Thread
switcher's review: Pbook 12"
My review of my new Mac Powerbook G4 12":
First impressions
This is a review of my new Mac. I've used Apples since the IIe, and was on OS X starting with the public beta. Nonetheless, I switched most of my work to an IBM laptop a few years ago. It seemed like now was a good time to switch back, so I did so.
How I chose the computer: It didn't seem very competitive to PC offerings out there. Pricewise, it was quite cheap, but price wasn't a factor for me. I really wish Apple would come out with lighter, faster laptops, like e.g. the Fujitsu 7000 (14" screen, 3.8 pounds), the IBM T43 (14" screen, 4.5 pounds), or the Sony Vaio 380 (13" widescreen, 4.7 pounds). All these computers I was considering came with build-in DVD writers. The Mac G4 12" was the heaviest, and yet also had the smallest screen, and also the lowest resolution screen (the IBM and Fujitsu are both 1400x1000, the Sony 1300x800, the Mac 1000x800). In terms of performance, the most noticeable stat is the bus speed. PCs are running at 533 MHz, the Mac at 167 MHz. The Mac was however cheaper than the PC alternatives, but again price wasn't an issue. So why did I still buy the Mac? For one thing, I thought the OS would make up for some of the other cons. This is partly true -- for example, Expose does make the 1024x768 screen slightly more bearable.
About the computer itself:
The display: I didn't notice this in the store, perhaps partly because I couldn't move the computers around to compare screens. But the 12" screen is very dim. The viewing angle is also awful. Even though the screen is only 12" diagonal, there are still very noticeable shifts towards the edge of the screen (with my head at a reasonable viewing position). Very precisely setting the angle of the screen helps slightly, but not enough. (If the angle isn't exactly right, though, the entire screen will look too dim.) Apple's hingeless design may look cool, but since the screen opens up so its bottom is actually beneath the keyboard level, this makes it a little difficult to use the computer with good posture (without hunching over). Perhaps other smaller notebooks have similar problems, I don't know, but just looking at the case, it seems that using a hinge would push the screen up by maybe 3/4". Maybe the first thing I did after turning the computer on was to change the desktop background. I chose one of Apple's backgrounds with I think a blue sky. And I was very surprised to see visible dithering. It shouldn't be dithering -- I think this means that the screen is only 18 bit, not true 24 bit capable. Apple's specifications don't say, so I am suspicious.
The noise: This computer is very noisy. The hard drive never sleeps and there is always a noise from it. Before the computer sleeps, there is a blessed moment of silence with the LCD screen still on but the hard drive asleep. Worse, the fans are quite noisy, too, and they come on quite frequently. I recently downloaded Temperature Monitor, and the graphics card might be the culprit. In any case, once the fans come on, I can't figure out how to get them to turn off. Leaving the computer on with nothing running, the fans will stay on indefinitely. I have to put the computer to sleep then wake it up for the fans to turn off.
The keyboard: I am not quite used to it, and am missing keypresses still. Probably just me.
The switching process: It took me a bit of time to figure out how to connect my old PC laptop to this one. Eventually, though, I figured out how to share Windows folders, and then how to get the Ethernet connection working. Apple's documentation wasn't very helpful, since it basically told me to look at the Windows documentation to figure out how to set up the PC. The Windows documentation isn't very good at all, and it would have saved me some hassle if Apple had included its own documentation. Eventually, though, things started to work, even with just a standard Ethernet cable. If anyone else has questions on how to do this, I think I can probably help. Actually, I was transferring files from three sources: the PC laptop, my old Mac, and the network. The PC laptop transfer was the easiest. When transferring from the old Mac, I repeatedly ran into issues with the Finder. It would often lock up (with a beach ball) when copying even just moderate numbers of files (a few hundred or thousand, a few hundred or thousand megabytes). Worse, when the Finder became unresponsive, so did the whole computer. For example, I sometimes had to wait at least a minute before the force-quit dialog would show up so I could relaunch the finder. Then the Finder wouldn't actually relaunch. This was hell. Since then I have learned that the Finder can't copy more than one group of items at a time. It consistently gives beachballs, and effectively freezes, when trying to copy more than one group at a time. This is very worrisome, because I don't like file-handling routines to crash, and potentially corrupt my data. It is such a basic bug, too.
The operating system: This is very unstable, worse than Windows XP but perhaps similar to WIn2k. I've had only one or two true operating system crashes in the few weeks I've been using this computer, but I've had many more Finder crashes and from my perspective the Finder is part of the OS. Generally, the OS is very unpolished. I have been used to Windows, which after a while one begins to feel was designed by the proverbial monkeys at typewriters. But the Mac is surprisingly frequently even worse. This was a big letdown. Besides the Finder, which has dozens of bugs, another random example is the Airport menu which often shows full bars when it means no bars.
The application switching method is just terrible. I cannot figure out the order applications show up when I command-tab. It stays consistent for a while, then seems to randomize. After it randomizes, I have to tab through all the applications to find what icon is associated with what name, and then shift tab back (because I'll have gone too far). Windows is more consistent and more efficient. While expose is frequently nice, there really needs to be a place where applications/windows are consistently organized, with text visible not just random icons.
Spotlight is surprisingly useful. Dashboard is hardly anything, but is better than I expected. (But it is quite slow -- why for example does it take a second for the clock to show its hands?)
The single-button mouse: It is very surprising to me that I am using modifier keys much more frequently than on a PC. For example, I have to command-click all the time. In Firefox, I have to control-click. To page-down, I have to press function-down arrow. To forward-delete, I have to function-delete. And yet I am less efficient than on a PC. For example, in Windows, one can always tab through the choices in a dialog box (Okay, Cancel, etc.). What is the equivalent key combo on a Mac? I just figured out that tabbing to cancel can be enabled in the Keyboard control panel, but I am still not sure how to hit cancel -- pressing return after selecting cancel still sends Okay. Why is Windows more intuitive than Mac?
Applications:
Powerpoint 2004 is not as good as the equivalent PC Powerpoint, I noticed very soon. For example, the animation controls are significantly worse (more complicated to use, fewer controls). It is also much slower opening files with meta inserts. I had thought that Keynote came with the Powerbook, but apparently, only a trial version. Anyway, it didn't do a good job importing a Powerpoint presentation (for example, losing arrowheads on line segments, changing transparent images to a solid color, and losing the animations). The arrows can be quickly fixed -- but Apple should have fixed this -- and I don't know how to fix the other things.
LaTeX installed easily, though I prefer the simpler directory structure and GUI interface of the Windows miktex. I struggled a bit with this yesterday.
For surfing the web, Firefox doesn't work as well on the Mac as it does on the PC. The key problem, which has forced me to switch to Safari, is that dragging URLs to the Finder creates a file with the URL as its name, instead of the web page title (as with PC Firefox, or Safari). Also, some of the commands seem to be messed up in Firefox. For example, Delete and Shift-Delete don't go forward and backward (as on the PC, or with Safari). Interestingly, two-finger mousepad scrolling works quite differently than in Safari -- up and down is fine, but left and right seems to go back two pages and forward two pages respectively (can't get it to go forward or back just one page). The Safari implementation is better. For now, I have to use both Firefox and Safari, because Firefox has better web archiving with the Scrapbook extension, and also it saves the tab bar state on quitting. I also don't know how to switch between tabs in Safari -- control-tab doesn't work. On a PC, FIrefox sufficed.
GraphicConverter is a nice powerful application, with a learning curve. iPhoto is just awful compared to Picasa -- no lossless editing and it forces you to use its directory structure, it also saves every image before letting you go on to the next one (meaning it is glacially slow) -- but I have been able to work out a photo workflow using GraphicConverter. Still, the PC workflow was superior, since Picasa is substantially faster with a much better interface and more controls than GraphicConverter. I had intended to pick up Photoshop CS 2 right away, but the Intel announcement has put software purchases on hold.
I am using VirtualPC to run a few applications, for example s7raw to convert RAW files from my Fuji camera.
I had assumed X11 would be either installed by default or downloadable from Apple. So I left the install CD at home and went on a trip. But in fact, the only way to get Apple's X11 is off the install CD. I had to compile and install X11 myself; this was a huge pain.
Random: The computer doesn't warn me before it goes to sleep because of low battery power.
Here is a bug which I assume must be an operating system bug, because the same thing happens in all sorts of different applications: A line of text just disappears, or is duplicated, in a text box. There are lots of bugs like this -- but I remembered this one because it just now occurred here. Clicking around, and scrolling up and down, then more clicking, and the text appeared again.
