Quickly Lock Your Screen in Mac OS X

As discussed on Mac Geek Gab 342, there are two easy methods to quickly lock your screen. First, you can use a menu bar item.

Launch Keychain Access and go to Preferences. In the General tab, check the box for “Show keychain status in menu bar.” This will add a padlock icon to your system’s menu bar.

Select this icon and you’ll see several options, the first of which is “Lock Screen.”

The second option is even faster: a keyboard shortcut.

Pressing Control-Shift-Eject on a Mac keyboard will immediately lock your display. If you set yoursecurity settings to require a password immediately after sleep, no one will be able to access your Mac without first entering a password.

To change your security settings, go to System Preferences > Security & Privacy > General. Check the box next to “Require password…” and choose the time delay that suits your needs. If you’ll be using your Mac in public places such as coffee shops or libraries, choosing “immediately” will provide the best protection.

[Updated to show that Control-Shift-Eject locks the display instead of sleeping the system.]

Source:http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/how_to_quickly_lock_your_screen_in_mac_os_x/

Great Place for Information...

Looking for a great place for information and PC tips try this!

http://computersupersecrets.blogspot.com/

Finally the day many have waited for...

They have waited long for the day and it has arrived. Windows 7 is released. Now a pc can be almost as cool/elegant/user-friendly as a Mac. Don't take my biased word for it...

Let CNET tell you!

Source: http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/apr2009/tc20090415_602968.htm
Byte of the Apple April 15, 2009, 10:16PM EST

Mac vs. PC: What You Don't Get for $699

A 17-in. PC may cost a lot less than a 17-in. Mac. But you get less, too, including security, multimedia tools, and, some say, satisfaction

By Arik Hesseldahl

I'm a sucker for a well-made TV ad.

Inspired by the Nike (NKE) "Just Do It" and "Air Jordan" campaigns of decades past, I mentally mapped out storyboards of the spots I wanted to produce. Nowadays I laugh at clever beer and soda commercials and get mad or pump my fist in the air along with political ads.

I cheered for Apple's (AAPL) 1997 "Think Different" spot that featured actor Richard Dreyfuss reading the "Here's to the Crazy Ones" speech. The commercial resonated in a house full of Mac users at a time when Macs were widely considered an endangered species. Apple's more recent "Mac vs. PC" ads lampooning Microsoft (MSFT) strike a different chord: Macs are friendly, cool, easy to use, and they don't have the kinds of problems usually associated with Microsoft's Windows operating system; PC, portrayed by the hilarious John Hodgman, comes across as ridiculous—not unlike the real-world, buggy Windows Vista.

Now Microsoft is fighting back with its own advertising campaign. I've enjoyed some of its elements. The Seinfeld spots were weird. I was intrigued by some of the "I'm a PC" spots that aired last fall, depicting PC users engaged in a variety of jobs—teaching law, protecting endangered species, blogging for Barack Obama. The message: You can use a Windows PC and still do cool and interesting things. Not bad. Then came the adorable little girls: Kylie, age 4, and Alexa, age 7, e-mailing pictures of fish and stitching together pictures of a fort into one. Microsoft, it seemed, had finally found its advertising voice.

Then came Lauren, the perky, red-haired twentysomething meant to represent an average American shopping for a computer. She wants a notebook with a 17-in. screen, and if she finds it for less than $1,000, she can keep it. Following her as she shops, we learn she considers the Mac too expensive—that she's not "cool enough to be a Mac person," she whines. From the Apple store, it's off to Best Buy (BBY), where she finds a PC that meets her specifications for $699. Mission accomplished, she jumps up and down clapping as though she won on The Price Is Right, ending the spot by saying "I'm a PC, and I got just what I wanted." Aaaand Cut!

The Price Weapon

Microsoft used earlier ads to defend itself suitably against Apple's nerdiness allegations. Now Microsoft is on the advertising offensive, wielding price as a weapon of choice. It's an effective approach during a recession. But as is always the case with advertising, the full story is more nuanced.

Yes, $699 beats the $2,800 you'd pay for a Mac with a 17-in. screen. But when it comes to PCs, there's still a great deal more to buy.

