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Apple guy in a windows Army...

F

Frank Z

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 11, 2008
5
0
Good Morning ladies and gents!

I just wanted to get in here and givea quick intro.

My name is Frank and i have recently purchased the AL iMac 24" with the 2.4Ghz C2D. It was stock so I am going to put in some thrid party RAM (4Gb) and a bigger HDD (seagate 7200.10 1TB). I am still deployed in Kuwait right now and should be heading home by the end of the month. My iMac is waiting for me.

I am making the switch from PC as I am sick of Windows and all the BS that comes with it. I have been using Ubuntu a little bit to avoid my Win machine and I figured it was high time to jump on the mac bandwagon.

I also got the new 16Gb iPhone and I love it (so far). I can't wait to get it back in the states and actually use the phone part of it. I have been using the wireless over here but hte networks don't like to work on it over here.

Now, a bit about me. I am currently in the Army and stationed in Kuwait. I do Satellite Communications and I love the Job. I heading home at the end of this month and I can't wait. I am in need of a few beers... Haha!!

Any tips or tricks of the trade that you guys could give me... I'm new to Mac and haven't ever used OS X. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks guys!!!

Frank Z :apple:
 
Hey Frank, bet you are psyched to be coming back!
My first tip to new Mac users is to go through the System Preferences one at a time. I know it's not very exciting but it will get you accustomed to the system and allow you to set up vitals like firewall and desktop pictures:). Other than that, you will likely find that it's similar enough to Windows to navigate but a lot less frustrating...
Anyway, welcome home from a fellow Ft. Gordon alum.
 
Although this may sound obvious but why did you buy something you are not able to use? :)

The general concensus is that the iMac is about to get an update so it might have been a wise choice to wait until that happened. Especially when you are on the other side of the planet and your newly purchased hardware is far out of reach ;)

Regardless of that I would like to congratulate you on your purchase and hope it lives up to the expectations you may have.

I would recommend you to read the excellent guide posted here at MacRumors, entitled the Beginner's Guide.

Other good sites to read are actually Apple's own.

They have excellent ressources, like the Mac 101 - Get started with the Mac and Switch 101 - Migrate to Mac.

They also have video tutorials which explain the basics and they can be found at the Find Out How and these cover Mac OS X, Photos, Movies, Web, Music and iWork.

A good plug-in for Quicktime is the swiss-army knife of codecs called Perian, which enables you to play most, if not all, video formats in Quicktime.

Hope this helps getting you started :)
 
Pressure said:
Although this may sound obvious but why did you buy something you are not able to use? :)
Click to expand...

Everyone's got to start somewhere. There was a time you were new to the computer you owned too. :p

Congratulations on your Mac, Frank, and on your return to the states.

I doubt you will find the Mac all that challenging coming from Windows and considering your technological background. It takes a bit getting used to aesthetics like the close, minimize and maximize buttons being on the top left as opposed to the top right as well as just dropping programs into the trash bin to uninstall them.

Overall however, OS X is a much easier OS to use than Windows in my opinion. It's also a far superior OS but that's also just my opinion. ;)

I still use Windows in Boot Camp for occasional gaming and the Boot Camp partition via VMWare Fusion to run some Windows-only apps.

Cheers.
 
Congrats on the new mac. OSX is really easy to use, yet still very powerful due to its *nix/bsd roots. Only advice I can give you is to forget how you do things in windows. If there's something you need to do, and don't know how, try the most intuitive thing you can think of. Chances are, that's how to do it. I used to ask my Mac friends how to do certain things. I'd always wind up saying "oh, that's it, really?"

Don't listen to all the talk about iMacs being updated any day now. Macs tend to last longer than PCs because they don't mysteriously slow down after a while. Yours will last you years.

Hope you make it back home soon!
 
Congratulations (on new Mac and coming home)! I switched cold turkey about 4 years ago too. I just went into a store, played with a Powerbook for about an hour, and just bought one. It was a bit frustrating at first, but eventually I came around. In the end I'm glad I did, because now OS X just seems more intuitive and "makes sense" so to speak. I guess the best advice I would give you is to just play around with everything. Just do stuff and figure things out on your own. Books are great and all, but hands on is how I figured things out. And don't be shy on these forums. There are a lot of people with excellent info out there. I learn something everytime I peruse through a few threads. Good luck.
 
Welcome Frank,

The Mac is quite easy to be accustomed to it has an easy interface. I suggest going through the system trying the iLife software it's really good. Try all the applications on the system and just go through by trial and error. It takes about a week to get used to.
 
heyadol said:
Anyway, welcome home from a fellow Ft. Gordon alum.
Click to expand...

Its funny that you say that... Thats where I am going next! haha!!! You know how Ft Gordon is a black hole for signal!!

You guys are great!! Thanks so much for all the support! Those links are awesome and I am sure they will help very much!

I honestly had no idea about the updates to the iMac. But we all know how technology goes... As soon as you get something, theres already something coming out or about to come out or already out that's better... So, I guess I'll deal. But thanks for the concern.

The reason I purchased it now, before I got home, was I could not see the logic in having it shipped here, unpacking it for a few days, then repacking it and shipping it home. That leaves too much open for damage. I figured that FedEx is better at shipping than the military system that would have been handled it from NY to here. Plus, I wanted a new toy waiting for me for when I get home!!! :cool:

Again guys, thanks for the quick reply's and support! I doubt I would have got this kind of support on some windows forum... ;)

Take care all!!!

Frank Z
 
Frank - You made a fantastic decision. That is a wonderful computer. You're really going to enjoy it, and the iPhone will further shine back here.

Congratulations, and thanks for your work!
 
Please accept the thanks for your service from a grateful nation.

I would suggest that you wait for the warrantee to expire before you change out the hard drive.

Welcome to the world of a different way of computing... mostly problem free.:apple:
 
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