peter Walsh's Profile

  • Feb 14, 2006
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Latest comments made by: peter Walsh

  • I totally agree. Apple should offer a price break, it's expected with software. I bet more people would upgrade, like my sister and friends. I think they should give an Adobe style price break around the 75% mark. One way you can get them to do it is encourage people not to purchase the next update. I'm not sure if I'll update iLife. I can do without most of the new features for a few years when I buy a new machine.
    peter Walsh had this to say on Jan 23, 2006 Posts: 5
    Upgrading, Why It Hurts To Be A Mac User
  • [quote][i]I dare you to go into any computer superstore (you can even pick one that sells Macs) and ask a salesperson, “I need a computer” and then count how many times he mentions the word “Apple” and “Mac.”[/i][/quote] I hate to admit this, but you have a very valid point. Even worse, the chances are the employee doesn't at that store probably doesn't make enough to purchase a Mac so it never enters the equation. They're clueless to the Macintosh experience. You can't sell someone something that you know nothing about. Most of the sales people I encounter know very little, it's just a job so they can survive. Once in a while I encounter someone that really knows. Also, a lot of those stores tell employees what to push. That has a lot to do with manufacturers offering incentives. Apple has never been known for this and often retailers make little of Apple hardware.
  • I gave some reasons early, but here's another insight on "Good Enough." Two female friends switched from XP over the last month. One, who's on a budget, I installed Ubuntu Linux on her Dell. I setup everything for her and put a pretty theme. She likes it and doesn't miss windows. Her main applications are Word (OpenOffice.org default save as word), Email (online), and Instant messaging (Adium). Updating the virus programs and spyware programs for her PC took her to the limit. She's happy living in a secure environment and finds it simple to use, "Good Enough." The second, who is definitely not on a budget, was on a Dell PC and I switched her to the new 20" iMac with the built in iSight. She was also tired of spyware and virus software, along with constant firewall pop-ups on windows. She had to have quickbooks and excell. Quicken comes with the consumer models and Quickbooks comes with the pro-models. She'll have to buy MS Office as I don't think OpenOfficeJ is a good alternative on the Mac. She was blown away by the experience. She's very happy and doesn't miss her PC. She actually gave her PC to me as thanks for helping her and it's a nice machine. I'll install Ubuntu on that as well. I guess my point is, if OS X is within your budget and the essential applications can be purchased for it, then it's a go. If not, you can go the Ubuntu route or stick with Windows if you're application dependent. Ubuntu is a great OS and "Good Enough" for those on a budget. A note on windows: To some extent I feel some the annoyances these girls felt with windows wasn't directly related to MS. If virus program, firewall, and spyware applications didn't ask for her attention, she's wouldn't have been so disgruntled. Most of the apps were set to as much automation as possible, but they all constantly needed human interaction. Personally I think it's a marketing ploy by these companies. They want you to see that they're working.
  • My experience tells me that people are unaware of Apple’s new OS. They get new OS’s from Microsoft (95, 98, me, 2k, XP) and they experience a slight improvement, but nothing major. They think Apple’s OS will be nothing special or different, except that less people run it, which to them is scary. Explaining to them the modern aspects of OS X and how it’s been rebuilt from the ground up and how it’s years ahead of Windows is hard for them to comprehend. Think about it. Microsoft is a giant corporation with tons of money, how can a smaller company do better. Their minds have been polluted with MS FUD. OS X has enough “Good Stuff” to easily sway basic users. I don’t think you can woo people to OS X by telling them it’s easier. I don’t think you can woo people by telling them about the killer iLife applications. If you want to woo the basic user, the receptionist, mother, aunt, uncle or friend, you have to show them that they wont have to deal with: 1. Constant virus update reminders 2. Mulitiple Spam tools 3. Updating Spam tools 4. Unexpected crashes 5. Security Even if they have to do some of these things on OS X, it’s not nearly as annoying on the Mac as on Windows. After you ingrain those 5 principals of the OS X experience into their head, you can then reinforce the ease of use. There’s one caveat: you must show them. Those that I have switched are bright people, but they IM, email, and call me all the time on how to do stuff and then they feel stupid because it’s right in front of them. They need to be shown the way. Silly little features like the slideshow in mail and being able to import photo’s from the slideshow go right by them. They never notice many of these features because they never expect it. Walking them through each step of iLife applications from ripping and burning cd’s to importing photo’s and making a coffee table book to importing video and creating a slideshow dvd. It’s simple and most of us take the time to figure them out on our own, but the majority will never open it because they are afraid they’ll run into problems. That it will be too difficult or they’ll never figure out how to add a song to their iMove. So if you want to help switch, you have to sign on as a long term teacher. It’s very rewarding to see their expression when you show them the latest tools and tricks. It’s like a light goes on.
  • I've tried many distros. I like RedHat, SUSE and Ubuntu. I've learned the most about Linux by installing Debian from sratch using the command line and following a very well written tutorial on their website. This was a great start as I learned how to use apt-get etc. I went about my way trying to setup an firewall, ftp, and http server. It's pretty simple to install all these tools. Though I did get a few headaches on the way. If you make a mistake, it can take forever to figure out where you went wrong. Forget to install a vital component and you are screwed. Even when you get it up and running, there's not easy way to remotely manage your server from OS X or linux. I'm sure there are tools, but their not easy to find. I like managing things with a GUI. I'm a visual type person. It would be nice as the Author said if there was a site that pointed out what the best ditro for what. Of course that could lead to a plathora of arguments. It's my opinion the Ubuntu is great for people that are home users wanting to learn. Debian is for more advanced users and RedHat and SUSE are for people that want to spend money. I'd love an all in one package that had a stripped down Linux distro that included Apache, MySQL, PHP, PERL and PureFTP. Then possibley a list of easy to use tools to help you remotely manage these tools. Maybe this does exist, but I have had a heck of a time finding them.
    peter Walsh had this to say on Aug 12, 2005 Posts: 5
    A Mac User Tries Linux Part 1