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First Week with a MacBook

Posted on August 18, 2007 by Jeremy Toeman

Back in high school and college, the provided computers were all Macs, but I always had PCs at home – most of which I built myself. After leaving school I picked up a Toshiba Tecra laptop, and have stuck with Windows-based laptops ever since. I’d put myself into the “power user” territory, with Windows experience dating back to my first installation of 3.0, from floppies. Over that time my feelings about Macs have waxed and waned, but I was always one of those guys who couldn’t ever picture myself switching, not for any negative reason, just that PCs worked for me.

Along came Sony with their VGN-SZ460N Vaio laptop, powered by (and I use the term loosely) Microsoft Vista, Business Edition. In 10 short weeks, that combination has dropped about $1100 squarely into Apple’s hands, and unless some phenomenal shift occurs, I don’t see myself switching back anytime soon (and I’m not the only one). Granted, it’s only a single week, and no, I’m not gushingly in love with OS X or anything, but I am so much less frustrated than I was with the Vaio.

Let’s start on the negatives, the things I (so far) don’t like about the MacBook/OS X:

  • Terribly inconsistent and lacking keyboard shortcuts. I was so used to Alt-F, N for “new …” and there’s no equivalent here. Further, every different app uses a different combination of alt-arrow, ctrl-arrow, apple-arrow to skip words left/right. My friend Michael Gartenberg pointed me to this article on how mouse usage is faster than keyboard shortcuts, but it’s almost twenty years old now and I don’t think it’s accounting for the expertise one gains after 10+ years of doing anything.
  • No hard drive activity light. I’m a big multitasker, and often launch a few applications simultaneously, and however sluggish Vista might be, the HDD light is a handy way to know how busy the computer is. I’ve often found myself wondering if the Mac is doing something, idle, etc.
  • Can’t open the screen to 180 degrees. However terrible (and its terrible) the Vaio may be, it can be opened such that the screen is totally flat. I’m sure the designers had a reason – I just don’t know what it is.
  • Proprietary video connectors and no card readers. What the heck is this silly mini-DVI thing, and where’s an SD slot?
  • Files, folders, and applications. When I install something, why do I have to drag and drop it into Applications? How come ‘save as’ requires two different pull-downs to pick a location to save a file? It just seems like the objective to simplify has created extra burden for those of us who really want an organized file system.
  • Missing NTFS integration. This seems like a bit of a “childish” development decision, OS X is way too incompatible with the Windows file system. I hooked up my Drobo and my Seagate FreeagentGo drives, and neither worked well (if at all). Considering how much Apple is trying to get people to switch (successfully) you’d think they’d make this work properly.
  • Right click? I know it’s there, but c’mon…
  • I also don’t like the iCal/Mail/”meh” combo, but that’s really a comparison of Office, so I’ll hold off for now.

Now for the things I do like:

  • Sleep/resume. Oh my, is this impressive. In fact, coming out of sleep mode is so fast and works so well, the guys in Redmond should be utterly ashamed at how bad a job Vista does. It’s actually a very empowering feeling, knowing that if I need something off the computer, I can simply open it up, and in a few seconds, there it is. All computing should be this elegant and work this reliably.
  • Force quitting really quits. No, OS X is not immune to crashes, I’ve seen quite a few already. But, when I force quit something, it actually goes away, and does it instantly. When I relaunch it, the application loads fresh. Vista again, doesn’t even come close in this regards.
  • Parallels. Despite some weird glitch that had me waste about 4 hours on the first install, it’s otherwise one of the most impressive pieces of software I’ve ever used, on any computer, ever. It’s so well integrated I am surprised it was built by a third-party, and am surprised that Apple hasn’t bought em (maybe MS should!).
  • Battery life and performance. As far as I am aware, this ~$1100 MacBook has the same CPU, RAM, and screensize as my $2500 Vaio, yet it appears to run about 25% faster for multitasking or running comparable applications. The battery is 45-90 minutes longer (easily) and in standby it’s not even comparable. Last weekend I went away camping, and put both into sleep mode at the same time. When I got home, the Mac had about 3 hrs of juice left, the Vaio had shut itself down into Hibernate after having 5% battery life left.

