iSwitched to Mac After 25 Years of PC

When you finally bite the bullet and do something you've been putting off forever, it's never as bad as you thought it would be. Sometimes, you kick yourself for not having done it sooner.

I remember my folks taking me to the country one summer and dumping me with a camp full of kids I didn't know. I was terrified. Then the baseball league started. I hit homers. My team won. I was the star. I met a girl. I never wanted to leave.

Yup, growing up is a lot like that. Safe, comfortable things turn out to be a problem after a while. Terrifying new things turn out to be awesome.

Come to think of it, being a successful executive or business owner is a lot like that too. If you don't challenge the status quo and get outside your comfort zone, you're doomed to mediocrity.

Then again, sometimes the status quo sucks so bad you want to destroy it with a sledge hammer and try something new. If you read So Long PC, It's Been Real, you know what I'm talking about.

I've been around computers for over thirty years, from IBM mainframes to Sun workstations. I had a Compaq Portable II in 1987 and more than a dozen laptops since. I was part of that Wintel rollercoaster ride for a quarter century until that fateful day when my Sony Vaio notebook crapped out. That was it, the last straw.

As luck would have it, Apple's new 13" MacBook Air with OS X Lion launched the day before the Sony debacle, so after reading the reviews and taking a day to mull over the big switch, I took a deep breath, placed my order, and waited.

Three days later, the FedEx guy delivered my three-pound baby, all the way from Shanghai. I set it up, transferred everything over from the PC, and 48 hours later, posted my first non-PC generated piece of work in 25 years: Why Getting Fired Can Be the Best Thing For You.

Sure, there have been a few challenges, like some glitches with the new OS and figuring out that Adobe Flash was sucking 30% if my battery life, but overall, the experience has been a lot like that time in summer camp. Here are the highlights of my big switch from PC to the new MacBook Air:

• The simplicity and intuitiveness of Apple's software and design, along with the new Migration Assistant you'll hear about it a minute, made the setup and transition ridiculously easy. Also, the two platforms are more similar than different. That came as a real surprise.
• The Migration Assistant - that I think launched with the new Lion OS - seamlessly transfers all your files, user accounts, network and printer settings, preferences, internet favorites, pretty much everything, and translates them to the proper apps and utilities on the Mac. For example, my Outlook email, calendar, and contacts were all up and running on Apple Mail, iCal, and Address Book right out of the gate.
• Since I have limited Mac experience, I can't compare the new Lion OS to prior versions of Mac OS or to an iPad. But I can say that, compared to Windows, this OS is smart and intuitive. It seems to adjust to my behavior. I'm not exactly sure where all my user files are, but I always manage to find the right folder for the right application and, once I do, it always seems to show up from then on.
• Not to sound like some star-struck Apple fan boy, it would be disingenuous and idiotic to gloss over the most important facts: This is the lightest, thinnest, brightest, quietest (no disk drive and no fans I can hear), coolest (meaning it doesn't get hot, even in the sun), 13" notebook I've ever had.
• The battery life was a mystery until I did some poking around and found that Adobe Flash was sucking two to three hours out of every charge. So I installed the QuickToFlash extension - which lets you choose when you want to load Flash - and now I'm getting about 7 hours running a bunch of apps, including Microsoft Word, outdoors with the brightness at about three quarters. So I can pretty much work all day without plugging in. Sweet. TweetDeck also sucks the battery, FYI.
• Next to long battery life, the one thing that's been on my notebook wish list for years is a display that's really bright outdoors, even in direct sunlight. Now I can finally check that off the list. Love the display.
• The new trackpad does all the same stuff you can do with an iPhone and iPad touchscreen like swiping, scrolling, and pinching. I'm still getting used to it, but it's pretty amazing stuff. The only problem is that I keep accidentally doing a secondary click (lower right corner), so I'll have to play with that setting a bit to get comfortable with it.
• When I bought my wife's MacBook Pro a couple of years ago, I noticed that Safari was way faster on her Mac than IE was on my high-end, high-priced Sony. The same goes for this Air - web pages load really fast.
• Of course there have been a few issues. There was a problem getting gmail POP to work, but a trip to the Apple store and some debugging took care of that. Also, I'm not sure where my email archives ended up after the transfer, but I haven't looked too hard, so I'm sure they're around here somewhere. The biggest problem by far is the Flash battery drain; Adobe says they're working on it.
• For a writer / consultant who relies heavily on Word and PowerPoint, the hardest things to get used to are:
  
  • The delete key on this keyboard is actually a backspace key. I learned that fn-delete performs the PC delete function, but that's an unnatural, two-hand motion that slows me down.
  • Some control-key functions on the PC use the Mac's command key, and it's not the same for all apps.
  • Word and PowerPoint are different for the Mac, so it's just like learning a new release of Office.

Sure, there are loads of other cool features, like Finder, Launchpad, Mission Control, and the way Safari displays your top sites when you open a new tab, but those are all just icing on the cake.

You know, I can list off the top of my head the top 10 consumer electronics products I've owned that exceeded my expectations and materially improved my life over the past 30 years:

1. Sony 15" Trinitron TV with remote, c. '80 (lasted over 15 years)
2. Sony Betamax, c. '81
3. Sony Walkman - thin / light metal cassette, c. '80s
4. Sony CD player, c. '90s
5. Digital Equipment HiNote Ultra 486 - first thin and light notebook, c. '97
6. Tivo, c. '01
7. Olympus digital camera, c. '02
8. Panasonic 50" Plasma HDTV, c. '04
9. Apple iPod nano, c. '06
10. Apple iPhone 3GS, c. '09

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