2 posts tagged “noob”
Having had the Mac for a good few weeks now I thought it would be a good time to post my experiences back on the blog. Initially I still found the user interface confusing as OS9 is quite different from Windows, I also had my suspicions confirmed in that there is almost no application support for legacy operating systems. To get round this I decided to take the plunge and get a copy of OSX, this is a decision I do not regret in the slightest - it's great!
The install for OSX ran like a dream, though I'm not really sure how long it took as I was watching TV in the other room for the bulk of it. Once it was up and running I downloaded all the patches (being a Windows user this made me feel at home) then got hold of the latest version of Firefox so I could start using the Mac in earnest.
So far I've found it very enjoyable getting to know OSX, most things seem to be where you'd expect and I love that funny toolbar that pops up at the bottom for launching applications - much nicer than the Start Menu. I decided to make the Mac my primary web-surfing machine and have moved it into the living room, saving my PC for more hard-core use as well as my email (I'm currently tied-in to Outlook).
Every second I use OSX I am mentally comparing it to Windows and it's obviously way ahead of XP in terms of graphical niceties and general usability. That said, Vista is hot on it's heels and in honesty the whole Aero/Glass thing beats OSX's graphical style hands down, MS are clearly taking their cues from Apple and hoping to go one step further.
Of course, Apple will have a chance to bite back with Leopard so I'll keep watching that space and I'm sure Vista will usher-in a whole new world of security issues and bugs that need fixing - comments I've heard from Steve Gibson on the Security Now podcast have been quite alarming and I've stopped using my copy of Vista Beta 2 because of security concerns. That said, I will hopefully receive Vista RC1 soon but I'll try that one inside a virtual machine if I can.
On a final note I had a very helpful and friendly email conversation with a guy from my local Mac user group, if you're reading this - thanks, I may be in touch again once I've gotten to grips with things a bit more. Also, I still find the Mac press to be over-zealous and have resolved not to buy magazines any more (barring useful cover disks) - I'll get my news from the MacBreak Weekly podcast (yet another great podcast from TWiT.tv.
Until the other day, the last time I used a Mac was circa-1994 when I got my hands on a Macintosh IIsi and some variant of the Macintosh Classic. They belonged to my parent's employer who needed a bit of help with printing and other IT tasks and I was pretty good at figuring these things out. I enjoyed using the GUI, at the time my only PC was either an IBM XT or AT running DOS and a mouse was an object of desire way beyond the budget my pocket-money would stretch to.
I'm giving you this backgroun because the other day I had the chance to get a much more modern Power Mac G4 that was being thrown out of some offices near where I live. Obviously I jumped at the chance as it had been well over 10 years since I last used one and getting Mac skills back on my CV can only be a good thing. First impressions – I was underwhelmed. I must point out that this thing is running OS9 and not everybody’s darling OSX, this makes it very hard to get software that will run on it – Firefox, Mozilla, Opera, none of them have released browsers compatible with OS9 for quite a while. The main source of my disappointment is that it basically looks the same as it did back in the day, nothing really new or innovative seems to be there and I’m finding it pretty tricky to navigate. As a born-again noob I realise that things aren’t going to be plain sailing and I do need to invest some time to read tutorials and familiarise myself with the OS, what I don’t want to have to do though is go out an buy OSX to get some decent use out of it – from what I’ve seen though, there may be little option.
I also bought a copy of Mac Format magazine and one thing that shines out of it’s pages is the adoration Mac users pour on their systems, something that seems a little odd for a platform whose most recent innovation is that it can run Windows. I’m far from a Windows fanboy (why do you think I want to switch), it’s just that the realities of working in a commercial environment mean it’s the OS I am most familiar with – Mac users seem to be so absurdly protective of their environment that approaching it from an outsiders perspective seems quite tough. My next course of action is to go to the community and see if they can help, I mean websites, user groups, etc. I’ll post back if and when I get any further in my quest, stay tuned…
