LOL forgive me as i have just bought an Apple

h0ughy (David) · #1 20-10-2011, 09:59 PM

well the deal is done - i just bought myself an apple macbook air 11" with 4 gig memory and a 1.6dual core processor with 128 gig SSD and loin onboard (originally had snow leopard).

yes its second hand - yes i bought it from flea bay - yes i more or less have no idea what i got myself into.

My question is do i meed Microsoft office or will some other suite be enough?

Why did i buy this - good question? my excuse was that i needed a light computer to take flying with me to cairns etc - i am hoping that i can get everything working with my canon camera (40D or maybe one of the newer ones)

Oh and don't ask what i paid - i shudder but it was well under a grand LOL by a few dollars

i blame it on all the clouds we have had here

when i did compare around i made an educated guess considering the new series is out with the i5 processor. I have until January with new warranty

Omaroo (Chris Malikoff) · #2 20-10-2011, 10:17 PM

Why should you be forgiven David?

Have fun with it, and consider it a learning experience - something new and different. There are things you'll dislike about the system, and other things that will delight. Same for me when I use a PC from time to time.

Try out Apple's iWork suite first, before you go buy Office. You can download "Pages" (Apple's Word) for about $18 from the Apple App Store. THeir spreadsheet application is called "Numbers". Very intuitive and completely capable of outputting Microsoft-compliant export files.

I'm looking at a new MacBook Air next week too - the i5 11" version. It should fit in nicely with my fleet.

h0ughy (David) · #3 20-10-2011, 10:18 PM

Chris i have been a hardened WIn/Dos user since i was a teenager....way back in the 80's til now.

h0ughy (David) · #4 20-10-2011, 10:23 PM

yeah i was looking at all the costs involved with upspecing the machine - thats what convinced me that the money i outlaid for mine was worth it - in comparison to the new breed. ok it doesnt have the thunderpants port or the illuminati keyboard

but it was top of the range only in january of this year. My only concern is the battery - not really friendly to get changed since its built in but hey i will get used to it.

cmr (Chris) · #5 20-10-2011, 10:50 PM

before buying microsift office, or even iwork (which is great) look at the free openoffice suite - has os x version n does everything basic youd want ms office for - plus files are compatible ith ms office

http://www.openoffice.org/

h0ughy (David) · #6 20-10-2011, 11:09 PM

ok will do. Last time i used openoffice was version 1. didnt know they had a mac version

Octane (Humayun) · #7 20-10-2011, 11:45 PM

Congrats, and, welcome to the light side.

DPP/EOS Utility, PixInsight and Photoshop work beautifully.

H

dugnsuz (Doug) · #8 20-10-2011, 11:54 PM

Next - Mac Pro
http://www.apple.com/au/macpro/

Interested to hear from a lifelong PC devotee as how the Mac experience compares.

h0ughy (David) · #9 21-10-2011, 12:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dugnsuz

Next - Mac Pro
http://www.apple.com/au/macpro/

Interested to hear from a lifelong PC devotee as how the Mac experience compares.

goodness gracious what a price

janoskiss (Steve H) · #10 21-10-2011, 05:31 AM

The latest incarnation of OpenOffice is LibreOffice. You may like to try that.

But if you want either of those to work exactly like Microsoft Office, you will end up frustrated. The worst thing is that they look very much like MS-Office and to some extent they try to imitate it (as well as other office software, like remember wordperfect??) but they are not the same. So it's easy to forget you're not using MS-Word etc and then expect it to behave just like MS-Word.

They are good though; in many respects better than the MS products that still have the bugs in them that were annoying me in the pre-animated-paperclip days in the mid 1990's!! I've been a Linux user since 1999. Never looked back. But I am a nerd and mostly use computers as big calculators / computing machines, which is what they are. Modern Macs are great in my limited experience.

iceman (Mike) · #11 21-10-2011, 05:57 AM

MS Office for Mac is 'ok'. Though a bit like Google Docs. Works ok, but still not quite as good as the PC versions; especially Excel.

spacezebra (Petra) · #12 21-10-2011, 07:10 AM

Hi H

Welcome to the world of apple. I carry both the mac office and microsoft office on my macbook pro. No issues to date.

Cheers Petra d.

h0ughy (David) · #13 21-10-2011, 07:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by iceman

MS Office for Mac is 'ok'. Though a bit like Google Docs. Works ok, but still not quite as good as the PC versions; especially Excel.

Quote:

Originally Posted by spacezebra

Hi H

Welcome to the world of apple. I carry both the mac office and microsoft office on my macbook pro. No issues to date.

Cheers Petra d.

thanks both for the productive input. might have to have a good think about it as the hdd is limited and needs to have astro stuff loaded

xstream (John) · #14 21-10-2011, 08:03 AM

Welcome aboard Dave. You will be looking to upgrade to a MacBook Pro in no time at all.

Funny enough, I don't think I will ever go back to a pc.

Octane (Humayun) · #15 21-10-2011, 11:39 PM

David,

Look at Pages, Numbers and Keynote. Beautiful, beautiful applications.

Lots of fun to use, too.

I did my AAIC presentation entirely in Keynote.

H

gbeal · #16 22-10-2011, 02:56 PM

Count me in as well, die-hard to the core, never go back. Only PC I own is the one I use at the pure and only because it works so well with Maxim etc. Yes I could run VMWare if I wanted, but an ugly old PC sitting out in the dew and cold, doesn't really worry me.
Everything else we have is Mac, and I can count about 6 at this stage.
Take your time with it Huff, you'll love it.
Gary

h0ughy (David) · #17 28-10-2011, 10:23 PM

ok here is my first post from the macbook air. geez its hard to drive - i am trying to load software on it - my goodness what a learning curve

Steffen · #18 28-10-2011, 11:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by h0ughy

ok here is my first post from the macbook air. geez its hard to drive - i am trying to load software on it - my goodness what a learning curve

With years of Windows baggage under your belt I bet it's more of an unlearning curve

In some situations, when you can't figure out how to do something, it helps to ask yourself "what would a completely computer-illiterate person try first?"

Cheers
Steffen.

marki · #19 29-10-2011, 12:35 AM

The more I look at the components use to build Macs these days the more I think thats just PC hardware at an extravagant price

.

Mark

Octane (Humayun) · #20 29-10-2011, 01:33 AM

David,

All you have to do, typically, is drag a downloaded application to your Applications folder.

To delete/uninstall an application, you simply drag it to your desktop from within your Applications folder, and it takes care of itself.

H