Transfers and Planning

[ceitfianna]

I have a new laptop and I'm enjoying switching over from one laptop to another without being in the midst of a crisis. Its rather relaxing. My new laptop is a MacBook Pro that's silver and has a 13 inch screen and is named Lark since she's light and quick. When I bought her, I got iWork and Microsoft Office for Mac while she has iLife and the normal Mac OS already installed. So far I've downloaded AIM, Firefox, Chrome and Dropbox, which I'll be upgrading as its a better way to transfer files than my external hard drive as that can't go from PC to Mac. I also need to figure out why my wireless router and my laptop don't seem to talk to each other, its probably something simple. Once I fill out a rebate form I'll get 100 dollars to spend at the app store and I need to introduce my iPod to the laptop. What's a pain is I actually have two accounts for iTunes and will be creating an Apple account, I really hope they figure out a way to merge them at some point.

So Mac users and lovers of my flist, what are your favorite programs and add ons that I should go find?

In other news, I had a fantastic visit with my parents and they left me with lots of great bottles of wine and a bottle of gin, as it gets hotter, I'll be having some gin and tonics. I drove them to the airport this morning and I'm currently finishing up some slide shows for Manga Mania, which is coming along really well. I love having a chance to go find images of heroes to share with kids.

I recently finished rereading The Wizard of London from Mercedes Lackey and it reminded me why I enjoy her Elemental Masters' series so much. The plots tend to be vaguely related to fairy tales, on this reread I noticed that this book has some of the Snow Queen story inside it. The first book of this series that I read was Phoenix and Ashes and it kept me awake since I just was so deeply into it. The idea of being able to connect to nature and the creatures and worlds in there clicks with how I see the world. I admit that not all of these books are as good, but Lackey's world building for the Elemental Masters makes sense for me. When I'm walking and feeling really angry, one of the things I say aloud is; Fear, Fire, Wind and Water and it helps to center me. I think this is an area I need to explore more.

I've also been reading A Tale of Time City by Diana Wynne Jones and I'm enjoying it. As always its her characters that I love more than the plot and this is a rather classic quest plot though the ideas and settings are wonderful. I enjoy that I can see variations on these characters in other books and its making me want to go read more Connie Willis since time travel is a tricky thing to write.

Since I've collected some more questions, I'll soon be posting another round of the five questions meme and might go find some more. My flisters, you always ask questions that make me smile and think. Also today I plan on doing some writing as I'd love to actually post a Sameth OOM this week.

Comments

[remindmeofthe.livejournal.com]

Welcome to MacWorld, enjoy your stay. :D

All my recs are free programs. I don't pay if I don't have to. *g*

I like Adium for IMing, though I haven't used AIM in so long I couldn't tell you if Adium is actually superior. It does allow you to be signed on to multiple accounts, if that's a useful thing.

VLC Player and GIMP are programs I used on my PC that I use on my Mac now, too - VLC is much more versatile in types of video file it will play than any default OS program, and GIMP is a good photo editing program that looks to my uneducated eye like it can give PhotoShop a run for its money.

Programs I've found useful substitutes for PC programs: UnRarX (opens .rar files, though it doesn't make them), MacHacha (HJSplit equivalent; again, only puts files together, as I've never needed to split any), All2MP3 (for converting .wma files, which iTunes won't play), and Jomic (comic book reader). I also like OpenOffice, which you may find useful if MS Office ever goes on the fritz/becomes homicidally enraging, and Vox, a very basic MP3 playing program for when I want to listen to something but don't necessarily want to put it on iTunes.

. . . you cannot tell at all that I do my share of pirating, can you? XD I hope some of these are helpful!

[ceitfianna]

I have VLC and GIMP on my PC and they're some of my favorite free programs so I'll go download them again. I've visited Macworld before as most of my family owns them and I go back and forth when using campus computers.

Ooh, UnRarX and Jomic sound very useful along with the All2MP3. *notes down*

[sardonicynic]

Congrats on the new Mac! They're a ridic amount of fun to play with. :D

Since you've got a Pro, you might consider downloading the free trial for CS5, if you have any interest in playing around with graphics and/or design? It's available on Adobe's site, and trial's good for a month, I think; you can futz around with Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, and Bridge to see how you like 'em.

[ceitfianna]

Oh that does sound interesting and maybe I'll use that and then Gimp later as I know what I'm doing with it.

They are but so far the wireless network isn't liking it, but I will find a solution.

[sardonicynic]

You know, I had a weird hiccup with my wireless connection Monday night, for the first time ever. My airport showed that I was connected, and the signal was full-bar strong, but my browser kept telling me I wasn't connected to the Internet.

I troubleshooted, and ran network diagnostics; that led me to the question that was something like, "How do you connect to your modem?" I chose the "wireless" option, and BAM, it was a-okay again.

Maybe try that, and see if it helps?

[ p.s. ]

[sardonicynic]

Oops, forgot to say: You'll have to physically disconnect your computer from the modem for the airport to kick in.

Re: [ p.s. ]

[ceitfianna]

Disconnecting it doesn't work, its like it doesn't like the password, bah.

Re: [ p.s. ]

[sardonicynic]

Hrrrrrrrm -- totally elementary question, here, but have you double- and triple-checked the password, and the way you're typing it in? Is it case-sensitive, or anything like that?

Otherwise, maaaaybe give Apple a quick call, so they can guide you and the computer through the process?

Re: [ p.s. ]

[ceitfianna]

I have and caps lock shouldn't be an issue. My mom had a problem like this at one point with Linksys too and had to basically make her time machine another IP.

I think I'm going to worry about this more tomorrow and for now go get food. There's a solution out there.

[ceitfianna]

I'll try that, so far when I enter the correct password and everything for my wifi, the Mac tells me its wrong. I just tried that and it didn't work and I'm confused.

When I google the problem, I get lots of options that might work but I'm not sure, its a pain. Especially as my PC is on the wifi.

[sardonicynic]

Fingers crossed!

[the_croupier]

Yay, new Mac!

Hmm, I'll second the Adium for all things chat and VLC for video (though that's available for everybody). Calibre is handy for accessing ebooks (including epub books) on your desktop.

ClamXav is a good and free antivirus program that won't slow you down. Most Mac users think this still isn't necessary, and the situation is still so much better on the Mac side than the PC side, but it's still a good idea to have *something*, what with the Mac Defender malwares and such out there now.

I use Comical for digital comics, though it does tend to crash on me a lot. I'm still looking for another Mac-based comics reader but haven't liked the others I've seen so far.

MagiCal is a quite little app that will put the day and date on your toolbar, which is nice

Growl is a fantastic notification app that will integrate with just about everything you have and let you know when stuff happens. I use it a lot.

I use Preview (comes with OS-X) for my pdf's but that's just because I'm lazy. There are probably better alternatives out there, which I'll get around to looking for eventually.

Oh, and TweetDeck for Twitter, but everybody can use that too.

I bet I'm forgetting lots of stuff, but we can talk next time we're F2F.

[ceitfianna]

Thanks for the recommendations. I was wondering about a good virus thing and hopefully it won't be too long before we talk.

Currently I'm using aim for mac and its working out okay and debating between hootsuite and tweetdeck as I don't like how Echofon works on the Mac.

Now I just need to be brave and fully reset my wifi so it'll work.