Thinking of getting a MacBook Pro...have some newb questions

[Hi-Power Jack]

Laptops have a big portability advantage, but some disadvantages, also:

1. much more expensive than a desktop (needlessly unless you need a lot of portability)

2. I've found it much easier to use the mouse and keyboard

on a desktop

3. the fastest laptop is slower than a nice desktop.

If you don't need the portability, I'd suggest staying with a desktop?

Good luck.

Jack

[wgnoyes]

Well, I don't know what Chills has done yet, but I now have a 13.3" MacBook Pro i7.

Yeah, when I'm scoring a match, I always use an external keyboard. (You HAVE to; there's no numeric keypad on anything but the largest laptops!)

[Chills1994]

hey, Bill, here in the St. Louis area, we have a CPA guy who has done scoring for our bigger IDPA matches. He has a seperate 10 key keypad that I guess plugs into his Windows/PC laptop with Beach Bunny scoring. He absolutely flies with it. I am guessing that it plugs in via USB port.

let me/us know how things go with your new MacBook.

as far as laptop vs. desktop tower goes, I got rid of Charter for internet and cable TV. Instead I have AT&T for my cell phone and my air card. plus AT&T gives me a pretty good discount for both through my employer.

so my computer no longer has to be tied (stationary) to a wire coming out of the wall.

Edited May 1, 2011 by Chills1994

[wgnoyes]

I've got an old Targus usb 10key pad, as well, that I've used for monthly regular matches. For major matches, I bring along a full external keyboard. (In case I have to do any sort of regular typing and don't want to have to reach across the trackpad to the rear-mounted keyboard, which is true of ANY vendor's laptop.) Guess I'll go back and get the wired keyboard w/10key. (Apple really needs to make a wireless version of that to go with their non-10key version. Maybe the extra keys cause the unit to draw too much power? ) My sales weasel also wanted me to go without an external mouse at first. I don't know; I don't think that's going to last too long.

Right now, I'm looking at VMWare Fusion for my windows guest machine. They say they have a feature that'll take and copy over an entire windows PC into a guest machine on the mac. (As opposed to genning a whole new iteration of a windows box under VM.) That sounds ideal for the smaller XP laptop I currently use to score matches in the field. I could pare that machine down to the bare-bones minimum amount of installed stuff needed to run ezws and then just bring it over. We'll see.

Edited May 3, 2011 by wgnoyes

[wgnoyes]

Here is a good buying guide for Macs. Don't buy an iMac right now, they are about to update them. Once they update you can usually get a good deal on the previous model.

Brand new iMacs just announced. http://www.apple.com/imac/

Oh, and here's a resource for everyone. http://forums.macworld.com/ Looks familiar, huh?

Edited May 4, 2011 by wgnoyes

[Chills1994]

hot diggity dawg!!!

I amy sitting down on the sofa with my refurb'ed MacBook Pro sitting on the coffee table right now!

giggityity! giggity!

okay, all you Mac users how do I get this internet window to expand to full screen?

[Chills1994]

hmmn...okay, two more questions:

1. I downloaded the latest version of Adobe Flash Player, but YouTube vids still aren't playing...what gives? And I did install it, twice. Then got out of Safari entirely as per the flash download/install instructions and went to youtube and it still says I need to install the latest version of flash.

2. In my photobucket account, where I would normally click on the different links for a particular pic, and it would automatically say "copied" ...well, how do I do that now on this MacBook? It seems like I can't click on and scroll over to highlight that link.

Edited May 5, 2011 by Chills1994

[-JQ-]

Congrats on the new machine!

Ditch Safari and use Firefox browser. No adobe issues, well supported.

Not sure about photo bucket issue...maybe login issue??

One thing that is a bit different with win v Mac is the "feeling" of their windows regarding min/max/etc.

And don't forget you still have right click menus...I think many mac-users never learned to explore with the right button.

[maineshootah]

hmmn...okay, two more questions:

1. I downloaded the latest version of Adobe Flash Player, but YouTube vids still aren't playing...what gives? And I did install it, twice. Then got out of Safari entirely as per the flash download/install instructions and went to youtube and it still says I need to install the latest version of flash.

Did you update flash with Safari still running? I don't think it will let you do that.

Try this.

Go to safari, and download Firefox, install it.

Then try to watch the youtube vids in Firefox. This will tell you if it is a Safari issue or a flash issue.

[wgnoyes]

I initially couldn't see flash (the missing photo gallery on the front page of uspsa6.org was my clue) and fixed it with a safari plugin; I just don't remember the sequence of what I did.

Here's mine, running vmware fusion, and win7 prof contained therein, and the ONLY reason I'm doing that is for ezwinscore, as shown. (Not much of a picture, but that's what is running.)

I like safari, especially their Top Sites feature. I like it enough that I installed it on my win7 desktop, as well. And THAT'S going to go away eventually, too, in favor of a "just announced yesterday" 2011 iMac 21.5.

