my Mac G5 is waving at your lovely new Mac. Congrats.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Okay, yeah – if I had the money I’d buy a MacBook Air in a heartbeat.

BTW – it’s not the smug from Apple users that’s annoying. It’s being smug while being a total idiot about computers and computing. Being around Mac addicts can be a lot like reading The Corner.

Yay! I got my iMac right after Christmas, after being a PC user for more than 20 years. I found myself salivating at the sheer beauty of this thing when I accompanied my mother-in-law to the Mac store and saw it sitting there taunting me.

It is a strange experience to actually fall in love with a computer. Strange but lovely. After about 3 weeks of hearing me say “Get a Mac” every time he started grousing about some new problem that cropped up with Vista, my husband came home with whatever that model with the big CPU is (I forget and I don’t care). He is now a bonafide MacLover, too.

I am also really surprised at how quickly we both adapted to the Mac Way. I expected months of frustration learning the new ways, but Apple really does make it simple.

Congrats. Have fun.

If you do a cost/benefit analysis, you might find that an iMac costs less than a similarly equipped PC nowadays. Built-in camera, microphone, (excellent quality) speakers. iLife (for photos, movies, garage band, etc) comes installed free. No need for antivirus software.

As for the smug thing, I admit it’s always bugged me to hear Mac folks brag. But I drive a Prius, too, so I’m now a member of the smuggest dipshit club around. ‘Sokay, though. I have a Mac.

Phht. I was hoping for some funny concerning the Magical Unity Pony Jackalope Whose Name We Dare Not Speak.

Enjoy your new toy, anyway. That’s the best part of being a grownup, the fact that you get to pick out your *own* toys.

I had a wonderful exchange with Little Miss Atilla tonight.

Anyone who would like to contribute go to:

http://littlemissattila.mu.nu/archives/255470.php.

Oh, and congrats on the Mac and joining us in the 21st century.

Maybe here?

http://littlemissattila.mu.nu/…..p#comments

That’s the ticket.

Me, Atti and two wingers whose first letters rhyme with “Z.”

Good stuff, I promise you.

Blogging will resume when I get the thingamajig out of the box, hook up the dealey-bop and learn how to use the whatsis.

…which should take all of six minutes. It ain’t another PC, T.

Congratulations.

Hells yeah. What the doc said. Hookup time is notime. Welcome to the fold.

Be sure that you’re aware of Keychain, which remembers all of your login passwords around the Toobz. F**king brilliant. That’s what has always impressed me about Apple: how well they understand what people really need, and will really like, as opposed to some basement-dwelling geek’s idea of what is useful (apparently the Microsoft approach).

Keep in mind that many computer experts love the Mac, too (all my ancient knowledge of Unix having gone mostly to waste when I was using a PC). We’re justifiably smug.

That’s what has always impressed me about Apple: how well they understand what people really need, and will really like, as opposed to some basement-dwelling geek’s idea of what is useful (apparently the Microsoft approach).

Oh yeah. Remember well reading Hanging on the Bill Gates of Hell, aka Microserfs.

Told ya resistance was futile.

Congratulations!

“We know things are bad — worse than bad. They’re crazy. It’s like everything everywhere is going crazy, so we don’t go out anymore. We sit in the house, and slowly the world we are living in is getting smaller, and all we say is, ‘Please, at least leave us alone in our living rooms. Let me have my Mac and my Mac and my steel-belted Mac and I won’t say anything.

‘Just leave me alone with my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac, my Mac.’

Well, I’m not gonna leave you alone. I want you to get mad! I don’t want you to protest. I don’t want you to riot — I don’t want you to write to your congressman because I wouldn’t know what to tell you to write. I don’t know what to do about the depression and the inflation and the PCs and the crime in the street. All I know is that first you’ve got to get mad.

You’ve got to say, ‘I’m a MAC Owner, Goddamnit! My life has VALUE!’ So I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window. Open it, and stick your head out, and yell,…”

You’re not going to miss slowing down to let the computer catch up with you nearly as much as you might think.

all things considered, maybe you should buy a Mac ?

One word:

Heh.

Is that a word?

I bought my first Mac in January 2006, and completed the changeover in September ‘06, after 14 years of PCship. That’s like 17 months of sobriety.

