Please help me to convince me to buy a mac!!! From a Windows user

Hello guys ive been using Windows all my life but i am very interested in the mac book pro but im just really confused about all my old programs, drivers for my printers, keyboard etc. Theres are some of the problem listed below

*I am VERY dependent on the right mouse button
*I know most hardware (printers, mp3s, keyboard) will be able to autoplay on the mac but i have 2 external harddrives and i heard you a need specific hardrive to work on a mac?
*Will i be able to download torrent files?
* I have a lot of video files that need specific codecs to run them, will mac have as many range of codecs as windows?


I could go on and on about it so i really just want to know what experiences that other users had from going to a mac from a PC. Please convince me as im not sure weather to sell my Sony TZ90HS or keep it

 

You will have no problem with the right mouse button as long as you have at least 2 fingers on your hands. If worst come to worst, just buy a 2 button mouse.

I have had no problems with my and my m8's external HDs and enclosures yet.

You can download whatever file you want from the internet as long as you have a download compatible web browser.

Install VLC player and Perian codec pack.

 

i) You may use any usb mouse of your choice on a Mac; and Apple's own Mighty Mouse comes with that function as well. On a notebook, Command-Click, or a two-finger tap on the trackpad serves the same purpose, and is perfectly convenient.

ii) Someone more knowledgeable should answer this one; I can say however that what determines compatibility is not the brand or the model of the harddrive, but how it's been formatted. If your external drives are FAT32-formatted you won't have any issues reading from/writing to those drives; but obviously FAT32 has its drawbacks. NTSF and +HFS are a bit more tricky in terms of compatibility across platforms.

iii) Yes, absolutely. One open source client, for instance, is called "Transmission".

iv) Yes. And in order to play audio files in diverse formats, you can use "Cog", which is a terrific open source program.

As a general principle, (and against the common myth) unless you're dependent on very spesific Windows-only programs, you won't have any difficulty at all finding the software you need on a Mac. Besides, there's a really rich library of open source programs that you can use for almost any purpose.

Is this all you needed you needed to ask, in order to become convinced? I'd encourage you to inquire more, and not only into whether a Mac will satisfy your needs, but into Apple's recent track record as well. I'm one of those lucky people who have had very minor problems with their MacBook so far; yet many others have been experiencing problems that leads one into doubt whether Apple takes the computer business seriously anymore, now that the compnay makes a huge (easy) income thanks to their hip new series of gadgets. I absolutely love my MacBook; and at least Tiger is a wonderful OS (Leopard, ahem, seems to need a bit more work); so I'd recommend a Mac over a Windows PC any day----yet, one should be alert to the "dangers" characteristic now of Apple's latest phase.

 

Trackpad only has 1 button, but there are a multitude of ways to "right-click". Any multi-button mouse will work with the MBP as well, so this really isn't an issue anymore.

Format it as HFS for full compatibility. OSX can read NTFS but not write to it. FAT32 can be read and written to by both Windows and OSX, but it has a few limitations.

Yes, but uTorrent doesn't exist for OSX. The main free clients are Azureus or Transmission. Transmission is lighter on resources but doesn't have all the functionality of utorrent or azureus (and some older private trackers ban it because older versions were abusive). Azureus is a bit heavier on resources but has a ton of functionality.

There's no such thing as a CCCP for Mac, but VLC can play almost everything. It sucks at soft-subs however.

For soft-subs, you'll want Perian. Unfortunately, Perian's latest release version and the latest QT player aren't fully compatible with AC3, so you'll get no sound.

For best results, get MPlayer OSX. Latest version is RC2, but depending on your needs, you'll need to download/compile different versions with different parameters. Also the MPlayer default interface module has a few incompatibilities with Leopard, so you'll need to use CoreVideo instead.

 

Everything said from the previous posters will help you a whole lot but could you please tell us what your actual need is for the MacBook Pro? Is it OS X that you are interested in or what is it that is driving you towards the Mac?

 

OMG thanks for the terrific replys everyone! What drove me to buy me a mac is the battery life and the new leopard OS system and also because ive heard great feedbacks from everyone who had ever owned one but was to scared to cross over ><. The black Macbook seems to be the one that im going to get as the macbook pro is a bit to big for me to carry around and also i dont think i will be using its full potential as i will only be using it mainly on surfing the net and university work.

