My First Mac

[SicEmBaylor]

So, I got a Mac Mini for my birthday. I've been addicted to computers since I was 5 and received my first Commodore 64. I progressed up from there, but I've always been a PC guy and never owned or used a Mac. In fact, I've always hated those stupid Mac commercials and thought Mac users were smug. I've never understood why anyone would spend so much on a Mac when you can get a hell of a lot more computer for a lot less with a PC.

I think I may have been wrong...

Even with just the Mac Mini everything on this OS is polished to what seems like perfection. I have the 2.0ghz/2gig ram version, but it runs as well as a higher powered PC which tells me OS X is much more efficient than Windows.

This is just an excellent excellent computer.

Anyone else out there been converted?

[olevetonahill]

Naw Im still heterosexual :D
Glad you are happy tho :P

[Petro-Sooner]

I bought my first computer not long ago. After recs from the SO and other I got a macbook pro. While I am NOT a computer person I like what I see so far. More so looked for something thats not going to cause me issues in the future.

[beer4me]

Well shoot I thought this was gonna be about Macdonalds :P

[AlbqSooner]

You and me beer. I read mini-mac and was thinking about the Big Mac I had on MY birthday.

[beer4me]

You and me beer. I read mini-mac and was thinking about the Big Mac I had on MY birthday.

:D

[SanJoaquinSooner]

I was originally a Mac person. In the late 90's I gave up and switched to a PC ... mainly due to software issues and secondarily due to hassle factor of needing special adaptors for this and that. There were several instances where software companies bailed on Mac versions.

This is less of a problem today. We have some Macs where I work with dual platforms, although they seem to run a bit slower.

Macs are high quality machines, but sometimes compatibility is a hassle. ... Less so than before.

[Howzit]

I used a Mac for the first time in the late 80's when a boss bought one for work. This was pretty much pre-Windows, and the concept was pretty foreign to me.

Fast forward to this year, I bought Jr a Macbook Pro for college and used it some. Love it. My next personal machine will probably be some sort of Mac laptop.

[Mjcpr]

My next personal machine will probably be some sort of Mac laptop.

You told me you were getting a butt rabbitt. :confused:

[sooneron]

So Sic'em is the deomographic that gets the mini. Ah, it all makes sense now.

[King Crimson]

i use both (Dell at home and Mac at work) and have owned both. don't really care much either way.

though, i still like winamp a lot more than itunes. simple, no BS. no ads.

[sooneron]

Ads?

[King Crimson]

Ads?

i don't want to go to the itunes store all the time. and itunes store blows. it doesn't even have Flip Your Wig.

right now, i like my Asus eeePC running the little Ubuntu better than both.

[sooneron]

I'm just trying to figure out how you're being prompted to go to the store. I only tread there if I click the icon thingy.

[King Crimson]

I'm just trying to figure out how you're being prompted to go to the store. I only tread there if I click the icon thingy.

i only use for the ipod so maybe i'm not a savvy navigator. i also don't need or care about all the customization stuff like genius or it trying synch my 250G drive of music if i'm not paying attention.

itunes at it's inception was an updated version of an old mac player called SoundJam. back then, there were only really Audion and Soundjam for mac mp3 (unless you count the useless Quicktime)....and i used Audion since mac was my only machine. it was a better player at the time...so, in addition to preferring winamp, i still see SoundJam in iTunes. Jobs tried to hire the Audion guys but they turned him down preferring to do their own thing instead of work for someone else. they may regret that now, but there's a Wired article about it i've used in class before.

[King Crimson]

i also think the proliferation of iTunes model and it's marketing as "the cool lifestyle" obfuscates any legitimate debate on what the nature of digital copyright and PtoP file-sharing could and should be....instead, it re-enforces a notion of copyright that's still based on fungible goods and the property law of the 17th Century and Lord Blackstone.

[Howzit]

You told me you were getting a butt rabbitt. :confused:

I thought about it, but I was concerned that might lead to a condom filled with scrambled eggs smell.

There is precedent, so I've been told.

[Mjcpr]

I thought about it, but I was concerned that might lead to a condom filled with scrambled eggs smell.

There is precedent, so I've been told.

While that does not sound all that pleasant, the real question is whether or not it beats the au naturel smell of the bobo.

