I've finally made the switch!

[skp574]

At last I have a Mac!

I've managed to pick up today a 20" iMac with 512MB RAM/160GB HDD, APE, BT + W/less KB and Mouse.

So far I have set up the APE to connect to my home network and getting the lastest software updates.

I have not touched a Mac for about 15 years, so it's a little bit different.

Is there anything else I should be doing to keep it tip top shape? I am a tweaker, so I'm aquainting myself with the numerous settings.

 

[Cybernanga]

Congratulations!! Welcome back

 

[cyanide]

welcome home

good to see you here on the forums. how did you hear about macrumors.com? OS X is a little bit different than what you are used to from fifteen years ago, but as everything Apple goes you will be on your feet in no time at all. This is a great site for info of all sorts, and there is always someone to answer your questions. As far as being a tweaker and keeping your system on the up and up, I recommend Cocktail which accomplishes both tasks quite nicely. it can be had here <a href="http://www.macosxcocktail.com">Cocktail</a> stick around the forums, we hope to see you posting again! happy computing!

-cyanide

Current Song::Little Black Backpack:Stroke 9::

 

[absolut_mac]

Is there anything else I should be doing to keep it tip top shape? I am a tweaker, so I'm aquainting myself with the numerous settings.

Congratulations, enjoy your new toy

There are numerous utilities which will allow you to tweak to your heart's content, but my advice is not to tweak anything until you are familiar with your computer and OS X. That way you can more accurately guage whether any tweak is right for you or not.

Just do a search for *utilities* on MR and you'll find many threads on that subject.

 

[cmvsm]

Welcome to the "club". To keep that nice new machine in tip top shape, you'll want to ensure that you repair permissions and optimize your system on a regular basis, especially each and every time you install a new program. There's a FREE program out for the Mac called "Onyx", and this will take care of everything for you. I run it once a week for a trouble free system. The download can be found at:

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/11582

This forum is the place to be if you run into any troubles. You can also check out the G5 Support Group as well at:

http://g5support.com/group/

Good luck!

 

[skp574]

Welcome to the "club". To keep that nice new machine in tip top shape, you'll want to ensure that you repair permissions and optimize your system on a regular basis, especially each and every time you install a new program. There's a FREE program out for the Mac called "Onyx", and this will take care of everything for you. I run it once a week for a trouble free system. The download can be found at:

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/11582

This forum is the place to be if you run into any troubles. You can also check out the G5 Support Group as well at:

http://g5support.com/group/

Good luck!

I've read a lot about repair permissions, but what exactly does it do? And why would I need to do it?

Thanks.

 

[Blue Velvet]

I've read a lot about repair permissions, but what exactly does it do? And why would I need to do it?

This page & the following does a good summation.

 

[skp574]

This page & the following does a good summation.

Thanks for that link Blue Velvet, that's answered the question.

Cheers.

 

[Applespider]

For the record (and from past experience ) - one thing not to tweak is where your Apple apps are sitting. Leave them all in the Applications folder and don't create subfolders to put them and other 3rd party apps into - for 'Music' for iTunes, 'Images' for iPhoto. Doing that may create problems using Software Update since your Mac may not 'see' those apps any longer.

Second, download Quicksilver - it's amazing for launching apps that you don't want to keep in your dock (or even if you do have them there but have your fingers on the keyboard rather than the mouse.

And go explore Versiontracker - there's always something new and somewhat interesting there. It amazes me what some people create apps for - whole new ideas of what to use your Mac for

 

[skp574]

One thing, that I haven't worked out yet is (coming from Windows), how do I access the menus without the mouse.

On a PC it's Alt + F (for File), Alt + V (View), etc. Normally there is an underscore beneath a letter to indicate which key to press.

I am used to doing a lot of keyboard entry and using it to access menu. I find it a pain to keep going back to the mouse to bring up the menu.

I know there are keyboard shortcuts to most things, but I just prefer to do it this way.

Also, is there a way to maximise a window to fill the whole screen and not just vertically?

 

[mduser63]

To access the menu with the keyboard, hit control-F2. That will make the Apple menu drop down, and then you can navigate to any of the other menus with the arrow keys. If you don't like the shortcut control-F2, you can get into Keyboard and Mouse Preferences in System Preferences and change it to anything you'd like. That's also a good way to see some other possibly useful keyboard shortcuts.

As for maximizing a window to fill the screen, the only way to do it is to click and drag the window to full size in most apps. I'm sure you've noticed that the green button at the top left corner doesn't really maximize the window as it would in Windows. What it's intended to do is expand (or shrink) the window to the optimum size. Optimum size usually is the size at which you can see everything being displayed, but no extra space is being wasted by the window. It'll be a little weird coming from Windows at first, but after a while you'll get used to it. In my opinion this way of doing things makes for better utilization of screen space than Windows constant use of maximized windows.

I just switched a few months back, and a book that I've found really useful is The Missing Manual: OS X (Panther Edition) by David Pogue. It's very well written and will really help you get up to speed on using OS X quickly. It's also got a section just for switchers that lists common things in Windows, and tell what the Mac equivalents are. Anyway, congratulations on your new iMac, and hope you enjoy it!