First, there's security software. The PC in question comes with a 60-day trial Norton Internet Security 2009 from Symantec (SYMC). After the trial runs out you'll pay Symantec $50 a year to protect your PC (and up to two others in your home) from all the nasty viruses, worms, and other malware lurking on the Internet. That's $150 over the three years Lauren is likely to hold on to her PC. No need for antivirus on the Mac.

Next, let's say something goes wrong on the computer once the warranty expires and that it requires the intervention of a third party. Geek Squad will charge you $129 just for a diagnosis. A diagnosis from the Genius Bar in Apple's retail stores? Free.

Then there's iLife, the suite of multimedia tools that comes standard on the Mac. With iLife you can organize photos and home movies and turn them into watchable DVDs. Garageband helps you create your own music and another iLife element aids in Web site creation.

Extras Cost Extra

It's hard to replicate that bundle if you're a Windows user. The Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) machine in Lauren's case does ship with discs for Muvee Reveal, a video-editing program that usually costs $80, and CyberLink DVD Suite, which runs $104. But if she wants Adobe's (ADBE) Photoshop Elements, including a membership in Photoshop.com Plus, she'll need to shell out about $140. Sonic Solutions' (SNIC) Roxio Creator 2009, which combines video-editing and DVD-creating tools, will cost another $100. And the closest equivalent to Garageband on Windows is Cubase Sequel and it goes for another $100.

Add it all up and it's not hard to imagine Lauren's $699 computer costing something closer to $1,500.

But that doesn't include harder-to-quantify shortcomings. The HP's battery lasts only 2.5 hours on a charge, compared with eight hours for the 17-in. MacBook Pro, which also happens to be 1.2 lb. lighter and boasts substantially better screen resolution: 1,920 pixels wide by 1,440 high, vs. 1,440 by 900 for the HP.

Even if Lauren doesn't care about pixels and multimedia software, her machine still doesn't measure up when it comes to overall consumer satisfaction. No less an authority than Consumer Reports rated Lauren's computer fourth in a class of six with 17- to 18-in. displays. The MacBook Pro was tops, despite its higher price.

PC Makers Should Focus More on Quality

Usually silent on such things, Apple did give me a comment on the Microsoft ads. "A PC is no bargain when it doesn't do what you want," Apple spokesman Bill Evans says. "The one thing that both Apple and Microsoft can agree on is that everyone thinks the Mac is cool. With its great designs and advanced software, nothing matches it at any price." Microsoft declined to comment.

Microsoft and its hardware partners wouldn't have to make this case had they focused less in the past decade on driving prices down and more on quality. Forrester Research (FORR) recently released results of a study of consumer experiences with computer companies, assessing their view of a machine's usefulness, usability, and enjoyability. Apple ran the table in all three categories, well ahead of Gateway (now a unit of Acer), HP, and Dell (DELL).

PC makers in the Windows camp have done everything possible to make their products progressively worse by cutting corners to save pennies per unit and boost sales volume. There's good reason Apple is seeing healthy profits while grabbing market share. It refuses to budge on quality and so charges a higher price. Rather than running ads that seem clever at first but really aren't, the Windows guys ought to take the hint and just build better computers.

Hesseldahl is a reporter for BusinessWeek.com.

I'm a PC....NOT!!! 100% Mac!

There is a new promo for Windows "I'm a PC" that features a young woman trying to get laptop for under $1000 and then Microsoft will bu it for her. Well it is not everything it is promoted to be...(read on)

So this isn't going to come as a big surprise, but "Lauren" (if that is her real name) didn't really go into the Apple store...or Crispin Porter had a bunch of extras walking around during the filming.

How do we know? Notice at 0:13 when she walks into the store, there is a balding guy with jacket and striped shirt and camera walking by. He is still walking by when she leaves the store filmed on the other camera. That gave her less than a second in the store. She said she walked in and looked around but how could this be?.

We also know she is an actress so the rest isn't a stretch. What LA actress wants a hulking, cheap 17 inch HP Notebook over a small white MacBook?!

Not that you believed it before, right?

Also-

Weintraub reports, "The hardware in question is the $699 at Best Buy HP - Pavilion Laptop with AMD Turion™ X2 RM-72 Dual-Core Mobile Processor... It is the epitome of what people dislike about PCs... It runs Vista Home on a slow AMD mobile processor. It has DDR2 RAM which is what $300 Netbooks run."