This is largely a negative review, and, yes, I am considering switching back. The noisiness of this powerbook is unacceptable -- as I sit here even just typing, the fan is cycling louder/quieter/louder/quieter -- and the poor screen is very annoying. Connecting to an external monitor makes it even more noisy, since the graphics card really struggles. And yet another forced incompatibility with the Intel switch? It's good news that Mac hardware will finally catch up to PCs (a year from now, at least), but I don't want to have to rebuy all my software. The bugginess of OS X has really annoyed me. Why can't Apple stop and fix the current bugs before adding on tons of new features which make it even buggier? The current Finder deserves the adjective "Microsoftian" more than Windows XP.
That all said, I'd certainly appreciate any advice as to how to improve things.
Second impressions (added 6/28)
Here are some second impressions a few weeks later. It's mostly a list of bugs I've run into, although there are some nuggets hidden there if you care to dig through it (Quicksilver!).
Short summary: OS X is great. I love the interface, and the screen space with dual monitors. Spotlight is fantastic — on Windows I had missed a decent search function (never tried the google desktop search, though). For me, Dashboard is very practical; I use it for conversions, calendar, weather, google maps, dictionary, stickies, and two photo albums for inspiration. Little tips I found in this thread like using the space bar to select a button have made navigation so much easier (but it doesn't work in Photoshop 7!). Another key combo: ctrl-cmd-D looks up the word under the mouse in the dictionary. I have no idea where these come from — couldn't find anything in the Help topics — but they are great to know.
Quicksilver works a treat and has eased navigation a bit. The developer's web site makes it sound like huge bloatware (talking about automating emails and the like — why do I need to automatically send out tons of emails from the Desktop?), but in practice it just works. I also downloaded Witch for app/window switching with text labels, but it was too ugly.
I've basically figured out a photography workflow. I convert RAW files in VirtualPC, then use GraphicConverter to edit IPTC and to finish conversion for my Jalbum website. Occasionally, I use Photoshop 7, but I don't trust that it saves the EXIF properly, so I only use it through GraphicConverter. GraphicConverter is dog slow even at trivial things like making a selection and I have considered using Picasa in VirtualPC, but for now I'll just wait.
About the interface, there are a few little things that I wish Apple would fix, but now know they never will. For example, dragging selected text doesn't work like I think it should. Back with OS 9, for example, I drag-and-dropped all the time. When I switched to Windows, I had to switch to using copy-paste, because drag-and-drop behavior just wasn't consistent. On OS X, drag-and-dropping is much like Windows, and I'm becoming resigned to using copy-paste. Another example: Menus occasionally open then immediately close, instead of staying open. So I have to open them again. Mac (pre OS X) used to have the best menus around, but nowadays little things like this have broken them.
Here come the promised bugs. I feel the software is all buggy, even more than most of the big Windows apps. I'm a bit afraid that we're doomed to buggy software for a while now, especially because of the Intel transition. I have taken to quitting applications when possible to try to keep them "fresh."
The "Open with.." is completely broken. OS X insists on opening my TeX files with Script Editor even though I have several times told it to "Always open" with TeXShop (another very buggy program).
Preview has crashed several times. Finder has crashed: At one point, while scrolling through a window, the Finder blurred all the icons down the window. It didn't freeze and I was able to take a screenshot and close the window. Once, after waking the computer up, the Dock would not appear (I typically have it hidden to the side, but nothing would get it to pull out). I could see the Dock if I went to the Apple menu and turned hiding off, but if I turned hiding back on again nothing would trigger it to show itself. When I tried to restart the Dock wouldn't go away. Apple's force-quit dialog is useless (Microsoft, from long experience I suppose, has a much better force quit dialog), but fortunately I have the Activity Monitor in my Dock (which was still responsive and was visible since I had turned off hiding) so I quit the Dock with that. After restarting, it seemed to work fine again.
I tried Keynote for a presentation last week. I did so because Mac Powerpoint has a worse interface than Windows Powerpoint. Keynote is missing a lot of features (e.g., an arc tool) and its LaTeX interface (via EquationEditor, the only option for what I do since I sometimes need tex->dvi->ps->pdf compiling) is inferior to Powerpoint's. But I decided I'd give it a fair shot anyway, and converted over a presentation I was working on. After Keynote crashed and I lost 30 minutes of work, I'll never use it again. Keynote doesn't do automatic incremental saves, and is quite slow at saving files (the same presentation, maybe 30MB, Powerpoint saves in ~5 seconds, and Keynote in ~45 seconds), so there is no practical way to protect my work. I've opened up both NeoOffice and OpenOffice, but they were too ugly to contemplate using. Maybe I'll give them a fairer shot next time.
Mail just crashed and I almost lost an email. Fortunately, I'm relearning the old habits of saving all the time, and I'd saved a draft. It crashed because I lost the wireless connection while I was sending the email, because the wireless connectivity stinks. </rant> (I haven't made any controlled tests on wireless connectivity, but it sure hasn't amazed me.)
Safari is buggy. For example, a few days ago it couldn't be hidden. Hide Safari didn't work, Hide others from another app didn't work. Restarting Safari fixed it. Perhaps this is a window manager bug.
I had a similar problem actually with X11. All of a sudden the windows all maximized (even though their hidden icons were still there), and I had to minimize them back one by one. X11 on a Mac laptop, by the way, is awesome.
The problem with disappearing lines of text seems to be limited to TeXShop.
Sleep is fairly nice. I wouldn't mind if it went to sleep faster, also if it gave some feedback that it was putting itself to sleep, but it wakes up quite quickly.
Fan just came on. I guess I'm typing too fast.
I'd like to upgrade to Photoshop CS 2 (still on 7), but I'm worried about this whole Intel switch thing. I'd like my software to last.. But I'll have to give in eventually, since converting 12 megapixel RAW files in VirtualPC, even with batches, is a lesson in patience, and I'm going on vacation soon (lots of photos!). This whole Intel switch caught me by surprise.
First impressions
This is a review of my new Mac. I've used Apples since the IIe, and was on OS X starting with the public beta. Nonetheless, I switched most of my work to an IBM laptop a few years ago. It seemed like now was a good time to switch back, so I did so.
How I chose the computer: It didn't seem very competitive to PC offerings out there. Pricewise, it was quite cheap, but price wasn't a factor for me. I really wish Apple would come out with lighter, faster laptops, like e.g. the Fujitsu 7000 (14" screen, 3.8 pounds), the IBM T43 (14" screen, 4.5 pounds), or the Sony Vaio 380 (13" widescreen, 4.7 pounds). All these computers I was considering came with build-in DVD writers. The Mac G4 12" was the heaviest, and yet also had the smallest screen, and also the lowest resolution screen (the IBM and Fujitsu are both 1400x1000, the Sony 1300x800, the Mac 1000x800). In terms of performance, the most noticeable stat is the bus speed. PCs are running at 533 MHz, the Mac at 167 MHz. The Mac was however cheaper than the PC alternatives, but again price wasn't an issue. So why did I still buy the Mac? For one thing, I thought the OS would make up for some of the other cons. This is partly true -- for example, Expose does make the 1024x768 screen slightly more bearable.
About the computer itself:
The display: I didn't notice this in the store, perhaps partly because I couldn't move the computers around to compare screens. But the 12" screen is very dim. The viewing angle is also awful. Even though the screen is only 12" diagonal, there are still very noticeable shifts towards the edge of the screen (with my head at a reasonable viewing position). Very precisely setting the angle of the screen helps slightly, but not enough. (If the angle isn't exactly right, though, the entire screen will look too dim.) Apple's hingeless design may look cool, but since the screen opens up so its bottom is actually beneath the keyboard level, this makes it a little difficult to use the computer with good posture (without hunching over). Perhaps other smaller notebooks have similar problems, I don't know, but just looking at the case, it seems that using a hinge would push the screen up by maybe 3/4". Maybe the first thing I did after turning the computer on was to change the desktop background. I chose one of Apple's backgrounds with I think a blue sky. And I was very surprised to see visible dithering. It shouldn't be dithering -- I think this means that the screen is only 18 bit, not true 24 bit capable. Apple's specifications don't say, so I am suspicious.
The noise: This computer is very noisy. The hard drive never sleeps and there is always a noise from it. Before the computer sleeps, there is a blessed moment of silence with the LCD screen still on but the hard drive asleep. Worse, the fans are quite noisy, too, and they come on quite frequently. I recently downloaded Temperature Monitor, and the graphics card might be the culprit. In any case, once the fans come on, I can't figure out how to get them to turn off. Leaving the computer on with nothing running, the fans will stay on indefinitely. I have to put the computer to sleep then wake it up for the fans to turn off.
