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Thoughts of a Switcher- 5 days of iMac ownership

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trip1ex said:
A strike against eSata is that I think Firewire 3200 would be backward compatible (Firewire 800 is with FW400 with a cheap adapter) and thus that's where the video pros might go to. Plus with many Mac consumers owning Firewire devices (camcorders and what not) it probably makes more sense to support those. And adding an extra port, like you said, takes up real estate that may not be there. Macs also boot off Firewire devices and use the port to do data transfers between Macs. It's pretty ingrained.

Also with USB 3.0 coming down the pipe I'm not sure eSata will have much of a chance on Macs.
Click to expand...

FW3200 is not here, now. (Ditto for USB3.) 3Gbs eSata is. If Apple turns the Mini hardware in the next few months, I can't see how they would go the FW3200 route when the eSata would be free. I think it is most likely that they would leave the ports as-is and do a simple chipset and CPU upgrade. Boring, but likely. As to video editing and the Mini ... any serious video editing would probably demand a system with more storage options than the Mini currently offers. One can assume that the Mini was targeted at "switchers", not video producers. (I am still looking for my 6-pin to 4-pin firewire cable so that I can "play" with iMovie ... I have way too much junk in my office at the moment.)

trip1ex said:
Ok the Avaya building. My neighbor was happy when Anthony's Pizza opened up in the strip mall across the street from there because he's from the East Coast. He was going through NY pizza withdrawals. I will say they do make some good pizza.
Click to expand...

I am hosting 2 summer students this year and will be forced to spend more time in the *real* office this summer. I have not tried Anthony's, but I may add them to the list. I am a long time fan of Jersey Mike's ... but I prefer the ones back east to the one on 120th ... they skimp on the thickness of the meat, IMHO.

Cheers,
Geo
 
gwerhart0800 said:
FW3200 is not here, now. (Ditto for USB3.) 3Gbs eSata is.
Click to expand...

Yep, FW3200 is pure vaporware, and SLOW vaporware, at that. It's only half as
fast as (equally vaporous, but-soon-to-be-much-more-standard) 6Gb/s SATA.

Anyhow, the best solution for high-bandwidth video peripherals is to use two
non-competing data paths: 1) firewire (or USB) for connection to the video
hardware, and 2) eSATA as a dedicated disk interface.

There's NO WAY that firewire or USB -- of any speed -- can be faster than the
disk drive's native interface.

LK
 
Yeah

czachorski said:
I felt the same way as you when I switched 6 years ago. But now, I would say that I have come to realize that OS X and iLife are actually quite intuitive, but I was so used to working with systems and applications that were not well done and unintuitive, that it took a while to un-train myself to always expect things to be difficult. If you are doing something on your new Mac that seems difficult to figure out, take a step back and try to think of the easiest way it could be done, and that is probably it. I found myself over-thinking things all the time at first, and when I found out how simple it was, it was like "duhhhh".
Click to expand...

That's exactly what happened to me! lol, sometimes, when i was new to macs, that happened. For example, the first day i got my mac, i installed some software that i didnt even need, (cmon, i was bored) so then i tried to nistall and i spent like an hour trying to find out how! i looked for "uninstall" "add and remove" "applicaions removal" and other stuff and as my last resource i said well, i will drag the app to the trash, and tere was the answer, as simple as that.. i was like duh!! anyway, macs rule... and when your already a mac user and by any reason you use a win pc again, your just like amazed how u lived that long with pc n not mac.. pc's are clumsy, not intellinget at all
 
duncyboy said:
This is the quietest computer I've ever owned. I was always looking at ways to silence my Windows box- quiet, volt-modded fans, water-cooling, expensive PSU's, fan controllers. And none of that comes close to how quiet this is.
Click to expand...
Hmm, I'm not saying that the iMac is loud, but I wonder how the hell ur modded "windows box" wasn't near as quiet as the iMac.

I've just build a Pc where almost everything is passive(got 2 fans in the chassi with the PSU) And my Pc is dead silence, compared to my mac mini the pc is quieter and the best thing is that it keeps quiet, when under load it's not getting louder, as the mac mini does.
 
paetrick said:
Hmm, I'm not saying that the iMac is loud, but I wonder how the hell ur modded "windows box" wasn't near as quiet as the iMac.

