The Other Side of the Fence

I have taken the plunge.

I have joined the few, the proud… the Mac owners.

A MacBook Pro, to be exact.

In order to aid my work at DIY Themes — not to mention to further connect myself to the Internet — I wanted to get a laptop. Getting a Mac seemed the logical choice –Windows doesn’t seem to be doing it for me anymore and frankly, I didn’t want to get a super-powerful computer just so Windows could run without being in the way.

Going on the combined input over time from David Baker, Colin Walker, and Chris Pearson, I opted for a Mac; and today at Best Buy, I dove in.

The Vitals

Okay, I know you want to know just what sort of machine I bought, and I will say that unless they were hiding some Macs somewhere else, I walked out of that store with the second-best MacBook they sold — the only one that bested mine had a larger screen. I don’t do much in the way of graphic design or media editing, so I “sacrificed” the screen size.

  • 2.5GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor (6MB shared level 2 cache)
  • 2GB of 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM
  • 250GB 5400-rpm hard drive
  • 15.4-inch widescreen display (1440 by 900 pixels)
  • NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT with 512MB of GDDR3 memory
  • iSight video camera built-in
  • 8x SuperDrive (reads and writes DVDs and CDs)

And more.

There are a few things I’d still like to get for it — most notably a wireless mouse. Overall, though, I’m very pleased with it. Now I just have to get used to using it!

7 thoughts on “The Other Side of the Fence”

  1. I also think of migrating to Macintosh. I never used that one for a longer time but I’m fed of constantly crashing or hanging up Windows XP and updates that do nothing but induce even more crap into the OS.

  2. Hey Rick,
    Congratulations on your seeing the light! I’ve been an avid Mac user since 1984 (yep, I got the first one!) and can say without a doubt that they are the best machines for the money. They last forever…my son is using a 6-year-old Powerbook now.

    I’ll be glad to point you in the right direction on software, etc if you wish.

    And thank you for all your help on the Thesis forums!

    Latest from Mike Nichols: Normal Worry vs Generalized Anxiety Disorder

  3. You’re going to love Mac, Rick. I got an iMac as a retirement gift to myself about a year and a half ago, after being a Windows user since Windows existed, and I love it. You can also run Windows on it, as you probably know, using a variety of tools. I use VMware Fusion personally.

    Came upon your blog through the Thesis support forums. You are doing an incredible job there. My appreciation to you.

  4. Rippa! I love macs. Although, I will admit that I’m softening on the topic of Windows machines. They are susceptible to viruses and generally have a lot more problems than most Macs, but if people can make them do what they need to do, then okay.

    Anywho, I’m sure that when you get to know your way around, you’ll love it. I have a list of good (free) Mac apps on my links page if you’re interested. I used to run a completely free/open source machine, but I’ve got a couple non-free ones now, like Coda, so I should probably update the list sometime.

  5. Rick!!
    We have the same machine!!! At least I think we do, I’m not sure about all those details exactly. I am SO pleased and happy for you (us). I didn’t know you were even in the market. In fact, I thought they were scary : ) . How did you get past it?
    There’s not much to not like, ay? I haven’t found anything so far, though I’ve struggled a little with iPhoto. I ended up installing 2 additional photo and image editors. I’m going to look at Kristarella’s list of Mac apps.
    I see in the comments at http://www.diythemes.com/thesis//version-101-release/ a link to your custom sheet, with some code for customizing the captions in WP 2.6.
    Then I see at http://www.yoast.com/wordpress-26/ another way to style the captions.
    I get confused with the class and id thing, as you know. The code at yoast could just be inserted right into the content section of the css, would that be right?

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