Requiem: New MacBook Released

Let me begin by saying that I am a huge fan of Windows XP.
Before that I really loved Windows 2000.

Both of these operating systems seemed to give you an elegant interface while at the same time, if you needed to get ‘dirty” it was easy to access the engine and do pretty much anything.

Vista came along about the same time that my Windows XP tower gave a loud gasp and then produced a small cloud of blue smoke. Based on comments from friends, I was reluctant to take the Vista plunge.

After my hardware failure, I was quickly spending my time surveying NCIX.com to see what manner of beast I would buy to replace it. My temporary fallback position was a small, white, 2 GB Macbook that for the most part was sitting on the shelf.

For clarification purposes, I am a freelance developer and my livelihood depends on rock-solid hardware and an internet connection. Within minutes of clearing the shrapnel left by my tower I gingerly setup this little Mac book on my desktop and began plugging in my internet cable, external monitor, scanner, printer, microphone, back up USB hard-drive, external keyboard, mouse, external speakers and a series of USB cables for a few other pieces of equipment.

Damage Control…

Most mac users know that it is possible to dual boot their Mac Books but at this point I had no idea what this involved. Before I knew it, I had a copy of windows XP running on the macbook and with the help of VMware, decided that rather than dual boot, I would go for the “shared environment” experience. That is to say, I would have Mac OSX and Windows XP up and running at the same time.

In business, time is of the essence and so I leaned heavily on OSX any time I could and only loaded windows programs for those situations when it would mean going out and buying OSX versions that would unnecessarily duplicate my inventory. Much to my surprise, thanks to a solid set of backups from my Iomega 320 GB external USB drive I was back up and running in under 4 hours. A secondary key to my success was Google mail and Google docs…thank you Larry Page and Sergi Brin.

Over the next month, I continued working with my Mac Book and it quickly dawned on me that this was an operating environment that I had written off as an entry level idiots operating system but in fact, it was really much much more. I was spending less time looking for wrenches and patches and more time concentrating on my business. The interface was friendly, accessible and with very few exceptions, incredibly intuitive. These Apple guys had (I presume) spent a hell of a lot of time working on the user experience. For the new user this translates into a friendly way to get up and running very quickly. For the battle hardened business Ninja it means an exponential leap in productivity and earning power. Hoping not to sound like a sycophant, the advertising literature was ringing true…it just works.
So here I am, 15 months later.

* I love loading demo software and I still do.
* I used to do a complete bare-bones Windows XP install every four months to clear out the junk. I am into my 15th month of continuous functionality with no speed degradation or crashes.
* I am still running my original monitor configuration - Mac book display and a Dell 20 inch external monitor.
* The Iomega USB 320 GB drive is now taken over by Mac’s Time Machine backup - a service that I do not access frequently but have had to access in order to restore client files that I over-zealously deleted.
* While I like the Safari browser, I tend to use the OSX version of Firefox 95% of the time. The Firefox plugins are just too helpful.
* Over time I have been replacing my windows software version with MAC OSX compatible versions and am now at the point where I access windows XP perhaps once or twice a week now, and then it is usually only to test browser compatibility issues.

All this has been accomplished with an Apple Mac Book, Circa July, 2007.
So what does this have to do with the release of the new Mac books?

Many of my subscribers email or phone me with hardware questions and I want to share the experience that I have had with Mac hardware and software. Hands down, you will be more productive with a new mac book and indeed, I would suggest that when that windows based tower gets long in the tooth, that everyone take a hard look at a Macbook / Macbook Pro.
If you are in business and need a reliable machine that you can easily take anywhere, here is my recommendation:

1. Use the apple.com or apple.com/ca website and order your laptop directly from the company.
2. I have a soft spot for London Drugs, but generally speaking, you have more order control if you order direct.
3. Get a MacBook Pro if you are not planning on using an external monitor. I can do a lot on a regular macbook but quite frankly, after you have had 20 inches of space to work with it seems pretty cramped on a daily basis.
4. Get 4 GB of Ram. Don’t skimp here.
5. Get a 7200 RPM drive. It will hurt your battery life but the speed difference is noticeable. 250 GB is the price sweet-spot.
6. Right now, the fastest processor speed will cost you $300 over the base model. Unless you are hurting financially, get the 2.53 GHz version.
7. If you have an existing LCD display hanging around, put it to use and buy the Mini DisplayPort to DVI Adapter. It is incredibly easy to use.
8. I spend a hell of a lot of time using my machine and picked up the external apple (chicklet) keyboard. I also use a regular logitech mouse that for me as a former windows user feels really comfortable and works great on a mac.
9. My MacBook came with an apple remote. For the new ones it is an extra…I really don’t see the value or need.
10. I did buy the extended warranty - this is your call.
11. Buy a back-up USB hard-drive. 500 Gb would be about right.

My Macbook saved my bacon and while I love the idea of a Mac Pro tower…I just have too many other bad habits to want to part with the cash right now. My lowly Mac book multitasks like a beast and has never let me down.

In 2009 when Intel releases their next generation of chips I expect hat Apple will likely be looking to incorporate these into the Mac Pro towers…the temptation will likely be too much for me at that point.

Email me if you have any questions or would like some guidance making the windows to mac conversion. It will rock your business.

Darrell

Free Mac App - Neo Office

All Windows users are familiar with the Microsoft Office suite of applications and most will have owned at least one version in the last decade. When I made the move to Mac I too went wanted to retain compatibility with a lot of my old documents and so I tried the OSX version of MS Office. Pretty quickly I was introduced to the concept of regualr software updates and compatibility issues began to surface with other apps.

There are a lot of alternatives and one of my favourites is indeed, Google Docs. I love keeping key documents and spreadsheets online and available when I am on the road and preferrably off my laptop so that I can access them from any computer. Google Docs allows you to do this.

There is a plethora of omformation out there on what you can do with Google Docs so I won’t try to summarize all the benefits here. If you don’t already have a Google account…quit wasting time and get one. Best value on the web right now.

If you still need somethign local and are not ready to try iWork (Apple’s office suite) then you may want to check out Neo office.

NeoOffice is a full-featured set of office applications (including word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, drawing, and database programs) for Mac OS X. Based on the OpenOffice.org office suite, NeoOffice has integrated dozens of native Mac features and can import, edit, and exchange files with other popular office programs such as Microsoft Office.

This program will look after virtually all your needs and quite frankly, I find myself wondering why governments and other publicly accountable organizations are not insisting that open source options not become the de-facto standard for office-ware.

Check Out Neo Office

Free Mac Application - AppCleaner

OSX has always been better at handling applications than Windows but there are some applications that insist on spreading their installation files amongst different directories.

The good news is a free program that can help you manage this issue:

AppCleaner is a small application which allows you to thoroughly uninstall unwanted apps.

Installing an application distributes many files throughout your System using space of your Hard Drive unnecessarily.  AppCleaner finds all these small files and safely deletes them.

Simply drop an application onto the AppCleaner window. It will find for the related files and you can delete them by clicking the delete button.

AppCleaner  - Free and Easy

Little Snitch (Mac)

Little Snitch (currently in version 2) is one of those indispensable tools that I wish I had as a windows user.

A basic description suggest that this is a firewall meant to protect your computer from sending information to other websites/hosts without your approval. Many users will be thinking of products or companies like symantec, Zone Alarm etc, but none perform as unobtrusively as Little Snitch.


Read more