OS X, A Space Oddysey
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
So about a week and a half ago, I dropped my once nice Dell XPS on the ground such that it hit in the right way as to damage the hard drive irreparably. Unfortunately, while the laptop could be repaired in three weeks for about $100, I was without a laptop during that time, and I had lost all my files for good.
So I managed to get a hold of a Macbook Air as my primary laptop. This means that I now have to use Mac OS X — 10.5.8, more specifically, for those who care. The first thing I did was mess with system preferences to get the dock the way I liked. The thing I love most about OS X is the dock. It took me awhile to learn how to handle the touchpad and single mouse button, but I got it down, and I’m having fun.
Also, you’d think I’d have shoved my Macbook Air into a manilla envelope by now, but unfortunately I haven’t found an envelope yet… :(
I downloaded Gimp and as my new picture editing software, Cyberduck as my FTP client, and after trying every single browser for the Mac, I settled on Opera as the fastest and best (although sometimes it doesn’t work with annoying websites). I then downloaded Songbird as my music player (Screw you, iTunes) and I downloaded Celestia just because it’s awesome.
I then ended up missing my Windows applications though, so I needed to figure out some way to run them — and I’m not going to Dual Boot because that takes too much time restarting my computer. I needed a solution — something like Wine, which is a program that allows Linux and Unix to run Windows programs… why doesn’t Mac OSX have Wine?
Oh wait! It does! If you have an Intel x86 chip (the new Macs do), you can run Wine just like the Linux people. Just download Wine and Wine Bottler and you can open and execute .exe’s just like Windows, and just as fast as if your computer was a real PC*. (*Note: Tested on only 1 Windows program.)
Initially I didn’t think as a hardcore Windows user for almost a decade that I would be able to survive OS X, but so far so good. A week in and now I’m enjoying OS X… And once you switch, you can’t go back!
A Mac is for life!
A Mac is for life!
Steve Jobs forever!
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Tsk tsk.
I dunno, I still can’t use Macs – and I’ve actually had a lot of access to non-sucky ones recently. Sure, GarageBand is cool, but the mouse and general quirks of the system always trip me up.
It just takes some getting used to, but it’s pretty awesome.