How to make a smooth transition to the Mac

DON'T PANIC!

I used to think switching to a Mac would be like pulling your own teeth. I was a power Windows user for 20+ years before I made the switch to a Mac, so you understand my misgivings.

It turns out it making the switch was easier than I feared. If there's one thing Apple is good at doing, it's making things easier for users.

Here are three important websites containing guidance from none other than Apple, to help you switch smoothly from Windows to a Mac.

Switch 101: Migrating to Mac

This web page that contains handy tips to help you make the move: how to move your files from your PC, how to connect devices including printers, and get introduced to basic Mac software you will most likely be using immediately. Go to the Switch 101 page. 

Mac 101: Getting Started with the Mac

This one is a more basic introduction, for those whose first computer is a Mac. I would still recommend this to those switching from Windows, because it contains among others, a "grand tour of the Mac interface". Go to Mac 101 page.

Mac Essentials

Read this one to get a jumpstart of the most important things you need to know about the Mac -- a bit about the interface, a smattering of how to click, copy, paste, etc. Go to Mac Essentials page.

Ctrl in Windows is Cmd in Mac

There are two most common questions by Mac switchers:

• How to right-click (there is only one clicker bar on the old Macbooks and the new aluminum Macbooks don't even have them) on a Mac.
• How to do copy-paste or cut-and-paste on a Mac (or Ctrl-C, Ctrl-X, Ctrl-V or Ins in Windows).

The first question is answered in this blog post on how to right-click.

The second question's answer is simply to substitute Ctrl with the "command" key on the Mac. There are two of these, one on either side of the spacebar. So if on Windows you do Ctrl-C to copy, just do a Command-C or Cmd-C. Here's a quick summary:

• Copy: Ctrl-C = Cmd-C
• Paste: Ctrl-V = Cmd-V
• Cut: Ctrl-X = Cmd-X

Connecting Mac OS X to a Windows Printer

Here is how to connect Mac OS X (Tiger 10.4 or Leopard 10.5) to a printer that is attached to a Windows computer on a Windows network.

Scenario: You've got an existing network setup that includes a printer attached to a computer in a Windows network.

Preparation:

• Your printer must already be shared on the Windows network.
  
• Also find out the printer's shared name, the name of the computer that is on the Windows network, and the printer brand and model.
  
• Be ready with your printer drivers for Mac. If you don't have them, try googling keywords like "Mac OS X printer driver for [insert brand and model here]" or "PPD drivers for [brand and model].
• If the printer driver is not available, read number 5, below.
  

1. Install the printer drivers on your Mac.

2. Click the Apple icon and go to System Preferences > Print and Fax.

3. Under the printer list, look for the button with the plus sign and click that. This will pop up the Add printer dialog box.

4. Click IP Printer.

5. Fill the boxes using the following specs. In the items below, the values in bold represent sample names. Substitute your own computer names and printer names.

Protocol: Line Printer Daemon - LPD
Address: MyComputer
[Note: Do not add slashes. Just put the computer name. You may also use the IP address of the shared computer, but this is not recommended, specially if you use dynamic hosting or DHCP.]

Queue: MyPrinter
[Note: This is the shared name of your printer. You should find this in your Windows computer by looking at the properties of your shared printer]

Name: [The system will automatically fill this in.]

Location: Optional

Print Using: [This is where you enter your select your printer's model number. If you installed the driver beforehand, you should see it in the list. If the drivers are not available, try using Generic Postscript Printer].

6. Close and try to test print.

If this does not work out, you may try to install Gutenprint (just google it).

Back to Firefox for Mac (or Firefox vs. Safari)

Okay, I got frustrated with Safari, so I switched to Firefox. Here's why.

Gmail just got slower and slower in Safari as Google added more features to it. Since I use Gmail heavily, I needed to solve this problem. I found a solution here but in the course of looking for a workaround, I started using FF again and the FF habit came back.

Anyway. I was a heavy FF user (something carried over from my Windoze days), testing the Safari waters slowly. When Safari 3 came out, I was impressed. Safari loaded faster than FF.

However, I noticed that in the long run, Safari slowed down in some websites I used heavily (like the BBC website), while FF performed well.

So now I'm waiting for Safari to catch up. I like Safari because it has better bookmarking features, allows private browsing and has generally a simpler and easier to use interface. But if it continues to drag my surfing down, then FF is just a click away.

Inject a little humor in your life: watch Mac ads

When I bought my Macbook, a friend quipped that it was the start of my life as a Mac junkie -- a life that included endless boasting about owning a Mac, surfing about things Mac, and buying gadgets and peripherals that perpetuate the Mac lifestyle.

Was he right!

Anyway, as I settled into the Mac lifestyle, I discovered the Mac ads in the Apple website. They poke fun at PC and Windows users, which naturally irks the aforesaid people and elicits a knowing chuckle and elbowing among Mac users. Watch the videos here to see why.

Mac is easier to upgrade than Windows

My recent upgrade to a 250 gb hard disk showed another great difference between Mac and Windows. Once again, the Mac beat Windows in the ease of transferring data to the new home.

In my more than 23 years of using Windows, each upgrade (whether getting a new computer or just upgrading the disk) was a dreadful, tiresome affair. To give one example, I had to do lots of workarounds just to find my browser bookmarks and transfer them to the new computer or disk. It's the same problem with most of the other applications in Windows (notably how to backup Outlook email and move them to the new system or disk).

So I was naturally paranoid and had to read up a lot on how to do it with Mac. I found out that all I had to do was login with administrator privileges and copy the directories under the /User folder.

