switchin'

[nicorojas]

I'm going to buy a powerbook, I've had enough windows for a lifetime.

So, now the question is which is the best software available? All my life i have been a wintel victim and i know nothing about mac software, except for, i don't know, office v.X.

I will use my mac mostly for sound editing and multitrack recording (got a band, if you like to check it www.mp3.com/pezblanco), video editing (but not too much, mostly convert avi to vcd to see in my dvd player), internet, word processing (lawyer), and a little photoshop.

Pleaseeeee heeeeeeelp me to switch

[zeethebrain]

i think that you answered most of your own questions. If you want a little word processing, then AppleWorks will do it for you, but if your used to Office and Word etc, then Office X is the same basically as Office 2000. Photoshop has the same layout, things like video editing (if your a infrequent user) Final Cut Express should do the job, music editing - well! this is the OS you should have been using along time ago! Cubase SX, Logic3, Soundtrack are all pro editing tools for music.

now all of that will cost a bundle, so a free photoshop type program would be GIMP (www.gimp.org - GNU Image Manipulation Program), a free movie editor would be iMovie - cheap (cos it comes free with all macs) simple to use and meets the requirements of basic video editing. Internet browsing - Safari - best browser in the world! Just thought - if your getting a powerbook, are you considering getting a dvdrw superdrive model? then you wouldn't need to make VCDs, you can make normal DVDs. If you have anything else or think i might have missed something cos i'm rambling now then just post another message. Hope this helps

[trebblekicked]

sounds like sound advice. what do you use for audio? i use ProTools LE, Bias Peak, Reason and Cubase. All good apps.

If you want complete MS Office compatibility, AppleWorks won't do. Try OpenOffice.

LINK (www.openoffice.org)

[nicorojas]

Thanks for the info:

No, I don't think i get a superdrive, a 15" powerbook is already a little off my budget, so i stick with the combo drive, and also i don't really think i would give it a lot of use

This is what I use in windows:

Word processing: Office XP
Photo editing: Photoshop elements
Sound editing: Sound forge 4.5
Multitrack Recording: Cakewalk 9.03 and Internet Tape Deck (a nice little freeware, 8 track, very simple to use, decent sound)
Internet: IE 6 and Opera 7
P2P: Soulseek, Winmx, DC and Kazaa
Video editing: TMPGEnc
Cd Burning: Nero
Music play and encoding: Winamp and Musicmatch
CdRipping: Exact Audio Copy

[e-coli]

You'll still need IE. Safari is SUPER nice, but it isn't quite "there" yet. 2 more versions and it will be.

Use Office v.X. It's nice.

For sound recording and mixing, call me crazy, but I use Final Cut Pro for most of it. It's extremely versatile and easy to use. Final Cut Express' sound tools should be sufficient.

CD burning app? What is that? I seem to have forgotten. :rolleyes: It's built into the system and it's quite nice. You'll be very pleased.

No Kazaa yet, but Poisoned is a nice P2P app. The others are crap.

There are tons and tons of video conversion apps for the mac. AVI codecs can be a big problem (especially in X), but a little hunting around should do you wonders. Just for the record, AVI is a MISERABLE video compressor, and absolutely nothing compares to QuickTime. You'll soon see what I mean. Windows Media Player is "garbage for the rest of us".

You'll need this app to get your Outlook info out of Microsoft's proprietary bear trap.
Move2Mac (http://www.apple.com/switch/howto/move2mac/)

Good luck with the switch. ;)