Just got shit canned. PC to Mac recs?

So today my boss took me to lunch and said the new owners of our company were downsizing and gave me my walking papers. This, after I was one of the top sales guys in the company and doubled most account business year over year. Sucks, but I'm not surprised with new owners.

Anyway, I still have access to my work computer for about 24 hours. It's a Thinkpad, and I'd like to get my personal photos/ files, and emails off of it as well as some contact information. I know I can save it to an external hard drive and put it on a new computer at a later date. Since my personal PC is a hunk of shit, and typically I have to replace them way too often I am thinking of getting a Macbook Pro or Air. I'm pretty sure I can get Office installed and everything should be compatible.

I know this is probably trivial bs for most of you guys, but I am a complete hack when it comes to anything Apple other than a phone. Any thoughts on running Office on a Mac? Good or bad experinces? Should I suck it up and go buy a PC?

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

office runs just fine on OSX
so does google docs or even apple's version of those programs
(and they all read MS's files too)

PC vs mac: who cares? just get a new machine and the latest OS and you'll be fine

Office on a Mac runs fine. Mac is more $ up front. My wife has an Air and loves it. It is a nice machine. No need for a Pro IMO unless you need the computing power or DVD drive on a regular basis.

Something to think about is what external devices you will connect to it as Mac has a bunch of proprietary bullshit connectors. IE - no HDMI

I have a Thinkpad, which I will probably need to replace more often, but cost 60% of what the Mac did. It also works fine. Honestly if I was in the market I would be looking hard at the Surface Pro 3. Lenovo is also selling their 2nd gen X1 Carbon at a significant discount at the moment.

Been using Office for Mac since 2006 with no issues.

Good luck with the transition dude. Layoff conversation sucks. Been there.

^^^ no shit. Vibes dude.

Shitty news.

I'd just go buy a usb external drive and copy everything over. Deal with compatibility issues later, first get the files you need in your hands.

Thanks guys, really appreciate your thoughts. In some weird way I'm relieved. I perversely missed the ski industry since I left, so I just booked a trip to Denver to attend SIA and see some familiar faces. I know it's not the time to shop for a new gig, but it certainly won't hurt to shoot the shit with old friends.

Good to hear about the compatibility. I'll be dumping everything tonight onto the external HD and shopping for a new computer when I get back from Denver. I think the whole reason I want to get a Mac is everyone I know loves theirs and seldom have issues. My track record with PC's is horrible (even when not checking out pron) the things seem to die in about a year.

...maybe it's just time to brush up on my anti-virus skills.

Get a mac. They cost more, but generally speaking they last longer.

Make sure the drive you use is formatted correctly. A FAT file system is compatible with Mac and PC do you won't have any issues transferring your files into a Mac. Only downside is that you can't have files bigger than I think 4 or 5 gigs. Most external drives that say Mac and OC compatible are already set up like that I believe, or its a five minute fix up front.

Obviously get your files no matter what. You can solve compatibility issues later if you need to. This will just make your life a little easier.

Won't something like Dropbox be useful this?

Had that conversation in November. I was supposed to stay on they the end of January, but they let me go a week before Christmas. At the end of the day, I think it'll be a good thing, but sucked after giving them 15 years of my life.

I'm enjoying my "mini-retirement" right now though. :).

Good luck with your search. And get a Mac.

Vibes.
The good news is that most of your stuff should transfer right over to a Mac. Photos, documents, that kind of thing. You can get Office for Mac. You may even be able to export contacts in a .csv. Can't remember. Outlook sucks, lol.

ETA: just Googled it. You can export your Outlooks contact in a .csv file which is pretty universal. It's actually just plain text with commas. (Comma Separated Values or something like that). You can probably import it right into Mac Mail or somesuch. You can definitely do it to GMail. Google Drive will also read other Office Docs. Depending on specifics, you may not need any special software at all.

Windows makes me hate being alive, if you feel the same way you should probably get a mac (or a linux box).

A Mac is worth it over time, if the upfront cost is tolerable go for it. I'd probably get a top spec air unless you're doing computationally intensive things.

Get the Mac.

Office on Mac works fine.

For any old files or programs that the Mac can't view or run and you need, you can always get a program called Parallels and have a complete virtual Windows PC on your Mac. I did that when I first converted to Mac. Haven't run it in years.