That’s where I am so far. I haven’t really tried iLife or iWork yet at all. I’ve spent most of the time in transition and getting comfortable with the new interfaces. I’m still “uncomfortable” with a lot of the OS X nuances. But I am using a computer that I’d call reliable, and that alone is worth the $1500 LESS I had to spend on the MacBook than I did on the Sony. Check please!

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Posted in General | 13 Comments
« ==Thanks
Canon, can you please slow it down? »

13 thoughts on “First Week with a MacBook”

  1. Ricky says:
    August 18, 2007 at 10:21 am

    An interesting post, for sure. I found myself in a similar position last Thanksgiving, as my Toshiba laptop died on me for the 4th time in 2 years, I was shopping. I picked up a cheap G3 Powerbook, just to play with the OS, and while really intrigued, I found the “sleep” thing annoying, but most of all, when it came down to it, the new Macbooks were almost exactly 2x more expensive than the exact same processor and other spec’d Gateway that I picked up, and I was able to get a 3-year replacement warranty on the Gateway, still under half what the Macbook would have cost.

    Reply
  2. Ed Kohler says:
    August 18, 2007 at 10:44 am

    Great analysis, Jeremy. I wish they’d get around to putting a 2-button clicker on the Macbook.

    Reply
  3. Richard Cole says:
    August 18, 2007 at 11:35 am

    Check out Activity Monitor which will give you more info than a hard drive light.

    Reply
  4. jonathanpberger says:
    August 18, 2007 at 11:46 am

    A few tips:
    – KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS: install Quicksilver (lots of good documentation around here), a free and robust CLI launcher, and use the “triggers” to assign yr own (scopable!) keyboard shortcuts. Absolutely killer.
    – HD ACTIVITY LIGHT: you’ll find the Activity Monitor app in /Applications/Utilities. Set it stay in the dock and right-click to make the “Dock Icon > Show CPU History” for a read on what your processor(s) are doing at a glance. You probably also want to set it to launch on startup (System Prefs > Accounts > Login Items). iStat’s Menubar is another option.
    – I’d never noticed that keyboard controls for text navigation aren’t consisant; there’re a few quirks across different browsers, but generally option-arrow moves bw words and cmd-arrow moves to the front or back of a line. Also, try resting yr left-hand pinky and ring finger on the Fn/Ctrl keys. With yr right hand on the arrows/mouse, you’ll be able to move around (and right-click) with ease. (Check out the Fn/Arrow key combos–lots of useful stuff in there.)

    Reply
  5. jonathanpberger says:
    August 18, 2007 at 11:52 am

    More:
    – the dock belongs on the RH side of the screen (Putting the dock on bottom by default is cute, but why eat up screen real estate on the shorter dimension?), no magnification (moving targets are harder to hit) and no disappearing (the dock is great for drag-and-dropping a file onto an app, esp when you want to preview a jpg in preview instead of photoshop).
    – in most “Save” dialogs cmd-shift-A for “Applications”, cmd-shift-D for “Desktop”, and cmd-shift-h for “Home folder”. HUGE timesaver.
    – in the finder, cmd-1, cmd-2, and cmd-3 toggle bw icon, list and column view. REALLY speeds up file browsing when you can change to the most appropriate view on the fly.

    Reply
  6. tivoboy says:
    August 19, 2007 at 11:06 am

    I DO often use the 180 degress on my thinkpads, for when travelling in coach and I want to put the screen up, I just hold the laptop on the table and the screen sits right up in front of me. Now that I am no longer a 1K, I spend a BIT more time in coach?

    🙂

    Works as a nice presenter.

    Reply
  7. Dave Zatz says:
    August 19, 2007 at 2:42 pm

    Configure the touch pad to two fingers on it + click = right click. Also any external mouse will right click as you expect. I’ve had a hard time with the ergonomics of keyboard cut&paste on the Mac versus PC. A universal file system (other than FAT) for shared external storage would be nice.

