Backing up and synching MAIL/iCal/Address

[NJRonbo]

Been a Mac Pro owner for two months now.

Love my Mac so much that I purchased a MacBook Pro.

Now....

I want to back up all my MAIL/iCal/Address Book settings on
my MAC PRO and move them over to the MacBook Pro.

So the first question is....is there a utility that you can back
all that information up and easily transfer it over to the MacBook?

Once I do that....

What is the best way to continually synch all this information
between the two computers?

I do have a 1-year subscription to .MAC so perhaps that is the
best way for now -- but I'm also interested in alternative ways
should I give up my subscription.

Next....

Generally, with the software that I purchased for my MAC PRO
(and I purchased about $200 worth), can I use those programs
on my MacBook Pro as well? I realize this may differ from program
to program, but I am sort of wondering how many people have had
no problem doing so?

Thanks, in advance, for the help!

 

[swiftaw]

.Mac is by far the easiest way to keep contacts, bookmarks, calendars synced across multiple Macs.

As far a software, it will depend on the EULA of the particular software. Some applications state that they can only be used on one machine, some (like microsoft office) state one desktop and one laptop, others state that you can install them on as many machines as you own.

 

[mkrishnan]

Depending on your patience / tolerance / needs, there are a few other options like....You can google Chronosync, RSyncX, etc.

There's a new one, which I have not tried, called SyncTogether that promises to be everything .Mac is and more, in terms of syncing multiple Macs, without yearly fees.

I have used a MarkSpace product before (MissingSync). My overall impression of them is that they care a lot about the Mac community, but they are very slow developers. They tend to be extremely poor about timely updates to embrace new hardware or software. So you should not use them if you depend on having support for the latest equipment. The other things I've found is that they do tend to have a buggy Bluetooth implementation, although that may not be an issue for this type of app.

Finally in the past at least, their solutions have not been sufficiently robust that they work properly when you are also syncing devices through another mechanism. For instance, with their other products, this configuration was not officially supported and could work unpredictably:

iSync <-> RAZR
and
MissingSync <-> WM5 Axim

At the same time. So you want to make sure that this solution can handle all of the things you need synced.