[Howzit]

Let us know what you find out.

[Mjcpr]

Let us know what you find out.

It does indeed.

[delhalew]

i also think the proliferation of iTunes model and it's marketing as "the cool lifestyle" obfuscates any legitimate debate on what the nature of digital copyright and PtoP file-sharing could and should be....instead, it re-enforces a notion of copyright that's still based on fungible goods and the property law of the 17th Century and Lord Blackstone.

this. Itunes is my mortal enemy, as are the i-pod, i-phone, and the snotty attitude of mac fanboys...BUT, if you need a workhorse of a system with a smooth as butter interface, anything with the words Mac and Pro is pretty damn sweet.

[Partial Qualifier]

i also think the proliferation of iTunes model and it's marketing as "the cool lifestyle" obfuscates any legitimate debate on what the nature of digital copyright and PtoP file-sharing could and should be....instead, it re-enforces a notion of copyright that's still based on fungible goods and the property law of the 17th Century and Lord Blackstone.

Post Of The Millenium.

[Mjcpr]

Post Of The Millenium.

I'm pretty sure this was in the scrambled egg condom butt thread from yesterday.

[Lott's Bandana]

I have an iMac I am typing this on, and a PC to my right that I use for work.

Love the iMac, although it has been a challenge to learn the navigation, regardless of the "seamlessness" of the design.

My PC? I loathe it...mainly because of the way Windows uses annoying pop-ups to tell me all these things I don't give a rats-heiney about. I don't care that a faster USB connection exists on the planet, for example.

I have had some difficulty calibrating my monitor to get photos printed properly, understanding that it is Apple's glossy screen that is the challenge. But man, that pron sure looks sweet on my 24"er!

[SoonerStud615]

You never fully realize all the "headaches" on PC's that the Apple commercials talk about until you get a Mac. You begin to just deal with them and accept them as part of using a computer, but the fact is, on a Mac, it isn't a part of using a computer at all.

[yermom]

i miss my MacBook Pro :(

and damn the prices are dropping...

i'm getting tired of using my EeePC all the time. i'm going to break soon, i think

i'm not really a fan of iTunes, but it's not like there aren't other things to play music. VLC is what i use on Linux for movies and music, it works on WIndows and Mac as well

www.videolan.org

[King Crimson]

i use VLC for movies, too.

[sooneron]

i use VLC for pron, too.

fixed




actually that's the only time that I have ever tried it out- when a mov file did not have the right codec for QT

[King Crimson]

on the mac mini. i've always thought they seemed like a good deal....but, heard some not so positive stuff about them getting too hot and being a little tweeky. anyway, i briefly considered one last time i bought a desktop but took the easy route and bought a Dell through CU at big discount.

[sooneron]

I have only seen one outside of a store. It was for an accountant at a prod company that I worked for, she ran windows for quicken and the mac for the other stuff.

[yermom]

i've never really considered them. it's like the guts of a MacBook without the screen

so basically you get all the downside of a laptop with none of the upside :)

well, other than size

[King Crimson]

i've never really considered them. it's like the guts of a MacBook without the screen

so basically you get all the downside of a laptop with none of the upside :)

well, other than size

see, that's what i heard....much mo better said.

[King Crimson]

i'd like to add to this thread that i've unsubbed over a half-dozen times from Apple's email list and i still get the BS.

I've given up.

that sounds like "open source"/new reality/avatars of the new cool **** to me. badger your customers to death after they try and unsub.

the Apple Store is a weird, creepy place that takes Starbucks to a new level of nonsense designer reality.

[Veritas]

I'm buying a tricked out MacBook Pro at the end of the month, but I'm trying to figure out some way to disguise it. I always want to bash snotty Mac dooshers over the head with my Lenovo and I don't want to be mistaken for one of them. :)

[Petro-Sooner]

Anyone upgrade to Snow Leopard? If so, any issues?

[Sooner_Havok]

Anyone upgrade to Snow Leopard? If so, any issues?

I have the damned thing, but haven't gotten around to installing it yet. I do know apple has already sent out some updates for it. Maybe I can get it installed this weekend.

Maybe.

