20 iMac G5 2.1GHz PowerPC - ive just adopted

[derthballs]

Well i have to say first post, im worried Ive sold up my pc today, and ordered the above machine which should arrive in a couple of weeks.

Have i done the right thing? I dont really play any 3d games on pc anymore despite having a powerful machine, only really football manager which i know is out for mac too.

What are the must have programs i should buy for burning dvd's and the like?

Could someone also recommend a usenet downloading program, ive been using newsleecher, but unfortunately it dosent have a mac version.

 

[VanMac]

Congrats on your new machine.

Play around with all the software it comes with before worrying about dl'ing stuff. Enjoy!

 

[Makosuke]

Welcome to the fold. There are plenty of threads (even some right now) listing must-have software for new Mac users, but in answer to your two specific questions:

For DVDs, you probably won't need anything new--the Finder (rough equivalent to Windows Explorer) does just fine burning data DVDs, iDVD (part of iLife, which will come with your Mac) does a very good job of mastering and burning video DVDs, and Disk Utility will burn most disk image formats. If you reall need more there are shareware programs out there, as well as the beefier Toast (about $80), but I've never needed any of the above despite having burned dozens of DVDs in various formats.

As for Newsreaders, it depends partly on whether you want binary-centric, reader-only, or a combination. For both binary and combo purposes, the best app was definitely Thoth, but sadly the author killed it so if you can't find somebody willing to supply you with a licence you're out of luck. Unison, from Panic software, has started to fill the gap--it lacks some handy features, and has an unusual interface for a newsreader, but it hase some awesome new features for sorting and downloading binaries. They're a good company, and it's not expensive, so I'd look at that.

Other options include Mozilla Thunderbird (which I think has a newsreader), MT Newswatcher (I used to use that YEARS ago, but it's more discussion oriented), and of course Google Groups for purely text.

 

[derthballs]

Welcome to the fold. There are plenty of threads (even some right now) listing must-have software for new Mac users, but in answer to your two specific questions:

For DVDs, you probably won't need anything new--the Finder (rough equivalent to Windows Explorer) does just fine burning data DVDs, iDVD (part of iLife, which will come with your Mac) does a very good job of mastering and burning video DVDs, and Disk Utility will burn most disk image formats. If you reall need more there are shareware programs out there, as well as the beefier Toast (about $80), but I've never needed any of the above despite having burned dozens of DVDs in various formats.

As for Newsreaders, it depends partly on whether you want binary-centric, reader-only, or a combination. For both binary and combo purposes, the best app was definitely Thoth, but sadly the author killed it so if you can't find somebody willing to supply you with a licence you're out of luck. Unison, from Panic software, has started to fill the gap--it lacks some handy features, and has an unusual interface for a newsreader, but it hase some awesome new features for sorting and downloading binaries. They're a good company, and it's not expensive, so I'd look at that.

Other options include Mozilla Thunderbird (which I think has a newsreader), MT Newswatcher (I used to use that YEARS ago, but it's more discussion oriented), and of course Google Groups for purely text.

thanks very much, not so much after reading newsgroups (thats so 97 ) but ill take a look at those you suggested.

Im quite excited

 

[derthballs]

i have one other question if someone would be kind enough to answer. If i buy an external storage, usb2 or firewire, would i be able to transfer files from my office pc to my home mac?

 

[katie ta achoo]

i have one other question if someone would be kind enough to answer. If i buy an external storage, usb2 or firewire, would i be able to transfer files from my office pc to my home mac?

Yup. A Mac can read windows formatted HDs.

You could also set up a network between the two so that you don't have to bother with an external HD.

Since you sold the windows machine, you could just take out the HD, put it in an enclosure and put a new HD in it, install windows, and boom.
You won't have to worry about deleting data and reformatting HDs.

 

[BrandonSi]

Well i have to say first post, im worried Ive sold up my pc today, and ordered the above machine which should arrive in a couple of weeks.

Where did you order from? Just curious, there are some delays in shipping from Apple.. there's a thread around here with people talking about the shipping times of the new iMac's.

 

[derthballs]

Where did you order from? Just curious, there are some delays in shipping from Apple.. there's a thread around here with people talking about the shipping times of the new iMac's.

ordered from apple uk - i live in scotland, 1-2 week delivery time apparently.

ive sold my whole pc, hard drives and all but they were sata anyway. My work is a few miles away from my house, so unfortunately i doubt id get away with running a cable that far, the local council might have a few complaints

Heres another stupid question, do mac's read excel and word documents?

 

[Nielsvdw]

you can download a free office solution like neooffice which will read all your documents, or buy Office for Mac from Microsoft ( a demo is included with your new imac )

 

[Makosuke]

Tip on the external drives for data transfer: The MacOS can read and write FAT32 (which is what most small disks, like USB pen drives, are alraedy formatted as), but it only reads--not writes--NTFS, which a some new Windows-formatted hard drives use. Just make sure your disk is FAT32 formatted and you're good to go, though--I know a lot of people who use pendrives for exactly this purpose.

 

[derthballs]

Tip on the external drives for data transfer: The MacOS can read and write FAT32 (which is what most small disks, like USB pen drives, are alraedy formatted as), but it only reads--not writes--NTFS, which a some new Windows-formatted hard drives use. Just make sure your disk is FAT32 formatted and you're good to go, though--I know a lot of people who use pendrives for exactly this purpose.

thats excellent thanks, i doubt id ever be transferring anything from mac to pc, my office pc has 24mb adsl and my home one only 2.

I have one last question (i think ) how would a 2.1 g5 imac compare on the intel world of processors, is it like for like? (e.g. 2.1ghz p4? )