Moving to a Mac

Recently, after a sustained bout of swearing at my laptop, which I’d had for a good few years and which thus owed me nothing, I decided to replace it with a shiny new one. Something speedy and modern, I thought, but not too expensive. So, a trip to the shops was duly organised and I spent some considerable time comparing features and realising how little I wanted Windows 8 anywhere near me in case I caught something horrible from it. After a good deal of umming and ahhing (and shaking my head at appallingly low screen resolutions) it became apparent that I was going to have to bite the financial bullet and buy a decent machine rather than a cheapie. Once that decision was made it wasn’t too hard to pick the right machine – a 15 inch MacBook Pro.

The first thing to say is that the Retina display, running at a huge resolution of 2880 x 1800 pixels, is stunningly beautiful. Really, simply gorgeous. After only a couple of days’ use I couldn’t possibly use anything of a lesser quality. The monitors I use at work now appear decidedly ugly. The second thing is that, due to the 256GB SSD (solid state disk) and lack of a fan (as far as I can tell) the machine is utterly silent. You really notice the difference when whatever music you were playing to amuse yourself while you worked finishes.

On top of all this, the whole device is thin, beautifully simply designed and just feels right. The casing feels solid and the only vents are positioned in such a way that you don’t block them if you use the computer on your lap. Nor does it get too hot, so your thighs remain unburned and, if you’re male, your ability to procreate remains as it was. Even plugging the power supply in is a joy – it attaches with a satisfying magnetic click and a small LED on the plug (the laptop end, not the mains) indicates when the laptop is fully charged.

As for OSX, I’d used it before but not very much, but it hasn’t taken long to get comfortable with it. It’s essentially a flavour of UNIX, as was the Ubuntu Linux I was using on my old machine, but much, much prettier. No great surprises, just solid, easy to use and attractive, which seems to be the Apple way. I’ve never been a rabid Apple maniac and I’m still not, but I can see why some people are.

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