The keyboard: I am not quite used to it, and am missing keypresses still. Probably just me.
The switching process: It took me a bit of time to figure out how to connect my old PC laptop to this one. Eventually, though, I figured out how to share Windows folders, and then how to get the Ethernet connection working. Apple's documentation wasn't very helpful, since it basically told me to look at the Windows documentation to figure out how to set up the PC. The Windows documentation isn't very good at all, and it would have saved me some hassle if Apple had included its own documentation. Eventually, though, things started to work, even with just a standard Ethernet cable. If anyone else has questions on how to do this, I think I can probably help. Actually, I was transferring files from three sources: the PC laptop, my old Mac, and the network. The PC laptop transfer was the easiest. When transferring from the old Mac, I repeatedly ran into issues with the Finder. It would often lock up (with a beach ball) when copying even just moderate numbers of files (a few hundred or thousand, a few hundred or thousand megabytes). Worse, when the Finder became unresponsive, so did the whole computer. For example, I sometimes had to wait at least a minute before the force-quit dialog would show up so I could relaunch the finder. Then the Finder wouldn't actually relaunch. This was hell. Since then I have learned that the Finder can't copy more than one group of items at a time. It consistently gives beachballs, and effectively freezes, when trying to copy more than one group at a time. This is very worrisome, because I don't like file-handling routines to crash, and potentially corrupt my data. It is such a basic bug, too.
The operating system: This is very unstable, worse than Windows XP but perhaps similar to WIn2k. I've had only one or two true operating system crashes in the few weeks I've been using this computer, but I've had many more Finder crashes and from my perspective the Finder is part of the OS. Generally, the OS is very unpolished. I have been used to Windows, which after a while one begins to feel was designed by the proverbial monkeys at typewriters. But the Mac is surprisingly frequently even worse. This was a big letdown. Besides the Finder, which has dozens of bugs, another random example is the Airport menu which often shows full bars when it means no bars.
The application switching method is just terrible. I cannot figure out the order applications show up when I command-tab. It stays consistent for a while, then seems to randomize. After it randomizes, I have to tab through all the applications to find what icon is associated with what name, and then shift tab back (because I'll have gone too far). Windows is more consistent and more efficient. While expose is frequently nice, there really needs to be a place where applications/windows are consistently organized, with text visible not just random icons.
Spotlight is surprisingly useful. Dashboard is hardly anything, but is better than I expected. (But it is quite slow -- why for example does it take a second for the clock to show its hands?)
The single-button mouse: It is very surprising to me that I am using modifier keys much more frequently than on a PC. For example, I have to command-click all the time. In Firefox, I have to control-click. To page-down, I have to press function-down arrow. To forward-delete, I have to function-delete. And yet I am less efficient than on a PC. For example, in Windows, one can always tab through the choices in a dialog box (Okay, Cancel, etc.). What is the equivalent key combo on a Mac? I just figured out that tabbing to cancel can be enabled in the Keyboard control panel, but I am still not sure how to hit cancel -- pressing return after selecting cancel still sends Okay. Why is Windows more intuitive than Mac?
Applications:
Powerpoint 2004 is not as good as the equivalent PC Powerpoint, I noticed very soon. For example, the animation controls are significantly worse (more complicated to use, fewer controls). It is also much slower opening files with meta inserts. I had thought that Keynote came with the Powerbook, but apparently, only a trial version. Anyway, it didn't do a good job importing a Powerpoint presentation (for example, losing arrowheads on line segments, changing transparent images to a solid color, and losing the animations). The arrows can be quickly fixed -- but Apple should have fixed this -- and I don't know how to fix the other things.
LaTeX installed easily, though I prefer the simpler directory structure and GUI interface of the Windows miktex. I struggled a bit with this yesterday.
For surfing the web, Firefox doesn't work as well on the Mac as it does on the PC. The key problem, which has forced me to switch to Safari, is that dragging URLs to the Finder creates a file with the URL as its name, instead of the web page title (as with PC Firefox, or Safari). Also, some of the commands seem to be messed up in Firefox. For example, Delete and Shift-Delete don't go forward and backward (as on the PC, or with Safari). Interestingly, two-finger mousepad scrolling works quite differently than in Safari -- up and down is fine, but left and right seems to go back two pages and forward two pages respectively (can't get it to go forward or back just one page). The Safari implementation is better. For now, I have to use both Firefox and Safari, because Firefox has better web archiving with the Scrapbook extension, and also it saves the tab bar state on quitting. I also don't know how to switch between tabs in Safari -- control-tab doesn't work. On a PC, FIrefox sufficed.
GraphicConverter is a nice powerful application, with a learning curve. iPhoto is just awful compared to Picasa -- no lossless editing and it forces you to use its directory structure, it also saves every image before letting you go on to the next one (meaning it is glacially slow) -- but I have been able to work out a photo workflow using GraphicConverter. Still, the PC workflow was superior, since Picasa is substantially faster with a much better interface and more controls than GraphicConverter. I had intended to pick up Photoshop CS 2 right away, but the Intel announcement has put software purchases on hold.
I am using VirtualPC to run a few applications, for example s7raw to convert RAW files from my Fuji camera.
I had assumed X11 would be either installed by default or downloadable from Apple. So I left the install CD at home and went on a trip. But in fact, the only way to get Apple's X11 is off the install CD. I had to compile and install X11 myself; this was a huge pain.
Random: The computer doesn't warn me before it goes to sleep because of low battery power.
Here is a bug which I assume must be an operating system bug, because the same thing happens in all sorts of different applications: A line of text just disappears, or is duplicated, in a text box. There are lots of bugs like this -- but I remembered this one because it just now occurred here. Clicking around, and scrolling up and down, then more clicking, and the text appeared again.
This is largely a negative review, and, yes, I am considering switching back. The noisiness of this powerbook is unacceptable -- as I sit here even just typing, the fan is cycling louder/quieter/louder/quieter -- and the poor screen is very annoying. Connecting to an external monitor makes it even more noisy, since the graphics card really struggles. And yet another forced incompatibility with the Intel switch? It's good news that Mac hardware will finally catch up to PCs (a year from now, at least), but I don't want to have to rebuy all my software. The bugginess of OS X has really annoyed me. Why can't Apple stop and fix the current bugs before adding on tons of new features which make it even buggier? The current Finder deserves the adjective "Microsoftian" more than Windows XP.
That all said, I'd certainly appreciate any advice as to how to improve things.
Second impressions (added 6/28)
Here are some second impressions a few weeks later. It's mostly a list of bugs I've run into, although there are some nuggets hidden there if you care to dig through it (Quicksilver!).
Short summary: OS X is great. I love the interface, and the screen space with dual monitors. Spotlight is fantastic — on Windows I had missed a decent search function (never tried the google desktop search, though). For me, Dashboard is very practical; I use it for conversions, calendar, weather, google maps, dictionary, stickies, and two photo albums for inspiration. Little tips I found in this thread like using the space bar to select a button have made navigation so much easier (but it doesn't work in Photoshop 7!). Another key combo: ctrl-cmd-D looks up the word under the mouse in the dictionary. I have no idea where these come from — couldn't find anything in the Help topics — but they are great to know.
Quicksilver works a treat and has eased navigation a bit. The developer's web site makes it sound like huge bloatware (talking about automating emails and the like — why do I need to automatically send out tons of emails from the Desktop?), but in practice it just works. I also downloaded Witch for app/window switching with text labels, but it was too ugly.
I've basically figured out a photography workflow. I convert RAW files in VirtualPC, then use GraphicConverter to edit IPTC and to finish conversion for my Jalbum website. Occasionally, I use Photoshop 7, but I don't trust that it saves the EXIF properly, so I only use it through GraphicConverter. GraphicConverter is dog slow even at trivial things like making a selection and I have considered using Picasa in VirtualPC, but for now I'll just wait.
About the interface, there are a few little things that I wish Apple would fix, but now know they never will. For example, dragging selected text doesn't work like I think it should. Back with OS 9, for example, I drag-and-dropped all the time. When I switched to Windows, I had to switch to using copy-paste, because drag-and-drop behavior just wasn't consistent. On OS X, drag-and-dropping is much like Windows, and I'm becoming resigned to using copy-paste. Another example: Menus occasionally open then immediately close, instead of staying open. So I have to open them again. Mac (pre OS X) used to have the best menus around, but nowadays little things like this have broken them.
Here come the promised bugs. I feel the software is all buggy, even more than most of the big Windows apps. I'm a bit afraid that we're doomed to buggy software for a while now, especially because of the Intel transition. I have taken to quitting applications when possible to try to keep them "fresh."