I've just build a Pc where almost everything is passive(got 2 fans in the chassi with the PSU) And my Pc is dead silence, compared to my mac mini the pc is quieter and the best thing is that it keeps quiet, when under load it's not getting louder, as the mac mini does.
Click to expand...

I'm sure it is possible to build or buy a quiet PC, but it seems like so often they are god awful loud, and Macs are often stunningly quiet. It's just the typical pattern out in the wild, but not the absolute rule. Probably a function of how many cheap PCs with cheap fans are out there.
 
gwerhart0800 said:
FW3200 is not here, now. (Ditto for USB3.) 3Gbs eSata is. If Apple turns the Mini hardware in the next few months, I can't see how they would go the FW3200 route when the eSata would be free. I think it is most likely that they would leave the ports as-is and do a simple chipset and CPU upgrade. Boring, but likely. As to video editing and the Mini ... any serious video editing would probably demand a system with more storage options than the Mini currently offers. One can assume that the Mini was targeted at "switchers", not video producers. (I am still looking for my 6-pin to 4-pin firewire cable so that I can "play" with iMovie ... I have way too much junk in my office at the moment.)
Click to expand...

Good points. But I don't think it happens. For one thing this is Apple and, second, for the same reason you say the Mini isn't for Pros I would say the Mini doesn't need eSata. And with FW3200 and USB 3.0 on the horizon eSata looks more like a stop gap tech. And who has eSata devices? I know many a person who has a Camcorder and who have many USB devices, but eSata?

There's a few other considerations there as well. You have to code the O/S support in there. You need drivers. The host controller has to support hot swap if you want that which I would guess means a more expensive chip. eSata supports a maximum cable length of 6 ft. Is that going to be a problem? Current eSata can't power smaller devices. .....And Apple I think is more about streamlining their product line. They aren't going to pop eSata into the Mini and then not put in say the MBP.

Nah the safest bet is actually FW800 because it's backwards compatible and Macs have ties to booting off FW external drives and using FW to transfer data and it seems like FW800 is slowly creeping down the Mac product line
 
trip1ex said:
There's a few other considerations there as well. You have to code
the O/S support in there. You need drivers.
Click to expand...

Nope. The OS 'doesn't see' any difference between an internal SATA drive
and an external eSATA drive. Both have identical performance, and eSATA
offers exactly the same features as an internal drive (NCQ, DMA, etc.), at
ZERO additional development cost, and ZERO additional protocol overhead.

Also, since there's no "bridge" logic, eSATA external enclosures are much
faster than FW800 enclosures -- at HALF the price of FW400 enclosures:

USB/FW800 enclosure @ $80

USB/FW400 enclosure @ $45

USB/eSATA enclosure @ $22

There's no conflict with camcorders, etc. because eSATA (like SATA) is
purely a mass storage interface. It's not a "bus", and it's not intended
for interfacing other types of devices. It's a cheap, industry-standard,
maximum-performance disk interface.

...it's hard to improve on 100%,

LK
 
Leon Kowalski said:
Nope. The OS 'doesn't see' any difference between an internal SATA drive
and an external eSATA drive. Both have identical performance, and eSATA
offers exactly the same features as an internal drive (NCQ, DMA, etc.), at
ZERO additional development cost, and ZERO additional protocol overhead.

There's no conflict with camcorders, etc. because eSATA (like SATA) is
purely a mass storage interface. It's not a "bus", and it's not intended
for interfacing other types of devices. It's a cheap, industry-standard,
maximum-performance disk interface.

...it's hard to improve on 100%,

LK
Click to expand...

I hear ya, but I didn't argue against the effectiveness of the tech. I merely don't think it's going to go into Macs and I listed why.

Imo it would have to replace FW to go into a Mac. Otherwise why bother?

It doesn't save any dough if you have to add an eSata connector and still include everything else. And I can't see Apple dumping FW.

