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Switching questions

S

shumster

macrumors member
Original poster
Aug 15, 2001
54
0
OK, I've decided to take the plunge after years of procrastinating and accepting PC laptops from my company, and invest in a 15" Powerbook. The spec I'm looking at getting:

1.5 Ghz
512 MB RAM (1 DIMM) - will pick up another 1Gb from a 3rd party
80GB 5400rpm
Superdrive
and all the usual standard stuff

I'm switching from a Sony Vaio running XP Pro, and my only concern over the switch is getting all my data across.

1. Outlook - I'm using Outlook for both personal and work email - I anticipate using Mail for my personal email and Entourage for work email (We connect to Exchange). Questions:
- my personal and work email are pretty much mixed up at the moment within the same Outlook .pst file. How can I separate them and transfer them to the appropriate program on the Mac. Is Apple's convoluted method of transferring mail via .mac the only solution (my PST file is about 2GB in size)

- What's the fastest way of getting data across from PC to Mac? Cat 5, wireless or Firewire?

2. iTunes - I have a 15gb 3G iPod which has been used exclusively on the PC - will there be any transfer issues once I have moved everything to the Mac?

Would appreciate anyone's support. Trying to make this as smooth a switch as possible :)
 
shumster said:
OK, I've decided to take the plunge after years of procrastinating and accepting PC laptops from my company, and invest in a 15" Powerbook. The spec I'm looking at getting:

1.5 Ghz
512 MB RAM (1 DIMM) - will pick up another 1Gb from a 3rd party
80GB 5400rpm
Superdrive
and all the usual standard stuff

I'm switching from a Sony Vaio running XP Pro, and my only concern over the switch is getting all my data across.

1. Outlook - I'm using Outlook for both personal and work email - I anticipate using Mail for my personal email and Entourage for work email (We connect to Exchange). Questions:
- my personal and work email are pretty much mixed up at the moment within the same Outlook .pst file. How can I separate them and transfer them to the appropriate program on the Mac. Is Apple's convoluted method of transferring mail via .mac the only solution (my PST file is about 2GB in size)

- What's the fastest way of getting data across from PC to Mac? Cat 5, wireless or Firewire?

2. iTunes - I have a 15gb 3G iPod which has been used exclusively on the PC - will there be any transfer issues once I have moved everything to the Mac?

Would appreciate anyone's support. Trying to make this as smooth a switch as possible :)
Click to expand...
Mac OS X Mail does have an import option, but I know that it cannot import messages directly from Outlook for Windows. I would use a two-step process - first, import all your Outlook Mail into Entourage, then import mail from Entourage into Mail. After that's done, you can delete mail that is in the wrong category. I don't know if Outlook, Entourage, or Mail supports selective import of mail messages.
 
10.3.4 should automatically find your home network (if you have one). You probably know this but you can't just hook two computers together by ethernet. You must have a router or a wireless network in your house to be able to transfer files.

Another way to transfer files would be to burn them to CDs or DVDs if your Vaio can.

Mail should be able to import all of your email messages.

Unfortunately you will also need to make another plunge and buy Office for Mac so that you can read all of the word documents you may have created on your PC

Your ipod song transfer should be seemless
 
Macdantheman07 said:
10.3.4 should automatically find your home network (if you have one). You probably know this but you can't just hook two computers together by ethernet. You must have a router or a wireless network in your house to be able to transfer files.
Click to expand...

You can just hook two computers together by an ethernet cable as long as one has auto detection. Lucky for you powerbooks do. No router or crossover required.
 
The best way to do it is to manually set the ip addresses. Try something like 192.168.101 and 192.168.102. Your mask should be 255.255.255.0 on both of them. I allow ftp access on the mac and ftp to and from it on the windows box. I hate windows networking and samba.
 
Neither Mail nor Entourage can read Outlook mail. If you use Outlook, my recomendation is to convert your mail to Netscape, transfer that to the Mac, and convert to Entourage as if was Netscape Communicator files. I think I'm missing one or two steps, but should be able to find another post more complete (I think I post one some time ago).

I recently switched and that was the only workaround I found. Apple also offer a software, but I didn't want to pay 50 bucks for something that should be seamless.
 
> 512 MB RAM (1 DIMM) - will pick up another 1Gb from a 3rd party
I recommend Crucial - http://www.crucial.com/

> 1. Outlook - I'm using Outlook for both personal and work email - I
Check out this guide:
http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum49/113.htm
Sort of roundabout, but it works. That'll get it into Entourage, then you can import it all into Mail, and then delete the personal mail in Entourage, and delete the work mail in Mail.

> What's the fastest way of getting data across from PC to Mac? Cat 5,
Ethernet, all the way.

> iTunes - I have a 15gb 3G iPod which has been used exclusively on the PC
I would recommend (while you got the Ethernet going) copying everything from the folder that your Windows iTunes uses into the folder that your Mac iTunes uses (usually Home->Music->iTunes). You may have to Advanced -> Deauthorize your PC computer if you purchased any music from the iTunes Store.

Lee Tom
 
Thanks for your help. Got a call from Apple today confirming delivery this time next week...cannot wait!

HOw about my Calendar, Contacts and Task entries in Outlook? What is the best way to transfer them to their respective programs in Office 2004/X and Apple's iCal, Address Book etc?

Also, I'm running a wireless network over a Buffalo G54 Airstation router - will the PB automatically detect and configure itself to connect to the router and the Internet?

Cheers
 
Another option to move e-mail from Outlook on Windows to Mail on the Mac is to use Hotmail. I had Hotmail set up in Outlook 2002 and copied my e-mails over to the Hotmail inbox, and then retrieved them on the Mac using the HTTP Mail plug-in for Mail. Worked great.
 
Assuming that you are collecting you work e-mail from an Exchange Server, getting you work e-mails into Entourage should be straight forward. You can set your powerbook to connect to the Exchange server, and provided that your office has set up Exchange to store e-mail on the server, when you connect it will automatically pull all your e-mails onto the powerbook. When you are in the office you can sync Entourage with the Exchange Server. You may need a friendly IS department to make some changes to Exchange Server to get your Powerbook to work with it ( Web Access for example if it as not already set up).
 
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