"Its screen is abysmal. One reviewer said this model series 'has the worst screen I have ever seen in my life. It's the 1440x900 screen and the viewing angles are so poor that even when sitting directly eye level with the screen it is totally washed out,'" Weintraub reports. "Its networking is five years old. 802.11G wireless and 100Mb Ethernet are surpassed by $300 Netbooks. 2004 called. It wants its motherboard back."

"The battery is said to last 2.5 hours. Real world usage is always close to around half of that. That means you can't watch a full movie on a battery charge," Weintraub reports. "The thing is almost two inches thick and weighs in at almost eight pounds... And this poor girl, the actress that Microsoft hired to play a person who is not an actress, is going to get a heavy, bulky slow Vista Home machine with a poor display, old networking equipment and weak battery loaded up with crapware."

Full article here.

MacDailyNews Take: No, she's not. She's going to take her residual checks and use them to buy a brand new MacBook Pro like every other working actress on the planet.


Full article here.

So do your won research and get what works for you!

Tips from David Pogue

Sometimes I find something and I have to share the entire thing. Well here is one of those. (source: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/02/technology/personaltech/02pogue-email.html?8cir&emc=cira1)

October 2, 2008

From the Desk of David Pogue

Tech Tips for the Basic Computer User

By DAVID POGUE

Last week, I wrote an entry on my blog that began like this:

"One of these days, I'm going to write a book called, 'The Basics.' It's going to be a compendium of the essential tech bits that you just assume everyone knows--but you're wrong.

(I'll never forget watching a book editor at a publishing house painstakingly drag across a word in a word processor to select it. After 10 minutes of this, I couldn't stand it. 'Why don't you just double-click the word?' She had no clue you could do that!)"

Many readers chimed in with other "basics" that they assumed every computer user knew--but soon discovered that what's common knowledge isn't the same as universal knowledge.

I'm sure the basics could fill a book, but here are a few to get you started. All of these are things that certain friends, family or coworkers, over the years, did *not* know. Clip, save and pass along to…well, you know who they are.

* You can double-click a word to highlight it in any document, e-mail or Web page.

* When you get an e-mail message from eBay or your bank, claiming that you have an account problem or a question from a buyer, it's probably a "phishing scam" intended to trick you into typing your password. Don't click the link in the message. If in doubt, go into your browser and type "www.ebay.com" (or whatever) manually.

* Nobody, but nobody, is going to give you half of $80 million to help them liberate the funds of a deceased millionaire…from Nigeria or anywhere else.

* You can hide all windows, revealing only what's on the computer desktop, with one keystroke: Windows key+D in Windows, F11 on Macs (or, on recent Mac laptops, Command+F3; Command is the key with the cloverleaf logo). That's great when you want examine or delete something you've just downloaded to the desktop, for example. Press the keystroke again to return to what you were doing.

* You can enlarge the text on any Web page. In Windows, press Ctrl and the plus or minus keys (for bigger or smaller fonts); on the Mac, it's the Command key and plus or minus.

* You can also enlarge the entire Web page or document by pressing the Control key as you turn the wheel on top of your mouse. On the Mac, this enlarges the entire screen image.

* The number of megapixels does not determine a camera's picture quality; that's a marketing myth. The sensor size is far more important. (Use Google to find it. For example, search for "sensor size Nikon D90.")

* On most cellphones, press the Send key to open up a list of recent calls. Instead of manually dialing, you can return a call by highlighting one of these calls and pressing Send again.

* When someone sends you some shocking e-mail and suggests that you pass it on, don't. At least not until you've first confirmed its truth at snopes.com, the Internet's authority on e-mailed myths. This includes get-rich schemes, Microsoft/AOL cash giveaways, and--especially lately--nutty scare-tactic messages about our Presidential candidates.

* You can tap the Space bar to scroll down on a Web page one screenful. Add the Shift key to scroll back up.

* When you're filling in the boxes on a Web page (like City, State, Zip), you can press the Tab key to jump from box to box, rather than clicking. Add the Shift key to jump through the boxes backwards.

* You can adjust the size and position of any window on your computer. Drag the top strip to move it; drag the lower-right corner (Mac) or any edge (Windows) to resize it.

* Forcing the camera's flash to go off prevents silhouetted, too-dark faces when you're outdoors.

