By Monday afternoon George was in Indianapolis, and two hours later he was bound for Cleveland. That meant he may be here a day early. And Tuesday I was scheduled to work at a client's. First thing Tuesday morning I checked FedEx, and George had left the Cleveland airport for the FedEx facility. By 7:30 he was on the truck and out for delivery by 10:30. I told the client I would be running a little late, and at 9:30 in the morning, dressed as a PC guy, I was on the front porch signing for George. I only had time to take the white Apple box (almost like the White Album) out of the packing case before I had to leave.
When I got back later that afternoon, I unpacked George, plugged him into Deadrock and turned him on. After registration, he immediately called back home and downloaded seven updates, including the two security updates of 2007 and the Daylight Savings Time update. After one more reboot, I was finally ready to be a Mac guy. After an hour or two of exploring, I finally started looking for something that would let me write this story. Skipping the Microsoft Office trial for now (I didn't want my first real task on a MacBook to be done using Microsoft software), I found an application called TextEdit that was actually more like a mini word processor than a text editor, since it can check spelling and format text. So that's what I used to write this story - it even lets you save the file as HTML.
To keep this story entirely on an "eating your own dogfood" level, I'll use Safari to log onto the Blogcritics site to upload it too. Beginning next week, start looking for a review of the MacBook itself, along with the apps that come with it. Actually, here's the first review - there doesn't seem to be a backspace key, only a delete key. And the delete key acts as a backspace.
(Sigh)
I guess I'm going to have to think different.
Article comments
1 - Ken Edwards
Well I want to be the first here to congratulate you Bruce!
2 - Daniel Woolstencroft
I'll be the second then!
The joy of owning a new piece of Apple hardware kind of makes me want one again...must...resist...
3 - Nukapai
Just got to say: I love your style of writing. Really engaging, informative and entertaining.
As for the MAC versus PC... I'm not convinced yet. I'm a PC girl all the way, but I do now own an iPod.
Still, let's see how you get on with your new toy. Looking forward to the next installment.
4 - Pico
Good read, and congratulations to ya.
Did you ever find out if you would get a free upgrade to OSX 10.5 (Leopard)? I asked a CompUSA guy that last night and he told me Apple typcially goes back about 6-7 months for free upgrades.
I know, consider the source...which is why I'm asking you ;)
5 - Misfit
I also switched to the Mac, although I have to use a PC for the majority of my work for the company I work for, but to answer your dilemma, the delete key has two functions. Backspace and Delete. If you use the fn+delete you get delete. if you use delete by itself you get backspace. Drove me crazy at first. This is only for the laptops. The desktops have two, yes two, delete keys, but one is a backspace and one is delete.
6 - Bruce Kratofil
Thanks for all the congrats, people.
Daniel- don't want to add to your Mac lust, but my wife says it almost has a new car smell.
Pico - the sales people at the Apple Store haven't been told; they said previously, Apple never announces the upgrade policy till they announce the actual shipping date.
Misfit -- thanks for the tip. I've been trying to figure out the little things on my own, but I just picked up the Mac OS X Missing Manual book to try to accelerate the learning.
7 - Pico
Hi, Bruce--
I've since phoned two Apple people and they've both said the same. Another thing they added is that in the past, the upgrade policy has applied only to those puchasing Macs about two weeks to a month prior. Everyone else will pay $129 to upgrade.
8 - Kevin Hatfield
Congrats! I don't think you will be let down. The new Macbook's are amazing.
9 - Ken Edwards
I seriously doubt there will be a free upgrade to 10.5, unless it is bought within a *slim* window of the release of 10.5.
10 - Ken Edwards
Bruce, I hope to read of your adventures with your new Mac here on BC! You know I started my personal blog in the same way - I got a PC and decided to write about my trials and tribulations (and let me tell you, there were trials and tribulations!).
I ended up just plain frustrated, getting more work done on my old Titanium PowerBook, so I sold the PC.
11 - Pico
I nearly decided to get an iMac today, but I'm gonna wait a few more weeks instead. In the meantime, I hope you'll check back in periodically to tell us more about your conversion.
12 - reggie von woic
No right click button--No thanks...
13 - Bruce Kratofil
Reggie -
I just plugged in a USB mouse that I had lying around, and the right click button works, as does the scroll wheel (the scroll wheel works within Firefox, at least)
I'll need to check how the right button works in some of the iLife programs.
14 - Howard Dratch
Congratulations! You will end up a happy Mac guy always dressed for artistic works and able to delete whole pages at a single bound.
I, too, bit the bullet and replaced my G3 iBook with a Macbook Pro which I have been working at for a few weeks -- very happily. After playing with dozens of pc's with Vista, it is wonderful to have Tiger (Leopard is now said to be waiting for the summer, I heard) and very happy with the quality of the hardware.
An employee here bought an HP for his son through Telmex's contract (computer, broadband, credit and added to the monthly bill). It arrived DOA. The phone company refused to listen to complaints - not their computer and HP screwed around 4 months before actually giving him a new machine.
I would have bought the more appropriately priced Macbook if only they had offered a 15" screen (I was in the States to have one eye repaired of cataracts, the other next trip) rather than going down to 13".
Suggestion: try NeoOffice freeware for a Word-styled app (and/or Google's Docs and Spreadsheets) and stick with Firefox and Camino for browsers. Safari is better than it was but still Safari. Onyx and Applejack also work well at cleaning the Mac, running maintenance chores, etc. and MenuMeters puts a lot of useful information on the Menu Bar. Xpad also lives happily on the Mac and gives you a really sophisticated alternative to Stickies -- and is freeware.
Welcome to the land of Mac and may all your dreams arrive on time and be user-friendly, even sexy.