Migrating from PC to MAC...

[MoreCowbell]

I made a couple of posts on here a while ago about XP(and Vista) Vs. Mac and you guys were extremely helpful and insightful. I decided to table my decision for a while, but my notebook is finally showing signs of age, so I’ve decided to open up the topic again.

I have heard a lot of raves about the new MacBooks and I am leaning in that direction. Some questions about making the changeover though...

1) I am a VERY HEAVY Office User. I use Excel daily, my life is on Outlook and I use word and PowerPoint frequently. All of these files have been created on Office XP. I am constantly editing these documents. How easy will migration be? Will I have a problem? Can I simply open my files on the Mac version of office? Can I then edit on both platforms?

2) How can I transfer to Mac Based Outlook without erasing all my contacts, email, etc? I am on a Blackberry Exchange Server. Will this effect my Blackberry at all?

3) I have a TON of pictures. The albums are all located in separate folders in XP. Will I be able to easily migrate and open my photos on the Mac?

4) My music. I have a few thousand songs. They are on my hard disk. Some are also on my ipod. How can I move everything to Mac and ensure I lose nothing? Also, how can I now pair the ipod to Mac without resetting it?

5) Will the Mac have all the internet plug-ins that I need?

6) Will my existing external hard-drive, that I use as a backup, be compatible with the Mac without reloading it?

Any other migration issues you can think of?

Thanks in advance!!!

[vladinecko]

Apple designed the Mac with people like you in mind. that is, people that are switching from Windows and are not sure how stuff will work now. they developed tools and guides to help you do that transition very easy. In the worst case, you don't even have to do anything, just bring your PC to an Apple store and they'll do everything for you.

but to answer your questions:

1) actually, the Office for Mac (2004) has received better reviews than the one from Windows. but to your question, you will need absolutely no conversions of any kind to view your Office documents on either Mac or PC.

2) Outlook for Mac is called Entourage. I believe when you first run it, it asks you if you want to transfer your account from Outlook. if it doesn't, there is a ton of tutorials out there as well as their help file is very good. the transition will be very easy! as for the Blackberry server, since it's just a matter of setting it up as your mail server, this shouldn't affect anything either (should be same setup as on your PC).

3) Absolutely! your new mac will come reinstalled with iPhoto (http://www.apple.com/ilife/iphoto/) which will help you organize all your pics with an ease. just choose import photos from the menu and that's it. in addition to iPhoto, you can always install an image viewer of your choice, there is plenty to choose from.

4) to transfer your music, just copy it on the Mac, launch iTunes and add them to your library. iTunes for Windows is a 100% replica of iTunes for Mac so you'll find it very easy to use. Not sure about the iPod (i don't have one) but I'm sure there is a help file discussing this issue.

5) Depends which one you get. All new Macs come with Ethernet (internet) ports and 54g wireless cards.

6) Mac OS X can read pretty much any file system (well, not any) but external hard drives are usually formatted in FAT32 file system and that will basically be plug-n-play on your new Mac.

you can find a pretty nice summary about this here:
http://www.apple.com/macosx/switch/

[MoreCowbell]

Originally Posted by vladinecko

Apple designed the Mac with people like you in mind. that is, people that are switching from Windows and are not sure how stuff will work now. they developed tools and guides to help you do that transition very easy. In the worst case, you don't even have to do anything, just bring your PC to an Apple store and they'll do everything for you.

but to answer your questions:

1) actually, the Office for Mac (2004) has received better reviews than the one from Windows. but to your question, you will need absolutely no conversions of any kind to view your Office documents on either Mac or PC.

2) Outlook for Mac is called Entourage. I believe when you first run it, it asks you if you want to transfer your account from Outlook. if it doesn't, there is a ton of tutorials out there as well as their help file is very good. the transition will be very easy! as for the Blackberry server, since it's just a matter of setting it up as your mail server, this shouldn't affect anything either (should be same setup as on your PC).

3) Absolutely! your new mac will come reinstalled with iPhoto (http://www.apple.com/ilife/iphoto/) which will help you organize all your pics with an ease. just choose import photos from the menu and that's it. in addition to iPhoto, you can always install an image viewer of your choice, there is plenty to choose from.

4) to transfer your music, just copy it on the Mac, launch iTunes and add them to your library. iTunes for Windows is a 100% replica of iTunes for Mac so you'll find it very easy to use. Not sure about the iPod (i don't have one) but I'm sure there is a help file discussing this issue.

5) Depends which one you get. All new Macs come with Ethernet (internet) ports and 54g wireless cards.