* When you're searching for something on the Web using, say, Google, put quotes around phrases that must be searched together. For example, if you put quotes around "electric curtains," Google won't waste your time finding one set of Web pages containing the word "electric" and another set containing the word "curtains."

* You can use Google to do math for you. Just type the equation, like 23*7+15/3=, and hit Enter.

* Oh, yeah: on the computer, * means "times" and / means "divided by."

* If you can't find some obvious command, like Delete in a photo program, try clicking using the right-side mouse button. (On the Mac, you can Control-click instead.)

* Google is also a units-of-measurement and currency converter. Type "teaspoons in 1.3 gallons," for example, or "euros in 17 dollars." Click Search to see the answer.

* You can open the Start menu by tapping the key with the Windows logo on it.

* You can switch from one open program to the next by pressing Alt+Tab (Windows) or Command-Tab (Mac).

* You generally can't send someone more than a couple of full-size digital photos as an e-mail attachment; those files are too big, and they'll bounce back to you. (Instead, use iPhone or Picasa--photo-organizing programs that can automatically scale down photos in the process of e-mailing them.)

* Whatever technology you buy today will be obsolete soon, but you can avoid heartache by learning the cycles. New iPods come out every September. New digital cameras come out in February and October.

* Just putting something into the Trash or the Recycle Bin doesn't actually delete it. You then have to *empty* the Trash or Recycle Bin. (Once a year, I hear about somebody whose hard drive is full, despite having practically no files. It's because over the years, they've put 79 gigabytes' worth of stuff in the Recycle Bin and never emptied it.)

* You don't have to type "http://www" into your Web browser. Just type the remainder: "nytimes.com" or "dilbert.com," for example. (In the Safari browser, you can even leave off the ".com" part.)

* On the iPhone, hit the Space bar twice at the end of a sentence. You get a period, a space, and a capitalized letter at the beginning of the next word.

* Come up with an automated backup system for your computer. There's no misery quite like the sick feeling of having lost chunks of your life because you didn't have a safety copy.

What are your favorite basics-that-you-thought-everyone-knew? Let us know in the comments for this column at nytimes.com/pogue!

Ubiquity

Found a cool little Firefox add on called Ubiquity. It is a way for you to get the web to work for you. Fully user expendable and you can add functionality to it. Here is a little video about it. If you use Firefox (I do) it could add a lot to your web experience. One thing that I like is that it makes it easy to embed maps into email messages or to email content from a page to someone. So give it a try. And if you are not using Firefox, then give that a try too!









Ubiquity for Firefox from Aza Raskin on Vimeo.

Firefox 3 ...Gmail tip

Configure Firefox 3 to use Gmail as your default email app

Posted May 22nd 2008 1:00PM by Brad Linder
Filed under: E-mail, Google

Firefox makes it easy to select a default email application like Outlook or Thunderbird. When you click a mailto: link on a web site, that application will automatically open. But with Firefox 3 RC1 you can also choose a webmail application like Yahoo! Mail or Gmail.

Selecting Yahoo! Mail as your default email provider is simple. Just hit the Tools button, select Options, navigate to the Applications tab, and select Yahoo! Mail from the dropdown list next to "mailto." But for some reason, that's the only webmail service included by default. So thanks to Lifehacker, here are the steps to add Gmail:

1. Type about:config in the URL bar, and click the I'll be careful button to continue.
2. Type gecko.handlerservice into the filter field and find the listing that ends with allowRegisterFromDifferentHost. Click this button to change the value from false to true.
3. Copy this line of code into the URL bar:
   javascript:window.navigator.registerProtocolHandler("mailto","https://mail.google.com/mail/?extsrc=mailto&url=%s","GMail")
4. A window will pop up asking if you want to add GMail, say yes and you should be all set.

Next time you click a mailto: link on a web site, you should get a choice of services to use including Gmail. You can then set Gmail as your preferred email service.

source: http://www.downloadsquad.com/2008/05/22/configure-firefox-3-to-use-gmail-as-your-default-email-app/

Firefox 3 is here...

Today is the day! The update to the best browser for the web is here.