(unless I’m reading Kevin Drum’s comments where that line comes up about twelve times a day)

Always a mistake. I love Kevin Drum, but his comments suck ass.

Just like Macs.

One of us! One of us! One of us!

One of us!
One of us!
One of us!

Seconded.

Now, buy another Mac. You need a laptop for blogging on the road.

[nerd]I presume you realize you can run all of your Windows progarms on the new Mac – although Microsoft was, predictably, a pain about letting me install my existing copy of XP on my MacBook Pro. “You’ve already used that license,” they said. “Yes, and that computer is fried, so I can’t uninstall it.” “Uh, I dunno…”

But with all of the hassle out of the way, I was able to install Apple’s Boot Camp, install XP on a separate partition, then buy and run Parallels, so I can run XP and Mac software at the same time.

Let’s see your PC do that, Tom Hilton![/nerd]

If you do a cost/benefit analysis, you might find that an iMac costs less than a similarly equipped PC nowadays. Built-in camera, microphone, (excellent quality) speakers. iLife (for photos, movies, garage band, etc) comes installed free. No need for antivirus software.

The problem with an iMac is you end up buying a monitor (and a camera, and a microphone, and speakers) every time you buy a computer.

It’s not bad the first time, because you can’t get away without a monitor. But, how much more consumer waste are you generating by buying a new monitor every time?

The real advantage to a PC is the ability to get a good mid-range computer for ~$500. Sure, you need to be a bit more tech savvy to use it properly. But you can upgrade it cheaply without the worry that your new parts won’t work in your machine. And you can buy a monitor just once. If you hate MS, you can always roll Linux-style and stick it to the man.

… Dont’ wait up? It’s a Mac you silly Boy.

Do not upgrade to 10.5.2.

Stay with 10.5 until they fix it.
You will be sorry!

It is now MY turn. I want a MacBook Air.

SO my permanent banishment would have been brief then if I had bit on the “get a Mac” threat recently…it was right on the tip of my typing fingers…
Second on the portable. You can get a used 12″ G4 Powerbook, LOADED on Ebay for under $1000, a REAL roadwarrior. I have 2 Powerbooks and Santa scored a demo IMAC loaded. First desk top I have had since an Apple SE at work in the 80’s…(It still works, but I don’t).

applewood is also a fabulous restaurant in park slope where you must own a mac by law…

Ah how aptly named you are bh dork!

Now all you have left is the fantasy that linux will solve all your problems.

But, not to worry, it won’t.

I am reminded of the journey of the creators of one of the most popular gaming comics on the web, Penny Arcade. As hard core gamers they were long time PC bigots. Their “Mac fanboy” character “Charles” was portrayed as basically an ignorant goofus. But over time Charles’ design became cooler as the PA creators got pulled in by Apple’s siren song, until eventually the artist came out of darkness…

Don’t worry TBogg, your first time can be scary. What are your preferences? ^____^

Funny the timing. I’m just starting to shop for a new pooter. For the first time I’m seriously considering Apple. Keep encouraging a scaredy cat pls.

Dude, get a grip!

The smug is from Mac users who don’t have to hand-crank the prop to get it started; who don’t have to worry about thousands of .dll’s all over the place, who care far less abour process and more about getting stuff done.

And before you bitch, I’m typing on my iMac while my XP machine is sitting at my left side, where I use it only for AutoCAD.

And I worked on mainframe machines in the ’70s, and could do hex math in my head. So I’m not some fuzzy-headed artsy type.

The $500 computer you tout is a myth, because it comes with absolutely NO software. The Mac comes with everything the average user needs, right out of the box, even without the purchase of iLife.

Works = MS Office
iPhoto = Adobe Photo Album, only much better
Safari = [retty damn good browser, although I use Firefox on both the Mac & PC;
etc., etc., etc.

And you can always buy a Mac Mini if you’re really that worried aobut the environment. It’s about the size of a Motel 6 Gideon bible, so you use the monitor of your choice.

The fact you didn’t post again within fifteen minutes of opening the box has caused me some alarm. Dude, when I got my G4 I upgraded the RAM and had it booted all with five minutes!

You tried to alt-control-delete something, didn’t you?

oh welcome to the club!!
you’ll be so glad you bought an Apple compy. once you get used to how things work, you’ll think “why the eff did I wait so long??” plus, they’re just prettier.

