Re: Just venting (totally OT)

Mandy <mandy2uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

real-address-in-sig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Rowland McDonnell) wrote:

Mandy <mandy2uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

real-address-in-sig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Rowland McDonnell) wrote:

Mandy <mandy2uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

lying_***@xxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

x-no-archive: yes

Mandy <mandy...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I've just found some resellers that sell Macs around here so
I'll see if I can persuade Steve to take me to each of them so
that I can have a look! :o)

I strongly recommend you find a friend who already has a Mac and
make sure it will run everything you need before you buy one.

I don't have any RL friends... only online ones!

Online is all you need - but remember, since you can run Windoze on
a Mac, everything you've got now will work on a Mac.

I don't know if I can afford to buy Windoze though! :o(

Well, that's fair enough - and if you're not getting rid of your
Windoze computers, you won't *need* it.

Okey dokes!

<grin of an unrepentant geek> Yeah, but it's just so flash to see two
operating systems on the one machine... ;-)

But you've said what applications you use all the time - Poser is
available in a Mac version (both Mac and Windoze versions of Poser
are the same, at version 7), and while MS FrontPage is discontinued
by MS, there are much better Web page creation tools around.

I doubt I'd be making pages on the Mac... not straight away anyway
:o)

Do ask on uk.comp.sys.mac about Web page creation software. I gather
that there's good stuff available, and you'll probably like the
experience once you've learnt how to use the software.


*nodding* I just want to get used to how to use the Mac first y'know?

Oh yes, but how can you get used to using the Mac unless you, you know,
*use* it?

Just playing with it's no good at all - that'd be wasting your money.

So: if you want to run Poser 7 on a Mac, the thing to do would be
to enquire about with the firm about a cheap `side-grade' so you
can go from Poser 7 on Windoze to Poser 7 on Mac without paying
full whack (not all firms do this, but some do).

I've just emailed them about it :o)

Any joy?

Defo! They said I could side grade (is that the right term?)

Yep!

it when I
get the Mac so that I can use it on both this machine and the Mac but I
won't be able to use the serial number for anything else - upgrades and
stuff - but I'm not too fussed about that :o)

Righto - coo. Good stuff. Hey, I gave someone some good advice! It
worked :-)

MS FrontPage - well, you should get something better even if you
stick with Windoze. But aside from that: ask on uk.comp.sys.mac,
explain that you use FrontPage now, and I'd bet that you'll get
lots of good suggestions on what'd be a better replacement for you
to use (they can probably advise you on a replacement for FrontPage
under MS Windoze too). For sure there will be a period of
learning, but whatever you get, it'll be better than MS FrontPage.
Remember, MS FrontPage was dropped by MS some time ago, and it's
always been the crappiest big name Web page creation software out
there.


Yup! I'm not going to build webpages on the Mac though so that's no
problem :o)

Mmm... But if you don't use it for the things you use computers for,
why buy the thing in the first place? No point spending money on tool
that's not used, is there? Thing before spending, yes?

I just want to get used to it first then if we (me and the Mac) become
friends I'll get a top notch Mac laptop and install all the Mac software
on it then :o)

That'd be a bit daft, really. You don't need a top-notch Mac laptop -
and the top-notch ones are very uncheap. The one you buy ought to be
perfectly up to doing everything you need. Seriously. Deadly seriously
- don't think of buying two Macs, really. Just the one.

And you'll not figure out how to use it, how to be friends with it,
unless you put on it the software you want to use and try using it.

Honest. Remember that installing software on a Mac is not like it is on
a Windoze machine. It's usually an utterly trivial job and - in the
case of almost all Mac software - *CANNOT* not cause any problems at
all.

Seriously, if you are going to `go Mac', your best bet is to get one Mac
and stick with that one Mac. Install on it the software you want to use
straight away, and play around with the things you want to use on the
Mac. Do a few jobs you want doing on it, that sort of thing. That's
how to `get to be friends with it'. If you like it, you'll just use it
more and more as you get the hang of things. But if you don't have
software on it to do the things you want to do, you just won't find out
what it's like to use.

