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Finnaly going Mac

visionari1

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Out in the Countryside of Nelson NZ
Yup I've been looking at Mac's.

I need a serious upgrade on my 10 year old HP which has been on death row several times in the last couple of years, and takes forever (sometimes to load).

So I've been looking at getting a new 13 inch Macbook Pro or the older 15.4 version of the Macbook pro April 2010 (at $200 more than the 13inch current model with thunderbolt) the NZ mac store has on the refurbished section of their web site (it's brand new, just old stock). I will also handing down my 3gs Iphone to the wife who needs a new phone, I will upgrade to an Iphone 4. Not sure if I should wait till the new Iphone 5 arrives?

As this is my first Mac I'll get our local Mac dealer to shift all the old info across and get everything working as well as a bit of tuition as I'd hate to stuff up a brand new machine.

I have a logitech wireless keybord which I use for typing and have the laptop set up higher to get better posture, I presume this will work with the new Mac and the wireless printer.

I have transcribe and will be using this on the Mac, ....need to find that post about transferring the key to Mac.

Any thing else I should know about changing from PC to Mac

Advice from cafe sax Mac-ites...please.

Cheers & Ciao

Jimu
 
i use both- for speed and reliability a mac is hands down winner. For me the lack of a right click on a mac always feels odd + I've never been comfortblewith its install/uninstall programs system. But aside from this- highly recommended (oh, and get used to using keyboard shortcuts)
 
Once you "Finnaly" go Mac you may be able to finally improve your spelling.................;}!

Seriously, as a Mac user over the past 12 years it feels so primitive using a PC (we have 4 Macs at home) and even my rebellious teenage daughter has abandoned her PC laptop for higher things.

Good luck with the change!
Kind regards
Tom:cool:
 
Thanks for the replies,

I'll try and make sure of my spelling, thou surely Mac's can still make spelling mistakes!

Good job you don't need to spell to play Sax, otherwise I'd be in trouble!

I'll be checking out the local mac users group that meets tomorrow night!

Cheers & Ciao
Jimu
 
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Any thing else I should know about changing from PC to Mac

The new OS, Lion, is out in july. If you wait until then it will probably come bundled with a new one and that might save a few quid on an upgrade.

Sadly I don't think there is a Transcribe cross grade, or there wasn't last time I spoke to Andy. Perhaps it has changed.

You will be able to install Windows on a Bootcamp partition anyway, but hardly worth it if it's just for one application. Especially as you need a windows disc to install.

Logitech stuff works well on Macs so there should be no problem. If you use MS Office, I would recommend getting iWork instead, it reads all word docs and Excel charts and is a nicer application altogether. It can export back to .doc and .xls so is very compatible.

And of course, you will get Garageband. Lovely. Add a Yeti stereo USB mic and you're all set for nice recordings.
 
The new OS, Lion, is out in july. If you wait until then it will probably come bundled with a new one and that might save a few quid on an upgrade.

Sadly I don't think there is a Transcribe cross grade, or there wasn't last time I spoke to Andy. Perhaps it has changed.

You will be able to install Windows on a Bootcamp partition anyway, but hardly worth it if it's just for one application. Especially as you need a windows disc to install.

Logitech stuff works well on Macs so there should be no problem. If you use MS Office, I would recommend getting iWork instead, it reads all word docs and Excel charts and is a nicer application altogether. It can export back to .doc and .xls so is very compatible.

And of course, you will get Garageband. Lovely. Add a Yeti stereo USB mic and you're all set for nice recordings.

Good info Pete re the new OS Lion. I can wait a month or so. I found the Link in this old post to reinstall Transcribe PC to Mac from Dave Mac in this old post

I recently changed from PC to MAC and the nice people at SeventhString gave me a new licence key for the MAC (I explained that I would NOT be using the PC again!!). If anyone else is doing the same - here is the link http://www.seventhstring.com/xscribe/transfer_os.html
Dave Mac.

So that should be fairly straight forward.

I'll investigate the Yeti, but not yeti untill I get the Mac.