[wgnoyes]

...And don't forget you still have right click menus...I think many mac-users never learned to explore with the right button.

No problem there. Learn the trackpad gestures; they become intuitive VERY quickly. 2-finger click gets you the "right-click" pop-ups. 2-finger drag (I think) scrolls up and down and side to side.

Or, get an external mouse. Regular PC mice will supposedly run fine with OSX.

Edited May 5, 2011 by wgnoyes

[wgnoyes]

...okay, all you Mac users how do I get this internet window to expand to full screen?

There's actually no such thing as maximize on osx, it seems. The little green button is called a zoom button, and it's job is to size the application frame to ideally fit your screen size, accomodating the dock at the bottom. (You can resize the dock or even set it to auto-disappear if you like.) There are downloadable add-ons that let you change the function of the zoom button to maximize, but I'm going to start down that path. I'll rather learn to run the operating system as its intended and likely be happier in the long run.

[maineshootah]

...okay, all you Mac users how do I get this internet window to expand to full screen?

There's actually no such thing as maximize on osx, it seems. The little green button is called a zoom button, and it's job is to size the application frame to ideally fit your screen size, accomodating the dock at the bottom. (You can resize the dock or even set it to auto-disappear if you like.) There are downloadable add-ons that let you change the function of the zoom button to maximize, but I'm going to start down that path. I'll rather learn to run the operating system as its intended and likely be happier in the long run.

The Green "stop light" button will maximize the application to the screen.

If it does quite fit to the size you want, you can drag the bottom right corner (out/in) to get the size that you are looking for. Enabling Spaces in System Prefs will also help you manage your "windows" easier, as you can have a "space" setup for one activity, another "space" for another...

[Chills1994]

last night I was browsing youtube videos...yes, seriously, youtube, and I guess I inadvertently clicked on something and I had a "pop up"...well...pop up.

I tried to close that window but then another one popped up that said something stupid like "40 of your friends took the IQ test and scored lower than.... click here to take the test"

so I tried pressing ctrl+alt+del , like what I would normally do in windows.

no luck.

arrrghhh...

I finally just decided to hit the power button.

so what is the Mac equivalent to ctrl+alt+del ???

normally, in windows, I could just click on internet explorer to close once the applications/processes window would open up.

[wgnoyes]

Command-Q By-God closes the application you're in. The red X stoplight button actually just "minimizes" the application (hence the little white fuzzy dot below the app icon on the dock). You can always also hit the Apple at the top left and log off and log back on.

[-JQ-]

command + option + escape

[wgnoyes]

Okay, that REALLY by-god shuts down an app! Good to know.

[Chills1994]

thanks guys!

[Chills1994]

when I go to hit the internet back button, sometimes I will get a little window that pops down and says something like "Are you sure you want to send the form?"

Huh?

form....what form?

so I just hit Okay and it takes me back a page....anywhoo...just kind of a pain or inconvenience I'd like to get rid of.

thanks!

[wgnoyes]

is this safari or firefox or some other browser, and what page are you on when you hit back and get this?

(And I was at the Apple Store at Lenox Square friday afternoon. Packed even more than usual, and iPads were flying out the door left and right! They had also rearranged a bit to emphasize their current selling push, which is the new iMacs.)

Edited May 14, 2011 by wgnoyes

[Jadeslade]

that happens a lot in safari. like at brownells. use the history to go back where you want.

[Jadeslade]

You are a brave man to go to Lenox Mall on Friday afternoon. just the traffic is enough to make me pull over and read my newest Joe Pike novel on my so called smart phone

[-JQ-]

when I go to hit the internet back button, sometimes I will get a little window that pops down and says something like "Are you sure you want to send the form?"

Huh?

form....what form?

so I just hit Okay and it takes me back a page....anywhoo...just kind of a pain or inconvenience I'd like to get rid of.

thanks!

Web pages used be basically static. You request their page, it loads, you see it.

Now, mostly, "individual" pages you see on your screen are "built to order"...even though you didn't realize you requested a customized page. These may or may not be a "form" as you would typically think, filled out boxes, check boxes, or likewise. Cookies or other preferences may cause this as well...

So in many cases when you go back, you are making another request from the data and not entirely loading from your cache (previously viewed/saved) pages.

All that...and each browser handles code differently...different version of the same browser...uggg...and then a new version of code...then blah blah blah

That's the short answer

[Chills1994]

thanks JQ...

A buddy of mine sent me some email with a .wmv attached.

I went to download it but Quicktime won't play it.

So just now doing some google'ing I found this:

http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/video/flip4macwindowsmediacomponentsforquicktime.html

I am guessing that will work and it is safe???

[wgnoyes]

If they put it on the apple site, it should probably be good. You might also look in the App Store for something there as well. (I didn't know about this part of the apple site; thanks!)