Ah how aptly named you are bh dork!

It’s called self-effacing. Kind of the antonym of smug…

Dude, get a grip!

The smug is from Mac users who don’t have to hand-crank the prop to get it started; who don’t have to worry about thousands of .dll’s all over the place, who care far less abour process and more about getting stuff done.

And before you bitch, I’m typing on my iMac while my XP machine is sitting at my left side, where I use it only for AutoCAD.

And I worked on mainframe machines in the ’70s, and could do hex math in my head. So I’m not some fuzzy-headed artsy type.

When was the last time you actually had a .dll problem with Windows? Personally, I gotta go back to early Win98. That was about the time of my last BSOD, too.

This is the kind of crap I was talking about. “Hand crank a prop…care far less about process than getting stuff done.” What the hell are you talking about? You make it sound like web browsing or word processing in Windows requires editing the registry and rewriting boot files. No, you click on the icon for whatever you want to run and get to work. You have both on your desk? Great. Tell me what is more difficult to run in Windows than in Mac? Office apps? Web browsing? Music and media? Where do you have to hand crank the prop?

I don’t hate Apple and I sure as hell don’t worship Microsoft. If I had a spare two grand for a laptop I’d be very tempted to get a MacBook Air. (The only Windows laptop I’d consider would be a Lenovo convertible tablet, which I’ve coveted for years.) I like the Mac OS-X. I’ve recommended it to people. I’m happy T bought one and I hope Jobs will read this and immediately send the vivacious and brilliant Mrs. Tbogg a MacBook Air because that’s the kind of product placement that money can’t buy.

But people, it’s a personal computer and an operating system. They do almost everything identically and they’re equally stable. If Apple’s marketing and product design makes you feel better about giving them your money, that’s fine – but don’t confuse that with a substantive difference between the products.

I can still beat you up with my abacus.

And I worked on mainframe machines in the ’70s, and could do hex math in my head. So I’m not some fuzzy-headed artsy type.

Me, too. And I could read a Univac 1100 machine language core dump.

Of course, that was in octal rather than hex.

The $500 computer you tout is a myth, because it comes with absolutely NO software. The Mac comes with everything the average user needs, right out of the box, even without the purchase of iLife.

The $500 computer is not a myth. I bought my tower for that. If you do a bit of searching about before you buy, it is relatively easy to find a tower “on sale”.

As for software, are you suggesting that you can’t get free apps for Windoze or Linux? That doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.

http://www.openoffice.org/

This will give you (for free) all the software that you need for business apps (i.e. average user). Vista gets a horrible rap, but most of the problems that come with it are due to PC companies subsidizing their hardware by trying to get you to buy software. Just do a really quick format and reinstall your OS(es). You *can* get a blazingly fast PC for $500. It just requires you to spend a little time with your new baby.

What technophile doesn’t love to muck about with their computer when they get it anyways? New toy is 2/3s the point, right?

What technophile doesn’t love to muck about with their computer when they get it anyways?

For that, we recommend the Mac Pro.

For that, we recommend the Mac Pro.

Yikes, I can’t really afford such a sweet toy. Even as stripped as stripped can be (still a screamin’ machine, I presume) it rolls in at $2300 plus tax. Zounds!

I knew you were a smart guy, TBogg!

If you have questions, just ask! As you know, there are plenty of Mac people here.

Actually, I recommend buying Apple refurbs. It can drop the price quite a bit, although you might have to wait for the model/arrangement you want (or settle for something else). My MacBook Pro was $500 cheaper as a refurb. Only one issue arose, which, according to the guy at the Genius Bar, wasn’t limited to refurbs – a bad DVD burner. Two hours, half of that in the car, and my ‘pooter was better that new, as the replacement drive was a bit of an upgrade.

me, i think the future is ubuntu

After one experience at the Genius Bar with a half-dead iPod, I can state that I would neveer trust *that* fsckin genius with a real computer.

‘[T]otal idiots about computing and using the computer.’

Ah, it was like the wind off 1993 to read that. I’ll send it along to the coders and 3d simulation guys I’m working with for a good laugh.

