Going Mac – first impressions Part 2…
It was great to log into my blog stats last night and see that my first “Going Mac” post garnered so many hits. Apparently, the post was linked by a few Mac sites, and my visitors jumped from about a dozen of my friends and family to several hundred total strangers! :) Anyway, I also got a lot of comments on my post, and I’m glad you’re all apparently enjoying my little adventure. It must be fun for Mac users to see PC users make the jump.
So, last night was my second night with the new Macs, but since I’ve had so little time with the machines so far, I’m still on my “first impression”. For those of you catching up, here are links to the story so far:
Switching Sides…
Going Mac – first impressions…
So, I have the Mac Pro set up and fully connected to both the internet and my old PC. But the iMac, the computer I bought for the wife and kids, is still not connected. Time to get that going, and let me tell you, although I’ve been a computer user, hacker and tinkerer for almost 30 years, and consider myself an expert in many respects, networking is my Kryptonite. I dread approaching any networking task, because for some reason, I just don’t “get” most of it. But I’d heard that Macs were different, that Apple had made networking truly easy and painless. I had experienced some of that on the first night, when I had found it so easy to network my new Mac to my old PC. So, how hard would it really be to get an Airport-equipped iMac to share the internet connection of my Mac Pro? As it turned out, it was basically effortless, as you Mac folks already know. Set up Internet Sharing over Airport on the Mac Pro with a couple of clicks, set up a network connection on the iMac to receive the connection with a couple more clicks, and presto! My wife is marvelling at how the iMac is fully functional with exactly one cord (the power cord) coming out the back of it. I quickly set up different user accounts for the wife and kids (and one for myself), and tell them their computer is online. The only thing not working there is e-mail, which I haven’t set up yet and which I’m not going to until the weekend, when I have time to transfer all their old e-mail, address books and settings, which I plan to do with a nifty little $10 utility called Outlook2Mac. I know there are other, free ways to do this, but this is the simplest and fastest way to get it done, and at this point in my investment, $10 is a drop in the bucket.
(A Mac buddy of mine is now telling me I’ve hooked up my iMac incorrectly – it’s piggybacking on the Mac Pro, when it should be getting its connection off my hardware router. I’ll have to fix this when I get home today, but hopefully that shouldn’t be too hard either.)
Now it’s back to the Mac Pro. I decide I want to start getting my music on the machine. I have a collection of over 600 CDs, and a 60GB iPod already loaded up with a bunch of that. What could be easier than connecting the iPod and getting all my music from it? Well, it turns out that Apple doesn’t make everything so easy. Did you know that while you can move music from your computer to your iPod, you can’t move music from your iPod to your computer? I’d love to hear the justification behind that, and if someone says “DRM”, I’m liable to punch something. These are my CDs, I burned the mp3 files myself, and I have the right to move them anywhere I damn well please. Oh well, surely there’s a way to do this anyway, in spite of iTunes lack of sanction – and there is. The answer is Music Rescue. There are a number of programs out there that do the same thing, but this is the one I used, and it worked like a charm. This ability should really be built into iTunes, but as long as it’s not, there will always be hacks around it.
After offloading all my music from my iPod, I play around with iTunes for a while, and enjoy listening to music without having to try and hear it over the din my PC used to create. But iTunes is nothing new for me; I’ve used it on the PC for a couple of years already. I do note how much more responsive and smooth it is on the Mac. Being a huge music lover, this is good stuff.
Now I’m ready to try a game. I want to test the graphics hardware, something I haven’t really done yet. I have the Mac version of Call of Duty 2, and I’m going to crank all the options up and see how it performs. A comment on installations: back in the day, I used Atari and Commodore computers, and I was an Amiga user for several years. Those computers “installed” programs similar to the way a Mac does today – you just drag a large file, which contained the executable code and data all in one file, to wherever you wanted it on your hard disk. When Commodore went bankrupt and I bought my first PC in 1993, I had to get used to the whole idea that an installation wasn’t just moving a single large file where I wanted it. It involved actually running an installation program that dumped many files all over your computer. I hated it back then, I got used to it over time, and now that I’m able to once again “install” programs with a minimum of fuss, I realize I’ve merely suppressed my hatred for PC installation methods all these years out of necessity. The way that PCs handle program installations is just plain stupid. A program should contain all the data it needs inside a single large file, and that’s how it is on Macs apparently. Hurray for them, and hurray for me getting back on a platform that understands this.
Anyway, I get COD2 installed easily, run it, crank all the settings – and wow. Silky smooth graphics with everything turned up. I didn’t run an actual frames-per-second test, but you know it when your game is running over 60 fps, and this one was. Today, I’m going to install World of Warcraft, which is something I play almost every day. My PC gave me 20-30 fps with WoW. Yeah, not too good, I know. I expect the number to be much more impressive on the Mac.
