What is the point of family packs for dot mac?

[Spanky Deluxe]

I bought a family pack for dot mac a while ago because I thought it would be a great way for my girlfriend and I to keep things in sync. It works great at syncing my laptop and desktop. Now I've just set up my girlfriend with an iMac and wanted to get it syncing with her laptop. I create a sub account for her, log in to it on her laptop in preferences and go to enable synchronisation. FAIL. Turns out you can only syncronise on a full dot mac account. So.... what is the point in this family pack?? I got it because of a deal where I could get a family pack for a great price but now I think even those few extra quid were wasted.

 

[emptyCup]

So.... what is the point in this family pack?? I got it because of a deal where I could get a family pack for a great price but now I think even those few extra quid were wasted.

The point is to provide the other benefits of .mac (email, photo sharing, etc.) at "a great price." Since you bought a family pack to use with someone who is not a family member, you are now obligated to marry your girlfriend. You could use your .mac email account to send out the invitations.

 

[Grasbak]

I am trying to understand how this all works....

i have .mac, an imac and a touch. I am looking to get an iphone and my wife will have the touch.

I thought if i got the family pack, my wife could have her own email - which would be set up on the touch. I would have my email on the phone and we both have emails set up on the mac. Other than that - our info is shared, contacts/calendars etc.

to me thats how the family pack should work - otherwise, like you say whats the point!?

 

[Spanky Deluxe]

Since you bought a family pack to use with someone who is not a family member, you are now obligated to marry your girlfriend.

LOL!

It looks like the family pack gives sub accounts the use of an iDisk, an email address (limited to @mac.com so neither of us want to use that) and iWeb hosting. I bought dot mac specifically for the syncing. Hopefully this stuff will get fixed with the advent of mobile me, otherwise I won't be buying a useless family pack again.

 

[masteroflondon]

LOL!

It looks like the family pack gives sub accounts the use of an iDisk, an email address (limited to @mac.com so neither of us want to use that) and iWeb hosting. I bought dot mac specifically for the syncing. Hopefully this stuff will get fixed with the advent of mobile me, otherwise I won't be buying a useless family pack again.

I don't understand this at all! I have a family pack and am doing, I believe, exactly what you are wanting to do. Only difference is we have just the one laptop, with our own separate logins. I can't imagine that really makes a difference?

The laptop has sync turned on for both accounts, and calendars etc are all synched up on both logins.

Am I missing something?

 

[Spanky Deluxe]

I don't understand this at all! I have a family pack and am doing, I believe, exactly what you are wanting to do. Only difference is we have just the one laptop, with our own separate logins. I can't imagine that really makes a difference?

The laptop has sync turned on for both accounts, and calendars etc are all synched up on both logins.

Am I missing something?

Because the sync is most useful for syncronising different computers. I.e. my Mac Pro and my MacBook both sync up all their details. I'd like to use one of the sub accounts for my girlfriend to sync her MacBook with her iMac but unfortunately you can't do that on sub accounts. So I'd have been better off buying two single person accounts. I'm hoping the "exchange for the masses" approach of MobileMe will sort this stuff out though.

 

[NAG]

That is very weird because reading the support forums everyone is saying that each subaccount gets to sync. Maybe this is a UK only problem (or maybe they're changing it for mobileme and everyone gets the new stuff for mobileme in which case you'll have to wait until the 11th).

 

[Spanky Deluxe]

Woah, well what do you know. It works now. That's so bizarre. It came up with an error before but now it does it fine. Maybe its because I'd set up the sub account just a few minutes before.

Edit: P.S. Great quote NAG!