Then move these folders back into the new system. Simple and painless! All my bookmarks, email and other settings were preserved when I logged back in!

Another myth on Macs, busted

Another oft-repeated myth about the Mac goes something like this: "I was considering buying a Macbook, but I got me a PC-based laptop instead. For the same price as a Macbook that runs on Core Duo, I got a machine that has better specs: Core-2, more memory, more etc etc."

Sad to say, I used to say that line too when I was still Windows-based. But the weird thing is, even if you get a machine that is more powerful than the basic specs of a MacBook, the money you saved is nothing compared to the headaches you'll get. After all, if you've been living in a Windows world, how can you make a good judgment of another operating system?

I venture to say that the gain in productivity you get from the bundled Mac software is already enough to offset any of the savings you get if you choose Windows.


For instance, one Windows-based assumption I always carried with me was that when you buy a machine, your next step was to buy the applications that would make it useful. This was because Windows by default had no meaningful applications. WordPad is not enough. You had to buy MS Office. Windows MovieMaker only came later -- and had very limited features. Etc etc.

In Mac, I was surprised that it came with useful applications like iPhoto, GarageBand, iMovie and iDVD. You don't get these for free with Windows.

Plus there's the headache of security loopholes. I had been a very cautious Windows user, running Firewalls and Antivirus software regularly and not opening any suspicious email attachments. Still, my computer regularly contracted spyware and viruses!

The time alone it took me to regularly run spy and virus detectors may have already cost me a lot of productive effort.

Switching to Mac: decision points

Switching to a MacBook was a major decision for me. Here are the points I considered before I took the leap of faith.

1. Tweakability. I like the ability to tweak my own computer. Although Macs were known for their stability and reliability, the old Macs did not really allow owners to tweak them. When Apple changed Mac OS to run on a FreeBSD platform (a Unix-based operating system), it added a Terminal mode called Darwin. Darwin is a command-line interpreter like DOS, but since it is Unix-based, it has more powerul commands. A pleasant surprise (there's lots of them you'll discover when you switch) is that Mac is really very user-friendly. I did not have difficulty adjusting my network settings, for example. When I used Windows, I had to do a series of steps to switch from office to home networking. In Mac, it's pretty much automatic and painless.
   
   
2. Application compatibility. I was worried that Mac applications would not be able to open my old Windows-based documents. I now know that this was totally unfounded. Thanks to open source technology like Open Office and cross-platform environments like Java, migrating to the new operating system was less worrisome. In fact, I had already been using OpenOffice. I was even pleasantly surprised to find that Mac had bundled software that I always wanted to have in Windows but never got. Example: GarageBand (a music creator), iDVD and iMovie (movie creators), etc. Also, since MacBook is now based on an Intel chip, it is even possible to run MS Windows on it through the use of BootCamp. I kept this knowledge filed away, just in case I had to open old files. But up to now, I have not needed to do this.
   
   
3. Price. This was a major consideration for me. I was initially craving for a MacBook Pro (MBP). But after visiting Apple shops and surfing for prices, I concluded that MBP is too expensive for me. Instead I went for a MacBook (no "Pro") which cost as much as other laptops like Dell Latitude. As a rough comparison, I bought my Dell Latitude 505 in the Philippine for P85,000. My MacBook (2.0 Gh, 80 Gb hard disk) cost about P80,000 from Hong Kong.
   

If you are thinking about switching, list down your main concerns and do your own research. You can visit Apple shops and pose your questions to the customer reps there. If they can't answer your questions, then they probably should not be trying to convince you to switch, after all.

Hello, MacOSX!

I finally sold my trusty old Dell Latitude laptop and switched to a BlackBook (aka the Black MacBook). Friends who know me will be surprised because they know I have been a staunch PC user since I started using computers in 1983, when DOS was the only operating system I knew.

For a few years, I even enjoyed using and defending MS Windows. After all, it was ubiquitous. It had become a de facto standard, thanks in part to piracy in Asia. I do a lot of presentations and sometimes have to print in different locations. Having Windows meant being able to plug into almost any projector or printer without compatibility issues. I also liked the “freedom” it gave me to open a DOS command window and tweak it at a level that the old Mac did not allow.

But like any Windows user, I got frustrated with all the viruses and instabilities that Windows is heir to. I started contemplating on switching to Ubuntu Linux. Fate, however, had different plans. One day while chatting with Konstantin, a student I was mentoring for the Google Summer of Code, we casually talked about text editors, which in turn led to a discussion of his programming environment.

I was surprised to find out that he was coding with a MacBook. I asked him whether using a MacBook limited his programming work. His answer was very simple: MacOSX is now based on Unix. It dawned on me that my stereotypical response to the Mac (”It’s mostly a tool for designers.”) was no longer correct. I probed Konstantin further and found out that MacOSX even had a Terminal mode that allowed you to run Unix commands.

After doing research on Macs, which included asking friends, surfing the web and visiting local Apple shops to try out MacBooks, I made my decision. I am going to talk more about my Mac journey later: my quest to free myself from MS Office by finding good substitutes, my pleasant discoveries on how MacOSX helps me become more productive, the problems I have encountered. For now, suffice it to say that some changes are in order.

To my friends who have always called me for help on PC and Windows: my knowledge of Windows will gradually decrease now, so be warned.

I will also probably start to be a Mac evangelizer. Actually, it looks like I have already become one. Friends who ask me if the MacBook is good will always receive a very positive response and even a demo from me. As Guy Kawasaki has observed, “Try to find anyone who ever switched from a Macintosh to an IBM PC.”

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BTW please also visit The Couch Kamote blog, where I keep my other observations.