[Sooner_Havok]

I'm buying a tricked out MacBook Pro at the end of the month, but I'm trying to figure out some way to disguise it. I always want to bash snotty Mac dooshers over the head with my Lenovo and I don't want to be mistaken for one of them. :)


Put an OU sticker over your apple logo. Or if you really want to confuse people, run Windows with bootcamp. I had to do that to run some programs for school, and it freaks people out seeing a shinny MacBook Pro running Windows Vista.:D

[Petro-Sooner]

I installed it this week but dont really notice any changes. Of course I'm new to mac and trying to learn all the ins and outs of it.

[delhalew]

I'm buying a tricked out MacBook Pro at the end of the month, but I'm trying to figure out some way to disguise it. I always want to bash snotty Mac dooshers over the head with my Lenovo and I don't want to be mistaken for one of them. :)

Use some of that camo tape.:D

[Frozen Sooner]

Put an OU sticker over your apple logo. Or if you really want to confuse people, run Windows with bootcamp. I had to do that to run some programs for school, and it freaks people out seeing a shinny MacBook Pro running Windows Vista.:D

Goddamn ExamSoft.

[bluedogok]

I'm buying a tricked out MacBook Pro at the end of the month, but I'm trying to figure out some way to disguise it. I always want to bash snotty Mac dooshers over the head with my Lenovo and I don't want to be mistaken for one of them. :)
Since my laptop was stolen I have been looking at new ones, to get what I need the MacBook Pro 17" starts at $2,499 and the Sony Vaio with more RAM and a Blu-ray burner for $1,899. With the Mac I would still have to get Windows 64-bit to run my software, I am considering it but just like last time I can't really justify the price premium for a Mac when I run Windows only software that is processor/RAM hungry. That and I've become used to my Core-i7 with 12GB of RAM in it to the point that it makes my Dual Xeon at work seem slow.

[Frozen Sooner]

Since my laptop was stolen I have been looking at new ones, to get what I need the MacBook Pro 17" starts at $2,499 and the Sony Vaio with more RAM and a Blu-ray burner for $1,899. With the Mac I would still have to get Windows 64-bit to run my software, I am considering it but just like last time I can't really justify the price premium for a Mac when I run Windows only software that is processor/RAM hungry. That and I've become used to my Core-i7 with 12GB of RAM in it to the point that it makes my Dual Xeon at work seem slow.

Can't run Windows 64 on a Mac, even one with a 64-bit processor. At least you can't with BootCamp. BootCamp only supports 32 bit Windows installs.

[Frozen Sooner]

Anyone upgrade to Snow Leopard? If so, any issues?

Yes.

No issues. And it's blazing fast. You have to tell it to boot into 64-bit mode with a boot file edit though.

[Petro-Sooner]

This one goes to 11.

[Petro-Sooner]

In all serious most of this computer talk is over my head, but I'm learning. When you say you have to tell it to boot into 64 bit mode what do you mean? I put the disk in and followed the instructions and assumed all was done. Did I miss a step?

[bluedogok]

Can't run Windows 64 on a Mac, even one with a 64-bit processor. At least you can't with BootCamp. BootCamp only supports 32 bit Windows installs.
I wouldn't mess with Boot Camp or Parallels, I would configure a true dual boot machine. I read somewhere that is possible with a MacBook Pro. The 64-bit OS really helps with Revit 2010, the 64-bit Revit 2009 was worthless compared to 2010...of course 12GB of RAM helps.

[Frozen Sooner]

Oh, it'll run just fine as is. When you install Snow Leopard, it defaults to 32-bit mode because 1) all Intel Macs have 32-bit compatible processors and 2) some of the drivers for various peripherals aren't don't support 64-bit.

If your Mac has a 64-bit compatible processor, you can enable 64-bit in Snow Leopard by:

Navigate to the file Library->Preferences->SystemConfiguration->com.apple.Boot.plist.

Copy this file to your desktop.

Open with TextEdit

Add the following on between the lines "<key>Kernel Flags</key>" and </dict>

<string>arch=x86_64</string>

Or, if you want to do it the easier way and want to maintain a default boot to 32-bit, just hold down "6" and "4" when you turn on the machine until it boots all the way up.

Edit: Sorry, forgot the last step. Save the file and copy it back into the original folder.

[SicEmBaylor]

Yes.

No issues. And it's blazing fast. You have to tell it to boot into 64-bit mode with a boot file edit though.