Unusually mild weather in NZ at the moment, I was in shorts today doing a little bit of local Busking.

Cheers & Ciao
Jimu
 
Hi Jimu
This will sound reactionary and will get the Mac-ites down on my head, but I just ask, Why?
Macs look good but are expensive and their upgrades are massively over-priced. If you are used to a PC with XP or '95 you may find a Mac OS hard to get used to. You can get a new 15in laptop with Windows 7 with the same spec and double the graphics power of a 15in Macbook Pro for almost half the price.
Macs have their advantages like build quality, ergonomics, battery life, and some people prefer the Mac OS, but it's simply not true that Macs are faster than the Windows based laptops.
YC
 
Well said YC!

agree totally - probably because I have no brain to be washed by apple...

Hi Jimu
This will sound reactionary and will get the Mac-ites down on my head, but I just ask, Why?
Macs look good but are expensive and their upgrades are massively over-priced. If you are used to a PC with XP or '95 you may find a Mac OS hard to get used to. You can get a new 15in laptop with Windows 7 with the same spec and double the graphics power of a 15in Macbook Pro for almost half the price.
Macs have their advantages like build quality, ergonomics, battery life, and some people prefer the Mac OS, but it's simply not true that Macs are faster than the Windows based laptops.
YC
 
Er, discussing Mac vs PC kind of comes under the "no religion" rule :)
 
No religion in an operating system/computer maker, unless it's Deus ex machina.
Or is it the book of Jobs vs book of Bill ?

;}
 
Rather than iWork, suggest Open Office, which tends to mirror Office but is freeware.

Doubt if you'll have any regrets unless you are a gamer, in which case buy one of YC's sons' products.
 
YC's absolutely right. This is why 95% of businesses use PCs rather than Macs. It's a simple matter of economics. With the massive bulk discounts we get, PC laptops cost about a third what an equivalent Mac costs.
 
Other issues:

the cost of conversion when you look at retraining, time lost
lack of compatibility of data,
necessary programs that don't run under Mac OS,
hardware upgrades that have to be specially selected, cos often drivers aren't there for Macs

Not that I'm a MS fan, I'm not. I'm just tired of being s...ed by big corporations, Apple & MS are just two of many. Sadly Linux is being rapidly commercialised, albeit in a different way. (And has more bugs and interoperability issues than MS and Apple together).
 
That's not fair

I think it's millionaires go mac paupers go pc. but what do I know:))):))):)))

In that case, I'm the exception that proves the rule.

OAP runs Mac!!!!!!!!!!!!

Truth is, started on Atari STE whilst having access to Apple at work, at a time when Bill Gates was still telling us that Command Line Instruction was all we needed. My problem was that I was, still am for that matter, too thick to use command line. Thank goodness for Xerox who invented WIMP. :welldone
 
I've been defenestrated for the last week somehow I've kicked it into life in safe mode but I'll probably have to buy a new machine.
Again although I've considered mac before it always comes down to price and software availability and compatability.
 
I have bought two used iMacs and a MacBook at less than £500 - excellent quality. No need to buy new IMO!

Kind regards
Tom
 
Well religion or not ..... I'm gonna give em a go. I like the fact that they seem to have much better customer service, I also liked the people at the local Mac users group, I haven't heard of any PC users groups?

Cheers & Ciao
Jimu

1935 Conn naked lady alto & Blessings soprano
 
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lack of compatibility of data,
necessary programs that don't run under Mac OS,

This argument works both ways, whatever OS you are switching to/from.

If I was to switch to PC now, I would have loads of incompatible data applications.

It's a big decision to make, and either way sacrifices are often made as a trade off for various advantages.

It's a decision to be made after checking out all the compatibility issues, although those issues do seem to be in favour of Mac, e.g:

  • Pages imports and exports word doc, but not vice versa.
  • Numbers imports and exports excel, but not vice versa.
  • A Mac can boot into mac OS and Windows, but a PC won't. (Well not in an officially supported capacity, there may be some dodgy hacks)
 
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