PC to MBP- Was it all you'd thought it would be?

[interstella]

I'd spent over 20 years using Windows and I decided to buy an iMac mainly because I was completely unimpressed by Windows 8. With the exception of Finder, every single thing about OSX is as good as or better than it's Windows counterpart. Add to that the superb hardware and I can't see me going back to Windows for everyday computing.

There are still a few programs I use that require Windows (Microsoft Money, a couple of aviation-related apps) but apart from that the PC rarely gets a look-in these days.

Having bought the iMac I decided to go for a 13" rMBP for mobile work. Best decision I've made in a long time. No longer do I have an enormous, heavy laptop doing it's best to burn a hole in my leg after 30 minutes use. The screen is gorgeous, the build quality is superb (no flimsy bending keyboard) and the battery lasts 5 times longer than a Sony Vaio.

Best of all...no BSOD!

 

[marc55]

Huh?

When you press print screen on Windows, dont you have to paste it in paint and then save a screenshot?

With OS X you press cmd+ shift + 3 for full screen capture that goes straight your desktop and thats it

or Cmd + Shift + 4 for a selection tool which again goes straight to desktop.


At my work, we use Macs and screenshots are a huge part of what we do day to day and i have found that no other OS does screenshots as easy as OS X




Ha you point out 2 Posts full of 3 pages of mostly positive results that tell you they will never use Windows again after using a Mac. Like everyone has suggested, buy it and return if you hate it. I doubt that you will but not buying because of screenshots is crazy (especially with how easy SS is on OS X)

When I do a screen shot, I am usually pasting it into an email, or a Word document.

No, I wouldn't defer buying a MBP simply on screen shots alone, but others have said Finder is not as good, which has me wondering what else is there I may not like.

I also have concerns after reading Office for Mac is not that great.

I will have to get one and try it out, but the issue is even though I can return it within the 14 days, I would have to buy Office for Mac to try it out, and I can't return that. What I need to do is find someone locally who has one, and have them walk me through it; I have asked several friends, and no luck thus far. If any of you guys live close to the Jersey shore and want to spend 1/2 hour or so showing me your MBP, please PM me.

 

[Justinhub2003]

When I do a screen shot, I am usually pasting it into an email, or a Word document.

No, I wouldn't defer buying a MBP simply on screen shots alone, but others have said Finder is not as good, which has me wondering what else is there I may not like.

I also have concerns after reading Office for Mac is not that great.

I will have to get one and try it out, but the issue is even though I can return it within the 14 days, I would have to buy Office for Mac to try it out, and I can't return that. What I need to do is find someone locally who has one, and have them walk me through it; I have asked several friends, and no luck thus far. If any of you guys live close to the Jersey shore and want to spend 1/2 hour or so showing me your MBP, please PM me.

And what is it that you do with Office?

I work for a Graphic design/ Color Seps firm that does work for Proctor and Gamble and we use tons of Office docs in our communications.

We use Office for Mac, they use Office for Windows. I build excel docs with formulas and charts and graphs on my Mac and send them and they have no issue. Same goes for them to us.

We have monthly meetings using PPT and also have no compatibility issues. Sure, maybe if you do some very complex Office stuff then you may have issues, I personally have never encountered them though.

I would say Office for Mac is 95% feature complete as its Windows counterpart with the 5% just being features that less than 5% of users even use or know exist.


ALSO if your Office needs are very simple then, I would reccomend trying iWork first which is free for OS X and is very easy to use and nice looking while being powerful enough to do lots of stuff.

 

[iamfredrik]

I will have to get one and try it out, but the issue is even though I can return it within the 14 days, I would have to buy Office for Mac to try it out, and I can't return that. What I need to do is find someone locally who has one, and have them walk me through it; I have asked several friends, and no luck thus far. If any of you guys live close to the Jersey shore and want to spend 1/2 hour or so showing me your MBP, please PM me.

There's a 30 day free trial:

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/f...rn&WT.intid1=ODC_ENUS_FX102853961_XT103927624

 

[priitv8]

With OS X you press cmd+ shift + 3 for full screen capture that goes straight your desktop and thats it

or Cmd + Shift + 4 for a selection tool which again goes straight to desktop.