Snow Leopard wasn't yet installed on my Mac Mini, so they knocked $9.00 off the cost of the computer (in addition to my student discount) so I could order Snow Leopard from the Apple website for $9.00.

I don't understand why they didn't just hand me a copy of Snow Leopard...they had a bajillion and one copies sitting right there.

[Frozen Sooner]

Snow Leopard wasn't yet installed on my Mac Mini, so they knocked $9.00 off the cost of the computer (in addition to my student discount) so I could order Snow Leopard from the Apple website for $9.00.

I don't understand why they didn't just hand me a copy of Snow Leopard...they had a bajillion and one copies sitting right there.

$9? It was $29 when I bought it from the Apple website. :mad:

[Petro-Sooner]

I got it for $9 as well. Maybe because I just purchased this thing not long ago. Not really sure.

And thanks Frozen.

[King Crimson]

tricked out?

haha.

[Frozen Sooner]

I got it for $9 as well. Maybe because I just purchased this thing not long ago. Not really sure.

And thanks Frozen.

My pleasure. One caveat: the apps in Snow Leopard that are compiled to run in 64-bit mode will apparently run in 64-bit whether SL's kernel loads to 64-bit or not (this according to MacUser). The only real benefit I think you'll get by booting to 64-bit is that some of the processor functions will run faster.

[Petro-Sooner]

I think I'll just keep things the way they are. Everything seems to work fine. At some point I may venture off into the deeper end of the pool.

[Sooner_Havok]

Goddamn ExamSoft.

Yup. Sucks, but I wasn't going back to a pc. I only use windows when I have to. BTW I got vista-64 running as well as you can get windows to work with boot camp. Still can't wait to put snow leopard on my mac...

[SicEmBaylor]

$9? It was $29 when I bought it from the Apple website. :mad:

It's normally 29.00, but if you bought a Mac after the release of Snow Leopard that doesn't include Snow Leopard then it's only 9.00.

[SicEmBaylor]

You never fully realize all the "headaches" on PC's that the Apple commercials talk about until you get a Mac. You begin to just deal with them and accept them as part of using a computer, but the fact is, on a Mac, it isn't a part of using a computer at all.

This is exactly how I feel about Mac now. Look, I never had that many computer problems, but I know what I'm doing well enough to know how to fix every little issue that comes up and stay on top of things. I never get viruses or spyware, but I'm very careful about what I do online. I also keep my computer fully updated, my drivers constantly updated, etc.

Basically, this Mac has liberated me from the 10billion little things you have to worry about with a PC on a daily basis. There are some definite tradeoffs with a Mac though. And, I still haven't figured out where all of this **** is installed at and the file system structure. It kind of has me flummoxed -- it seems like most programs are self-contained files like small windows programs that are the .exe file only. Kinda neat but hard to get used to.

[49r]

Yeah, Mac users are unfamiliar with the concept of a program uninstaller. But it is kind of unnecessary because they don't have the nightmare of a registry in their OS.

[StoopTroup]

Naw Im still heterosexual :D
Glad you are happy tho :P

That's kinda of worrisome....lol

[Lott's Bandana]

I have a 6 month old, 24" iMac with OS X 10.5.7 and...


Hardware Overview:

Model Name: iMac
Model Identifier: iMac9,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 3.06 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 6 MB
Memory: 4 GB
Bus Speed: 1.07 GHz
Boot ROM Version: IM91.008D.B08


What would Snow Leopard do for me? Should I get it?

[49r]

Snow Leopard will free up between 5 and 15 gigabytes of hard drive space.

It's definitely worth the $29. But don't expect it to look or feel much if any different than Leopard other than being a tad "snappier".

[yermom]

yeah, all i've really heard is that it's faster

[49r]

There are tons of little tweaks that are in it that are very nice but maybe not terribly noticeable, some of the bigger things are like Exchange support built in to Mail, Address Book and Calendar which are nice. Skyhook location awareness as well is very cool.

The biggest things are naturally under the hood. OpenCL, GCD, and 64 bit to the kernel (although right now nearly every Mac loads 32 bit kexts by default as has been discussed before but from the reading I've done it really doesn't matter unless you are running 64 bit apps, in fact right now it's probably faster to go 32 bit).

I like it.