6) Mac OS X can read pretty much any file system (well, not any) but external hard drives are usually formatted in FAT32 file system and that will basically be plug-n-play on your new Mac.

you can find a pretty nice summary about this here:
http://www.apple.com/macosx/switch/

Vlad…Thank you so much for taking the time to answer my post…It is very much appreciated.

In response to your responses!!!

1) Wouldn’t Office 2004 be quite old? Is there a new Version coming out? What is the cost of the suite? More importantly. Can I continuously edit my doc on both a Mac and PC? Example, edit at night at home on my mac and then open in the next day on pc and edit again? Basically, can I got back and forth?

2) My outlook info is stored on a 3rd party exchange server. Entourage can simply sync up to this with no problem?!?!? That’s awesome!!!

3) So, the Mac can look at my external hard-drive, that I use as a backup with my XP laptop and use the same files?
4) Cool!!!
5) What I meant by plug-ins were video play, music player, Active-X, stuff like that…
6) Excellent!!!

THANKS AGAIN!!!

BTW Vlad…You going to get a 335?

[Hunter399]

Your making a very smart move, enjoy!

[vladinecko]

no problem!

1) office 2004 for Mac came out about a year after office 2003 for windows did and that's basically how microsoft keeps releasing them. the prices should be comparable to windows version. you can definitely do edits back and forth between mac and pc. it is the same application so you'll have absolutely no problems. you can look up pricing, upgrades and other info here:
http://www.microsoft.com/macoffice/

2) yeah, entourage can definitely sync up with the exchange server, that should be no problem whatsoever (both made by MS).

3) yup, plug-n-play, basically.

5) well, active-x will [thankfully] not work on your mac. it is an IE and Windows only proprietary technology full of security holes, bugs, etc.
as far as video and music files go, QuickTime will handle most of embedded music and video content, however, I would recommend installing a little application called Flip4Mac (http://www.flip4mac.com/) and downloading the free version of the plug-in. What it will do is make all your Windows Media Video files playable in Quicktime (including browser support).

Also, you might find some pages not loading properly under Mac's built-in browser Safari. just like with Office, Firefox for Mac is exactly the same (in most parts) as Firefox for Windows so you shouldn't have any problems when using the browser.

hope this helps.

i'm still contemplating on whether to get the Z4 coupe or 335. i still have about 3 years to decide before i'm ready to trade my 330 in though so hopefully i'll have it figured out by then.

[MoreCowbell]

Do they make Internet Explorer for the MAC? What is the most complete browser out there?

Also, which MacBook do you recommend? I don't travel all that much, so weight is not really a concern. I do use it in bed a lot.

[bimmer4me]

Originally Posted by gluck75

Vlad…Thank you so much for taking the time to answer my post…It is very much appreciated.

In response to your responses!!!

1) Wouldn’t Office 2004 be quite old? Is there a new Version coming out? What is the cost of the suite? More importantly. Can I continuously edit my doc on both a Mac and PC? Example, edit at night at home on my mac and then open in the next day on pc and edit again? Basically, can I got back and forth?

2) My outlook info is stored on a 3rd party exchange server. Entourage can simply sync up to this with no problem?!?!? That’s awesome!!!

3) So, the Mac can look at my external hard-drive, that I use as a backup with my XP laptop and use the same files?
4) Cool!!!
5) What I meant by plug-ins were video play, music player, Active-X, stuff like that…
6) Excellent!!!

THANKS AGAIN!!!

BTW Vlad…You going to get a 335?

1a) Office for the Mac retails for $400 and $500 for the Standard and Pro version respectivelly. I 99% sure Office 2004 is the latest version for the Mac.

1b) Yes, you can go back and forth seemlessly. You can always edit office files with the Mac version and/or the Windows version without any hassle. "It just works."

2) Again, I'm pretty sure Entourage will work with exchange. Try this link for more info.

3) yep!

4) yep!

5) Active-X stuff won't work, but so what. There are Mac versions for everything else.

6) yep!

Also, you can always dual boot into Windows for those 1 or 2 applications on Windows you still want to use (like games) if you have a version of XP you can install. You can buy software from Parallels to run Windows at the same time with OS X too if you want, but it costs something like $40.

[bimmer4me]

Originally Posted by gluck75

Do they make Internet Explorer for the MAC? What is the most complete browser out there?

Also, which MacBook do you recommend? I don't travel all that much, so weight is not really a concern. I do use it in bed a lot.