The point about O/S support is that not all Sata host controllers support hot swapping and thus the O/S might not be setup for that either. Plus there's many other considerations. Putting eSata in would confuse the customer. Apple would have to make sure it works with Time Machine. And probably support it for file transfers between Macs. yada yada yada. I'm no expert, but I know enough to be dangerous and that things are always easier said than done. And also we were sorta talking about the Mini and whether it would get eSata. And plus with USB 3.0 on the horizon why go eSata? You'll get some more speed, but not that much more.

On the pc it's different. Manufacturers tend to throw everything into their machines. Tawain throws everything onto their mbs. Look at all the laptop makers with fingerprint readers. Apple is more selective for better or worse.
 
trip1ex said:
I hear ya, but I didn't argue against the effectiveness of the tech.
I merely don't think it's going to go into Macs and I listed why.
Click to expand...

No argument there! Cupertino is the NIH Capitol Of The Universe. Never use
standard/cheap/fast when you have a corner on proprietary/expensive/slow.

Imo it would have to replace FW to go into a Mac. Otherwise why bother?
Click to expand...

Why? Because FW800 doesn't have sufficient bandwidth to keep up with
the current generation hard drives -- and HDD speeds are increasing by
leaps and bounds with each generation. Seagate's 7200.11 drives are 35%
faster than the 7200.10 family -- and Samsung's F1 family is faster still.


It doesn't save any dough if you have to add an eSata connector and
still include everything else. And I can't see Apple dumping FW.
Click to expand...
True, but the only cost of adding eSATA is the connector. eSATA doesn't
(and shouldn't) replace FW or USB for general-purpose peripherals -- it's
just for disk drives. The HUGE advantage is that it eliminates contention
for bandwidth between external HDDs and audio/video stuff.

The point about O/S support is that not all Sata host controllers support
hot swapping and thus the O/S might not be setup for that either.
Click to expand...

OS-X doesn't support hot swapping of anything. Why should eSATA be different?

Apple would have to make sure it works with Time Machine.
Click to expand...
If TM works with internal SATA drives on a Mac Pro, it'll work with eSATA.

That's a key point: eSATA is NOT a new/different interface; it just allows
you to duct-tape an "internal drive" to the outside of the case.


...yo, Steve! ...If you're not the lead dog, the view never changes.

LK
 
Just a note - I'm not sure if this was answered/covered...

Expose - if you have a mac keyboard use buttons F9 through F12 for various functions - example: F9 shows all open windows - F9 to return - or click on the one you want.

Someone was missing the use of "mouse menus" If you right click on a file you will get a contextual menu with operations relevant for that file, including make copy. If you right click e.g. on the desktop it is possible to choose paste - an thereby making a copy.

If your filewindow is in column view and no folder is selected, you must highlight the folder you are copying to - if you select the folder first you can drag the file to the next column (and that column will highlight)
 
MacHappytjg said:
jus use stuffit it comes with the software and does the job
Click to expand...

Fortunately, Stuffit does not "come with the software".

Darkroom said:
do NOT use StuffIt... it messes with system files and can really slow down your computer... it's awful... i will recommend you use a free application called The Unarchiver: http://wakaba.c3.cx/s/apps/unarchiver.html - it's so much better than StuffIt
Click to expand...

Yeah, The Unarchiver is great. Thanks to ARD, I've been able to remove Stuff it from all of our 300 machines at work. People are amazed at how much quicker Unarchiver is after suffering with Stuffit all these years.
 
There is no reason for Apple to not have FireWire, USB, and eSATA on the Mac Pro. Our HP workstations do and it's great because:

  1. We use Firewire for optical drives and connecting camcorders to download video.
  2. We use eSATA for external drives.
  3. We use USB for everything else.
 
Leon Kowalski said:
No argument there! Cupertino is the NIH Capitol Of The Universe. Never use
standard/cheap/fast when you have a corner on proprietary/expensive/slow.



Why? Because FW800 doesn't have sufficient bandwidth to keep up with
the current generation hard drives -- and HDD speeds are increasing by
leaps and bounds with each generation. Seagate's 7200.11 drives are 35%
faster than the 7200.10 family -- and Samsung's F1 family is faster still.



