Switching to Macs after 22 years!
May 9, 2008
In my desk, I still keep the Windows 1.01 disks. I've been working with Microsoft's OS for over 22 years.
Occasional efforts to move to Linux came to nothing, mainly because I couldn't find [since they didn't exist] applications to do my work with, compatible with those used by my colleagues.
About a year ago I moved to Windows Vista, initially with a Toshiba R400 and later with a Fujitsu Siemens T4220 [btw, it's a great notebook!].
And this is the point at which the story begins.
Yes, I am literally a gadget maniac. Yes, I do tend to search every six months for the next notebook I'm going to work with. But I never had the same desire in relation with the OS.
I have to admit that Vista was not the OS that left the best impression on my, mainly because of its performance. As far as the interface is concerned, Vista is by far the best OS Microsoft have ever produced. But, as soon as you load it with a few applications, lots of fonts and some add-ons for the already memory-hungry Firefox, the system starts to show deplorable delays, even if it is equipped with a CPU, memory, hard disks and other subsystems of the latest generation.
For the last eight years, I have been working with a notebook and I didn't want to migrate to a desktop system.
For some months, I studied the user comments about Vista and Leopard in various international forums. And, finally, some weeks ago, I made the decision to try it. I started with the impressive MacBook Air but soon gave it up, because of it's low performance. [I cannot help being a power user :-P]
As soon as the new series of MacBook Pro was released, I ordered a system with a 2,6GHz Intel Core2, 2GB RAM and a 250GB HDD.
The project "Switching to Mac" just started.
Today, after less than two weeks of everyday use, I have to admit that I am IMPRESSED.
Impressed by the speed, the functionality, the stability and, above all, the result of all these for the final user: the PRODUCTIVITY.
Yes, Macs also crash, but not with the way and frequency I was used to :-P
After having used Windows for so many years, it's reasonable that even closing the windows in OSX puzzled me, but the decision to put my new possession on test in extreme conditions of work and productivity forced me to find solutions for [almost] everything.
First of all, in order for my notebook to match my iPhone , I bought a protective case for it from Vajacases.com [yes, I am also a super-consumer ;-P]. Furthermore, I bought the Apple's Bluetooth aluminum keyboard [btw, I hope Logitech and Microsoft will soon come up with something similar…]. Then, I connected the notebook to an 24'' Samsung monitor and I started…
Office:
I'm a fan of MS Office, so I installed its Home Edition for Mac , maintaining compatibility with older files. To be honest, I also installed iWorks , in order to explore a little bit the capabilities of Keynote [Apple's application for presentations]…
MindMaping:
Being a MindMaps evangelist for the last eight years, I use the best application around: MindManager . Luckily, there is also a Mac version of it, so the change was… no change and within an hour the publisher of the application, Mindjet , gave me the new serial number, so I was able to continue my work ;-)
Notetaking:
I had been using OneNote , but some months ago I migrated to the amazing Evernote that allows you to share your notes online. Of course, there is a Mac version of it too…
eMail:
I use only Gmail [I had also bought 150GB from Google], so there was no real change in sending/receiving emails.
GTDing:
In Windows, I used GTDInbox [a GREAT Firefox add-on] for managing my emails, and MyLifeOrganized for managing tasks and projects. Now, I kept, of course, the terrific GTDInbox and for the rest I "play" with OmniFocus .
IM/Voip:
Skype was always my choice regarding VoIP and it still is in Leopard. As far as instant messaging is concerned, the all-in-one solution I found is the very good Adium [that does not support video yet].
RSS Reading:
I stopped using Google Reader because I think it's at least intolerable for use with more than 10 feeds. Since my OPML contains over 800 feeds, I use the superb, cross-platform BlogBridge , the version 6.3 of which allows even Sentiment Analysis!
Since I apply a certain system in order to get informed and not lost among hundred of feeds, I now use the innovative [still in beta] reader Times for quick updates from my most important feeds.
Twittering:
The one and only and very good Twhirl , that plays on almost every platform because of Air, is still my gate to Twitterland...
Web browser:
Having used Firefox with lots of add-ons in the last years, the transition to Mac was easier than I expected. I just installed the Password Exporter add-on, with the help of which I transferred all my passwords to the new installation of FF.
