Thinking of going to the dark side....

Before dropping any $ with the evil empire on Office, I *strongly* suggest you try out "Neooffice" [www.neooffice.org] - It's free, is a native Mac port of the well respected Openoffice suite and will do (pretty much) everything that M$Office can do - Including importing & exporting the various Office formats with no problem.

HTH, cheers,
Ian
PS - I have no attachment with Neo other than as a very satisfied user.

 

The only challenge with NeoOffice is that other people can not open it. With Office it is compatible with mac and windows

 

Sorry, I have to respectfully disagree there. Whenever you save a document/spreadsheet/presentation/etc it gives you the option to save in a myriad of formats - Some of which are the Micro$oft "standards" (sic) for docs, s/sheets, ppt presentations etc etc.

Obviously, when you open, eg, a "ppt" presentation originally produced in Office it then gives you the option to save it in ppt format. So you can receive it, edit it, and send it back with no one any the wiser that you're not using the empires products!

Give it a try! - I think you'll love it!

Cheers,
Ian

 

invest in a Mac. i did, and it;s the best investment i've ever done

 

+1

[And, you're saying that while unable to use an external drive! - Excellent! ]

 

checkout that thread again, Ian.

 

That's what the tax rebates are for

 

The "latest & greatest" - 802.11n - As long as your base station can handle it of course.

As to specs, there is no doubt that the $1,299 version is the way to go - Not for the additional processor speed (nice, but no big deal for your stated uses) but the additional 1GB ram (essential IMCO) + hard drive space + the superdrive [Allows burning of DVD's rather than just CD's] is a great value for +$200.

If you're on a really tight budget, choose the "build it yourself" option and "downgrade" the processor to the lower speed version and save a few $.

HTH,
Cheers,
Ian

 

Buy the Mac

 

As has been said many times, more memory is generally a good idea - $200 for 4GB is a pretty good deal. It will certainly last longer than a PC laptop.

Your base station will be one of "802.11b, 802.11g or 802.11n" - 'b' is the oldest and slowest, 'g' is the most widely installed and 'n' the newest. All MacBooks now come with an 'n' card installed, but will "fallback" to g (and I think even b) as and when required [You don't need to do anything - it happens automagically] If your base station is old (b) I'd recommend upgrading to a new one - Apples own is *awesome* as it incorporates a hard drive that will transparently backup your internal disk.

And yes, it will connect to any wi-fi hotspot you come across - Be they b, g or n.

HTH,
Cheers,
Ian

 

i am using a macbook air right now and it is by far the best computer i have ever owned. its awesome. unless your planning on doing hardcore photoshop and music/movie editing, it really is all you need. It is extremely durable and a solid machine. The macbook is also a tank, significantly moreso then the air, but the air is perfect for me. find what works for you.

 

Dude! - WTF?

*Please* do me a favor before spending $ on either of those! - Download Neooffice (www.neooffice.org), install it and poke around in "preferences" [Like you would in M$Office] to set it up the way you want, and give it a go - I honestly believe you'll get everything you need.

Cheers,
Ian
PS - Congratulations on joining "the dark side" - You'll soon see the light

 

I underclocked it because I only do typing on this computer so 800Mhz is more than enough. This way the Macbook Air is completely silent and it doesn't get hot.

 

Haven't used NeoOffice, but OpenOffice that it is based on is a KILLER program. I was shocked it is free.

 

Just Bought a MAC Book. Interesting....... I think i'll like it. Only had it for 1 week. Still don't know what i'm doing. BIG learning curve

 

Armen,

OSX is certainly very interesting, but pretty soon, you'll learn to love it!

Took me two days to be fairly familiar with it after using Windoze from 3.1, and a bit of linux. Everyday I'm still learning new bits and pieces!

All in all,

-Installers are not .exes. Instead, they are .Dmg packages which you open up, after following the instructions, just drag the .dmg to the trash. Usually downloaded .dmgs are stored in the "Downloads" folder.

-Drag and drop to install programs in the Applications Folder. To uninstall, drag the application to the trash.

-Use "Hot Corners" to have quick access to different features like Expose, Dashboard, etc.

-Expose is a whole lot better than Alt-Tab. There are two types that can be accessed. "All windows" and "Application windows," all shows all open programs; application shows all open windows pertaining to that program you are currently using.

-Spaces is awesome if you want to customize different "desktops" to different uses.

-On the trackpad, use two fingers to scroll, two fingers to "right" click, three fingers to do swipe gestures (only latest macbooks)

-While in Finder browsing for files, click a file and press space bar - you can quickly see details on the folder, file, preview the image, pdf, movie, etc.

-Calibrate your battery once in a while... http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=86284

-Command + Option + Esc = "Task manager" in Windoze, allows you to force quit non responsive programs (yes those happen to macs too!)

-Command + Spacebar = the answer to life, the universe, and everything -- it opens up spotlight. Start typing in stuff, and the mighty finder will locate the answer!

Hope you have fun on this side of the line!

 

thanks for the tips!

 

Very cool! (Pun intended) Questions:

1. "Completely silent" - You mean the fan never turns on? - How cool is that!

2. Did it "get hot" before? - "Warm" I can deal with, an inability to rest it on my lap would be another thing altogether.....

Another little tip for the Apple newbies that are reading this (and "welcome" BTW!) is to accept your one year free subscription to Macworld - You *will* find at least one or two useful articles / comments/ fixes etc in every issue. [Beware however - You will become a real fanboy ]

Cheers,
Ian

 

Apple *never* offers any deals

Seriously, I'm pretty sure that a valid "student-id" card gets you (up to?) 10-20% in an Apple store...... [The same applies with many company id's if you ask btw.]

As to the "back to school" thing - Who knows? - They *may* time a product upgrade and price drop on existing models with that season, but they may not.... [Murphys law says that the week after you purchase, they'll make it faster and/or cheaper and/or bigger - That's life, and I suspect even more prevelant in the PC market.]

Cheers,
Ian

 

What consists of a "valid" student id? I ask you this b/c I graduated last December but still carry my school id around, honestly bc it saves me a dollar at the movies . Will this count for anything? Oh and there is no date or anything on the id.

 

Give it a shot?

Just go to apple.com and click on the education store?