Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Helping friends switch to Mac from Windows

Wanna do your friends a favour helping them switch to a Mac from Windows?


I found this article on 10 ways to help people switch to a Mac From my own experience of helping some of my friends it has some good tips and tricks.


The best ones highlighted in the article for me were:


  • Explaining the Dock - a key part of Mac OS X
  • Providing an overview of Mail, Calendar and Contacts - as most people will need this and it’s a little different to (say) Outlook on Windows… more like using an iPhone, which many switchers will probably already have
  • App store - something that a lot of people will get into, a new way of buying and maintaining software on your new Mac
  • Printers - a must!
  • System Preferences - so people can tweak the settings ‘under the hood’, or at least the easy and visible ones anyway… there are deeper ones that require a knowledge of Unix and use of the Terminal
  • …. and of course…. loading Office for Mac (so they don’t get homesick ;) )
A few other tips I would have added are:
  • Good tips on filing documents and how to make good use of Spotlight
  • … and how to use iLife (Music, Photos) and maybe even iWork (Pages, Numbers and Keynote) to help them let go of Office, if they want to experience a more creative way of doing stuff.
I am sure there are many others I have forgotten, having used Macs for over 10 years its easy to take it all for granted now…. but part of the fun of switching IMHO is exploring and learning.

For those switchers out there, enjoy! and contact me if you need help, I’ll give you details of how to transfer donations to me PayPal account ;) lol