The "Open with.." is completely broken. OS X insists on opening my TeX files with Script Editor even though I have several times told it to "Always open" with TeXShop (another very buggy program).
Preview has crashed several times. Finder has crashed: At one point, while scrolling through a window, the Finder blurred all the icons down the window. It didn't freeze and I was able to take a screenshot and close the window. Once, after waking the computer up, the Dock would not appear (I typically have it hidden to the side, but nothing would get it to pull out). I could see the Dock if I went to the Apple menu and turned hiding off, but if I turned hiding back on again nothing would trigger it to show itself. When I tried to restart the Dock wouldn't go away. Apple's force-quit dialog is useless (Microsoft, from long experience I suppose, has a much better force quit dialog), but fortunately I have the Activity Monitor in my Dock (which was still responsive and was visible since I had turned off hiding) so I quit the Dock with that. After restarting, it seemed to work fine again.
I tried Keynote for a presentation last week. I did so because Mac Powerpoint has a worse interface than Windows Powerpoint. Keynote is missing a lot of features (e.g., an arc tool) and its LaTeX interface (via EquationEditor, the only option for what I do since I sometimes need tex->dvi->ps->pdf compiling) is inferior to Powerpoint's. But I decided I'd give it a fair shot anyway, and converted over a presentation I was working on. After Keynote crashed and I lost 30 minutes of work, I'll never use it again. Keynote doesn't do automatic incremental saves, and is quite slow at saving files (the same presentation, maybe 30MB, Powerpoint saves in ~5 seconds, and Keynote in ~45 seconds), so there is no practical way to protect my work. I've opened up both NeoOffice and OpenOffice, but they were too ugly to contemplate using. Maybe I'll give them a fairer shot next time.
Mail just crashed and I almost lost an email. Fortunately, I'm relearning the old habits of saving all the time, and I'd saved a draft. It crashed because I lost the wireless connection while I was sending the email, because the wireless connectivity stinks. </rant> (I haven't made any controlled tests on wireless connectivity, but it sure hasn't amazed me.)
Safari is buggy. For example, a few days ago it couldn't be hidden. Hide Safari didn't work, Hide others from another app didn't work. Restarting Safari fixed it. Perhaps this is a window manager bug.
I had a similar problem actually with X11. All of a sudden the windows all maximized (even though their hidden icons were still there), and I had to minimize them back one by one. X11 on a Mac laptop, by the way, is awesome.
The problem with disappearing lines of text seems to be limited to TeXShop.
Sleep is fairly nice. I wouldn't mind if it went to sleep faster, also if it gave some feedback that it was putting itself to sleep, but it wakes up quite quickly.
Fan just came on. I guess I'm typing too fast.
I'd like to upgrade to Photoshop CS 2 (still on 7), but I'm worried about this whole Intel switch thing. I'd like my software to last.. But I'll have to give in eventually, since converting 12 megapixel RAW files in VirtualPC, even with batches, is a lesson in patience, and I'm going on vacation soon (lots of photos!). This whole Intel switch caught me by surprise.
A few weeks ago, I almost bought a 12" powerbook, as I need a small machine. I had one when they first came out and did not like the screen, but I assumed Apple had improved it. I went to the Apple store and discovered they had not -- same screen, which for me makies the computer almost unusable. So I bought a 15" 1.5 gig, and am quite happy with it. The screen seems much brighter than my older 15" and it is a joy to work with. Apparently, Apple will not have any first-rate very small laptops until the Intel chips. I certainly hope they improve the screen.
go back to windowz!
seriously.
you arent needed
seriously.
you arent needed
Why 12-inch? 15 and 17 inch PowerBooks have clearly superior, brighter displays than the 12-inch PowerBook. I am pretty sure that Apple is aware of the major issues right now with PowerBook & iBook specifications relative to PCs, and that major revisions to correct these problems will be forthcoming with Intel processors.
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Originally Posted by tie
Apple's hingeless design may look cool, but since the screen opens up so its bottom is actually beneath the keyboard level, this makes it a little difficult to use the computer with good posture (without hunching over). Perhaps other smaller notebooks have similar problems, I don't know, but just looking at the case, it seems that using a hinge would push the screen up by maybe 3/4".
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That's your opinion. I for one am a big fan of the current hinge design with its rear firing speakers. It helps make it easier to use the laptop in a cramped seat. Besides, have you ever had to read a book or write on a sheet of paper? You usually have to look straight down at your desk to do these things.
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| Maybe the first thing I did after turning the computer on was to change the desktop background. I chose one of Apple's backgrounds with I think a blue sky. And I was very surprised to see visible dithering. It shouldn't be dithering -- I think this means that the screen is only 18 bit, not true 24 bit capable. Apple's specifications don't say, so I am suspicious. |
First off, calibrate your screen. Secondly, Apple's backgrounds may not be 24-bit. The dithering or posterizing that you see may also be due to JPEG compression artifacts.
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| The noise: This computer is very noisy. The hard drive never sleeps and there is always a noise from it. Before the computer sleeps, there is a blessed moment of silence with the LCD screen still on but the hard drive asleep. Worse, the fans are quite noisy, too, and they come on quite frequently. I recently downloaded Temperature Monitor, and the graphics card might be the culprit. In any case, once the fans come on, I can't figure out how to get them to turn off. Leaving the computer on with nothing running, the fans will stay on indefinitely. I have to put the computer to sleep then wake it up for the fans to turn off. |
Sadly, this is true. My PB runs its fan like an HVAC unit.
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| The keyboard: I am not quite used to it, and am missing keypresses still. Probably just me. |
Get an external.
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| The switching process: It took me a bit of time to figure out how to connect my old PC laptop to this one. Eventually, though, I figured out how to share Windows folders, and then how to get the Ethernet connection working. Apple's documentation wasn't very helpful, since it basically told me to look at the Windows documentation to figure out how to set up the PC. The Windows documentation isn't very good at all, and it would have saved me some hassle if Apple had included its own documentation. Eventually, though, things started to work, even with just a standard Ethernet cable. If anyone else has questions on how to do this, I think I can probably help. |
Luckily, you only have to switch once. Besides, there are a lot of threads on this board on how to migrate files over.
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| Actually, I was transferring files from three sources: the PC laptop, my old Mac, and the network. The PC laptop transfer was the easiest. When transferring from the old Mac, I repeatedly ran into issues with the Finder. It would often lock up (with a beach ball) when copying even just moderate numbers of files (a few hundred or thousand, a few hundred or thousand megabytes). Worse, when the Finder became unresponsive, so did the whole computer. For example, I sometimes had to wait at least a minute before the force-quit dialog would show up so I could relaunch the finder. Then the Finder wouldn't actually relaunch. This was hell. Since then I have learned that the Finder can't copy more than one group of items at a time. It consistently gives beachballs, and effectively freezes, when trying to copy more than one group at a time. This is very worrisome, because I don't like file-handling routines to crash, and potentially corrupt my data. It is such a basic bug, too. |
I don't see this problem. Maybe you're trying to copy files with unusual characters in their names?
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| The operating system: This is very unstable, worse than Windows XP but perhaps similar to WIn2k. I've had only one or two true operating system crashes in the few weeks I've been using this computer, but I've had many more Finder crashes and from my perspective the Finder is part of the OS. Generally, the OS is very unpolished. I have been used to Windows, which after a while one begins to feel was designed by the proverbial monkeys at typewriters. But the Mac is surprisingly frequently even worse. This was a big letdown. Besides the Finder, which has dozens of bugs, another random example is the Airport menu which often shows full bars when it means no bars. |
I'd say this has more to do with your particular system than with OS X in general. Watch out for shareware and hacks.
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| The application switching method is just terrible. I cannot figure out the order applications show up when I command-tab. It stays consistent for a while, then seems to randomize. After it randomizes, I have to tab through all the applications to find what icon is associated with what name, and then shift tab back (because I'll have gone too far). Windows is more consistent and more efficient. While expose is frequently nice, there really needs to be a place where applications/windows are consistently organized, with text visible not just random icons. |
Use the dock?
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| The single-button mouse: It is very surprising to me that I am using modifier keys much more frequently than on a PC. For example, I have to command-click all the time. In Firefox, I have to control-click. To page-down, I have to press function-down arrow. To forward-delete, I have to function-delete. And yet I am less efficient than on a PC. For example, in Windows, one can always tab through the choices in a dialog box (Okay, Cancel, etc.). What is the equivalent key combo on a Mac? I just figured out that tabbing to cancel can be enabled in the Keyboard control panel, but I am still not sure how to hit cancel -- pressing return after selecting cancel still sends Okay. |
Hitting escape, 'C', or command '.' often works for me.
