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How to move files - Windows to Mac

swmr

swmr

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jan 22, 2008
172
0
Penn State
Hello all!

I am in the market for a new laptop that I will be using throughout college, and I have a LOT of questions. Sorry for the long read. I am a high school senior so I obviously love my music, movies, and pictures. I have about 50 gigs of music right now (but sadly only a 30 gig iPod), and when I buy a new computer I want to move these files over.

I currently have a Dell Dimension 3000 desktop with Windows XP. I am looking at the Macbook Pro to become my new laptop. I know most of you will tell me to get a regular Macbook, but I want a big and powerful laptop that will last me all the way through college, and then some. I am talking about 5+ years.

The main reason I am posting is I am looking for a way to move my files from my PC to my new laptop when I get it. Most of my music and movies are on my external drive, but because of the movie files, I formatted the drive to NTFS. Will I be able to plug the drive into my new laptop and copy the files over?

Another potential option is to find a program that will take the music right off my iPod and copy it to the laptop. If this is the case, is there a program that will do it with 1) a Windows formatted iPod, and 2) keeping library information such as playcount and playlists updated in the new Itunes library?

I have no problem redownloading and reinstalling the programs I currently use, but I was wondering how I can keep all the files I used throughout high school. Will the Mac be able to open and read Word documents and Powerpoints without Office for Mac, or is that my only option.

Also, because I am still a senior and I don't technically need this laptop until college, I am in no rush to buy it anytime soon. For that reason, I am trying to wait as long as I can for the MBP updates, but it is getting harder and harder each day.

Please reply with any and all information you can provide me with on moving files, switching over to Mac, and even which laptop to buy.

Thank you all in advance!

Mitch -- Swmr
 
Macs will read an NTFS formatted external, but will not be able to write to it

Windows formatted iPods are readable by Macs, you can use something like Senuti to pull the music off the iPod.

To keep playlists and playcounts though, you'll have to transfer your library file over from your PC.
 
swmr said:
The website I found Senuti (http://www.fadingred.org/senuti/) says that it requires Mac OS X 10.4. Does this mean that it will only work for Tiger, or is it also compatible with leopard?
Click to expand...

Seems perfectly compatible with Leopard. I haven't actually taken any music off an iPod with it, but it did correctly find the (Windows formatted) iPod and offer to rip everything off it.
 
Osarkon said:
Seems perfectly compatible with Leopard. I haven't actually taken any music off an iPod with it, but it did correctly find the (Windows formatted) iPod and offer to rip everything off it.
Click to expand...

i've used it in leopard without a problem
 
As to reading Office documents without office, the default text editor, TextEdit, will open word files. Other alternatives for Word on the mac include Abiword, Apple's Pages and Neo Office.

For powerpoints, you won't get quite as accurate rendering on the mac, but both keynote and Neo Office will open them.

If your wanting to keep these files mainly for archival purposes, if found this automator script (automator by the way is really simple but very extensible automation script creator for the mac).

http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/automator/texttopdfconverterautomatoractions.html

Once it's in PDF, mac osx is all over it. Powerpoints could also be exported to pdf.

All that said, Office on mac is great, and if you wnted you could always boot into windows on your Macbook to use your PC version of Office.
 
Thanks for all the information. Looks like I will be using Senuti unless some Google search gives me a better program. I've seen friends using Senuti (on Tiger) though, and I kind of like it. They were able to take music right off my iPod and add it to their library.

As for Office on Mac, that is what I wanted to hear. I will be buying iWork to see how it goes, but I wanted to be able to at least read word documents. Copy and paste is always an option if I ever need the actual paper again, so thats no big deal.

At a later date I will probably buy Office for Mac just in case I absolutely need it (like borrowing the school's printers or something). I will also probably buy XP and use boot camp when required, but that is quite expensive considering I still have my windows desktop for 6 more months.

On a side note, I use Mac Pros in a video production class this year, but being on a school network, quite a few sites are blocked. I can't even download Firefox, so I am stuck with Safari. Can I download Senuti on my Windows machine, save it to a USB drive, and use it at school to update my iTunes library there? I know things like this work on windows, but I don't know if I can use it across platforms despite that fact that the drive itself is readable on a mac. If that works, can I use the same method to put a Firefox for OS X on the computer?

Mitch -- Swmr
 
i was wondering if i have windows vista installed onto my computer, an HP, can i buy the leopard CD-rom (199$) and install it on my computer?
 
Any updates on the questions on my last post? I would be happy to edit that post and re-ask in a new thread, but I am new here so I am not positive if that would be allowed.

For more information, I have successfully downloaded Senuti, but I do not have the administrative rights to put it in the applications folder. Can programs be run from any folder like on a Windows machine or must they be installed in the Applications folder? Will this also give me a problem with Firefox?
 
You can run programs from anywhere pretty much. When I'm testing software out I run it from the disk image, I don't even bother extracting it. Normally works fine, just takes a bit longer to start up. :)


rjk1541 said:
i was wondering if i have windows vista installed onto my computer, an HP, can i buy the leopard CD-rom (199$) and install it on my computer?
Click to expand...

No, you can't.

Also it's completely irrelevant to this thread.
 
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