Btw, the add-ons I use in FF are the following: ColorZilla, Diigo BookMarks, DownThemAll, FasterFox, Firebug, Gmarks, Google Notebook, Greek Spelling Dictionary, GTDInbox, MeasurIt, Speed Dial, Tab Mix Plus, Text Formatting Toolbar and the very good Web Developer Toolbar.
FTP client:
My personal search concluded that ForkLift is the best FTP client for Mac. It reminds my of the once unique Norton Commander [what came into my mind now...] and perfectly combines the file explorer with the FTP client.
Torrenting:
In Windows, I used the very good UTorrent , of which there is still no version for OSX. So, after testing Transmission and Azureus , I decided for the second one without thinking around a lot [it's faster and stabler].
Web developing:
There is a Mac version of Dreamweaver , and CSSEdit is much better than almost any of its competitors in Windows. TacoHTML and BBEdit can meet many html/php editing requirements. Finally, the superb Aptana Studio is cross-platform and works everywhere, for serious projects, from Ruby and PHP to Ajax and Air...
Apache, MySQL, PHP:
I have already installed the VERY good MAMP Pro in order to forget LAMP ;-)
Graphics/Photoshoping:
There are OSX versions of Photoshop and Illustrator , so the transition was way too easy. The surprise came from Pixelmator which is very fast and reminds of "Photoshop Light", with many capabilities and, above all, a lot faster than Photoshop ;-)
I miss FiltreForge but I'm sure I will find something similar.
Skitch is great for screen-capturing and uploading to Flickr and ScreenFlow is excellent for screencasting although it still has a long way to go before reaching Camtasia ;-) [BTW the Jing Project has a Mac version too]
Video/DVD:
iMovie , that comes with MBP, is the best tool for those who want to quickly and easily create their custom videos and its preview speed has no match in Windows...
BTW, if I need more capabilities, FinalCut Express brings to Mac almost all features of Premiere.
ImTooDVDRipper is the best application for transferring your movies to iPhone, iPod and so on, while MacTheRipper is a freeware DVD extractor with many capabilities.
Nero , that I used in Windows, has now been replaced by Roxio's Toast Platinum , that leaves nothing to be desired.
As far as the media player is concerned, Miro and VLC are the best solution after the pre-installed QuickTime/iTunes.
To also play MWV and other audio/video files that I already had, I installed Flip4Mac and Perian and now everything is played by the fast MBP ;-0
Audio/DJing:
iTunes [comes pre-installed] is the king of sound in Mac, but there are also other solutions like VLC , that I already used previously.
Once a year, I organize together with friends a super party, in which I play music [8-)]. For years I have been using VirtualDJ along with the Hercules DJ console MK2. Well, I installed the Mac version of VDJ and the Hercules' drivers and everything remained the same ;-)
Utilities:
I already use some utilities for various tasks and I promise to present them to you in an other post, because I want to test them extensively.
But two of them are worth of being mentioned today - iFreeMem does very well exactly what its name suggests [it frees up memory for better performance] and AppZapper is probably the best program for fully uninstall applications in OSX.
Games:
And yet, they exist! Many of them and of different kinds. WoW runs also on Mac, but there also some other Windows flagship-games, that offer OSX versions, like Need for Speed , Quake and Collin MacRay .
Fractals/Processing:
I have created hundred of fractals in the past, but unfortunately I have found no program for Mac, equal to UltraFractal and Apophysis . Luckily, Mojoworld and Processing run perfectly in Leopard, so I can continue with some of the projects I participate in.
The migration from Windows to Leopard is already done and all I mentioned above are only a part of the process. There are positive and negative points, as in every other change we undertake.
The thing is that the journey must be interesting and unexpected, to make the course more adventurous :-)
Don't you agree?
Comments
#1 Για instant messaging,
Για instant messaging, με υποστήριξη video, πολύ καλό είναι και το Mercury 1.9. Μόνο παράπονο, οι πολύ αργές ταχύτητες μεταφοράς αρχείων.
