Technology musings…

Well, after much back and forth, I finally bought my first Mac.  A while back, I had decided that my next computer would be an Apple product and had all but settled on the 12" Powerbook.  But then Jobs & Co. dropped the bomb and announced a switch to Intel.  Since then I’ve been waiting for the Intel version of the 12" Powerbook.  This year’s Macworld announcement of the Macbook Air meant that there is no 12" Powerbook replacement.

I spent a good month debating on the Macbook versus the Macbook Air.  While the size and weight of the Air are very appealing, I made the more practical choice and bought the Macbook.  So, now I’m a new owner of a Macbook 2.2GHz (white).  I’m a little bummed that an update was released so soon, but hey that’s technology.

Here are some of my thoughts since switching to the Mac and OS X.  I’ve had my machine for two weeks now.

• Apple customer support is hit and miss:  I’ve had some great interactions with Mac sales reps and customer support as well as some very sketchy ones too.  I was a bit disappointed about Apple releasing an update within a week of receiving my Macbook so I called the customer support line.  They offered to make things up to me and so I’m satisified with the result.  However, they weren’t very helpful a week earlier when I was waiting for my Macbook to arrive – the invoice had an ETA of 14 days even though the store had a 1-3 business day shipping time.
• Switching wasn’t as annoying as I expected:  I expected quite a few hiccups when switching to the OS X platform, mostly in terms of using keyboard short-cuts and identifying the proper menu options.  During the past two weeks, I’ve been pleasantly surprised at how easy the transition has been.  Some of my Windows habits are still there (e.g., trying to hit CTRL + a letter for shortcuts), but I’m slowly getting used to the Apple short-cuts.  Moving my data over was very simple.  I had an external hard-disk and copied everythng over to it.  My only concern was that the hard-disk was formatted using NTFS and I wasn’t sure if OS X would recognize it.  Not a problem.  All of my 30GB of data was copied over in a few minutes.
• Mac Geniuses – I’m not convinced:  As I previously wrote, I’m not sure about Mac Geniuses.  After getting my Macbook, I noticed that the Finder was acting a bit strange – it took about 6 seconds for information to appear.  Since I’m new to OSX, I wasn’t sure if this was considered "normal" so I decided to get it checked out.  I visited an Apple store and met up with a Mac Genius (I forgot her name).  She was very nice and after listening to my issue, she tried a few things.  She correctly identified the problem as an issue with my user account, created a new account, and copied the files over.  So far so good.  But, she told me to set-up the account as an "administrator".  I told her that I would prefer to set-up my main account as a "standard user" and she looked at me funny.  She asked why?  I told her that it’s better to run the day-to-day account as a regular user and have a separate account for admin-type activities because it’s more secure.  Again she looked at me as if I was some crazy person and then said that I should *always* run as an administrator because "it’s better".  I pretended to agree with her and tried to end the session.  I’m sure she meant well, but that’s just bad advice.  So far I haven’t had very many good experiences with a Mac Genius.
• The Mac Experience:  Overall, I’ve had some good shopping experience with Apple.  I have to say that the Apple retail store is a stroke of sheer brilliance.  Every time I visit or walk by, the store is packed and has people walking out with (new) product.  Before my eventual purchase, I did a "one-on-one" session with a Mac sales rep to try and help me decide between the Macbook and Macbook Air.  I appreciated having someone available to help me decide, even though I knew as much about the technical details of the products as they did – actually one of the sales guys tried to tell me that "Apple memory" is more efficient than "Windows memory" and that 2GB of "Apple memory" was equal to 4 or 5 GB of "Windows memory".  I’m not sure what kind of crap he was saying, but I’ve decided to stop listening to the Apple sales folks for technical matters.
• OS X:  As a regular user, I can’t say that there are things that are blantantly obviously better than Windows XP in terms of the GUI.  I’ll admit that over the past few years, I’ve used my Windows XP computers and set them up similarly to Macs.  Sure OS X is prettier and seems a bit easier to use than Windows, but I would have to say that the average Joe wouldn’t be able to identify what exactly is better or different (other than how it looks).  But, I can tell that "under the hood", OS X is leaps and bounds better than Windows.  Having access to the shell and X windows/X11 is just amazing.  You get the full Unix/*nix experience available to you.  I think I’ll grow to appreciate OS X more as I use it.  However, in the short time I’ve had my Macbook, the operating system doesn’t seem to make as much of a difference as touted.

Those are my overall thoughts about my switch to Mac.  I’ve only had my Macbook for two weeks so I haven’t had too much time to explore and really put the computer to use.  Most of the things that I need are bundled with the computer, so that makes me happy – and the programs are actually usable without any crapware installed.  I’m still figuring things out, but each day I’m mildly suprised at the new things I learn.

I can’t say that the switch has been "life changing" as some people have stated:  Maybe it’s because I’ve spent over a year preparing myself for the switch and learning about OS X, or maybe it’s because I’m a power user and have been pretty good at getting my Windows computers to work for me.  I would have to say that the switch as been painless and satisfying – about what I was expecting.

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