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| Why is Windows more intuitive than Mac? |
Because you're used to it.
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| Random: The computer doesn't warn me before it goes to sleep because of low battery power. |
Sure it does. It says that you have very little battery power left and to plug in your computer. If you ignore the dialog, the PB eventually sleeps by itself. What's the point of throwing up another dialog? The PB HAS to sleep by that point.
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| Here is a bug which I assume must be an operating system bug, because the same thing happens in all sorts of different applications: A line of text just disappears, or is duplicated, in a text box. There are lots of bugs like this -- but I remembered this one because it just now occurred here. Clicking around, and scrolling up and down, then more clicking, and the text appeared again. |
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| That all said, I'd certainly appreciate any advice as to how to improve things. |
Post threads asking specific questions in the appropriate forums. You'll get answers faster that way.
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Originally Posted by f1000
That's your opinion. I for one am a big fan of the current hinge design with its rear firing speakers. It helps make it easier to use the laptop in a cramped seat. Besides, have you ever had to read a book or write on a sheet of paper? You usually have to look straight down at your desk to do these things.
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You may be right, certainly for use in a cramped seat. This is just a small thing anyway.
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| First off, calibrate your screen. Secondly, Apple's backgrounds may not be 24-bit. The dithering or posterizing that you see may also be due to JPEG compression artifacts. |
I ran Apple's calibration tool, but still need to really calibrate it. Unfortunately I'm travelling at the moment. You may be right about the backgrounds. I was just surprised because I use the same backgrounds on my old desktop Mac, and had never noticed this. It's easy to check, and I'll do so when I plug into an external monitor again.
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| Luckily, you only have to switch once. Besides, there are a lot of threads on this board on how to migrate files over. |
Yup. And of course I can't fault Apple that Microsoft's documentation is poor. I did like that I could use a standard Ethernet cable. If I had to do it again, though, it would be trivial, and a little documentation from Apple should be easy.
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| I don't see this problem. Maybe you're trying to copy files with unusual characters in their names? |
I don't think so. I see this all the time. If I'm copying a large number of files, and am too impatient to wait for it to finish before starting the next copy, then I'm beachballed. If I let the first copy finish, then things work fine (so I don't see why unusual characters could be the problem).
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| I'd say this has more to do with your particular system than with OS X in general. Watch out for shareware and hacks. |
The major instability is the Finder copy command. This bug was present in the fresh system, since I first noticed it as I was transferring over my files. I think my other crashes can be linked to having to restart the finder (which can't be good!).
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| Use the dock? |
This is what I am starting to do. I had been keeping only my most frequently used applications in the dock. But then some apps show up at the middle of the dock (if they are permanently in it) and some open in the side. So I have to look in two places, still. And I still need to navigate based on icons, without any text help. (I actually have the dock on the side of my screen, and would find it very helpful if the names for all apps showed when I moused over there, not just the one. Also all names should show when command-tabbing.) I think I might drag every app I have into the dock, and put them in alphabetical order there.
I am also going to have to change my habits. For example, I have gotten used to hiding applications in the background, because I don't like clutter. But then they don't show up in exposé.
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Hitting escape, 'C', or command '.' often works for me. ... Because you're used to it. |
Thanks for the tip. After I've fn-tabbed to a button, though, do you know how to "click" that button? Yes, it should certainly get easier in the future. But: I never had to ask how to switch between buttons on Windows, I just tried what seemed natural and it basically worked (at least for buttons, I never figured out lists). Right now, I'm stumped on how to do this on a Mac, despite trying things and also looking through the documentation.
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You've never seen disappearing lines of text? Maybe it is me, but I've seen the same thing happen in 10.2 on a different computer. But I've also seen the same kind of bug occasionally in windows text editors, so this seems to be a common problem.
I was a bit stingy with the praise in my first post. The computer is small and handy. The power cord management is great, though the adapter takes two plug spots. The computer wakes from sleep to a useable state very quickly.
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Originally Posted by Dave Hagan
Why 12-inch? 15 and 17 inch PowerBooks have clearly superior, brighter displays than the 12-inch PowerBook.
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I've worked on the 15 inch. You are right, the screen is definitely much better, and people say it is quieter. But my first impression is that it is just too large and bulky. That might be okay, but it is also too heavy. 5 pounds is really my upper limit for a laptop. I had been using a 5.5 pound, 14" PC laptop, and really wanted something lighter and no larger.
I'm a little concerned with your finder copying crashes. I don't recall ever experiencing those since I switched to OS X over 2 years ago, and I've been duplicating files all the time. (and it sure would be annoying when you're trying to get set up!) One of our PB12" models had a defective HD from the beginning, and it took some time to document. In the end, the Apple hardware test CD showed a defect, while most other tools did not see the problem. New HD, works great now.
I really cannot emphasize this enough -- my experience with OSX is that it is VERY stable, certainly more so than our XP machines (which have a significantly simplified set of apps to minimize conflicts). Your finder should NOT crash. The main issues I have are the apps that just are not as stable as they should be - mainly office.
As for Office for the Mac vs Office for Windows, the mac version normally has more features (and tends to come out a year later). I am surprised you found such a difference in powerpoint; are you comparing comparable versions (Office 2003 for Windows with Office 2004 for the Mac?) Or are you comparing Office for Mac OSX with Office 2003?
We've had PB12" models since they were first shipped; the HD is the only significant issue we experienced (and it WAS hard to diagnose because the HD worked at first test; not Apple's fault the HD was defective). For example, the text problem you are experiencing is unusual in my experience. And I cannot say anything about your screen except that our PB12 models' screens are all bright enough for everyday use.
And please ignore the forum critics -- you are certainly allowed to express your opinion. But suggesting OS X is less stable than XP is really a sign something is not right with your computer, that is not normal.
I really cannot emphasize this enough -- my experience with OSX is that it is VERY stable, certainly more so than our XP machines (which have a significantly simplified set of apps to minimize conflicts). Your finder should NOT crash. The main issues I have are the apps that just are not as stable as they should be - mainly office.
As for Office for the Mac vs Office for Windows, the mac version normally has more features (and tends to come out a year later). I am surprised you found such a difference in powerpoint; are you comparing comparable versions (Office 2003 for Windows with Office 2004 for the Mac?) Or are you comparing Office for Mac OSX with Office 2003?
We've had PB12" models since they were first shipped; the HD is the only significant issue we experienced (and it WAS hard to diagnose because the HD worked at first test; not Apple's fault the HD was defective). For example, the text problem you are experiencing is unusual in my experience. And I cannot say anything about your screen except that our PB12 models' screens are all bright enough for everyday use.
And please ignore the forum critics -- you are certainly allowed to express your opinion. But suggesting OS X is less stable than XP is really a sign something is not right with your computer, that is not normal.
Thanks for the detailed critique. Sorry you're having some problems. I'm not going to claim Apple is perfect, but I haven't seen the same problems. I have a 12" Powerbook (rev. D) used with a DVI 17" display and the fan seldom comes on, either with or without the display hooked up. When it does come on, I can barely hear it. I use mostly word processing, safari, mail, and a few other low intensity apps. To be fair, you're not the only one who's reported constant fanning in these forums, but it's not my experience.
I've had maybe 3 crashes in almost a year of use. Do you have enough memory? I didn't notice how much RAM you got -- I have 768 and it makes a big difference over the included 256. Have you tried repairing permissions (via Disk Utility) and running Apple's disk repair app?
I've had maybe 3 crashes in almost a year of use. Do you have enough memory? I didn't notice how much RAM you got -- I have 768 and it makes a big difference over the included 256. Have you tried repairing permissions (via Disk Utility) and running Apple's disk repair app?
my finder hardly ever crashes on me...you ever think that the reason mac os x is a lil unstable for you is that you dont know the ropes yet? this is more of a bash than a critique and some of your points are pretty lame. you complain about the keyboard, when others here have thoroughly stated how much they love it (me included), you complain about how the screen opens??? whats the difference if the screen is open an extra inch higher? if you have bad posture you have bad posture. i do agree that some stuff needs fixing but to me a critique is supposed to be non biased and all i hear from reading all this is that windows and windows boxes are better...
iREZ, the poster had high expectations from his mac, and he has had lots of problems. His posting is largely full of frustration. I'm not sure how he could use his mac improperly and get a bunch of finder crashes.
I agree that the comments about crashing and the fan always on sounds like a major problem with the machine; none of our powerbooks have that problem.
I agree that the comments about crashing and the fan always on sounds like a major problem with the machine; none of our powerbooks have that problem.