I oftentimes also use Preview app to take screenshots. Or QuickTime if you need to record a movie of screen action.

 

[priitv8]

There is no question that Finder is nowhere near as functional as Explorer, and 3rd party substitutes like Path Finder are nothing like Directory Opus.

I may be ignorant, but what are exactly Explorer treats that Finder is missing?
For me the most annoying Explorer thing was lack of QuickLook-equivalent preview. Win 7 finally got it sorted. In it's rather weird way (it launches full instance of Word or Excel to show it's content in preview pane! Meaning you also need to buy office to peek into these files). It's also not a systemwide service like on OS X (QL works the same in Mail or Spotlight).

 

[jayroc2k]

I use Windows 7 for 8-10 hours a day at work then home to my macbook.

Much prefer the macbook OS X any day of the week.

But here is my take.

At the end of the day, most cross platform apps look the same (or very similar).

here are the pluses of a macbook
- Super smooth scrolling
- so easy to control my headless mac mini via "share screen"
- imovie
- facetime
- bootcamp
- Safari
- free OS upgrades (or cheap OS upgrades)
- OS upgrades that actually adds usable features


pet hates of Mac are:
-Excel is not great if you are a power user (i don't mean those who think using sumif, SUM, sumproduct qualifies power users)
- the rotating ball when it is stuck in a process (prefer hour glass!!!!)



of course you can get by on windows. I am just too 'old', to stuck in my ways to learn windows 8.


And i can rest in the knowledge the company i work for will use Windows 7 until its death bed before switching to windows 8


Spend an hour in store, play with one until you are comfortable, ask a genius when stuck, you may find you prefer good ol faithful windows!

 

[fenjen]

For those who have switched to MBP recently from Windows 7 or 8.1, is the MBP and OSX all you thought it would be? How is the MBP experience better than your Windows PC.

The reason I ask is I'm trying to justify the expense, and while I can afford a MBP, I just want to try to ensure I won't be disappointed, as Windows 8.1 is really not that bad, albeit the touchpad on my XPS could be better.

So overall, is the MBP significantly a better user experience over your Windows computer?

Thank you

EDIT: I am retired, so this will be for general home use; letters, excel spreadsheets, surfing the web, etc.

I think the Macbook is amazing. The touchpad is great, the system is fluid and comprehensive, etc. etc. The only thing that bugged me going from Windows to Mac was the window management, but that was solved by download a app for like a euro (BetterSnapTool).
I had a lot of issues with my old windows pc (mostly related to producing, but some in general as well such as freezes) and I've had almost no problems since going to Mac.
I'd say, go for it, but if you're only going to do basic stuff on your pc, I'd recommend you to consider a Macbook Air instead of a Pro.

----------

I'd spent over 20 years using Windows and I decided to buy an iMac mainly because I was completely unimpressed by Windows 8. With the exception of Finder, every single thing about OSX is as good as or better than it's Windows counterpart. Add to that the superb hardware and I can't see me going back to Windows for everyday computing.

There are still a few programs I use that require Windows (Microsoft Money, a couple of aviation-related apps) but apart from that the PC rarely gets a look-in these days.

Having bought the iMac I decided to go for a 13" rMBP for mobile work. Best decision I've made in a long time. No longer do I have an enormous, heavy laptop doing it's best to burn a hole in my leg after 30 minutes use. The screen is gorgeous, the build quality is superb (no flimsy bending keyboard) and the battery lasts 5 times longer than a Sony Vaio.

Best of all...no BSOD!

And except for the graphic drivers and the lack of DirectX. OSX is completely useless for gaming. That's what Bootcamp is for, though. ^^

 

[Sym0]

For those who have switched to MBP recently from Windows 7 or 8.1, is the MBP and OSX all you thought it would be? How is the MBP experience better than your Windows PC.



The reason I ask is I'm trying to justify the expense, and while I can afford a MBP, I just want to try to ensure I won't be disappointed, as Windows 8.1 is really not that bad, albeit the touchpad on my XPS could be better.



So overall, is the MBP significantly a better user experience over your Windows computer?



Thank you



EDIT: I am retired, so this will be for general home use; letters, excel spreadsheets, surfing the web, etc.