Im pretty convinced now since i know ive got great people here to give all the advice i need Thanks everyone!

Does anyone here own a mac that use to own a pc? if so could you tell me your experiences changing from XP pro/Vista to OS X?

 

Cody, I think nearly every Mac user was once a Windows user although not the other way around so you may get tons of replies. I switched way back when it was Mac OS 8.5. Of course as many I had a lot of Windows software discs but I just didn't allow that to stop me. What I mostly wanted to do for myself is to drop my concerns of software that "may" not be available on the Mac and begin my transformation from Windows software to Mac software and eventually get rid of my Windows discs.

The popular stuff really shocked me like Adobe's Photoshop and Microsoft's Office suite as I was told there was no Mac versions. After I discovered that Office was on the Mac before it was on Windows I began to search the web for everything I needed for my Mac that I used on Windows. Google will find it for you if not NBR. I found everything equivalent and even more. Even Napster made a Mac version called "Macster" made by the same company.

So my advice is when coming from Windows, drop your Windows centric thinking such as trying to make the Mac work "like Windows" because it's not Windows and ignore naysayers that tell you Macs don't have much software and are not compatible with much hardware because as a home user you should have very little concerns.

 

I still have a desktop PC I use for Photoshop and gaming (can't afford another copy of Photoshop for Mac ). My transition from XP to OS X was really smooth. The two guides I always recommend helped me a lot in finding my way around OS X:

http://www.apple.com/support/switch101
http://www.apple.com/support/mac101

 

The biggest drawbacks for me are the torrenting and video situations. Transmission/Azureus just aren't comparable to µTorrent, which is frustrating. I use Transmission, but it's not even close, and it isn't really adequate for more than a dozen or so torrents at a time. In comparison, one could easily manage 100 torrents in µTorrent.

In terms of video, VLC is a swiss army knife, as it is on all operating systems, but the seek bar in OS X is just as awful as it is in XP. The difference is that in XP, once could achieve all the functionality of VLC via Media Player Classic + a codec pack, with an excellent seek bar in the process. MPC doesn't exist in OS X, so you're stuck with VLC (Quicktime doesn't have incremental seeking either).

Due to these two reasons, I'm seriously considering going back to XP. I enjoy OS X, but apparently, both of these factors were a larger part of my computing experience than I realized. I enjoy my MB, but it doesn't seem rational to run boot camp and spend most of my time in XP; it would be cheaper and easier to do so on a dedicated PC laptop.

That said, if neither of these are issues for you, it should be a simple affair to use OS X. Some things are annoying (like the inability to maximize, or open a Finder window at any time via a key combination...and no, Apple+N just isn't comparable to Win+E), but overall, it's a useful OS. It's definitely easier on the eyes than XP. That was actually one of my primary reasons for trying it out.

 

VLC:
Well to be fair, the VLC seek bar is better in OSX than in its XP version - you can scrub anywhere to any frame you click in OSX - you need to actually change skins in Windows to achieve the same unless this changed in the latest version.

Torrents:
The uTorrent vs. Azureus debate has gone on forever...
I personally prefer utorrent, but it's not the end of the world for me if I have to use Azureus...

Functionality: Azureus > utorrent, especially with all its plugins. A casual user won't need all the extra options though so utorrent is usually enough.

Download speed: Same. Just too many variables to really test this, and they usually end up so inconclusive that the general conclusion is there's no real noticeable speed difference between the two if ALL conditions are held constant.

Trackers: Azureus just slightly, or doesn't matter. There are some private trackers that still unreasonably ban utorrent after Bittorrent, Inc. bought them out. Yes, this is probably completely unreasonable, but it's still a fact that exists, so Azureus wins in this regard.

Resources: uTorrent wins. Azureus is java. Azureus takes a ton of RAM. On the other hand, uTorrent uses the pagefile in Windows a lot more, which tends to be slower than RAM - so it's not as resource-light as most people think from just looking at the memory footprint. Furthermore, with systems having 2-4GB of memory, this becomes less of an issue. On the other hand, the java version in OSX is much more outdated than the one in Windows. All in all, utorrent still wins here.

As an aside, I love that the "Zoom" button on the title bar actually zooms to the right size instead of automatically "Maximizing" the window I wish Vista had introduced that instead

 

Buy a Mac. Or else.

 

I agree!

Serious note though, pretty much everyone else has had the good normal advice.

