my $.02

[Trout74]

I had a Mac Color Classic back in college and it was the top of the line, yes I am getting old, dont remind me. Then 10 years of PC's.

I got intrigued with the iMac, but got all caught up in the recent update rumors and found myself waiting for an update. Better GPU, more RAM and less noise blah blah blah.

Finally after much thought, and then some more thought I came to my senses.

What did I really want?

1. I want the the iLife suite of software.
2. I wanted a stable platform
3. I am sick and tired of viruses and spyware
4. I wanted to not feel like im taking off in a 747 when im on my computer(fan noise)
5. and I want to enjoy computing again.

So I went to the apple store today(denver) and bought a stock 1.42 Mac Mini, and on the way home I got 512Megs of third party Ram.

I set it up , booted it up, and all t he normal stuff. Then I popped it open and installed the new RAM, (corsair, 512, PC 3200, blah blah blah) it recognized it just fine and I went right into imovie. Plugged my fire wire into my DVrecorder that is 4 years old, and downloadeda few clips to iMovie, then I arranged it how i wanted it, and made a small sample movie.

Then got frustrated trying to burn it( still cant figure out how to burn a CD while in Imovie), but saved the movie to the HD and then dragged and dropped to a blank CD and make a Quicktime movie I could send to my brother to watch on his computer.

point is......

I am having fun, I am surfing the web, making movies, and learning OS-X and the Mac agian. and it is FUN, and STABLE, and not as intuitive as I thought it would be, but im gettin along ok.

and the Mini!!!!

power Mac smauwer Mac, this thing is plenty fast. I got 512MEg's of RAM and 1.42 G4, comming from a PIII 933 with 256RAM. This thing is lightning fast. I dare say im set for a year, and for 700$ to boot!

Thank you apple, thank you Macrumors and for those on the fence, the GRASS IS GREENER ON THE OTHER SIDE!

trout

 

[jackieonasses]

I am sooo very happy you are satisfied. We need more of these success stories, because more often then not, we see the horror stories and not stuff like this. TO help you with your question.... The reason why it might not be able to burn is iDvd doesn't support your dvd burner? (if you have one) If you have an external... make a disc image and burn it with Disk Utility or Roxio's own version of Toast.


If you need anything post it here! or you can pm me if it is a simple question.

Welcome to the Mac community!!!


kyle

 

[mcgarry]

jackieonasses: I think he's talking about burning to CDs, not DVDs. And I don't know if iMovie supports this or not, though his workaround seems fine.

trout: congratulations, I'm glad you like it, welcome back. Have fun learning OS X.

 

[jackieonasses]

jackieonasses: I think he's talking about burning to CDs, not DVDs. And I don't know if iMovie supports this or not, though his workaround seems fine.

trout: congratulations, I'm glad you like it, welcome back. Have fun learning OS X.

Well, in that case he still needs Toast to make a video cd... I have done that before. Care to give me more imformation so i can help your movie problem?

kyle

 

[Trout74]

Well, in that case he still needs Toast to make a video cd... I have done that before. Care to give me more imformation so i can help your movie problem?

kyle

thanks guys!

Well I downloaded a few clips(3) to iMovie, and dragged the clipsto the bottom of the page and arranged them so I was happy, not to hard and fairly intuitive. IT was fun playin with it, for sure.

So now i have my three clips arranged and named and saved. So I pop in CD, I dont have a DVD burner, I got the combo drive, so I can only burn CD's. But I was under the impression that i could burn a CDVD or something like that. Anyways, I coulnt find any options to " make a CD or Burn a CD" So I went to my " Movies" folder and found my movie i made, then dragged and dropped it to my blank CD, and then tried to Eject it, and it asked me if I wanted to " burn a CD" and I said YES and it burned it. Then I popped it in my old PC and it played just fine !!

BUT I wonder if there is a way to make a movie right from iMovie? or is iMovie jsut for editing and then you make a CD on your own? I dont know im new!, but its fun trying to figure it out.

I do however wish I had a big manual to read, im the kind of person that reads a manual. If there were 500 pages of info on how to use imovie and idvd and iphoto I would read it.

thanks for the help

trout

 

[mcgarry]

trout,
This might not be what you had in mind for a manual, but there are always the support pages.

 

[Mitthrawnuruodo]

As you're fond of manuals, maybe you should try iMovie HD & iDVD 5: The Missing Manual from O'Reilly (there's also a version for iMovie 4 if you're still using iLife '04), O'Reilly books usually hold a very high standard...

Edit: Welcome back to the Mac platform, by the way, and nice to see you're pleased with the "Mac mini experience"...

 

[russed]

pleased to see you are enjoying your new purchase! like you, i have managed to get three people now to buy mac mini's as an door for them into a stable os and a world without virii and malware and they all love it! i'm getting my parents one soon also!

 

[Artful Dodger]

Hello Trout74,
I just ordered "The Macintosh iLife 05" by Jim Heid. If you google his name his web site will come up and his book with a 2 1/2 hr dvd will be out in a few weeks for a pre-price of $23.00 and free shipping on Amazon. a friend of mine let me use his for a few weeks "ilife 04" and it was a very good guide for someone just getting into the programs, imovie, idvd, itunes, iphoto and the new one should have garageband as well.
Hope this helps for long term helpfulness. Nice to hear a good switch or should I say reswitch

 

[ncoffey]

I also got a bit caught up in the iMac G5 updates threads and was going to wait. Last night I decided I didn't want to wait anymore and I ordered a 1.25Ghz Mac Mini/512/40/super/BT+AE and a wireless keyboard. Sadly the expected ship date is March 30th, but I'm glad I decided on this instead of the iMac. Its cheaper and will fit my real goal for ditching my PC: the noise factor.

 

[Trout74]

Thanks guys, ill read those manuals, eer purchase them.

I appreciate the replys.

trout