One final note: I have a Logitech G7 wireless gaming mouse on order from Amazon, and it can’t come soon enough. For everything else that Apple does right, they sure don’t know how to make a decent mouse. Never have, and I wonder if they ever will. At least the mighty mouse is better than the hockey puck, but it’s still not a good mouse, and I couldn’t play COD2 for long with it. Jerky and unresponsive, it’s too small and difficult to handle, has no weight to it, and doesn’t track well. And what is Apple’s phobia with mouse buttons all about? Just make a regular mouse, please – it would be the final touch on an otherwise outstanding machine.
Oh well, even Apple isn’t perfect. But they get closer than most.
So, them’s my first impressions. I am enjoying my new Macs a great deal, and I plan to spend much of the weekend digging in and learning all about how they work (and playing World of Warcraft at a smooth framerate). I bought myself a couple of good books (Switching to the Mac and Mac OS X Tiger, both from the excellent Missing Manual series), and I’m sure I’ll find no shortage of things to learn and discover. That’s it for now, but keep checking in – I’m sure I’ll have plenty to say about the new Macs in the future as well. Thanks for reading!
Squidly
7/19/2007
New “switchers” always struggle a bit mentally at first. They try to maintain old paradigms which no longer apply. It’s pretty funny to watch for old timers. :) Don’t feel too bad though, most of us have been there at some point.
With the iPod to Mac copy thing…yeah it’s a concession to the music labels. It’s also no big deal.
You have your music on your old pc. You have your old pc on the same network as your mac. Copy the files to a temp directory and import them.
There’s a dozen other ways to do it, but buying a program to move stuff from an iPod when you don’t have to is silly. :)
I’m glad you’ve learned how to do installs. Lots of PC useres stumble over that at first. Note that some applications still do more complex installs, moving files to libraries and the like. Adobe PS3 is one good example.
Once you install a program to your “Applications” folder, you may decide you want to place it on your task bar. Just drag it and drop it on the taskbar to accomplish this. It won’t make a copy of the program, just a shortcut. When you want to remove a program to your task bar, drag it off, and it’ll go “poof”.
Get used to the 3 views of finder. Try (cloverleaf)-1, 2, and 3. See what happens.
Learn how to change icon sizes. Learn how to change the color and background of folders. You may decide to never use these things again, but it helps you learn the way the Mac “thinks” about things. Select a file, right click on it, and choose “file info’. Go into applications and take a look at Comic Life.
Have fun exploring…there’s a ton to play with.
Andy
7/20/2007
Your comments about the mouse are interesting – because I went the other way. I bought a Logitech MX Revolution – a mouse many people were calling the best ever, and not cheap either. I hated it. In fact, I lasted about 2 weeks with it before eBaying the thing. What did I replace it with ? An Apple Bluetooth Might Mouse, which I absolutely love….
The best think about the Mighty Mouse – and the thing Logitech and MS consistently get wrong with their mice – is that the sensor is right under your fingertips, instead of under the heel of your hand or off to one side. This makes it feel very responsive (to me, anyway).
The iPod comment – yes, the music on your iPod is yours. But the music on my iPod is not yours, and if Apple did what you suggest then you’d just be able to plug in my iPod and download all my music, without paying for it. I can understand the reasons why this is disabled. As you pointed out though, there are plenty of utilities that let you download music off an iPod – and of course you can always save the best one onto the iPod itself so you always have it when you need it.
Somebody
7/20/2007
As great as Logitech mice are hardware-wise, the software drivers for Macs are the exact opposite and flawed.
If you experience frustrating delay in mouse functionality after startup or sleep for instance, you may want to opt for the $20 shareware mouse driver named SteerMouse from Japan. Logitech should buy them out and fire their own people – imagine exxpensive mice working better (or properly) with a shareware driver than with their own drivers.
seattlekarma
7/20/2007
Squidly: Actually, I had a hard drive crash a few months ago in which I lost the music on my computer (otherwise, of course I would have just copied it over). No big deal, because that was all backed up on the iPod and, of course, I have the original CDs. I could have re-ripped them all from scratch, but I figured I may as well save myself some time by grabbing 60GB of it from my iPod where it already sits. I didn’t pay for the program, I just put up with the nag screens. ;)
The installs were easy, because I had used other systems where installs were done like that. In my opinion, the PC is the one that’s deviant here – Atari, Amiga and Mac installs are the way it should be done. I did find last night that some programs do more complex installs. And all the exploring stuff – yeah baby. :) It is fun, I really like the way OS X displays info and lets me see things in different ways. It’s all very intuitive as well (though I am referring to my books here and there).
