and the winner is……… *someone please insert a drumroll here*

MACBOOK!

Okay, it was kinda obvious I suppose. Though like I said in my previous post, it was actually a hard choice for me. Originally I was pretty much brainwashed/sold on the macbook from all the great things I heard about it, but then (after finding a store that actually had a Macbook to see/touch/be physically there) we went to a Best Buy just to review the other options that I had and find their processor speed, since we missed that before when we took notes. I really didn’t like the Sony laptops I had been looking at, because they felt like golfballs or something. They felt like crappy plastic. I dunno.. I just didn’t like that. I decided a no on Dell because of all the mixed messages I heard and I just didn’t want to risk getting one of the sucky dells vs. one of the good dells (I guess some people just get good ones and some people get the ones that break).

I don’t like the idea of spending less for something like this. Let me clarify. I don’t want to spend $500 on a so/so computer, only to have it break on me therfore causing me to spend another $500 for another machine. I would rather pay $1,000 for a computer that will last and hold up than going the cheap route. I can understand why people would rather spend less (my dad is one of them. I do understand it) I just know that for me, I don’t like to do that. Not to mention I would hate dealing with the hassle of havign to buy yet another one and then wondering why I didn’t just buy the more expensive one in the first place. But again, I can understand it. If I wouldn’t have gotten that thousand from my grandparents (I still can’t believe they gave me that much..) I probably wouldn’t have bought the mac. But since I was able to, I did.

ANYWAY. I got sidetracked there lol. I kinda widdled throught the rest on my list, and it pretty much came down to HP and the Mac. The HP I was looking at was $900, so $100 less that the mac. Either way I was spending around a thousand. The HP had a slower speed, I think, but it had 3 GB memory and 320 GB hardrive (vs the macbook 1 GB memory and 120 GB hardrive). Plus, I really liked it’s design. It had a nice white cover, and the inside was very sleek in silver and black. Then my thoughts of “well, it is a PC, and I know how to deal with those. I won’t have to worry about something not being to work with it like the Mac. Plus, it’s pretty. And I havn’t heard anything bad about HP. My printer/scanner/copier/faxer is an HP and it works great. OH I DON’T KNOWWWW”.

lol.

So then, while my heart was torn, I told my dad I wanted to look at the iPods at the Best Buy (as Apple has the ‘buy a mac get an iPod free” thing). I saw the 8 GB nano I was going to get. But then I thought, “Oh yeah, you can get an iPod touch too..” so I went over to the touch….

omg. I was just amazed. My dad was very impressed too. I really liked how I would be able to sync the calendar the notes and such. It would be really helpful to have for college. Not to mention it has lots of space on it (compared to my 1 GB nano lol) I could also download the iTunes U lecture if I wanted and could watch them on there.

That was what made the choice difficult. I just couldn’t decide.

So I contemplated in the car on the way home. Eventually, I just decided that I would go with the macbook. I wanted something new and different. And I just seemed to trust all the good things everyone said about the mac. I was also iffy on Vista, something I heard so many bad things about. So I went with the mac. I bought it that night (the 12), and then waited madly for it to arrive. Once I got the tracking number, I would check it every day. lol, My macbook and ipod got here on the 18th, and I got up at 10 that morning and first thing I did was check the tracking. I saw that it was located about 20 miles from me and was in transit and i was like “DAD!! OMG IT MIGHT BE HERE TODAYYYYYYYYY!”.. and then, lo and behold, 15 minutes later I hear a nock at the door.. and it was here!!

So, I spent, from the moment I got my laptop until 5:30 ish, just playing with it. Then I had to go to my Target Orientation lol.

The only thing that sucks is that I don’t have WiFi at home. or even ethernet. We have great ol’ dialup. I think I have to buy a port to connect dialup to my laptop, but I don’t know. Can’t I just cannect the phone line in the ethernet slot thing? So I havn’t been able to go online at all on either my macbook or my ipod, so I don’t know how the internet speed is (though obviously if I use dialup it won’t be much faster than what I am using now).

Sooo anywho. That is my lovely long story. Sorry if it’s pretty boring lol. I can say that so far I am really happy with my decision. I LOVE iCal! That is going to be perfect for college. Should help me be more organized for sure. I also paid an extra $70 for iWork (I think that’s what it is called)- which had the mac versions of Word, Powerpoint, and Excel. I’m glad I did, because it is AWESOME! It’s so much easier than word, and I havn’t even messed around with it that much. I havn’t tried to take a mac document and open it on windows, or vise versa, yet, but I am hoping that won’t be a problem.

I had one other question- How do you get Paint on a mac? Ehmuhlee inquired about it, and I am wondering too (since I use paint a lot). Or is there a similar program on the mac that i am not aware of? Keep in mind that I can’t download anything online directly to my mac (though I can use a flash drive or something if need be). I’m not too worried if I can’t, because seeing the ease of how you can just drag a picture somewhere and it appears right away on the mac, I don’t know what I’ll need paint for. I’m just wondering how you mac users feel about not having paint (though maybe you didn’t use it much to beging with lol). And feel free to leave me any other mac advice. Or mac newbie advice. Both would be nice lol.

And here are some pictures that i took. Enjoy.

 

lol. Sorry about the “redness” of the pictures. With my room color being red, it always makes any pictures I take have a red tint. It’s annoying, but I deal. It goes away if I use flash, but if I use flash it flashes out the computer screen.

So yes, I am now a happy mac user

And yesterday was my college orientation! U_U I had to get up at like 5:45 (after staying up until 1 in the morning) so we would be there at 8. I got a whole bunch of crap… I mean, papers and handouts, and listen to lots of people talk to me. And then I had to split up with my family and was on my own… ugh, I am going to be a mess when I go to college. I managed to talk a little, but I was just scared to open up. I was nervous being on my own and felt so much better when I was back with people I knew.

One thing I did notice was that in the FOUR STORY LIBRARY (love<3) they had maps with labels on them. I saw labels for computer stations, and then I looked at other floors and there were ones labeled “macintosh computers” so that makes me feel better. I was going to ask somebody, but I wasn’t sure who lol. I think I’m going to surf around their website some more.

And one more thing. I sincerly apologize for not blogging much lately. I havn’t blogged about anything other than computers since around the beggining of June. I really am sorry. Buying a laptop has been occupying my mind pretty much, not to mention worry about getting my new job and going to college orientation. My internet life has, as such, suffered. I mean, I was approving comments and reading them, just not responding. My mind has been occupied with other things lol. But now that my work life seems to have settled and schedualed, i have my laptop, and I don’t have to worry about college till August, I should be around more. I started taking pictures for my book post, which I’ll try and have up this weekend. So, I am sorry about this. I feel bad when I don’t post anything lol. Because I know I always feel bummed when I go to blogs i like and there isn’t anything new to read. So I am sorry everyone.

(wow, long, long post)

*EDIT* I just thought of a question for all you amazing mac people who know so much . I paid that extra $70 for the iWork to get the mac version of Word, Excel, and Powerpoint. I tried and those programs DO open up the PC documents. However, I’m trying to open up the mac documents on the PC and it doesn’t work. I don’t know if I am doing something wrong or don’t know what to do at all, or maybe it just doesn’t work. I tried saving the files as .doc on mac, but it doesn’t let me (that was my best guess as for what to do..)… So know i have no clue how to do this, or if it can be done. Heelpppp meeee X3!!