HTC
- Average user rating:
- My rating: 0 stars
Full user review
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15 out of 15 people found this review helpful
4.5 stars
"New Mac user from PC - Terrific hardware, design and great OS...But I have a few issues"
Pros: Sleek design, monitor quality and size, easy of use, e.g. dvd burner, etc...
Cons: Some Apple based software, safari, address, mail - all light and junk
Summary: My goal is to share my personal experience/opinions on converting from a PC (Win) to a MAC.
I would consider myself a medium user of a computer. Focused on, spreadsheets, PowerPoint, email/ contact mgmt, internet, 1,000's of digital photos, home movies and building a personal website.
First off, the Mac construction and hardware is top notch. My wife couldn't believe how many cords our old PC has versus the new MAC. One minor grip on this note, I opted for the wireless keyboard / mouse option and as such there is not easy access to USB ports for ipods etc (Apple put one underneath the monitor).
The OS system took about three days to get use too. I would say the pros out weigh the cons to a Windows. Example - I like being able to drag a software application to the trash can and not worry about residual files not being deleted like on a MAC. The finder function is incredible fast. Renaming files, pictures, etc... is a bit cumbersome.
I had no trouble hooking up to my wireless network and working with my other PC / Xbox.
The only real compliant I have about the conversion is around the contact mgmt software. Apple's email and address software are for very light users. I consider it Junk really. For the time being I am using MS Entourage for email (might convert to thunderbird). Getting Outlook files to a Mac took some research; I found a $10 program to convert the files (called little machines O2M). getting files to attach via the email function is not a right click like in Windows. In my mind the contact mgmt software is the only real let down I have with the Mac.
Iphoto is great for organizing your photos, took a while to get use to the filing system.
Ichat is good
Safari junk, replace it with Firefox and you will be set
Widgets are great!
Have not use iweb yet.
Hope this helps.
- 3 replies to this review
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I agree wholeheartedly with your assessment. I am a switcher myself. The e-mail program was incredibly basic and Safari is one of the slowest browser I have ever seen. I have just installed Camino, it is light years faster. I will probably try Firefox. I found installing programs very strange and I found the push for .mac subscription...well a little pushy. Many of the things they offer for a price can be found for free. Solid review thanks! So far I am very pleased with the hardware and am learning the OS quickly.
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As someone else who is thinking of switching to a Mac from a PC, what did you mean by "Renaming files, pictures, etc... is a bit cumbersome"? I have renamed many files on my PC and wondered what's the difficulty with renaming files with a Mac.
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Firefox has been the darling web browser of choice by disgruntled Internet Explorer users like myself (on the pc side) and I encourage Firefox over IE anyday.
But on the Mac, Safari is faster, more stable, and has more default plug-in settings set to play right out of the box. The only bad thing about Safari is that tabbed browsing is turned off by default. Firefox isn't as good on a Mac, because is doesn't shine over the alternative, like it does on a PC.
