Buying a mac - need advice

Posted At : January 30, 2007 5:31 AM | Posted By : Trond Ulseth
Related Categories: Misc.
Hi all,

We're looking into getting a new computer for home use. I thought I'd get us a iMac (24inch model). Being that I've hardly ever laid my hands on a mac before I thought I'd try and gather some advice.

The first question is important: Will Windows XP in Paralells run all software it usually would (including ones that need a USB license plug to work). My wife has a $4000 program she uses in her work and it is very important that she should be able to work with it at home.

The second question is more of a "what software for mac do you recommend and why?"

The following categories are of interest: Everyday life (mail, office apps, calendar etc...) Web development Music (recording, composing, etc...) Utilities (those programs you can't live without - like ePrompter and Total Commander are for me on Windows)

Thank you for all your input.

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# Posted By J￸rgen M. Skog￥s | 1/30/07 5:58 AM
I've found several Total Commander replacements that are worth checking out... they don't all live up to Ghisler's amazing product, but they come close.

Check out XFolders and muCommander first -- they are free. As a last resort, take a look at Disk Order. The only things I can see that Disk Order has that the other two don't (and I bought Disk Order btw), is the fact that you can edit files directly on an FTP server, multi-rename tool, and some of the keyboard shortcuts mimic Total Commander.

I use Parallels and run pretty much everything I need to.. however you should check the Parallels forums on the company web site to see if anybody has had any problems with your specific applications.

Cheers, best of luck with your Mac switch!

Brian
# Posted By Brian Dunphy | 1/30/07 6:15 AM
Parallels *should* work for you. If for some reason it doesn't, you can always use Boot Camp and install Windows on a different partition. That's the setup I run with - it has the advantage of native machine (non-emulated) performance. I say go for it!
# Posted By Tom Lee | 1/30/07 9:44 AM
Keep in mind that Parallels does not "yet" have hardware acceleration for graphics so your wife's expensive program may or may not function properly depending on it's graphics requirements.
# Posted By Tom Cornilliac | 1/30/07 10:03 AM
First - buy as much memory as you can afford - third party works since you can add it yourself

second - i use all the normal iLife products - they are freebies and i use the mail.app that comes with the mac. Garageband comes with your mac as part of iLife and is a wonderful music program.

third - i haven't tried any of the windows things - sorry no help from me :)

lastly - tho i hate to suggest it as a shareholder, if you can wait to buy your mac, wait until they announce the new OS version - then you'll get the latest without having to pay upgrade costs (which should be before june) - there should also be new iLife application versions before june as well.

enjoy your iMac - i love mine - and i only have the 20" model :)
# Posted By Mitch | 1/30/07 10:53 AM
Hi Trond, Going Mac. Good idea. In regards to you partners software. You should really check out the Parallels site for compatibility, they have a really good support forum you could post questions to. Though since last August it has been able to handle the stuff I do - VPN, Notes, Office etc.


I also did a blog post for switchers at http://www.andyjarrett.co.uk/andy/blog/index.cfm/2...

Nearly all the links in that post I used for migrating over. So far I haven't found any program which hasn't got a Mac equivalent.
# Posted By Andy Jarrett | 1/30/07 11:23 AM
Be very careful with Paralells and USB stuff. My dad (who just recently switched) had a USB 2.0 External disk drive that wont make it to Paralells. Works fine in Mac, but it wont pass the connection on to the running XP instance.

If you have to use windows and user external USB stuff, I'd recommend just dual booting if possible. There is less to go wrong.

Good luck, and have fun :)
# Posted By rob | 1/30/07 3:34 PM
Thank you for your advice so far guys. Highly appreciated.

The system requirements for my wifes program can be seen here: http://www.wingsxp.com/System_Requirements.htm

@Mitch - I can't wait till June, as the extra money comes in now in February. Come June these money will be long gone no matter how hard I try to save up. And also I just don't have the patience :)
# Posted By Trond Ulseth | 1/30/07 3:46 PM
Also forgot to mention that my colleague got his brand new MacBook today. We'll be testing my wifes software on Paralells on that one, so then we'll know.
# Posted By Trond Ulseth | 1/30/07 3:49 PM
My main development machine died recently and I'm looking at having to get a new box soon. I've been thinking about getting a MAC since I'd like to do some work with digital video too. This post came at an opportune time. :-) Thanks!
# Posted By James, F.E. | 2/5/07 12:23 PM
Just wanted to follow up and say that the test on my colleagues MacBook went like a dream, so the order is now placed for a 24 inch iMac :)
# Posted By Trond Ulseth | 2/5/07 1:20 PM
If I may hi-jack the comments for this post, one of my concerns about switching over to a Mac is the need to support MS Access and MS Sql Server databases for my current clients. Is there a way to support these on a Mac?

Also, what databases do you use natively on a Mac when your doing web development work?

Thanks.
# Posted By James, F.E. | 2/6/07 9:07 AM
@James - you can use Paralells to have a Windows virtual machine where you can have both Access and MSSQL server running. I even seem to remember reading that Sean Corfield conected to a MSSQL server running within Windows in Parallels from his Mac OS environment.
# Posted By Trond Ulseth | 2/9/07 4:08 AM
Good to hear you're taking the plunge, I'm sure you won't be disappointed :)

For apps: Parallels is great, TextMate is the text editor you've always wanted and QuickSilver is a must-have. All the iLife and built-in apps are pretty good too.

There's no problems in communicating from the Parallels VM to OSX so any web server/database running on one is accessible to the other so you can create your own cross-platform development environment. I think you'll be impressed by how fast Windows boots up when running in a window.
# Posted By Paulo | 2/9/07 4:59 AM
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