Mozilla Releases Firefox 3 and Redefines the Web Experience

Major performance enhancements and revolutionary “Awesome Bar” make Firefox 3 the fastest, smartest, most powerful browser Mozilla has ever released

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIF. - June 17, 2008 - Mozilla today released Firefox® 3, a major update to its popular and acclaimed free, open source Web browser. Firefox 3 is the culmination of three years of efforts from thousands of developers, security experts, localization and support communities, and testers from around the globe.

Available today in approximately 50 languages, Firefox 3 is two to three times faster than its predecessor and offers more than 15,000 improvements, including the revolutionary smart location bar, malware protection, and extensive under the hood work to improve the speed and performance of the browser.

“We’re really proud of Firefox 3 and it just shows what a committed, energized global community can do when they work together,” said John Lilly, CEO of Mozilla.

If you have never used Firefox you need to see what the web is really all about. If you have used Firefox, then see what the update has done. I have been using a beta version of Firefox 3 for the past couple months and I love it. It does everything that I want a browser to do. More integrated now with the OS than ever, whether Mac, windows or Linux. Give it a try!

IT Consultants....not what we are

There is a great column about IT Consultants from Robert X. Cringely. It does a great deal to explain why IT transitions happen as they do; off schedule and over budget. Also, why many IT consultants stick with inferior products like Microsoft Windows...if the products work as advertised then they have nothing to do. Read on...
source: http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2008/pulpit_20080418_004737.html


The Truth About IT Consultants: Some are great but most are not.

By Robert X. Cringely

These days everyone in IT is a consultant, employs a consultant, or both. I'm a consultant, aren't you? Outsourcing, offshoring, LEAN management, a lousy economy, and covering one's IT butt have led organizations of every type and at every level to look outside for answers to their IT questions and often even to ask those questions in the first place. This has led to the greatest disconnect I have seen between job requirements and apparent internal capability in the 30 years I've been around IT. It's scary. Hardly any organization can get by without using consultants and -- here's the bad news -- most consultants aren't very good. So here is my advice on how to select and use an IT consultant followed by a grim list of the 10 most common lies told by bad consultants.

What led me to write this column were the troubles of a local company here in Charleston -- American LaFrance, the storied maker of fire engines. American LaFrance was last year spun off from Freightliner, the big truck manufacturer, which agreed to maintain the company's computer systems for a few months while the new American LaFrance bought its own systems with the help of a big IT consultant that rhymes with I-B-M. At the time of the cutover the project was months late and millions over budget. The company suddenly had no idea where it stood in any part of its business and today is in bankruptcy likely as a result. The company is close to failure probably because a consultant didn't perform as it promised. The consultant didn't perform as it promised most likely because there was no way to do so and still make money on the contract, which was underbid.

Who does YOUR IT consultant really work for?

So here's my guide to the various types of consultants, what to look for, and how to get the most good and the least bad for your money.

There are generally three types of IT consultants, which I'll simply label A, B, and C.

Type A consultants are hired to do a specific thing -- set up an email system, design and install a network, put in a POS system, etc. Usually the customer knows what they want before they find a Type A consultant to hire.

Sometimes a customer does not know what they want. These customers start with a Type B consultant who is supposed to help them think out of THEIR box, develop an improved business or IT vision, etc. In the early days when finding ways to improve things was easier, good consultants came to a new customer armed with benchmark data. They could look at a company's various departments and give some good guidance on what areas needed work. They'd tell a customer they were spending too much or not enough on xyz. One of the biggest roles of this type of consultant was to help sell the eventual plan to upper management and secure funding.

These days it is doubtful that most Type B consultants can provide any good ideas. They are mostly expert at being salespeople. The solutions they offer are often what their firms have to sell -- not necessarily what the customer actually needs. This can get exciting when it comes time to implement the project, as Type B consultants tend to be very poor project managers. They don't fully understand the technology they are selling so overruns are common.

There is another class of consultants that are mostly project managers, which we'll call Type C. These folks are brought in as contractors to help implement a given project. The good ones are like Attila the Hun and can get things done even in a very uncooperative environment. They don't care about making and keeping friends, just getting the job done. This is both good and bad. Good project management is important, but equally important is the environment. Getting Attila may be a case of treating the symptom and not the problem. Why is it so hard to get things done in your company? Could that be what is really holding back your business?

