Panic At The Disco! HELP!

[Wags44]

Greetings all! Long story short, we purchased a MacBook Pro for my son for college. I'm a huge tech nerd, agnostic of Windows vs Apple vs Android vs PlayStation vs Xbox vs etc etc.
That being said, my son starts college on Monday, the MacBook is being delivered today, AND I KNOW NEXT TO NOTHING about setting everything up correctly.
Need a gaming computer built? I'm your guy. Need an electronic device fixed? I've done it. I've just only ever owned the original Apple iPhone and the original iPad.
I checked through the guide section on what, how, when, where for tips on this, but the guide seems a little dated at 2019 from the last post? Maybe some is still relevant?
I would REALLY appreciate it if someone could get me pointed in the right direction! Thank you in advance! Do people still use Time Machine for backups? What are the must have apps for college bound students?
I just started listening to a few podcasts like iOS Today etc. Thank you for reading this, and any help.

 

[bogdanw]

Apple Support
Set up your MacBook Pro
https://support.apple.com/guide/macbook-pro/apd831707cb3/mac
macOS User Guide
https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/welcome/mac
Get to know the Finder on your Mac
https://support.apple.com/HT201732

Potentially useful apps
LibreOffice for documents https://www.libreoffice.org/download/download-libreoffice/
IINA for media files https://iina.io/
PeaZip for archives https://peazip.github.io/
iMovie https://apps.apple.com/app/imovie/id408981434

 

[Wags44]

Apple Support
Set up your MacBook Pro
https://support.apple.com/guide/macbook-pro/apd831707cb3/mac
macOS User Guide
https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/welcome/mac
Get to know the Finder on your Mac
https://support.apple.com/HT201732

Potentially useful apps
LibreOffice for documents https://www.libreoffice.org/download/download-libreoffice/
IINA for media files https://iina.io/
PeaZip for archives https://peazip.github.io/
iMovie https://apps.apple.com/app/imovie/id408981434

THANK YOU SO MUCH!!! I REALLY APPRECIATE you taking the time to help me out!!

 

[highmayhem]

Yes people still use Time Machine. It's dead simple and highly effective.

 

[Wags44]

Yes people still use Time Machine. It's dead simple and highly effective.

Thank you much!!

 

[Basic75]

Please if you post something in the future use descriptive titles.

This one made me thing of a Mac being used to play music in a disco having kernel panics.

As for your actual question, my advice is to not install any system cleaning or optimising tools.
Just install the applications that you actually need, and don't bog down the machine with fluff.

 

[bogdanw]

my advice is to not install any system cleaning or optimising tools

If needed, at a later time, I recommend
OnyX https://titanium-software.fr/en/onyx.html
Pretty Clean https://www.prettyclean.cc (https://github.com/pretty-clean)