On the job, economy is picking up. Better to be looking for a job in a up economy vs. even a few years ago.

Good luck on the job search.

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Originally Posted by char

Something to think about is what external devices you will connect to it as Mac has a bunch of proprietary bullshit connectors. IE - no HDMI.

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You can get a thunderbolt to HDMI cable. Mine was about $12 on Amazon - fuck Apple brand cables.

Vibes, now go on vacation! Also, pm if you want a copy of office for Mac.

I don't understand all the trouble people have with Windows and how or why it would magically disappear with a Mac. Was working on one the other day and it pinwheeled so bad I hard reset it. I was talking to my brother who's a bit of a technophobe. He's forced himself to learn how to deal with computers in a passable manner. He mentioned that at this point, he was just tired of dealing with Windows error messages and just wanted to see someone else's for a change. lolz.
OTOH, this 7 desktop I built is 5 years old and works great. I think at least part of the problem is laptops.

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Originally Posted by stuckathuntermtn

I don't understand all the trouble people have with Windows and how or why it would magically disappear with a Mac. Was working on one the other day and it pinwheeled so bad I hard reset it. I was talking to my brother who's a bit of a technophobe. He's forced himself to learn how to deal with computers in a passable manner. He mentioned that at this point, he was just tired of dealing with Windows error messages and just wanted to see someone else's for a change. lolz.
OTOH, this 7 desktop I built is 5 years old and works great. I think at least part of the problem is laptops.

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I would claim, unscientifically, that average uptime is significantly higher on Mac than PC (and higher yet on a stable GNU Linux, but that's beyond the ken of the average user). Not to say every Mac is perfect, hardware ages, disks get full, etc. But going 30 days between reboots instead of 30 hours is a win in my book. The hardware quality is also far superior to your average PC laptop in terms of screen, keyboard, touchpad, power supply, etc.

I'm typing this on a 2007 macbook pro with 6gb of ram and an ssd. So I put a little money into it since I got it.
My brother recently gave me his "old" 2011 win7 Acer and it's basically unusable with similar specs, no ssd. The fans spin like crazy and if you put it on a cushion it overheats and powers down in a minute.

If you did a ton of research maybe you could find the perfect pc for not much money. And, If that happens let me know so I can gut it and install OSX.

Yeah, laptop hardware can really suck. If the fan starts to die, it can be hard to impossible to replace as the machine just gets slower and slower. You'll get no argument from me there. And yes, the touchy feely stuff is usually better. The actual computing hardware is mostly identical. You're paying 4x as much to add more RAM, hard disk space, or inches of screen. Fucking brilliant marketing.

Just got a MacBook Pro. Thought I was going to go w an Air, but the form factor, weight is so similar now and the extra ram and storage, screen quality and connection ports for another 1-200 bucks made it a no brainer to go w a pro.

Apps are inconsequential cause all that windows shit is pretty much done w Google and te cloud taking over so don't worry about that. Once you get in moved onto the Mac you'll be fine

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Originally Posted by stuckathuntermtn

You're paying 4x as much to add more RAM, hard disk space, or inches of screen. Fucking brilliant marketing.

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you make it sound like it's double or something
price it out exactly and don't leave out any of the hardware features
i think you'll find that you're paying somewhat comparably
apple just makes those choices for you -- some people love that, some hate it

No, it often literally costs twice as much. It may have come down in relation because Apple has made us pay more for less across the technology and electronics board. Remember way back when prices were in freefall? Maybe they just hit rock bottom, but no one is competing on price anymore and even non-Apple phones or tablets or whatever are overpriced.

You guys rock, thank you for all the input and advise. I just got back from SIA and will be going to get a new rig this week. Definitely looking forward to a new chapter. Thanks again!

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Originally Posted by mbillie1

I would claim, unscientifically, that average uptime is significantly higher on Mac than PC (and higher yet on a stable GNU Linux, but that's beyond the ken of the average user). Not to say every Mac is perfect, hardware ages, disks get full, etc. But going 30 days between reboots instead of 30 hours is a win in my book. The hardware quality is also far superior to your average PC laptop in terms of screen, keyboard, touchpad, power supply, etc.

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30 days between reboots is bad because patching. People like to compare high end macs to low end PC's. Go with whatever you feel more comfortable with, or a PC if you're in any kind of specialized industry (as any specialized software is likely PC only).