Far too often projects fail at the requirements phase. That was most likely the case with American LaFrance. The new organization was probably incapable of setting its own requirements and the consultant didn't help.

The next common problem in managing both IT projects and the consultants who usually do those projects is scope. Projects are often too grand by design or by default due to a lack of requirements. In either case you don't know you've bitten off too much until it is too late. This causes many problems and often destroys the ROI value of the project.

Remember that more than 50 percent of big IT projects fail completely with an ROI of zero percent, so while succeeding is good, not failing is even better.

The best consulting efforts are the ones that take a long hard look at the ROI and have a proven track record of making it happen.

The best consultant I ever knew was Christine Comaford-Lynch, who is now an author and a VC and no longer does IT consulting at all. A key part of her success was her requirements gathering process. She turned it into a very effective collaboration effort involving the key people who would use the software. The requirements would be tight, the project would be highly focused, and there would be little or no scope creep. When it came time to implement the project her project managers didn't have to be Attila's -- there was cooperation and enthusiasm. The training and start up of the application was quicker and easier. There were few surprises that needed to be fixed.

The Holy Grail of IT has long been the convergence of applications and databases into a unified environment where everything would work together. The original hope was to use relational databases and base all future applications on them. Next was the ERP wave. Talk about a huge and expensive effort! Putting in ERP was like a Borg invasion. Today we have SOA, which is even more complicated and expensive code that is supposed to be the glue between disparate applications and databases. Most of these approaches follow the classic computer industry business model -- make the customer spend lots of money and invest in lots of consultant time.

There is an easier way to do this stuff. The best consultants are the ones who come with a portfolio of products and tools. Their trick is to have a really good portfolio of stuff that really works, is really good, and can be sold and implemented quickly in a very cost-effective way. So it isn't necessarily a bad thing at all when a consultant offers to sell you tools, as long as they are the right tools and the consultant really knows how to use them.

What's key to my simplified concept of IT consulting is adapting a limited number of very robust and proven products and to do it all in a reasonable amount of time. Having fewer choices is vital because many companies will spend months or years making a decision. And some consulting firms will bill these clients a small fortune as things drag on.

Now to the 10 most frequent lies told by IT consultants. When you hear these lines spoken you have two alternatives: 1) fire the consultant on the spot, and; 2) bring your smartest and most crotchety nerds into the room and make the consultant explain his or her statement to their satisfaction then back it up with some performance guarantee and penalty clause.

1) "This can only be accomplished through a large custom development project."

2) "Of course your data is safe."

3) "We'll need a day or two for optimization and debugging."

4) "Yes, we've done this before. There are several companies using this product (or technology). They really like it."

5) "Server consolidation and virtualization will save you money."

6) "Storage consolidation and virtualization will save you money."

7) "The upgrade (or change) will be seamless and will not affect production."

8) "The upgrade (or change) will be transparent to users."

9) "Yes, we tested this thoroughly before installing it."

10) "If you install Tivoli it will solve all your support problems."

microsuck.... Yep!

In case you needed another reason to drop your PC and get a Mac... Here is something that might help push you over the edge. According to Engadget it "burns our eyes"...Watch

Gift Horse...

I am a Mac user as is abundantly clear but I can't look a gift horse in the mouth. So when a new online resource available, you bet we're going to use it. If you are interested in setting something similar up for your business or family let me know. Check it out.
http://wtvmacspec.tech.officelive.com

Networking...Technorati

Technorati...If you have not heard of it, you should check it out. You can see my information there by clicking below.

Technorati Profile

More Evidence...Macs work better

If you are on the fence about getting a Mac here is another report of switcher and how it can effect your computing experience for the better.

Migrating to a new Mac - say hello to a Mac Switcher

From: http://www.tuaw.com/2007/08/30/migrating-to-a-new-mac-say-hello-to-a-mac-switcher/

Posted Aug 30th 2007 10:00AM by Jason Clarke
Filed under: Switchers, Productivity, Reviews

Well, what better way to introduce myself but to sing the praises of the almighty Mac! I'm Jason Clarke, and I'm brand new to TUAW, although I've been writing over on sister-site Download Squad for a couple of years now. I was also briefly the lead blogger for The Unofficial Microsoft Weblog, until it was rolled into Download Squad. Despite my checkered past, this post is going to be me preaching to the choir, so consider yourself warned.

