I've been a Windows user for the longest time... ever since Dos became replaced with Windows 3.1 as that's what my dad used, all the way up to Windows XP, which is what I'm running now on my desktop computer, in dual-boot with SuSe Linux 10.1.
I've been using Linux for over 4 years now... and I like it much better than Windows... I don't like M$ for ethical reasons but aside from that I find that Windows offers me much less functionality, unless you add a dozen of 3d-party apps to it, and then still.
In the near future it'll be time to upgrade again, and I'm sort of building a business case as to which platform will allow me to be the most productive in my tasks. I consider myself to be a 'power user' (although not a 'geek') and I'd like to go beyond the limits of what I'm doing right now. Only Windows doesn't allow me to do that and Linux up to a certain extent.
The problem is, I have no clue what the Mac is like... it's like an alien landscape to me ATM.
So I'm just going to try to describe the most important tasks I have to use the computer for, and I apologize for the avalanche of information and questions:
1. Website Development, Maintenance, Image Editing
For my job, I do manage the content of my company's website, using a Html-Editor (Html-Kit). However, I'm thinking about starting a small business of my own developing websites for private persons and small companies.
I'm not gifted with godly drawing skills (quite the contrary...), but I use my digital camera to capture sights and elements and then processing (filters etc.) in Photoshop to obtain the graphic elements for my webpage templates. In this case, things I'd like to be able to do are auto-downloading of photographs, batch renaming a bunch of files (with accompanying previews), batch resize of image files, e.g. to quickly create thumbnails for a thumbnail gallery. I also need to scan articles and export to PDF, or create a document from scratch and export to PDF (currently using OpenOffice, Scribus). One other question: does Mac have good OCR software?
Another thing that I do, is film movies with a digital camera, and then resizing it, putting music to it, and optimize the filesize for website playback. I don't like wmv or .mov files (both require extra plugins) however, so I'd like something that can export to mpegs or avi's
I use file management and FTP a lot, so a site-wide abd advanced search&replace functionality would be a godsend, as would be the possibility to automate certain tasks, for example resizing pictures to a thumbnail format and immediately upload it to the proper folder on the webserver.
What I don't do yet, but will need if I'm going to run a business, is a program for creating Mockups, Sitemaps, draft versions of website screens or PDF's, ... something with a set of stencils and 'connectors' that you can use to quickly layout or draw something.
As for file management, I'd like to do things like auto-sorting files according to a certain filetype, sender (mail), certain keywords, ... have the browser automatically download certain filetypes to a particular folder (e.g. all movies from site X go to the 'movies' folder), easy drag&drop and cut&paste between different applications and folders, ...
As for my personal time, I like to surf the web, e-mail people (Gmail or one of my other webbased accounts, most enabled with pop access), watch anime movies, listen to music (just bought an ipod nano last week), ...
I also play the keyboard, I have a midi-enabled keyboard and I'd like to get into producing my own music... playing the keyboard to 'simulate' the different tracks, record my voice over it, ... just hobbyist in the beginning... all this digital music stuff is overwhelming enough as it is, but perhaps I could switch to something more professional later...
I also play games, but mostly adventure games...
So is a MAc for me you think?
I've been using Linux for over 4 years now... and I like it much better than Windows... I don't like M$ for ethical reasons but aside from that I find that Windows offers me much less functionality, unless you add a dozen of 3d-party apps to it, and then still.
In the near future it'll be time to upgrade again, and I'm sort of building a business case as to which platform will allow me to be the most productive in my tasks. I consider myself to be a 'power user' (although not a 'geek') and I'd like to go beyond the limits of what I'm doing right now. Only Windows doesn't allow me to do that and Linux up to a certain extent.
The problem is, I have no clue what the Mac is like... it's like an alien landscape to me ATM.
So I'm just going to try to describe the most important tasks I have to use the computer for, and I apologize for the avalanche of information and questions:
1. Website Development, Maintenance, Image Editing
For my job, I do manage the content of my company's website, using a Html-Editor (Html-Kit). However, I'm thinking about starting a small business of my own developing websites for private persons and small companies.
I'm not gifted with godly drawing skills (quite the contrary...), but I use my digital camera to capture sights and elements and then processing (filters etc.) in Photoshop to obtain the graphic elements for my webpage templates. In this case, things I'd like to be able to do are auto-downloading of photographs, batch renaming a bunch of files (with accompanying previews), batch resize of image files, e.g. to quickly create thumbnails for a thumbnail gallery. I also need to scan articles and export to PDF, or create a document from scratch and export to PDF (currently using OpenOffice, Scribus). One other question: does Mac have good OCR software?
Another thing that I do, is film movies with a digital camera, and then resizing it, putting music to it, and optimize the filesize for website playback. I don't like wmv or .mov files (both require extra plugins) however, so I'd like something that can export to mpegs or avi's
I use file management and FTP a lot, so a site-wide abd advanced search&replace functionality would be a godsend, as would be the possibility to automate certain tasks, for example resizing pictures to a thumbnail format and immediately upload it to the proper folder on the webserver.
What I don't do yet, but will need if I'm going to run a business, is a program for creating Mockups, Sitemaps, draft versions of website screens or PDF's, ... something with a set of stencils and 'connectors' that you can use to quickly layout or draw something.
As for file management, I'd like to do things like auto-sorting files according to a certain filetype, sender (mail), certain keywords, ... have the browser automatically download certain filetypes to a particular folder (e.g. all movies from site X go to the 'movies' folder), easy drag&drop and cut&paste between different applications and folders, ...
As for my personal time, I like to surf the web, e-mail people (Gmail or one of my other webbased accounts, most enabled with pop access), watch anime movies, listen to music (just bought an ipod nano last week), ...
I also play the keyboard, I have a midi-enabled keyboard and I'd like to get into producing my own music... playing the keyboard to 'simulate' the different tracks, record my voice over it, ... just hobbyist in the beginning... all this digital music stuff is overwhelming enough as it is, but perhaps I could switch to something more professional later...
I also play games, but mostly adventure games...
So is a MAc for me you think?