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Originally Posted by ender2002
go back to windowz!
seriously. you arent needed |
People like you give Mac users a bad name. The majority of us realize that Apple is far from perfect, and that Apple isn't a religion - just a company that makes great products. Most PC people assume we are all like you, close minded and ignorant.
Steve Jobs cited laptops as one of the key reasons he jumped to Intel. The PowerBooks are great, I just bought a 17" 1.67 myself. However, I am fully aware of the flaws in the current lineup. I want to run OS X, so I'm willing to live with the flaws.
Feedback like this is what Apple needs to continue to push forward and start innovating again. They have innovated on the software side, but the hardware side has been lacking for a few years now. The Intel move will help to correct that.
I have a 1.33 GHz PB with 768 MB of RAM and have not experienced any of the problems you have.
I did have the HDD die within 4 months of purchase though. I suggest you add RAM if you only have the stock 256 MB (now 512 MB in rev 2 12" PBs), run some disk check utilities like Disk Warrior 3.03 and if that does not fix the problems, format the disk to zeroes and reinstall 10.4 over. If that does not fix the problems with Finder crashes, I would be calling in at your local AS before too long in case it is a developing H/W fault.
I have heard some comments from rev 2 owners that the screen is not as good as the rev 1 but have never had the two side by side for comparison. Mine seems fine and holds up well with the XP machines I have to work on most days.
I did have the HDD die within 4 months of purchase though. I suggest you add RAM if you only have the stock 256 MB (now 512 MB in rev 2 12" PBs), run some disk check utilities like Disk Warrior 3.03 and if that does not fix the problems, format the disk to zeroes and reinstall 10.4 over. If that does not fix the problems with Finder crashes, I would be calling in at your local AS before too long in case it is a developing H/W fault.
I have heard some comments from rev 2 owners that the screen is not as good as the rev 1 but have never had the two side by side for comparison. Mine seems fine and holds up well with the XP machines I have to work on most days.
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Originally Posted by tie
Thanks for the tip. After I've fn-tabbed to a button, though, do you know how to "click" that button? Yes, it should certainly get easier in the future. But: I never had to ask how to switch between buttons on Windows, I just tried what seemed natural and it basically worked (at least for buttons, I never figured out lists). Right now, I'm stumped on how to do this on a Mac, despite trying things and also looking through the documentation.
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Space.
Hitting return clicks the default (blue) button (and on Windows, the button with the thick border).
If you tabbed through objects and suddenly the Return key should change its functionality from hitting the default to hitting the currently selected button, that could be considered seriously broken interface design.
IIRC, space works the same way on Windows.
the command tab sorts the apps left to right in the order of what you're using most recently. As to OS X crashing - not something I'm familiar with 
maybe you should look into the hard disk thing as mentioned above, or check the RAM. Bad RAM tends to be the culprit for OS X crashes.
maybe you should look into the hard disk thing as mentioned above, or check the RAM. Bad RAM tends to be the culprit for OS X crashes.
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Originally Posted by tie
My review of my new Mac Powerbook G4 12":
[snip] This is largely a negative review, and, yes, I am considering switching back. The noisiness of this powerbook is unacceptable -- as I sit here even just typing, the fan is cycling louder/quieter/louder/quieter -- and the poor screen is very annoying. Connecting to an external monitor makes it even more noisy, since the graphics card really struggles. And yet another forced incompatibility with the Intel switch? It's good news that Mac hardware will finally catch up to PCs (a year from now, at least), but I don't want to have to rebuy all my software. The bugginess of OS X has really annoyed me. Why can't Apple stop and fix the current bugs before adding on tons of new features which make it even buggier? The current Finder deserves the adjective "Microsoftian" more than Windows XP. That all said, I'd certainly appreciate any advice as to how to improve things. |
Yep, this is largely a negative review. I agree with some of the things you've mentioned, but all in all there are things that weights up for the negative ones. I assume you are using the latest Apple OS, 10.4.0/10.4.1 and I have to agree it's buggy. Finder is buggy. Apple rushed it out a bit early. I've been on OS X since 10.0, and 10.3.9 alias Panther is probably the most polished 10.x version to this date. You just happen to get the bleeding edge offer from Apple, and thus there are more bugs in it. When Apple shipped 10.3 I thought it had its share of indisputable bugs, but they soon got ironed out. The same thing will happen in 10.4.x, and 10.4.2 is probably not to far away. OS updates for X is more than just "security updates" to put it that way, they usually fix some flaws and add features as well. So I would perhaps waited a little before I put a "final verdict" on this OS. If it's how you say, the OS doesn't warn you about little battery power, that certainly must be flaw (with the installation or whatever). I've owned a couple of Apple portables, and the procedure when the battery is draining up is a pop-up warning when you have about ten minutes left. If you ignore the message, the computer just goes to sleep. When you find a power-outlet, you can wake the machine up again and keep on working on your documents from where you left it. It's quite simple. When it comes to the hardware, I guess no-one will dispute you on the LCD quality. It's not on pair with those machines you are comparing it with. My biggest complaint about the 12" is the weak screen and bad 802.11b/g reception. Other than that, I find it interesting that you find the sound of a spinning hard-drive disturbing. Still, for me the winner was the software bundle, price, portability and build quality that made the 12" the right choice for me. I might understand that your perspective is different if you don't think the OS makes a difference, or the price tag for that matter.
I really appreciate everyone's comments. There was some frustration in my post, and I was a little worried that it would be interpreted as trolling/flamebait, but I'm glad for the positive help. I really don't want to hear that my hard disk or RAM might be defective -- I'd rather hear 10.4.2 will fix everything -- but I'll follow people's suggestions for looking into it.
By the way, I should have mentioned that I have 1.25 GB RAM installed.
This is basically right. I did a little experimenting and it seems that when you hide an application it is reordered to be just in front of the last application which was hidden. This may be part of the reason why I was seeing applications moved into seemingly random locations in the middle of the list -- I have a habit of hiding apps frequently.
There is also a bug in the ordering algorithm. For example, just now the first three applications in the list are Firefox, then the printer application, then the rest (all hidden apps). If I tab over to TextEditor and call Hide Others, then the order becomes TextEditor, printer application, Firefox, the rest. It should be TextEditor, Firefox, printer app. That is, Hide Others reorders the applications being hidden (for no reason I can think of). Calling Hide Others to hide more than two applications reorders them in an even worse way, I can't figure it out but it is worse than just a single swap or a cyclic permutation. I had found this really confusing, thinking that Apple must be using some odd interface logic, but now I think it must just be a bug.
Wow. Thanks. I disagree on interface design, but that's for another thread.
As I pick up on little things like this, I am enjoying this computer more and more. I think I will be able to keep fixing most of my OS and Applications issues, while avoiding the Finder Copy bug. The Airport menu is also buggy. Perhaps application switching will become easier as my icon recognition improves, but I am just much faster at finding patterns in text than images and hopefully Apple will show more text in the future.
By the way, I should have mentioned that I have 1.25 GB RAM installed.
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Originally Posted by moodymonster
the command tab sorts the apps left to right in the order of what you're using most recently.
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This is basically right. I did a little experimenting and it seems that when you hide an application it is reordered to be just in front of the last application which was hidden. This may be part of the reason why I was seeing applications moved into seemingly random locations in the middle of the list -- I have a habit of hiding apps frequently.
There is also a bug in the ordering algorithm. For example, just now the first three applications in the list are Firefox, then the printer application, then the rest (all hidden apps). If I tab over to TextEditor and call Hide Others, then the order becomes TextEditor, printer application, Firefox, the rest. It should be TextEditor, Firefox, printer app. That is, Hide Others reorders the applications being hidden (for no reason I can think of). Calling Hide Others to hide more than two applications reorders them in an even worse way, I can't figure it out but it is worse than just a single swap or a cyclic permutation. I had found this really confusing, thinking that Apple must be using some odd interface logic, but now I think it must just be a bug.
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Originally Posted by analogika
Space.
... If you tabbed through objects and suddenly the Return key should change its functionality from hitting the default to hitting the currently selected button, that could be considered seriously broken interface design. |
Wow. Thanks. I disagree on interface design, but that's for another thread.
As I pick up on little things like this, I am enjoying this computer more and more. I think I will be able to keep fixing most of my OS and Applications issues, while avoiding the Finder Copy bug. The Airport menu is also buggy. Perhaps application switching will become easier as my icon recognition improves, but I am just much faster at finding patterns in text than images and hopefully Apple will show more text in the future.
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Originally Posted by tie
I don't think so. I see this all the time. If I'm copying a large number of files, and am too impatient to wait for it to finish before starting the next copy, then I'm beachballed. If I let the first copy finish, then things work fine (so I don't see why unusual characters could be the problem).