Macs do not use different hard drives, it just prefers them formatted to HFS+. Just like windows likes fat32 and NTFS. The physical hard drives are no different.

If you want to use a powerful bittorrent client, Azereus is good, though in general, Transmission is awesome.

As far as the whole right mouse button... Takes a bit getting used to the whole two finger right click. It's great, now I prefer it to having two mouse buttons on your track pad. I can even play WoW with it fairly well.

Codecs are good. There seem to be two good packages for Mac, unlike PC where there are 500 different collections. VLC is decent, but I generally just use their codecs in Quicktime (which is so much better under mac than PC, just like iTunes sucks in XP but rocks in OS X).

I'm a big CS guy, so I've used MANY OS's and I love OS X. I XP on bootcamp for gaming, and I also have Solaris and Ubuntu under Parallels. Each has their strengths and weaknesses, but I find OS X to be my favorite primary OS. Just MHO.

 

Well, switching to a new OS implies developing new habits; it's absurd to complain that one's methods of getting things done in Windows don't work so well on a Mac (or any other OS for that matter).

At the beginning one may find OSX's windows management system or its "file browser" somewhat annoying; but gradually one comes to understand that within the Mac environment, they make the most sense.

I used to maximize absolutely all windows on XP; and coming from DOS/Win3.1, I always had an instance of Windows Explorer running in the background, which would be how I would access any file or program in my system. That's how I continued doing things after the 'switch', but somehow those procedures no longer 'felt right'. One of the things I realized about the MacOS GUI was that the design of the program windows *allows* and *encourages* one to lay things out on the computer desktop the way one arranges his books and notes and whatnot on his "real" desk. The borders and menus are elegantly designed and don't take up much space at all, leaving more room for the content of each window----what's best, borders and scroll bars and menus etc. all fade into the background as you work, and don't keep reasserting themselves as huge concrete-like structures. You must have realized that there's a single Menu bar in MacOS, situated at the top of the screen; this saves lots of space, actually: If each program window had its own menu bar as in Windows, this would have made it quite cumbersome *not* to maximize.

Also, many applications come in really small, compact panes, with additional functions etc. tucked in separate drawers which you can hide or show at will.

Considering that you don't need your *whole* screen to display a website, or your e-mail client, what you can do instead is to arrange your windows in such a way on the screen such that each shows something important that is ready to your sight: Right now I have in a non-maximized but perfectly convenient window the NBR website, on the left is a bit of the Mail window sticking out, where I can keep an eye on my mailboxes; underneath Safari on a little strip I can see the HandBrake progress bar. And yes, all this fits very nicely on the 13" MacBook display. Of course, some programs do require the whole screen; and you'd have no hardships (!!!) fully maximizing them; in fact the green button does maximize fullscreen when necessary.

Mind you: I don't know about Vista, but on XP such an arrangement of windows would look really awkward, and tiresome to the eye----that's not to say that XP's windows management is inferior to that of MacOS; all I'm saying is that they handle their overall visual workings, as it were, differently, and I think MacOS is a lot more efficient for my purposes.

In fact, why don't you find screenshots of MS Word running on Windows and on MacOS, and compare for yourself how each handles toolbars and menus differently? This would give you a good idea as to the difference in approach between the two as to making use of screen space.

Sometimes you may hear people complaining that some program doesn't quite have the "Mac Look"----that's not a matter of mere 'fashion', but of functionality.

Similarly, I was frustrated with Finder at first. Now, Finder does have *glaring* omissions still not redressed in Leopard; yet one thing to realize about it, is that it's not a file "browser" proper: That is, it works rather "spatially", with emphasis on dragging and dropping objects from one little window to the other. When you learn to treat Finder "spatially" like that, you no longer miss the Win Explorer.

Again, people have been complaining about the lack of a Start menu, and the application bar. Trying to use the Dock as a Start menu of some sort is bound to be frustrating; that's not what it's designed for: A common complaint about the Dock is that minimized windows on it all look the same and don't give a clue as to what they're about; whereas on Windows, you see on the application bar the name of each minimized windows, etc. The trick on a Mac is that you don't keep minimizing and maximizing things. To see what's going on in the background, you can just hit one key and see it all on Expose; it's another click to get the thing you want to the foreground. Again, as an application launcher, the Dock should be considered only as a collection of the quickest shortcuts that you want, to the programs you use the most often. People have been complaining that whereas programs are listed alphabetically, and thus easier to find, on the Start menu, all you get on the Dock is a series of pictures in random order: Well, the Dock isn't supposed to hold *all* your programs, and I bet anyone can remember which little picture goes with which application he runs daily.

