InGeniusBlog.com

Oddly, I’ve ended up with a Mac.

I’ve been a committed PC user since 1984, and have built my whole career on PC’s - but last fall I needed a cheap laptop in a hurry while on a business trip - and the cheapest laptop in the store was a Mac! So, what the heck, I decided to try it. I bought a 12″ iBook with a 30G hard disk, and 1G of RAM. It’s a nice, small, solid, well designed, fun-to-use machine.

So… have I switched? Nope - I still have a PC on my desk, and at home as my main home PC, but the laptop serves well as my “road” PC, and a great PC to use on the couch while Dale watches Coronation street every night!

So, how’s it been? I have to say I’m impressed. It is a joy to use - and there’s some really great Mac software out there. The wireless components are terrific - nicely integrated with the OS and entirely within the PC. The Mac version of MS Office is solid, and extremely compatible with PC’s. It’s fun to use a new OS as well. Everything is similar to what you’re used to, but different. It’s nice that the OS is built on BSD Unix - you’ve got a powerful underlying OS, and a really nice GUI on top.

It’s opened quite a few doors and ideas for me as well - there’s a ton of terrific Mac software that has no PC equivalent - I’ve ended up creating some cool PC software (Etherwatch, for instance) by copying a Mac app or two. And, it’s resulted in me losing 20lbs (so far) and re-organizing my business life completely - but that’s another post.

It’s nice to have a small, really portable laptop as well - I never hesitate to toss it in my bag - though I get some odd looks when I haul it out in meetings.

So, I’m not quite a Mac-head, but I’m a convert none-the-less…