(In any case, you'd find it bloody annoying if you don't add /any/
software, I promise.)

You see, as far as I'm concerned, a Mac `as delivered' is not as `user
friendly' as I require from my computers. If you get a Mac, I'll give
you a list of `things you'd find handy to install' - nothing
complicated, nothing that does anything dodgy or devious, nothing that
causes any problems for anything, and nothing that's remotely confusing
(well, probably not confusing anyway). Never mind the details - they
don't matter unless you've got a Mac. And it's not many bits either.

I wouldn't suggest you (or anyone sane) bolt on all the bits I've added,
but there's a subset of my add-ons that I think really ought to at least
be considered by everyone. If you get a Mac, let me know, and I'll lead
you through it. I promise it'll be pretty much painless, not very time
consuming, and I can promise you'll understand all the bits I think you
should consider using. Cost of these bits? Umm. It is /possible/ to
add 'em all for free if you lack money and aren't troubled by, erm...

Getting and installing these bits is not a painful process, and it can
make life a lot easier. `Another upsder' has taken my advice on this
after deciding to get a Mac with no prompting from me at all - anyway,
`this other upsder', a Windoze-only person, went mad for Macs after
using mine for a short while, and seems to think my list of suggested
add-ons is just about right too.

No, I'd not suggest that you used *ALL* the add-ons I've got - just a
few of the `really useful bits'.

[snip]

So: if you're an avid gamer, don't get a Mac. But otherwise, it's
a better bet than Windoze in general.

I mainly use the computer for email, building websites and using PSP
and Poser and I'll keep using Windows for all those, I just want to
play around with a Mac to see what it's like :o)

Best to play around with it at the jobs you want to do, or you'll not
really find out, will you?

I guess... I can't afford a lot of software for it though unfortunately!
:o(

You'll find a /lot/ of shareware is available, and though one shouldn't
make suggestions like this, it's not always essential to pay for the
stuff.

I have a Big List of URLs. I have many useful Mac Websites listed in
it. Many of the bolt-on goodies I've got to suggest are freeware in any
case.

[snip]

Put it like this: Safari 2 came out years ago. It's long been able
to pass the Acid 2 test.

<http://www.webstandards.org/files/acid2/test.html>

MS IE /7/ fails the test - the new one (not sure if it's out yet),
v8, is the first MS Web browser capable of passing it.


Blimey! It looks like IE7 fails it badly!

<chuckle> It's a really evil torture test - if the browser fails it,
it's likely to look really nasty.

It didn't even remotely look like it should have done and there was a
scroll bar thing in it too which shouldn't have been there! lol

<grin> Yeah, that's the sort of junk you get to see when the browser
fails the test. A bad mess doesn't mean a *particularly* bad handling
of the test page, it just means `failed'. And while your Web browser
shouldn't fail that test, it's not great shame on the developers if it
takes 'em a bit of time to get round to work out how to get their
browser to pass it. Shame on them, but not *great* shame, you know?

The Acid2 is *really* evil - it's the most stringent test of a certain
set of Web browser behaviours going. Amongst other things, the test
page contains deliberately wrong HTML code to make sure that the Web
browser handles broken HTML correctly.

[snip]

If you get a Mac, it makes sense for *YOU* to put Windoze on it in
my opinion to aid with the transition because you're Windoze only
at the moment. If you don't do that, you could possibly get stuck
at some point if you don't have access to a Windoze PC. If you've
got Windoze available, you can't get stuck without access to
Windoze software.

We've got 3 Windows PCs and a Windows laptop atm... would I still
need to put it on the Mac?