Spotlight is all the application launcher I need; all I need to do is to type the first couple of letters of the application's name, and as I have set Spotlight to list Applications first, hitting Command-Enter launches the application right away. There are third party application launchers as well, if you like.

In fact I could say that Spotlight alone is worth considering a Mac.

But as I said in my first post, as wonderful as MacOS may be, if you're considering to make the substantial financial commitment (?!) into switching to Mac, I'd humbly recommend you learn a bit about Apple Inc.'s latest policies as a company, and decide for yourself whether the hip-gadget-crazed company is all that committed to their Macintosh line any longer. A few simple searches on Google should show you expert reports on security issues, hardware quality issues etc. which cannot be ignored. There are blogs and websites by Mac Lovers (not fanatics!) out there that sharply criticize the recent decline in quality of Mac software and hardware, so you might want to check those out.

Take a look at this page, for instance: http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/?p=758

Imagine what the consequences of this would be, had MacOS had the market share of a Windows....

Apple Inc. first saved its skin, and is now doing amazingly well, thanks to the iPod/iTunes business----NOW is the time for them to concentrate their energies on the Mac once again.

 

you should have no problem switching to mac. it only took me a few days.

 

the answer to all your questions are, they have you covered. simple as that.

 

Made the switch in August and haven't regretted it at all.

There are some oddities about Macs (such as the finder) which take a bit of getting used to - but all of the usual PC user worries (one mouse button and so on) have long been dealt with. Personally I've found my mac to be a relatively trouble free and very easy to use computer - the only reason I could think not to switch would be reliance on a particular set of PC software (I work in 3d for a living and its annoying to have to reboot to be able to use 3dsmax). Otherwise I'd make the jump. It's a bit more expensive than a PC but just...works. While next door my GF is cursing her Dell.

 

Thanks everyone for replying, much appreciated!!!!! Time to get myself a macbook. HAPPY NEW YEARS EVERYONE AND MANY THANKS AGAIN!

 

Glad we were able to help, and Happy New Year's to you as well, Kody!

 

i'm also one who's thinking about mac like kody. i want to buy a black macbook but some questions on my mind. People complains about poor volume of speakers. Also i'm wondering how is the tft screen compared to led backlighted ones. The battery performance seems incredible which they say up to 6 hours but in practically how is it?

 

The speakers are okay...they're not extremely loud nor are they that quiet. Typical of most notebook speakers.

The backlighting isn't really related to TFT, the MacBook and most notebooks out there use CCFL-backlighting, while the 15.4-inch MacBook Pro has LED-backlighting. Personally, I find CCFL-backlighting to be very good already, the LED-backlighting on the MBP is an "extra feature" which is good but not needed. I'd definitely prefer getting LED-backlighting though, and who wouldn't? Less power, more bright.

I would not expect 6 hours...that's a high estimate. Expect 3+ hours on the MacBook.

 

it was very helpful thanx for all. Besides i wanna ask something. How is the white color? Do you have so much trouble keeping it clean? Because the price difference between black and white macbook is 200$ and the only tech. difference is 60 gb hdd more in black. With that money i may consider to upgrade the ram and it will be still cheaper.

 

Raymond, I think you put too much effort into your post to let it go without comment. First, thanks. I've been a Mac user for quite a while but never really gave a lot of thought to the reasons why I like OSX. You've just explained many of them quite well.

One odd issue: the way windows open, minimize, maximize, etc, in OSX, which you prefer, annoys me to no end. And, am not sure why, but I dislike Expose. This is probably the single area left where I actually prefer a Windows method of accomplishing something. LOL I dislike having to drag the corner of the screen in order to maximize pages. My preference normally, is that windows be fully maximized, especially on smaller screens. When I owned a MB, I always maximized everything. When using a MacPro with a large monitor, that issue isn't so important. Your eyes must be much younger and in better shape than my own.

 

I'm a little perturbed at your post. You say you don't like having to resize the browser window to maximize and your preference is have everything maximized.
Well you only have to do it once and it stays that way, what's the big deal? Also to add, everything in OS X maximizes by the click of the green button except for iTunes.