True, but the only cost of adding eSATA is the connector. eSATA doesn't
(and shouldn't) replace FW or USB for general-purpose peripherals -- it's
just for disk drives. The HUGE advantage is that it eliminates contention
for bandwidth between external HDDs and audio/video stuff.



OS-X doesn't support hot swapping of anything. Why should eSATA be different?


If TM works with internal SATA drives on a Mac Pro, it'll work with eSATA.

That's a key point: eSATA is NOT a new/different interface; it just allows
you to duct-tape an "internal drive" to the outside of the case.


...yo, Steve! ...If you're not the lead dog, the view never changes.

LK
Click to expand...

Well if you're saying Apple is going to include eSata in the Mini then we disagree. If you're saying eSata is faster and fairly cheap to include then we agree.

Personally I was just talking about whether or not Apple includes the tech and really we were talking about it being on the Mini first and foremost. Imo the tech alone isn't enough of a reason to include it.

And there's many considerations there. Where are you going to put the connector on the Mini? Do you take out a FW port? OR some USB ports? How about on the laptops? How much does it cost to reengineer your products to include an eSata port? How much is it going to cost to test? How many customers will be affected by taking out one of the other ports to include an eSata port. Do customers really need that extra speed? How much extra speed are we talking about? Do the advantages of that extra speed outweigh the advantages that the other ports/interfaces have? Is eSata taking off? Do our customers demand it? Do we put in eSata now knowing FW3200 and USB 3.0 are coming down the pipe? yada yada yada.

For a company like Apple that makes few products that are end to end and run more towards consumer products and have a focus on form as well as function it's a big dealio.

Plus with the other techs being backward compatible and getting faster in the future does it make sense to even bother with eSata today?
 
trip1ex said:
Well if you're saying Apple is going to include eSata
in the Mini then we disagree.
Click to expand...

Apple is never gonna do anything in a timely fashion. They
finally put FW800 in all iMacs, in August '07 -- just in time
for it to be outpaced by the speed of modern disk drives.

The mini is a classic example of Apple's form-before-function
fetish for "cute" packages. They shaved a few mm from the
footprint by using slow, low-capacity, low-reliability, notebook
drives (that cost twice as much per GB as Real™ hard drives).

Do customers really need that extra speed?
Click to expand...
Mini customers apparently don't care about HDD performance,
(except for Bill and Karolyn, who like it just the way it is).

How much extra speed are we talking about?
Click to expand...
The mini's FW400 port is good for 35MB/s-40MB/s, tops;
eSata is good for whatever the drive can deliver -- that's
about 100MB/s-120MB/s for modern 3.5" drives.

Do the advantages of that extra speed outweigh the
advantages that the other ports/interfaces have?
Click to expand...

Bill & Karolyn don't want a 3x performance increase.

Is eSata taking off?
Click to expand...
No, eSATA is not "taking off." It took off several years ago,
and has been the de facto industry standard for quite a
while -- but as usual, Cupertino "didn't get the memo."

Just check out the external enclosure selection on Newegg.com:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...&N=2010090092+1053807123+1054107131&name=SATA

- products with Firewire ..... 15 of 172 = 9%
- products with eSATA ..... 104 of 172 = 60%

And about half of those firewire enclosures are FW400 only.

Hint: Prolly not a good idea to hold your breath while waiting
for a FW3200 external enclosure or external hard drive.


...Fast. It's not for everyone.

LK
 
Well this has devolved into another pointless, "Apple Sucks" / "Apple is Great" slap fight. I honestly don't know why some of you even bother to buy Apple products and post on Apple-centric web forums.
 
Can we kill the eSata versus FS800/3200?

Apple will do whatever it damn well pleases. (As if you didn't already know this!) SO, we will get whatever they decided to give us. All of the discussion on this board will not change that.

The original topic was on "thoughts of recent switchers" ... a noble discussion of issues or insights that the "newly converted" have.