#2 I made the same move ~2
I made the same move ~2 months ago (after 18 years of Windows :-P) and I'm also thrilled I did it. I found I didn't need to install Parallels or use BootCamp or anything, the "OS X all the way" approach worked like a charm!
My two bits on nice applications to use on the Mac:
Web development: Transmit (FTP client) and Coda (dev environment) from Panic software. Like most things mac, they're simple, pretty and just get the work done, effortlessly... I find myself using the Dreamweaver beast less and less (CSS Edit can't be beaten though, once you get there there's no going back!).
I wish I had done some more research on MAMP, I did it the hard way myself...
Games: give Tomb Raider Anniversary a try. The new graphics card of the MBPro really shines here.
And some small touches:
Thanks for sharing! :-)
#3 gterex: Thank you for your
gterex:
Thank you for your suggestions! I'm ready to test all these apps:-)
smcFanControl2 is great!
#4 For implementing GTD you
For implementing GTD you might try out this web-based application:
Gtdagenda
You can use it to manage your goals, projects and tasks, set next actions and contexts, use checklists, schedules and a calendar.
A mobile version is available too.
As with the last update, now Gtdagenda has full Someday/Maybe functionality, you can easily move your tasks and projects between "Active", "Someday/Maybe" and "Archive". This will clear your mind, and will boost your productivity.
Hope you like it.
#5 Pingback
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#6 Hello there and welcome to
Hello there and welcome to the Mac community!
It's a very nice post! I'd like to point you out a few applications that you didn't mention: The best "simple" editor for programming under macosx is, no doubt, TextMate. It's just amazing for editing or writing small apps, python, perl, ruby scripts or editing HTML code, even the integration with xCode for writing Objective C applications is very good
As for utilities you forgot mention Quicksilver, it improved my user experience significantly.
I like adium as an MSN client but it lacks of features (video conference etc) althoug it's the most good looking IM I've ever seen.
For Office I prefer Pages over MS Word and Numbers over Excell for my tasks. Number could deal with Office tasks but everyone there is using Excell and I can't make the entire world switch, neither everyone knows how to deal with broken fonts etc. There some minor incompatibilities between Excell and Numbers.
As for the rest, it's UNIX and for the command line prompt (UNIX Shell, I prefer Bash over others) is vital for me.
There are tools like: Ruby, Python and Perl preinstalled in the System.
I like the simplicity of Mail.app and the latest version of firefox is native.
Another point, personally I believe that the best video converter for your iPhone is Visual Hub. I own an iPod Touch, didn't want to buy the iPhone before the official Greek release, but I'll get one as soon as it hits the Greek market.
I understand that you use firefox widely, you're lucky because the pre-3 versions were slow and buggy on MacOSX.
Anyway happy computing and remember that there's a thrilling, smart and creative community that can support you!
#7 Panagiotis, Thanks for the
Panagiotis, Thanks for the words and suggestions!
When u go Mac u never go back ;-)
#8 Great info Stefanos, Just
Great info Stefanos,
Just changed to MacOSX myself at work (I see it comming at home soon too).
Must admit it's a MacPro desktop system, but wow what a change from windows.
You gave me some great software input I will checkout.
I few suggestions from me.
FTP client - I use the free Cyberduck client
VNC - I had alot of problems with the buildin vnc client, so I am running JollysFastVnc now, not perfect, but the best I have found so far.
Postgresql database users should know that pgAdmin exists on the mac too.
Office - I just OpenOffice for the mac, works pretty good.
#9 Hello Claus, The Cyberduck
Hello Claus,
The Cyberduck is a very cure and fancy FTP client with interesting features. Especially the new version, however it consumes dozens of memory. The best feature that I found in Cyberduck is the Textmate integration for editing *human readable files* on the fly via FTP.
I know it because I work on an iBook G4 1.07 Ghz with just 758 MB of RAM. It's not comparable with the Mac Pro in *any* way.
The best FTP client for mac is rumorred to be Transmitt, but I prefer lftp by far, it's CLI but it's just "uber alless".
#10 I'm actually tempted to use
I'm actually tempted to use the MacBook Air, I have to say. I am rather disappointed by and of Vista myself and my beloved iTunes is not available for Linux.
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