Today was a very happy day for me, because my MacBook Pro that I've been eagerly anticipating arrived. I've been a very happy Mac user since I received my first MacBook, about 4 months ago. Now, receiving a new primary computer for me has always been somewhat bittersweet; the excitement of the new machine is always offset by the pain of migrating from the old one.

When migrating from and old to a new Windows machine, I would always plan for two days of hell, followed by two weeks of minor (and sometimes major) aggravation when some utility that I needed in that moment had yet to be installed or configured. I had heard that Macs have a migration assistant, so I wasn't quite sure what to expect. Find out what happened (as if you don't already know) after the jump.

Well, tonight I connected the two machines via a FireWire cable, and let the Migration Assistant do its thing. At first I was a bit put off by the four hour estimate to copy 60 GB, however, that quickly dropped to under two hours. To be honest, it was a loooong two hours, since neither machine was available to me during the process. You know, it can get a bit like watching a pot waiting for it to boil.

But the moment of truth came when it had completed. I dutifully turned off the "old" Mac as I was told to do, but I could barely contain myself from scoffing at the very idea that I might not need it further tonight. Then I let the MacBook Pro boot up. Hey, it knew my name and contact info already. Hey, it had my profile picture already set. Hey, that's my desktop wallpaper. Holy #$^*, all of my startup utilities are dutifully starting up, and my dock is identical to what it was on my MacBook!

That was all well and good, but are any of these programs actually going to work? I launched BonEcho (the Intel-Mac optimized version of Firefox), and was blown away to see all of the tabs that I had left open using the TabMixPlus extension opening up here on the new machine!

Other than needing to install keyboard and mouse drivers for my (gasp) Microsoft keyboard and mouse, I have yet to find anything that doesn't just work. I'd like to accuse all you long-time Mac types of keeping this secret from Windows users, but the truth is that you have been telling us, and we haven't wanted to hear it. My biggest fear when getting my first Mac was that I didn't want to become an elitist Mac snob - they drove me crazy. But now I realize it's not their fault; when your computing platform is so noticeably better than Windows, it's hard not to get a bit full of yourself. Just ask my family, friends and co-workers. Really.

Forget about Larry Craig...Get a Mac

Here is a taste of what a Mac can do for you.

Treasure Valley Mac Users Unite!

Treasure Valley Mac Users, when you hear a person say that Windows is better than the Mac you can smile and know that the person saying that is deranged. Also, that the Grand Puba of Windows once had the following to say about the Mac. The Same Mac that we use now.

The Truth!

I am a Mac user. That's right. I prefer Apple Macintosh computers to Microsoft Windows PCs. I am not crazy, to the contrary I am very sane. I am a college graduate, I have spent considerable time in the professional world and I am now more than ever, a Mac user.
I have used Macs for over ten years. I started using them when I was going to college. I went to the computer lab and saw that there were these computers that were not used as often and I wouldn't have to wait for. So I jumped at the chance to use them. What started as a convenience turned into understanding and then admiration for the ease of use that the Macintosh computers provided. This was made more evident when I had the opportunity to work at one of the computer labs on campus. In the lab I worked in it was 2/3 Windows 98 machines and 1/3 Mac OS machines (this was before Mac OS X). When we would have a problem with one of the computers we had the ability to rebuild the machine from a server, both for the Macs and PCs. I did not ever, nor do I recall anyone ever rebuilding a Mac because of a technical problem. If anything a restart could resolve most issues. But with the Windows PCs it was easier to hang an "out of Order" sign on the PC than to troubleshoot it and just rebuild it from the server and hope that the student using it had saved on a disk, not the local hard drive.
I want to start writing about my experiences with my Macs and the reasons why someone with my intelligence would make such a choice. (Other than it is the Obvious choice)
I recently read an article that discussed the struggle that Microsoft endured in trying to "kill off" Apple's Quicktime. Here is a link to the document. It is an interesting read. Funny how the big kid still tries to beat up on the little ones.
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Welcome...

Welcome. I am a Mac user and I am interested in sharing my knowledge and experience using Macs with other Mac users. If you have questions or concerns or need assistance with your Mac I can help.
West Treasure Valley Mac Specialties...

You can contact me @ petersonchrisr at gmail.com