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I've seen this before, but not recently.
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| You've never seen disappearing lines of text? Maybe it is me, but I've seen the same thing happen in 10.2 on a different computer. But I've also seen the same kind of bug occasionally in windows text editors, so this seems to be a common problem. |
I haven't experienced it enough to remember it happening.
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| The computer wakes from sleep to a useable state very quickly. |
I used to shock PC users when I'd just close the lid on my iBook and get up and go. They'd ask, "Don't you have to wait for it to shutdown?" Hehe, such poor lost souls.
Believe or not, most modern Windows laptops (post 2003) go to sleep pretty well. Granted, they are definitely not as fast as the PBs, either to go to sleep or to wake up, but they do it w/o crashing. Of course, as opposed to PBs, Windows laptops have to re-initialize lots of software, even after coming out of hibernation, so I would say that the total time to wake up is about 30~40 seconds depending on what you have on the machine, which although is a long time, is much better than a fresh reboot. Going to sleep is similar to the PB, because you don't really pay attention once the lid has been closed.
I really don't have experience w/ desktops, my last windows desktop being from about 2002, but those suckers really didn't go to sleep mode very well, basically a coin-flip as to whether it would go to sleep/wake up properly.
I really don't have experience w/ desktops, my last windows desktop being from about 2002, but those suckers really didn't go to sleep mode very well, basically a coin-flip as to whether it would go to sleep/wake up properly.
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I had found this really confusing, thinking that Apple must be using some odd interface logic, but now I think it must just be a bug. |
I am not sure if this is a bug or not, but in either way, you could tip Apple about it. Your friend:
http://www.apple.com/macosx/feedback/
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Originally Posted by tie
There is also a bug in the ordering algorithm. For example, just now the first three applications in the list are Firefox, then the printer application, then the rest (all hidden apps). If I tab over to TextEditor and call Hide Others, then the order becomes TextEditor, printer application, Firefox, the rest. It should be TextEditor, Firefox, printer app. That is, Hide Others reorders the applications being hidden (for no reason I can think of). Calling Hide Others to hide more than two applications reorders them in an even worse way, I can't figure it out but it is worse than just a single swap or a cyclic permutation. I had found this really confusing, thinking that Apple must be using some odd interface logic, but now I think it must just be a bug.
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I looked into this a year or so ago, and the only reason i can think of is that when you call "Hide Others" it invisibly shows everything and then hides everything again. This is quite likely to put applications out of order as you could guess. Note that when you do it its not always the same order, which seems to support that hypothesis.
As for the fan, that does seem quite weird. I have a PB 12" RevA which is probably the hottest and noisiest of the lot and i find that the fan rarely spins up, and when it does i can only just hear it.
As for the Finder issues copying from Windows, I have had similar issues in the past. The only thing i can find which would cause it is that Finder is waiting for SMB (windows filesharing) commands and isnt getting them. Quite often my Win2k box will just refuse to send SMB commands to either of my Macs or my Linux boxes. Once this has caused Finder to beachball.
My biggest advice is that if you are familiar with *nix at all is to leave a Console open so that you can terminate the SMB process or Finder if the Windows machine stalls up. For that matter, just leave Console open all the time.
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| I also don't know how to switch between tabs in Safari -- control-tab doesn't work |
command+shift+left/right arrow
when tabbing through the applications, the text should come up under the application on the mini-exposé window that pops up (and unless they changed it in tiger, after you command+tab to start switching apps, isn't it command+~ to go back)?
Your review sucks. I can't believe you used your ignorance of hotkeys as a negative point, and almost everything else seems contrary to what I've noted. Windows 2k being more "polished" than 10.4? Come on man, everyone in the windows community accepts 2k's fastness as such BECAUSE it's such a boring OS.
The only time my finder ever crashed was when I did a "rm -rf /" in the terminal on my iBook a few years ago. My current PowerBook has been running flawlessly since I got it last August. Perhaps you have faulty RAM or some hardware problems? OS X (10.3.9 for me) has been one of the most stable OS I've used so far. If not for the software updates that requires a restart, my uptime can go for months. My computer just goes to sleep when I am not using it.
As for using cmd+tab to switch between apps, it should be very intuitive once you're familiar with the icons, which I feel represents the apps much better than icons in Windows XP. Or you can use Expose to go quickly to the window you want. I also use the dock often for apps switching.
There's plenty of UI for latex on OS X. I use TeXShop occasionally, but I perfer to just use the terminal with X11.
As for using cmd+tab to switch between apps, it should be very intuitive once you're familiar with the icons, which I feel represents the apps much better than icons in Windows XP. Or you can use Expose to go quickly to the window you want. I also use the dock often for apps switching.
There's plenty of UI for latex on OS X. I use TeXShop occasionally, but I perfer to just use the terminal with X11.
Forget the dock. It is worthless to a power user. Personally, I use a shareware app called DragThing which allows me MUCH more control over various 'docks' that I can enable. I can't remember the last time I used my dock. I just made it as small as possible, turned on auto-hide, and stuck it on the left side of the screen. My drag thing docks are on the bottom where I have easy access. I have one dock which shows running apps (and the order never changes). I have another dock with one tab containing icons for running apps and another tab which shows documents I am currently using and has some applescript I use frequently, included some that are just drop targets, so I can drag files onto them and have things happen to them. Finally, on the bottom right, I have another dock in which I store things I cut and paste frequently, since DragThing allows you to store 'copied' text in a dock. I've got some newspaper website passwords and some command line commands that I use frequently for work stored there. I click to open the dock and then right click to copy the content of an entry.
I can't recommend DragThing highly enough. It changed the way I use the computer, and I don't think I spent even $20 on it. Use google to find it.
--sam
I can't recommend DragThing highly enough. It changed the way I use the computer, and I don't think I spent even $20 on it. Use google to find it.
--sam
I will agree with your review on one point, the screen is lacking in brightness and overall goodness. There are a lot of nice, bright, super crisp LCDs out there and the 12in appear to have gotten the shaft. This is not really a major problem for me, its just a bit annoying at times. Thank goodness I have good eyesight.
I still use the Dock, but there are plenty of alternatives along with the much-praised DragThing: e.g. Quicksilver (shareware), and Devon's free XMenu, which puts an app launcher in the menu bar, and lots of others. Search the Applications threads.
Here are some second impressions a few weeks later (I also copied these into the first post). It's mostly a list of bugs I've run into, although there are some nuggets hidden there if you care to dig through it (Quicksilver!).
Short summary: OS X is great. I love the interface, and the screen space with dual monitors. Spotlight is fantastic — on Windows I had missed a decent search function (never tried the google desktop search, though). For me, Dashboard is very practical; I use it for conversions, calendar, weather, google maps, dictionary, stickies, and two photo albums for inspiration. Little tips I found in this thread like using the space bar to select a button have made navigation so much easier (but it doesn't work in Photoshop 7!). Another key combo: ctrl-cmd-D looks up the word under the mouse in the dictionary. I have no idea where these come from — couldn't find anything in the Help topics — but they are great to know.
Quicksilver works a treat and has eased navigation a bit. The developer's web site makes it sound like huge bloatware (talking about automating emails and the like — why do I need to automatically send out tons of emails from the Desktop?), but in practice it just works. I also downloaded Witch for app/window switching with text labels, but it was too ugly.
I've basically figured out a photography workflow. I convert RAW files in VirtualPC, then use GraphicConverter to edit IPTC and to finish conversion for my Jalbum website. Occasionally, I use Photoshop 7, but I don't trust that it saves the EXIF properly, so I only use it through GraphicConverter. GraphicConverter is dog slow even at trivial things like making a selection and I have considered using Picasa in VirtualPC, but for now I'll just wait.
About the interface, there are a few little things that I wish Apple would fix, but now know they never will. For example, dragging selected text doesn't work like I think it should. Back with OS 9, for example, I drag-and-dropped all the time. When I switched to Windows, I had to switch to using copy-paste, because drag-and-drop behavior just wasn't consistent. On OS X, drag-and-dropping is much like Windows, and I'm becoming resigned to using copy-paste. Another example: Menus occasionally open then immediately close, instead of staying open. So I have to open them again. Mac (pre OS X) used to have the best menus around, but nowadays little things like this have broken them.
Here come the promised bugs. I feel the software is all buggy, even more than most of the big Windows apps. I'm a bit afraid that we're doomed to buggy software for a while now, especially because of the Intel transition. I have taken to quitting applications when possible to try to keep them "fresh."
The "Open with.." is completely broken. OS X insists on opening my TeX files with Script Editor even though I have several times told it to "Always open" with TeXShop (another very buggy program).