 

There's more to the blackbook than just the color. If you have ever owned the iBook you would know. The white picks up little scratches like there's no tomorrow. You can be as careful as doing next to nothing to it and it will pick up scratches. The blackbook's matte finish is much more durable.

 

i see but anyway it's only the color as i understood except the hdd. then what do people do with white ones? i think they're always using in cases

 

You're perturbed? Well, ain't that just a damn shame; I can't tell you how bad that makes me feel. You're having a bad day, I guess. Bad way to start the new year.

And, you're wrong - the screen does NOT stay that way all the time. And the little green button does not maximize all pages fully - this one, for instance.

 

i think what he means is that is a VERY VERY VERY, small complaint that shouldn't keep someone from being efficient with using an OS, actually, having a window fully maximized any way, is in most cases, should be a less efficient way to work, in cases like browsing the web, or your computer.

full screen apps, such as photoshop, final cut, etc. are obviously a different case.

 

circa, I would never try to dissuade a person from buying a Mac because of this or any other issue. I love Macs! I just dislike this particular feature. And I happen to prefer maximized windows - simple as that.

FWIW (perhaps not a damn thing LOL): in my household, four Macs currently can be found: MacPro, MBP, 12" PB and a 15" PB. Also, two ACD's and several iPods. If I didn't like Apple, Macs or OSX, I'd buy a PC.

 

Thank you! And you've made an interesting point: It wouldn't do much harm, I guess, if there were a maximize-full-screen option in addition to the "traffic lights" we already have.

But still, windows that need to be maximized-full-screen on OSX often can be maximized-full-screen by just hitting the green button; as far as stuff that really doesn't need all that screen space is concerned, I guess it's once again a matter of developing the requisite habits. Pdf-reading, word processing, and iPhoto are the only applications which I need to maximize-full-screen, and I have no trouble doing that.

Re: The Query concerning MacBook speakers----one thing I'd add to Sam's answer is that they are ABSOLUTELY AWFUL when it comes to producing Bass sounds. I'm no tonmeister; but I think I'm justified in making that comment: The MacBook totally squanders, for instance, Cello lines on a Strinq Quartet; and that ruins the music completely (harmonic disorientation, weaker texture....)---- and we're not talking about very low frequencies either, just the lower regions of the F-clef.

 

About the speakers, sure they do suck. But the audio interface found in the Macbooks and Macbook Pros are more than decent. For your occasional listen, the speakers should do, but if you want more, headphones or speakers come into play.

On a lighter note, love the fact that you said you're no tonmeister still you made the analogy of cellos and F-clef

 

Sure, using headphones or some decent set of speakers one would have no problems.

Re: the tonmeister comment----I was speaking qua former-composer who is clueless as to how mixing/recording/reproducing sound works, but has some idea as to how musical textures etc. work.

Now that I've started typing; re: The White Color: No it's not difficult at all to keep it clean; just make sure you don't wait for the dirt, etc. to accumulate. It's somewhat more tricky to keep the screen clean; and that does affect visual quality, so it's a good idea to wipe the screen every now and then using a slightly damp cloth.

 

LMAO, judging your response to me it looks to everyone that you are having a bad day. LOL

Of course you didn't actually READ what I said to you. I said that outside of the browser and iTunes Apple's applications maximize to full screen, I didn't say all PAGES. Take a chill pill.

 

You are correct as far as actual differences. People have had discoloration issues in the past but as I understand it Apple has fixed this in more recent models but dirt will show.
What I meant about the blackbook's color is because of lesser chances of the surface scratching you will most likely have a higher resale value than say the white ones. The blackbook will still look new after a few years go by whereas the white one won't but if it's all the same to you then go for the white one.

 

Actually it looks to me like bmwrob has a sense of humor and you don't.

 

Unfortunately, I did READ your entire post, hldan. I caught the sarcastic tone and your condescending attitude - it would've been hard to miss even if I were as dumb as you seem to assume, and I'm not. So, judging by your response to me, you're hoping that somebody here will find you to be as clever and witty as you obviously find yourself. Certainly has been a pleasant experience dealing with you.

/with this post, another addition to the ignore list


Edit: thank you, swarmer.

 

Cult alert! Attempt to qualify any criticism with cult credentials:

 

Damn, swarmer, I missed your cult post, or had forgotten it. LOL

So, do I qualify for membership?