From a personal perspective it has bee great, from a work perspective not so great.

I switched about 8 months ago and am really impressed by the physical build quality and design of the MBP15 full Monty. It is by far the best hardware design and spec combination still available today.

OSX is pretty good, for home use it is brilliant as it fell into place with my iPad phone and Apple TV. All my media is organise in iTunes and I mainly use safari and games at home 50% of the time and the other half downloading or archiving movies and media with the SuperDrive and various software. I also manage my entire photo and video library of my family and kids which started life as folders in windows XP in 2000 and has now migrated to iPhoto. All 150GB of it.

I boot camp windows 8.1 which supports 200% dpi scaling and looks and runs great on this hardware. This is where I work. And windows is definitely the best place for work to reside. From specialist software to needing 100% resources and seem less integration to all my clients it is definitely the OS for performance and work.

Fortunately the brilliant hardware host both OS like a pro and makes it feel like I have two top of the line laptops.

Very happy. So much so I bought my wife the MacBook Air and rMini iPad.

 

[Dazzled]

I am a web developed who just recently purchased my first ever Mac last month. I bought it to replace my POS desktop and laptop, both pc's running windows 7. I like 7, I deplore 8, and I deplore all the ashes that come along with a lot of the cheaper computer builds. Myself and several other web developers I know go through a laptop every few years - not because we want to upgrade but because the machine simply fails. What drove me to invest in a Mac was this:

1. Getting away from windows 8 and all of its horrors
2. Getting a sleeker machine with better specs that held much less chance of failure
3. Resale value - macs hold their value extremely well
4. Physical equipment - I like the magnet power plug, no more plug and play cylinder that fails, the battery life reports to be much better on a Mac, as in the batty itself goes a lot longer without having to be replaced, the ssd drive makes hard drive failure improbably, and the OS upgrades are cheap/free
5. Battery life is awesome - I can work remotely for up to 9 hours on a full charge vs the 2 hours on a full charge of my other brand new battery laptop
6. Less crap. Less hackers and layabouts worry about writing stuff for Mac (although it can and does happen) so you don't have to stress about viruses and other common issues.
7. Synchs with all of your other apple products. I have an ipad mini and an iPhone and I never really thought about or cared about my laptop synching to my other devices. But it's so dang handy to enter calendar events from my phone to have them auto alert on my desktop. Or conduct a band interview and use notes on my ipad to scribble down tidbits and have the entire thing auto synch and import and show on my MacBook so that I do not have to worry about copy and paste or anything else.

There are more praises I have to sing but all in all I am a Mac convert. I really feel like the product is worth the many and I love not having to worry about upgrading a computer in a year due to burnout or failure.

 

[M5RahuL]

Been using Windows since 3.1 and, apart from Win 98, ME, and Vista, it's been good. I like both OSs. I have yet to try Win 8/8.1 but Windows 7 Pro is quite stable.

So, I'm just as happy with Windows as with OS X.

 

[interstella]

Of course one very big advantage in buying a Mac of any kind is that, unlike most PC's, it doesn't come with a hard disc full of utterly useless crapware!

 

[Sym0]

Of course one very big advantage in buying a Mac of any kind is that, unlike most PC's, it doesn't come with a hard disc full of utterly useless crapware!

We'll that is how they make them so cheap. All that crap is sponsored and subsidises the purchase cost.

 

[akdj]

And what is it that you do with Office?

I work for a Graphic design/ Color Seps firm that does work for Proctor and Gamble and we use tons of Office docs in our communications.

We use Office for Mac, they use Office for Windows. I build excel docs with formulas and charts and graphs on my Mac and send them and they have no issue. Same goes for them to us.

We have monthly meetings using PPT and also have no compatibility issues. Sure, maybe if you do some very complex Office stuff then you may have issues, I personally have never encountered them though.

I would say Office for Mac is 95% feature complete as its Windows counterpart with the 5% just being features that less than 5% of users even use or know exist.


ALSO if your Office needs are very simple then, I would reccomend trying iWork first which is free for OS X and is very easy to use and nice looking while being powerful enough to do lots of stuff.

