DisSuggs4u

Last January, my wife and I took the plunge and purchased one of the (at the time) new iMacs from Apple with the Intel Core Duo processor. This decision did not happen overnight. In fact, it had been something I was contemplating for well over a year before I actually made the purchase. Being a (for the most part) lifetime PC user, I needed to make sure that the transition was going to be as smooth as possible.

Let me just tell you, it could not have been any easier.

The one thing I spent the most time worrying about was software and whether or not the Mac would have everything I needed in order to do whatever I needed to do. This made me sit down and evaluate everything that I use a computer for. Although I like to think that I do a lot more than this, what I found out is that I use a computer for:

• e-mail
• traversing the internets and its many tubes
• spreadsheeting
• word processing
• photo management & editing
• life management (through a calendar and address book)
• task management (for all of my “honey do’s”)
• music
• videos
• and a very small dash of web development

After confirming that the Mac could do all of the above, I decided that there was nothing else to lose and made the switch. As with what seems to be everything else on the Mac, it could not have been any easier.

If you do any research on the Mac you will come across a recurring mantra: It just works. For many of you who are still trapped in the PC world, I can understand your skepticism. I was there once, too.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I am not one of those Mac fanboys who scoff at people who refuse to entertain the idea of using a Mac, and I won’t use pressure tactics to try to get you to jump on the bandwagon. However, for anyone who has used a PC for long enough, and has had to deal with more than their fair share of security updates, virus threats, application crashes, operating system crashes and reboots, and countless other things, the idea that a much easier life must sound tempting.

Believe me, it is nice. The things I absolutely love about the Mac are:

1. The design quality of the entire system (from the hardware to the operating system to the software to the box the bloody thing comes in) is all top notch.
2. The entire experience is the epitome of simplicity.

Of course, there is a whole detailed list of other things that I love about the Mac. However, they can all be boiled down to those two things.

As for our transition, it went really well. Not only can I do all of the things I “need” to do as mentioned above, there are a whole host of other things that I cannot do on a PC… or, at least not nearly as well or as easily as I can on the Mac.

The other benefit I have gotten out of my Mac experience is time. No longer do I have to spend any length of time wrestling with Windows to try to get it to do what I want. There is an elegance to OS X and Mac applications that let it work with you instead of against you. The mantra is right: it just works. Thanks to this, I have become much, much more productive on a Mac than I think I ever was on a PC.

Not only that, the out of the box experience was exceptional. You really can boot it up and get right to work. No need to download umpteen million software updates and security patches. And the desktop is anything but cluttered with useless bundled applications that I will never use.

The last PC I bought came bundled with AOL, Earthlink, MSN, WordPerfect (I kid you not), a music jukebox, and photo album starter addition (which is basically Paint Shop Pro light) along with a slew of other minor players that I cannot seem to remember. ALL of these applications had icons cluttering the desktop along with the standard compliment of desktop clutter: My Computer, the Recycle Bin, Windows Media Player, Microsoft Internet Explorer, etc.

My Mac came with a completely blank desktop, save for an icon for the hard drive, and all of the applications I needed were neatly arranged along the bottom in the Dock. Simple. Elegant. Perfect.

Looking back on this, it makes me giggle a little thinking of all the crap Windows comes with that seems to just get in your way, where Mac OS X’s orientation is centered more on letting you get to work.

I think it is safe to say that I have beaten my point to death. The Mac is a much more user friendly and easier machine to both own and operate. This translates into letting you concentrate on getting work done rather than performing maintenance.

Now that I have stepped into the light, every day spent working on a PC at work is about as fun as stabbing my eyes out with a fork. Someday, hopefully, I will be able to make the transition there as well.

Oh, what a great day that will be.