Andy: Ew. ;) It’s actually not so much the mouse itself as the mouse tracking software. I hate mouse “acceleration” – hate it. Mouse acceleration is when your mouse moves at different speeds depending on how fast you’re moving the mouse – when you move the mouse fast, the cursor moves quickly, but when you move the mouse slowly, the cursor moves slowly. That feels hopelessly wonky to me – when I move the mouse, fast or slow, I just want it to move a certain number of pixels depending on how *far* I move the mouse, not how *fast* I move the mouse. In Windows, this is an option – you can turn mouse acceleration on or off. In OS X, this isn’t an option – mouse acceleration is simply turned on. I did some Googling on this yesterday, and confirmed there is no way to turn it off. Fortunately, both MS and Logitech provide Mac drivers for their mice where mouse acceleration is an option. Last night, I powered off the Mighty Mouse and hooked up my old MS wired Intellipoint and installed the drivers for it. Problem solved, until my Logitech gets here.
As for the iPod, yes, I could plug in your iPod and copy (i.e. steal) the music on it. And that would be wrong. But there are also legitimate reasons to download music off an iPod (for example, when I own the iPod and the music on it), so I think this should be possible to do straight from iTunes. I understand, though, that in this day and age with zealous record companies, this probably wasn’t an option for Apple if they wanted to contract companies to sell music through iTunes. I’ll bet if Jobs had it his way, though, the iPod would be an open device in this respect (judging off his comments on DRM in general).
Squidly
7/20/2007
I never bother with the drivers unless I’m playing with a mouse that has buttons that need programming.
I also think that wireless mice are horrible for graphics professionals (or serious hobbyists.) The resolution simply isn’t there, and it MUST be, if you’re trying to grab a pixel.
I believe it won’t be long until you’re back to wired mice on the Mac Pro. The wireless mice will be fine for the iMac.
Have you played around with iPhoto at all yet? Dig through the stuff like ordering prints and books. You don’t actually have to order stuff, but it’s fun to play with. I frequently order large prints through the service, and it works very well.
tom b.
7/21/2007
Mouse acceleration may fell weird and wrong at first, but once you get used to it, it really is better, and requires less effort for long movements (especially on a 30″ screen!)
I would recommend the MacRumors Forums (http://forums.macrumors.com/) for all your questions or problems you may need to ask about, or just for general discussion about Macs. Everyone is very nice there, and will quickly reply to any questions you ask.
And good luck with the Mac Pro and iMac, not that you’ll need it!
seattlekarma
7/22/2007
Squidly: That’s definitely the reputation most wireless mice have; however this is a Logitech mouse that’s geared specifically towards gamers with a high dpi, and has gotten excellent reviews at the major gaming sites. I’ll try it out and if I don’t like it, you’re right – I be right back to my trusty wired MS Intellimouse. The drivers are just to remove the mouse acceleration, which Apple doesn’t offer.
I haven’t played with iPhoto at all because I’ve got Lightroom (which is freaking awesome, as you know). I’ll be setting up the kids and Jen on iPhoto, though, so I’ll play around with it pretty soon. Yeah, I’ll check out the ordering options, that sounds neat.
Tom: I am starting to get used to it, but it’s still not my preference. It’s probably a Coke versus Pepsi kind of thing. ;) I will check out MacRumors – thanks!
Andrea
7/22/2007
I really enjoyed reading your experience and I hope I can try the same soon, I’m trying to be a switcher but I have to make money, before :)
I’m definitely linking your story from my site tomorrow and I’ll follow your adventures :)
RickHap
7/27/2007
Here is an article on how to get your ipod music visible in Finder:
http://rixstep.com/2/20050321,00.shtml
I recently added a Macbook to my computer arsenal. It is a very good machine and there are numerous excellent programs for the Mac. Wireless networking is very solid.
Enjoy!
Mouse
7/29/2007
Keyboard
yeah thats what I ment, i didnt remember the spelling but i did remember the meaning of the Mouse
Dan Derrico
7/30/2007
I can’t wait for your next installment! More please — and soon!
seattlekarma
8/2/2007
Andrea: thanks!
RickHap: thanks for the link. There are lots of perfectly legitimate reasons we should be able to easily move music from our iPods back to our computers, and I don’t think it’s reasonable to outlaw or ban everything that *could* be used in a criminal way (which is basically anything and everything). It’s pretty easy to hack around, so all the anti-copying effort does is raise the hackles of people like me. Oh well…
Dan: I’m writing more as we speak – stay tuned!