Not if you keep them, not at all. If you've got a home network, the
Mac can connect to your Windoze PCs (although exactly how much
networking will work is anyone's guess - one way or another, you'll be
able to get access to files across the network, although it might be
that `only the Mac can connect to the Windoze machines' or `only the
Windoze machines can connect to the Mac' depending. Why do I say
that? Because I've read lots of questions from people who have had
trouble with that sort of thing, and usually they've got it working
one way but not the other).

We don't have a network, just PCs and laptop that all use the same router
to get access to the net! :o/

Yeah, but hang on: that means you *DO* have a home network! Seriously:
if all your PCs and laptops use the one router, they've all got to be
networked to it. Do they use wires, or is it wireless that you use?

Not that it much matters, 'cos there will be an Ethernet port on that
router box which should allow a wired network connection to be made to
the household computer network which you really do have, honest.

Erm. Of course, you can get `Wifi' (Airport in Mac language) - wireless
networking - for any modern Mac you like. But I prefer wired
networking, which is why I'm talking about doing it that way. I like
the reliability and speed of doing it over wires, you see, and I don't
mind putting a hole in a wall or ceiling for the wire to pass through.

Anyway, if they're all connected to the one router, they're all on the
home network, and you should be able to have them talking directly to
each other without a lot of bother. I've heard many horror stories of
setting up Windoze machines to do that sort of networking between each
other. I've no personal experience of doing so at all with Windoze. I
know how to do it with Macs: just go to *that* preferences pane, turn on
file sharing (if that's what you want to do), and then you can log on to
that Mac from any other machine on the home network just by `navigating
to the home network icon, and selecting the computer you want to connect
to'. Type in yer name and password, and Bob's yer auntie's live-in
lover.

This allegedly works for getting Macs connected to Windoze machines, but
I've heard of people having trouble with that, mostly because they can't
work out how to get the Windoze machines to do their bit properly.
uk.comp.sys.mac is full of people who solve those problems - I've read
of the fixes many times.

[snip]

The flash way of doing it involves Parallels Desktop.

<http://www.parallels.com/en/rc/screens&demos/>

Now, with that on your Mac, you could have all your old Windoze
software available and the new Mac stuff, all running alongside
each other. That'd be dead convenient in many ways - you could use
the Mac stuff until you got stuck, and if you did get stuck, you'd
have your Windoze stuff available to use at the click of a mouse.
For sure it's not a *cheap* way of doing it, but oh boy oh boy is
it fancy or what?

It looks it but I don't think I could afford to do that :o(

No need to worry about it, really. Although you might consider
looking for a second hand copy of Windoze XP or something - I dunno
what that might cost, but if you could get a version that would work
on a Mac (I don't know what limits there are) at low enough price, it
might be something you'd think about. But there's no need. But - oh,
there's MacBook Pro here that belongs to someone else and I don't use
but I've seen it running Windoze and the MacOS (separately) and it's
just one of those `Oh wow!' things, you know? I love clever gadgets
showing off how clever they are. So I'm a geeky bloke, so what? ;-)

Hold on while I look on Amazon... looking at Amazon prices I can't
afford it and I was looking at used prices so I dread to think what the
New prices are!

They can be horrible[1] - but there are many, many versions of Windoze.
Oh look, you really do not *NEED* Windoze on a Mac, and it'd be far too
much brain-ache for you to figure out a sensibly economic way of getting
a version of Windoze that'd work right without breaking the bank and
let's face it, there's something more useful you could spend that sort
of money on, like a mountain of teddy bears or similar. (more useful
than another bloody copy of bloody MS Windoze, I reckon - sorry, am I
sounding miserably cynical again?)

Rowland.

[1] People complain that the MacOS is expensive. It's not peanuts to
buy - but it is /very/ cheap compared to a full-on copy of Windoze
Vista. <shrug> Both are infinitely more expensive than the free Unixes
- always worth bearing in mind when making comparisons, I feel. Get it
in perspective: it'd better be worth the money to buy the OS, given that
free operating systems are available and they're pretty good for geeks
if no-one else.

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