going on.. the keynote.. just needed to.. express.. my.. emotions.. O_O

    not to “threadjack”
    I bought a Macbook and I installed Windows on it. I go back to Mac OSX from time to time but I’m finding it harder to get things done…

  • Allen Hong

    LOL, yeah that iPhone is real eh?
    It does look pretty slick too ;)

    So Kismet, you run Windows fulltime on your Macbook? How is it? Runs good?

  • http://www.geardiary.com Judie

    I have been saying all along it would still be called iPhone. Just last night I told someone that I bet it would still be called iPhone, Sysco be damned, and they looked at me like I was nuts. ;-) ha ha!

  • Allen Hong

    I think Sysco is going to rename their phone to something else… unless they want apple to sue them?

  • http://www.geardiary.com Judie

    Nah, I think 8ysco owns ‘iPhone’ fair and square…but I bet Apple will pay them a pretty penny to use the name. ;-)

  • Kismet

    Windows runs surprisingly well with nary a glitch. With the most recent BootCamp drivers it added the one thing I was missing, touchpad scrolling. It does so the same way Mac OSX does it too, two fingers on the touchpad. Right click works by having two fingers on the touchpad and clicking. Two caveats off the top of my head: battery life is slightly less, and the screen/Apple logo doesn’t turn off when I close the lid. My solution to the latter is to place my mouse on the Apple logo when I goto bed at night until the screen powers off =D.

  • Kismet

    I wrote more on my blog, cut and paste to here

    “I bought the Apple Macbook last year on my birthday as a gift to myself. After using Mac OSX for a few days, I installed Windows XP. It didn’t work very well, lacking some key features that make navigating Windows very hard. Some third party applications solved a lot of the problems so I kept it on there in case I needed to install some applications. OSX was nice, a very refreshing change. There were some major problems though. Loading multimedia applications was strangly slow. WMV support was non-existant. A short “hack” later and it works but again, slow. Switching between windows/applications was strange and may require a complete re-wire in my head to use it comfortably. Installations were easy and fun, causing me to smirk each time I installed something new. File management would also require a re-wire since everything is sorted by application and by the application. Startup is faster yes, but a Windows power user can achieve similar results by configuring and optimizing startup. There’s no video support in MSN Messenger. Scrolling through FireFox isn’t as smooth. One of the bigger issues is that I’m unable to use my favorite programs. “There are better/easier to use programs that take its place” you say. NOT! There is no program that replaces IrfanView, a robust, lightning quick, full-featured image viewer. BSplayer is still one of the easiest to use video players, the older versions mind you. VLC is great but not as intuitive. Quicktime is extremely slow in everything and not intuitive at all. In short, I CAN use Mac OSX, but I don’t WANT to. The more I think about it, the less I like OSX.

    The Macbook hardware is exceptional. It lacks some key features however. Most notably a memory card reader. Everything else is in order. The MagSafe connector works very well. The screen is beautiful. The built in webcam works wonderfully, in both OSX and Windows. The keyboard is a delight to type on. The trackpad is large and almost flush with the wristpad, making it comfortable to use. The trackpad’s button is a bit mushy but works properly and doesn’t make much noise. I have a huge issue with the DVD-RW drive though. The slot loading is nice and the eject button on the keyboard works, however, when burning audio CDs, it skips. This is in both OSX using iTunes and in Windows using Nero. Bugger.”