Half the fun of the experience is talking to the resident geeks at the Apple stores. We have had multiple half-dead iPods which are always revived and as good as new….except for mine which had a fried whatchamadoodle and had to be replaced. Tbogg and I decided last night that working at an Apple store is the 70’s equivalent of working at a record store. Only they’re nice and actually want to help you. Or the niceness is all part of the great conspiracy to help Jobs take over the world. If he sends me an Air, as suggested above, I’m okay with Apple domination.

It always seems to come down to the price.

If I buy a mac, it will cost me roughly $1100+tax for a good (and new)machine.

If I buy a PC, it will cost me roughly $500+tax for a good (and new) machine.

Oh Tbogg, I envy you. A first time Mac user. You are in for such a treat.

Talk to me in a week.

I’m looking forward to Basset Blogging with Photo Booth. Satch, Beckham, meet Andy Warhol.

We get your point on the cost, but you also need to factor in how often you need to purchase a new box. I bought my PB G4 over 5 years ago, still going fine. Needed a new case after I dropped on the garage floor, but fortunately the Genius guy helped me to get it covered under AppleCare (2 years and 10 months into the 3 year plan. The Air is very tempting at this point, I must admit.

I run the Computer Science Department’s labs at a large midwestern university. We just finished the switch to 100% Intel iMacs in our 5 labs (I get to play with about 120 of these puppies). When we have to go slumming and ride the short bus of operating systems, we use virtualization (Parallels is what we have; VMWare has its fans) to run XP SP 2.

Make sure you download NeoOffice, the Mac port of Open Office. Reads and saves in all those proprietary Winderz Orifice 2007 xml formats. Crucial has wondrous prices on RAM.

Although Apple Inc. is certainly no Apple Computer, you still made a wise investment. I’m typing this on a Cube. Over seven years old and it’s runnin’ 10.4.11 happily.

I have been absorbed.

Landrieu, guide us!

i still use 2 beer cans n string, wrks jst fine.
except 4 utube

For the record, I don’t hate MS. I just love my new Mac. As for how much more consumer waste are you generating by buying a new monitor every time?

1. I don’t “buy a new monitor every time” and have upgraded by pieces and parts many, many computers many, many times over the years to accommodate whatever I needed to do with a computer and

2. I give my good useable older equipment to young people who don’t have money for that kind of thing or to non-profit organizations where a lot of people can use it

If you prefer PCs it’s fine with me. I don’t.

I get a kick out of how cute the people who work at the Apple store are being so damned helpful and earnest and wanting “your Apple experience” to be a good one. So much nicer than the places where they act like you’ve interrupted their day to come in and buy something.

Go get yourself a Mac Air. Now.

Got a MacBook at home and a MacBook Pro at work. All the Maccy goodness on the surface, all Unixy goodness underneath. You have entered the light.

No, really, I have absolutly no time to try new video cards, wank with the Registry and BIOS, nor would I even want to. That desire to be all techy inside my computer left me after I left the mainframe world.

Seriously, there’s not much wrong with Windows, it’s just that the Mac GUI is much better all around.

And in re: your $500 laptop, you stil spend a lot of time downloading all that software, finding which version doesn’t work with which other video driver, etc., all the while I’m actually browsing using Safari that came built-in and works. My techiness is about getting things done, not putting the model car together.

If you still enjoy assembling your toys, that’s cool, but not for me, thanks.

Welcome to the world of Mac. Dude.

I’m typing this on a Cube. Over seven years old and it’s runnin’ 10.4.11 happily.

!!! My Cube got relegated to a dusty corner of the basement, living out its remaining days as a jukebox. If you are willing to share some tidbits about getting 10.X installed on it, you’ll find a very attentive audience at someguywithawebsite AT gmail.com

Well done!

TBogg, don’t know whether you’ll need to use it, but it might be nice for you to know that your iMac comes with an Apache server. (I’ve yet to meet an Apple store employee who could explain the Apache setup to me, which is why I post the info here.) I don’t know how you use Dreamweaver, but if you use it with databases, PHP works nicely on a Mac — after you set up the Apache server (on your new Mac) as your testing server.

Best Apache setup instructions are by David Powers, and his “Foundation PHP for Dreamweaver” is the best, most complete explanation that I’ve found for Mac — see the Friends of ED website for updated info about Mac setups for Apache: http://www.friendsofed.com/boo…..1590595696

Enjoy your Mac, and congratulations!