First Mac! Mid 09 MB

[Thejrace]

Finally part of the family! Just grabbed a mid 2009 macbook 5,2 with a 120 ssd and 4 gigs of ram earlier this morning. Think i made out alright as I was working on a budget and talked him down from $300 to $250. Already super psyched messing around with it!

Now onto what little i can improve on, haha. The previous owner wiped it and brought left ml on it. A friend of mine is giving me some programs tomorrow morning. I would also love to get maverick up and running. Should i install those programs first and then upgrade to M or just setup M first and then install those programs? Also should i even back it up as there isn't anything really on it? Thanks for any help guys.

Outside of that, i do intend to get it up to 6 gigs of ram, which i think is its max, and a 240 ssd as well.

With the leftover money, grabbed some used soundsticks as well. Someone has a new setup, haha. Pics to come in a bit.

 

[CYB3RBYTE]

Nice! I was going to get that model and upgrade it to an SSD, but I ended up saving for a MacBook Air that I received last friday. I fondly remember my first Intel Mac, a 2007 Black MacBook with upgraded specs that I bought for $220 last September. Congrats on your purchase and welcome to the family!

PS- That Mac's RAM limit is 8GB, so until you absolutely need it I would say you can hold off for now. Also I would say that you should install Mavericks first and install your programs, as it will take up less space in the long run due to not having that old OS data. I wouldn't back it up because it sounds like a fresh wipe, unless you put any valuable data on it.

 

[Maydon0z]

Congrats I have a late 2008 with 120gb SSD and 4gb of ram. It runs Mavericks pretty snappy I must say. If I were you I would just grab a fresh install of Mavericks and install your apps afterwards.

 

[Thejrace]

Thanks guys! Waiting on a mini dvi to vga adapter now, so i can multi screen. Maverick seems pretty cool so far. Any program suggestions?

pics to come tonight!

 

[Thejrace]

Macbook! Notice the soundsticks right behind it too.

 

[MCAsan]

Any program suggestions?

To do what?

 

[CYB3RBYTE]

You should definitely install some games, like older steam games, since you have the Nvidia GeForce 9400m.

Also, if you need any copies of productivity software like iWork 09' or iLife 11' just ask I have some.

I would also throw some anti-virus on that as well, because even though it is a Macintosh it always helps.

Finally, install a copy of ONYX, a maintenance utility that keeps your Mac nice and clean. You can find the latest version online for free. I personally use it and it is a very handy tool!

Again, congrats on your purchase and welcome to the family!

EDIT: I have a Mini DVI to VGA adapter sitting around if you would like it for the price of shipping!

 

[realitydroid]

Congratulations on your first Mac! I recently got my first Mac too, although it's a bit older. Early 2008 Macbook running OS X Lion.

I got a couple pics up in another thread, so I figured that I'd just link to that post if you want to see them.

https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/19577404/

There's also a great youtube channel that has some terrific videos for us OS X newbies.

I'll find them and link them in a moment, gotta restart my Mac as I am fighting with Dropbox to get it to upload. EDIT: Here they are. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdAB2_LWUp3rlxLovm_SnohiEzOEbleCZ

P.S. Still getting used to using OS X. I also use Windows 8.1/7 and Ubuntu 14.04, so OS X is quite a bit different from what I'm use to.

 

[Thejrace]

Thanks for all the responses guys. Really helpful. I may take you guys up on some of these offers. My main concern at the moment is that in my About this mac window, there is an obscene 33gigs used up as other. I am quite perplexed by that. How would i find out exactly what Other is?

cyberbyte, thanks again. What steam games can I run on this? I'm going to go out on a limb and figure some form of cs works, haha.

realitydroid, awesome desktop. heres mine. Posted it up on the desktop thread.

 

[Thejrace]

You should definitely install some games, like older steam games, since you have the Nvidia GeForce 9400m.

Also, if you need any copies of productivity software like iWork 09' or iLife 11' just ask I have some.

Finally, install a copy of ONYX, a maintenance utility that keeps your Mac nice and clean. You can find the latest version online for free. I personally use it and it is a very handy tool!
Again, congrats on your purchase and welcome to the family!
EDIT: I have a Mini DVI to VGA adapter sitting around if you would like it for the price of shipping!

What does iwork/ilife include? I grabbed office, which i think covers most of my needs.

Edit, sorry for anything posted that may have crossed any rules.

 

[Altemose]

Cyb3rbyte, may i take you up on that offer for the Mdvi to vga cable? Installed a bunch of software, but def need to run another display with a good number of them.

Just wanted to let you know for future reference to PM when regarding sales/giving of products. It is against forum rules to perform a transaction outside of the Marketplace on here. I wouldn't want to see you receive a warning from a moderator for violation of forum rules.