I've found the exact same experience with Office '11 for Mac. 08 and earlier were awful. I'm not an excel power user....but use it often and for dozens of tasks. I work with colleagues on PCs and compatibility is and has been very good. There's even a 'compatibility check' when you export or save an MS docx, xlsx, or ppt file.

As well, pending how deep an Office user you are...don't automatically rule out Apple's 'free' productivity suite. iWork. It's absolutely amazing for 90-95% of people. Excluding accountants, bankers, and Excel power users.
As mentioned earlier, Windows does indeed provide a free trial of Office for both Mac and Windows, 30 days.

I can't speak for Outlook. I like, use and enjoy Mac's Mail program.

I switched in 2007 after twenty years of PC only and within a week I was hooked. Of course it came with training wheels (bootcamp was beta back then), but I didn't install Windows on my second or any subsequent Mac. Now that all of Adobe's software is cross platform, OSx only for me. It's hard to explain what a revolution it was for us. Especially as mentioned so often, the ability to keep everything synced and organized.

NO idea why anyone would have a problem with file setup and organization in OSx. You can do it the same way as in Windows. Make new folder. Put files in folder. Done. Finder has a couple quirks that don't remember paths to my external drives but there are plenty of excellent Finder apps and options if you need. Software these days is amazing. Between OSx and iOS, we've never had access to this much! Amazing time to be an OSx user IMHO.

J

 

[Misskitty]

I came over to OSX in 2011 and honestly, as much as I hate windows for some things, I also hate OSX for other things. Basic basic stuff like uninstalling programs, is a major nousense on Mac compared to windows.

 

[Reimer]

I came over to OSX in 2011 and honestly, as much as I hate windows for some things, I also hate OSX for other things. Basic basic stuff like uninstalling programs, is a major nousense on Mac compared to windows.

How so? For most things, you can just drag the app to the trash bin or use an app like AppCleaner to clean out preferences as well. Actually, I don't see how it's any worse than on the Windows side. I don't remember how many times I couldn't uninstall apps in Windows because the uninstaller was broken in some way.


For me, I've only made OSX my full time personal OS within the last year or so. There are still some programs that I can't find equivalents on OSX for such as 7-Zip for archiving and unpacking or MPC-HC for watching videos. There are very few choices for media players on OSX. You either use VLC or a ffmpeg/mplayer derivative (which all pretty much function the same).

Otherwise, I'm happy with OSX.

 

[blooperz]

Pretty Happy with the switch overall...have windows 8 running on bootcamp to run certain programs when needed... I do however miss the ability to disable the trackpad while typing like i could on my yoga 2 pro...I'm not really sure why macs don't have that feature, I feel like the base of my thumb is always moving the cursor around when I type and it can get pretty annoying .

 

[akdj]

I came over to OSX in 2011 and honestly, as much as I hate windows for some things, I also hate OSX for other things. Basic basic stuff like uninstalling programs, is a major nousense on Mac compared to windows.

Misskitty.....that made me truly LOL! When I first switched, back in '07, I had installed a program I didn't want on a 13" white MacBook I'd bought my wife as a graduation gift (her doctorate). She'd been bugging me for a year...a couple of her friends had them, but she couldn't use it in school as most everything was proprietary to Windows that she needed. The MB made a perfect gift....but I couldn't put it DOWN!!! Ended up buying myself one two months later

Anyway....initially, about four days in---that program I'd installed, like you--- I got SOOOO Frustrated trying to find a "Control Panel" somewhere, with the "Add/Remove" program to 'populate'....etc, etc. Finally...called the CompUSA (remember them? ) ---talked to "Dexter", the dude that sold me my Mac and vented my frustrations to him...(too dumb too Google apparently I was??). He, too, lol'ed!! Just drag the program to the trash, empty. Done. With OSx, when switching from Windows---I've found with the switch I would tend to over think simple processes. OSx is simple, elegant, fast, stable....and as time has moved forward....for me anyway, I've found less and less reliance on Windows (still have to use @ work)....and more and more fulfilled by OSx, with iOS.

AppCleaner....as mentioned by Reimer is actually the proper tool to uninstall, as mentioned....it will also clear associated and hidden files. Too easy, free...click, drag, erase. Done.

j