    Reply
  8. Ben Drawbaugh says:
    August 19, 2007 at 2:50 pm

    Nice write-up, I couldn’t agree more about the inconsistent keyboard shortcuts and no right mouse button, but the multi-touch touchpad more than makes up for it.

    As for NTFS, they have to license it from MS, which would be nice, but who knows how probably that is. The read drive they use now is from open source projects, which also don’t have write support. You’re best bet is to use HFS+ and MacDrive, which I’ve had good success with.

    I think the Application installation process in ingenious, a program files directory and installers for everything seems archaic.

    I’ll also add, no built-in 3G wireless option and when the last window in an application closes the application should quit.

    Reply
  9. James says:
    August 19, 2007 at 2:56 pm

    The cool things about the drag and drop installation is that when you want to uninstall the program, you just hit delete in the applications. Usually, there’s no long uninstall process where you have hunt down deleting registry information or other external files. It’s all right there in the applications folder — very simple.

    The drag and drop makes me more at ease knowing exactly what I’m copying over and what I’m actually changing on my mac. In windows installs, who knows what else they are installing and changing!

    Reply
  10. Jeremy Toeman says:
    August 19, 2007 at 10:21 pm

    re HDD light: I can’t explain the real motivation, but I really like a physical light for it, not the onscreen indicator. I have activity monitor and “mini-meters” installed, still not the same.

    Jonathan – GREAT tips all around, thanks, esp comments on the Dock

    Dave – thanks for the “right click”

    Ben/James – MacDrive still isn’t making my NTFS drives more accessible. Also, I agree with you that the program files concept is archaic, but it’s still not intuitive to drag&drop new installs to Applications.

    Also, I have to say – the import into iPhoto was awful. I have >7000 “uncategorized” photos that were perfectly organized into folders on my NAS. The great presentation factors do not outweigh that obvious blunder IMHO.

    Reply
  11. Thomas Caleshu says:
    August 20, 2007 at 10:22 pm

    Menu Meters 1.3

    Changed my life, can’t live without it. A simple utility that places status icons in the menu bar for hard drive activity, CPU usage (as 0-100% or timeline graph or both), network throughput, memory used/available.

    Seriously – if you want to know what’s going on inside your computer, this will tell you far more than a simple blinking HDD light…
    -t

    Reply
  12. David Badash says:
    August 27, 2007 at 6:49 am

    Interesting that the list of negatives is twice the size as the list of positives! My first computer was a Mac Performa, more than 10 (12?) years ago. I made the switch to Windows after that, and had a Gateway and then 2 Dells and an IBM (all laptops.) I am now on my second in a row Mac laptop (PowerBook G4 followed 2 months ago by a MacBook Pro.)

    Secretly, I think I prefer Windows. But I also enjoy formatting my hard drive, and I try out a ton of shareware. (I also pay for what I keep!)

    For either platform, I truly believe that with few exceptions, there is an application/script/keyboard shortcut/tweak that will improve functionality for any desire. You just have to find the one you want. (Feel free to contact me if you have a question/want to know how to do something, or if there is an “add-on” you’re looking for and can’t find.)

    My only 2 “complaints”? (1) I miss Outlook. Nothing comes close, and I will probably go the Parallells route to add it. (Way pricey to buy Parallells + Windows OS + MS Office.) (2) The Windows GUI/hand-to-mouse environment is a little more precise. Mac’s OS to me has always felt a little “klunky.”

    Reply
  13. Pingback: » I’m a failure as a Mac evangelist » Ben Drawbaugh

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About

Jeremy Toeman is a seasoned Product leader with over 20 years experience in the convergence of digital media, mobile entertainment, social entertainment, smart TV and consumer technology. Prior ventures and projects include CNET, Viggle/Dijit/Nextguide, Sling Media, VUDU, Clicker, DivX, Rovi, Mediabolic, Boxee, and many other consumer technology companies. This blog represents his personal opinion and outlook on things.

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