Preview has crashed several times. Finder has crashed: At one point, while scrolling through a window, the Finder blurred all the icons down the window. It didn't freeze and I was able to take a screenshot and close the window. Once, after waking the computer up, the Dock would not appear (I typically have it hidden to the side, but nothing would get it to pull out). I could see the Dock if I went to the Apple menu and turned hiding off, but if I turned hiding back on again nothing would trigger it to show itself. When I tried to restart the Dock wouldn't go away. Apple's force-quit dialog is useless (Microsoft, from long experience I suppose, has a much better force quit dialog), but fortunately I have the Activity Monitor in my Dock (which was still responsive and was visible since I had turned off hiding) so I quit the Dock with that. After restarting, it seemed to work fine again.
I tried Keynote for a presentation last week. I did so because Mac Powerpoint has a worse interface than Windows Powerpoint. Keynote is missing a lot of features (e.g., an arc tool) and its LaTeX interface (via EquationEditor, the only option for what I do since I sometimes need tex->dvi->ps->pdf compiling) is inferior to Powerpoint's. But I decided I'd give it a fair shot anyway, and converted over a presentation I was working on. After Keynote crashed and I lost 30 minutes of work, I'll never use it again. Keynote doesn't do automatic incremental saves, and is quite slow at saving files (the same presentation, maybe 30MB, Powerpoint saves in ~5 seconds, and Keynote in ~45 seconds), so there is no practical way to protect my work. I've opened up both NeoOffice and OpenOffice, but they were too ugly to contemplate using. Maybe I'll give them a fairer shot next time.
Mail just crashed and I almost lost an email. Fortunately, I'm relearning the old habits of saving all the time, and I'd saved a draft. It crashed because I lost the wireless connection while I was sending the email, because the wireless connectivity stinks. </rant> (I haven't made any controlled tests on wireless connectivity, but it sure hasn't amazed me.)
Safari is buggy. For example, a few days ago it couldn't be hidden. Hide Safari didn't work, Hide others from another app didn't work. Restarting Safari fixed it. Perhaps this is a window manager bug.
I had a similar problem actually with X11. All of a sudden the windows all maximized (even though their hidden icons were still there), and I had to minimize them back one by one. X11 on a Mac laptop, by the way, is awesome.
The problem with disappearing lines of text seems to be limited to TeXShop.
Sleep is fairly nice. I wouldn't mind if it went to sleep faster, also if it gave some feedback that it was putting itself to sleep, but it wakes up quite quickly.
Fan just came on. I guess I'm typing too fast.
I'd like to upgrade to Photoshop CS 2 (still on 7), but I'm worried about this whole Intel switch thing. I'd like my software to last.. But I'll have to give in eventually, since converting 12 megapixel RAW files in VirtualPC, even with batches, is a lesson in patience, and I'm going on vacation soon (lots of photos!). This whole Intel switch caught me by surprise.
Short summary: OS X is great. I love the interface, and the screen space with dual monitors. Spotlight is fantastic — on Windows I had missed a decent search function (never tried the google desktop search, though). For me, Dashboard is very practical; I use it for conversions, calendar, weather, google maps, dictionary, stickies, and two photo albums for inspiration. Little tips I found in this thread like using the space bar to select a button have made navigation so much easier (but it doesn't work in Photoshop 7!). Another key combo: ctrl-cmd-D looks up the word under the mouse in the dictionary. I have no idea where these come from — couldn't find anything in the Help topics — but they are great to know.
Quicksilver works a treat and has eased navigation a bit. The developer's web site makes it sound like huge bloatware (talking about automating emails and the like — why do I need to automatically send out tons of emails from the Desktop?), but in practice it just works. I also downloaded Witch for app/window switching with text labels, but it was too ugly.
I've basically figured out a photography workflow. I convert RAW files in VirtualPC, then use GraphicConverter to edit IPTC and to finish conversion for my Jalbum website. Occasionally, I use Photoshop 7, but I don't trust that it saves the EXIF properly, so I only use it through GraphicConverter. GraphicConverter is dog slow even at trivial things like making a selection and I have considered using Picasa in VirtualPC, but for now I'll just wait.
About the interface, there are a few little things that I wish Apple would fix, but now know they never will. For example, dragging selected text doesn't work like I think it should. Back with OS 9, for example, I drag-and-dropped all the time. When I switched to Windows, I had to switch to using copy-paste, because drag-and-drop behavior just wasn't consistent. On OS X, drag-and-dropping is much like Windows, and I'm becoming resigned to using copy-paste. Another example: Menus occasionally open then immediately close, instead of staying open. So I have to open them again. Mac (pre OS X) used to have the best menus around, but nowadays little things like this have broken them.
Here come the promised bugs. I feel the software is all buggy, even more than most of the big Windows apps. I'm a bit afraid that we're doomed to buggy software for a while now, especially because of the Intel transition. I have taken to quitting applications when possible to try to keep them "fresh."
The "Open with.." is completely broken. OS X insists on opening my TeX files with Script Editor even though I have several times told it to "Always open" with TeXShop (another very buggy program).
Preview has crashed several times. Finder has crashed: At one point, while scrolling through a window, the Finder blurred all the icons down the window. It didn't freeze and I was able to take a screenshot and close the window. Once, after waking the computer up, the Dock would not appear (I typically have it hidden to the side, but nothing would get it to pull out). I could see the Dock if I went to the Apple menu and turned hiding off, but if I turned hiding back on again nothing would trigger it to show itself. When I tried to restart the Dock wouldn't go away. Apple's force-quit dialog is useless (Microsoft, from long experience I suppose, has a much better force quit dialog), but fortunately I have the Activity Monitor in my Dock (which was still responsive and was visible since I had turned off hiding) so I quit the Dock with that. After restarting, it seemed to work fine again.
I tried Keynote for a presentation last week. I did so because Mac Powerpoint has a worse interface than Windows Powerpoint. Keynote is missing a lot of features (e.g., an arc tool) and its LaTeX interface (via EquationEditor, the only option for what I do since I sometimes need tex->dvi->ps->pdf compiling) is inferior to Powerpoint's. But I decided I'd give it a fair shot anyway, and converted over a presentation I was working on. After Keynote crashed and I lost 30 minutes of work, I'll never use it again. Keynote doesn't do automatic incremental saves, and is quite slow at saving files (the same presentation, maybe 30MB, Powerpoint saves in ~5 seconds, and Keynote in ~45 seconds), so there is no practical way to protect my work. I've opened up both NeoOffice and OpenOffice, but they were too ugly to contemplate using. Maybe I'll give them a fairer shot next time.
Mail just crashed and I almost lost an email. Fortunately, I'm relearning the old habits of saving all the time, and I'd saved a draft. It crashed because I lost the wireless connection while I was sending the email, because the wireless connectivity stinks. </rant> (I haven't made any controlled tests on wireless connectivity, but it sure hasn't amazed me.)
Safari is buggy. For example, a few days ago it couldn't be hidden. Hide Safari didn't work, Hide others from another app didn't work. Restarting Safari fixed it. Perhaps this is a window manager bug.
I had a similar problem actually with X11. All of a sudden the windows all maximized (even though their hidden icons were still there), and I had to minimize them back one by one. X11 on a Mac laptop, by the way, is awesome.
The problem with disappearing lines of text seems to be limited to TeXShop.
Sleep is fairly nice. I wouldn't mind if it went to sleep faster, also if it gave some feedback that it was putting itself to sleep, but it wakes up quite quickly.
Fan just came on. I guess I'm typing too fast.
I'd like to upgrade to Photoshop CS 2 (still on 7), but I'm worried about this whole Intel switch thing. I'd like my software to last.. But I'll have to give in eventually, since converting 12 megapixel RAW files in VirtualPC, even with batches, is a lesson in patience, and I'm going on vacation soon (lots of photos!). This whole Intel switch caught me by surprise.
I'm glad your impressions of your mac have changed so dramatically in the last two weeks - your first post was very derogatory about it, but now you have become accustomed to the difference in OSes, its a much more balanced and fair review. Sure OSX isn't perfect (especially Safari 1.3 - damn crashing with all my carefully found windows open), but at least now you've seen that some aspects of it are actually quite good.
He's got a point on screen resolution.
I still think you have a hardware and/or software incompatibility problem on your machine. For example, I've been using Preview, Acrobat, and Acrobat Reader to read and edit various Pdfs, and I have to say that I have not experienced the crashes you have in any of these apps (and I read a lot of scientific papers as pdfs.) The only issue I have with Preview is that for some pdfs that read fine in acrobat reader, preview gives me junk. The app stills runs, however.