No, Microsoft stopped supporting Internet Explorer for the Mac.

If you do video or want a big screen in general get the 17" Mac Book Pro, otherwise I'd get the 15" Mac Book Pro.

[Hunter399]

I have internet explorer on my powermac
I like to use Firefox

[vladinecko]

Originally Posted by gluck75

Do they make Internet Explorer for the MAC? What is the most complete browser out there?

Also, which MacBook do you recommend? I don't travel all that much, so weight is not really a concern. I do use it in bed a lot.

as bimmer4me said, i believe the last version of IE for mac is 5.2 and that's really ancient. safari, firefox or netscape would probably be your best bets.

which macbook is a tough question. i'm in the market for a new one myself and i'm just going to wait till august (going to WWDC in san fran) to see if there will be a new revision of the Macbook Pro. remember this is their absolutely new product line-up, so just like the first year production run of E90, there are some bugs and issues with it that will most probably be eliminated by their second revision. right now, their main concerns are overheating and battery swelling.

once i'm ready to buy, i'm going to go for the 2.16Ghz 15" Macbook Pro or one level lower than that (2.06 i guess). if you're not looking for power just go with a lower configuration. however, since you're doing a lot of Word processing and office kind of work, I wouldn't recommend the Macbook (white or black) as it only has a 13.3" screen which might be a little small for you.

you should just go to an Apple store and play around with them and see which one fits you best.

[bimmer4me]

Yeah, and get the new rumored 12GB iPod nano coming out in the Fall too! With that iPod, your e90 and your MacBook you'll STYLING!!!!!

[jflecha]

You can now run windows on the new Macbooks, its called BootCamp http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=303572.
You can dual boot either into Windows or OS X, this might make your transition a little easier.

Altough MS Office 04 for the Mac uses Entourage for e-mail which I use at work because we use an exchange mail server, you can also use Apple's mail app which I use at home with my ISP.

Entourage is no Outlook.

[MoreCowbell]

Whats amazing to me is that every time we discuss Mac Vs Windows...we never see any Windows supporters...

Any out there?

[whippersnapper]

gluck, your only issue might be speed until a universal binary of Office for the Mac appears. I was playing around with a Macbook at the Apple Store and it was kinda slow in office apps. That won't be a permanent problem however.

I use XP at the office and OSX at home and have no problems with editing the same documents with office on both platforms.

we also have a couple of people in the office with Macbook Pro on our network and syching to the exchange server with entourage no problems.

I switched to Mac a year ago and I am like a reformed smoker, selling the Mac to anyone I meet. It is a night and day thing.

[MoreCowbell]

Originally Posted by whippersnapper

gluck, your only issue might be speed until a universal binary of Office for the Mac appears. I was playing around with a Macbook at the Apple Store and it was kinda slow in office apps. That won't be a permanent problem however.

I use XP at the office and OSX at home and have no problems with editing the same documents with office on both platforms.

we also have a couple of people in the office with Macbook Pro on our network and syching to the exchange server with entourage no problems.

I switched to Mac a year ago and I am like a reformed smoker, selling the Mac to anyone I meet. It is a night and day thing.

I just need that last kick in the ass to actually do it.

Any "Must-Have accessories"...Like the Sport Package on the E90?

[PaPaGz]

I know I changed from a PC to a MAC and I couldn't be happier. No crashing, no viruses, and seems like a faster processor as well even though my PC stated a faster one... you're making a great choice

[bimmer4me]

Originally Posted by gluck75

I just need that last kick in the ass to actually do it.

Any "Must-Have accessories"...Like the Sport Package on the E90?

A hammer to destroy your existing Windoze machine!

[vladinecko]

Originally Posted by bimmer4me

A hammer to destroy your existing Windoze machine!

[MoreCowbell]

How is Web-Surfing on the Mac? Similiar I imagine....

[just4kickz]

i didnt read the entire thread but personally i think PC's are better in some ways where MACs are a bit lacking. I mean I've built my own computers and from that I can say that upgrading it and problem solving are alot easier than on macs. A friend of mine actually once asked me to help fix her MAC... I opened it up and tried to run to see if there were hardware problems n' stuff but I wasn't very familiar with the parts and therefore didn't do a very good job in fixing the problem... I mean maybe its just IMO but I think PCs are alot more easier to operate & control.... *shrugs*

[MoreCowbell]

Finally, a dissenting opinion!!!

[whippersnapper]

Originally Posted by gluck75

How is Web-Surfing on the Mac? Similiar I imagine....

if you use firefox, then exactly the same