New contribution ... now back on our regularly scheduled topic:

When I was an undergrad (1980-1984 Ohio University ... Go Bobcats!), I was working in the computer lab in Morton Hall and with others, put up an early (if not the first) Unix box (PDP11/20 with Version 6) on campus. Once we had it running, I went to one of my profs that I respected and asked him if he wanted an account on the system. His reply shocked me ... he said: "I have learned 7 operating systems, 15 languages and I really don't want to learn another, so ... no thanks." At the time, I thought he was being myopic, but as time has progressed, I find myself falling into the same trap.

As I use the Mac, I keep having to remind myself that each of the modern, popular OS offerings has their own way of doing things (or in the case of Linux, many ways) and that just points out how much differently people look at things. I am getting used to the "application centric windowing" paradigm of OS X versus the "multiple document interface" prevalent in Windows. So far, I don't see any significant difference in terms of my personal productivity. Most of my productivity gains are from being able to use scripting via Terminal to accomplish tasks that would be difficult or impossible to automate in Windows.

Cheers,
Geo
 
IgnatiusTheKing said:
Well this has devolved into another pointless, "Apple Sucks" / "Apple is Great" slap fight.
Click to expand...

gwerhart0800 said:
The original topic was on "thoughts of recent switchers" ... a noble discussion of issues or insights that the "newly converted" have.
Click to expand...

Glad I'm not the only one that noticed that... ;)

Well, it's a whole week since I've had my iMac and maybe a time for some reflection.

1) I'm sold.
Converted.
I am Uncle Steve's bitch from here-on in. I love this computer. I love this OS.

2) I've found my first two Leopard bugs! Yay! I popped my Leopard cherry! I can't "unhide" QuickTime from the dock and I can't turn off system sounds like when you delete a file. Will the sun come up in the morning...?

3) At work (where we use XP Pro) I've been trying to use Mac keyboard shortcuts all day. Talk about annoying :eek:

4) Talking of keyboards- this really is something special. I'm a pretty competent typist at the best of times, but this is outstanding.

5) Mighty Mouse. It's alright. Nothing more.

6) Why, when there are two "delete" keys on the keyboard do I have to CMD & Del to delete files?

7) Why, when I've downloaded a bunch of pictures in one folder from deviantArt, and I want to skim through with Coverflow/QuickLook can I not delete them without it highlighting the parent folder instead of the next file?

8) The Mosaic screensaver. That's nothing short of snazzy!

9) Made my first iMovie project last night using pictures and clips of my nephews along with a Daft Punk track- great fun and a great tool.

10) Spaces. It's a close second with oxygen for me. How did I manage without it?
 
Leon Kowalski said:
Apple is never gonna do anything in a timely fashion. They
finally put FW800 in all iMacs, in August '07 -- just in time
for it to be outpaced by the speed of modern disk drives.

The mini is a classic example of Apple's form-before-function
fetish for "cute" packages. They shaved a few mm from the
footprint by using slow, low-capacity, low-reliability, notebook
drives (that cost twice as much per GB as Real™ hard drives).

Mini customers apparently don't care about HDD performance,
(except for Bill and Karolyn, who like it just the way it is).

The mini's FW400 port is good for 35MB/s-40MB/s, tops;
eSata is good for whatever the drive can deliver -- that's
about 100MB/s-120MB/s for modern 3.5" drives.



Bill & Karolyn don't want a 3x performance increase.


No, eSATA is not "taking off." It took off several years ago,
and has been the de facto industry standard for quite a
while -- but as usual, Cupertino "didn't get the memo."

Just check out the external enclosure selection on Newegg.com:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...&N=2010090092+1053807123+1054107131&name=SATA

- products with Firewire ..... 15 of 172 = 9%
- products with eSATA ..... 104 of 172 = 60%

And about half of those firewire enclosures are FW400 only.

Hint: Prolly not a good idea to hold your breath while waiting
for a FW3200 external enclosure or external hard drive.


...Fast. It's not for everyone.

LK
Click to expand...




do u know if they have firewire 800 external cases yet ?
 
I know this is amazing to some here - but Apple has actually picked up on the fact that some people actually value some things over "fastest" and "expandability" and "cheapest". Myself and the OP included. It is a lot of fun to see so many posts on these forums everyday of more and more people that are seeing that same value.

:)
 
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