Andy's Un-Official Unsolicited Mac Advice Thread

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  • AndyAndy Registered Users Posts: 50,016 Major grins
    edited January 16, 2006
    marlof wrote:
    I was not saying you were not current, I was just saying your system is probably that fresh, that the need for maintenance is less felt. I've been running Mac OS X on the same iBook for over three years. Been updating automagically like you, been buying the new cats over the years. But never did a fresh install, just upgraded all the time. Doing maintenance is a requirement, esp. if you use your system for a longer period of time. And running system updates is only part of your maintenance schedule. But I see that you run Disk Warrior, so you do some maintenance. Good for you.

    And about those crons, I can't help it but I'll always think Leica, not UNIX.

    I had no troubles upgrading to Tiger last year either - I just folly'd the instructions, taking the defaults all the way :D

    lol3.gif
  • patch29patch29 Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 2,928 Major grins
    edited January 16, 2006
    Anyone else notice that vbulletin and Safari seem to be working properly now, after the 10.4.4 update? ear.gifclap.gif my work here is done. 1drink.giflol3.gifumph.gif
  • gubbsgubbs Registered Users Posts: 3,166 Major grins
    edited January 17, 2006
    A hint to the performance of photoshop / rosetta / intel imac

    ooh, & mines been dspatched : )
  • DavidTODavidTO Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 19,160 Major grins
    edited January 17, 2006
    Gubbs,

    The review-meisters at Ars Technica have their review of the iMac Core Duo up.
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  • gubbsgubbs Registered Users Posts: 3,166 Major grins
    edited January 17, 2006
    DavidTO wrote:
    Gubbs,

    The review-meisters at Ars Technica have their review of the iMac Core Duo up.
    Thanks David, not sure how much that all means when he only used 512Kb of RAM ne_nau.gif What do you think??
  • AndyAndy Registered Users Posts: 50,016 Major grins
    edited January 17, 2006
    David beat me to a pulp :beatwax so I finally broke down and bought Macaroni.
  • pathfinderpathfinder Super Moderators Posts: 14,707 moderator
    edited January 17, 2006
    gubbs wrote:
    Thanks David, not sure how much that all means when he only used 512Kb of RAM ne_nau.gif What do you think??

    I thought it was an impressive debut of the Intel dual core chipsets in the iMAC. In some areas it was approaching 2.5GHz Dual PowerMacs speed even with less RAM. The pros software ( PSCS2 ) needs to be ported to Intel code, not translated via Rosetta, but an impressive debut.

    In the next generation, next year, these are going to be great machines - I may purchase an 20in iMac for use in my office.

    But I won't swap out my PowerMac for at least two more generations - it doea everything I need for now and into the future for a while longer.
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  • DavidTODavidTO Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 19,160 Major grins
    edited January 17, 2006
    gubbs wrote:
    Thanks David, not sure how much that all means when he only used 512Kb of RAM ne_nau.gif What do you think??


    It means that if you put more RAM into it you'll get better results, especially with Rosetta, I believe.
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  • DavidTODavidTO Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 19,160 Major grins
    edited January 17, 2006
    Andy wrote:
    David beat me to a pulp :beatwax so I finally broke down and bought Macaroni.


    Good boy.
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  • gusgus Registered Users Posts: 16,209 Major grins
    edited January 18, 2006
  • gusgus Registered Users Posts: 16,209 Major grins
    edited January 18, 2006
    Now this one is even better but please please be aware that a swear word is used twice in this rather long & funny vid (it is a bad one) so dont say you were not told.
  • gubbsgubbs Registered Users Posts: 3,166 Major grins
    edited January 20, 2006
    DavidTO wrote:
    One of the benefits is lifetime, free DavidTO Tech Support.
    David, please can I have some of this free support deal.gif

    Just planning the transfer of files from my sick PC to the mac. In the PC I have a 300GB slave HDD (NTFS) which I'm going to take out and put in 1 of the 2 firewire enclosures I've bought. I've also bought a new and as yet unformatted 300GB drive which I'll put in the other.

    1/ am I right in thinking that for my windows laptop and the mac to be able to read/write the drives they have to be FAT32?
    3/ if that's the case, is it possible to reformat an NTFS drive to FAT32
    4/ There was a 2 but but I was being thick(er):D

    Thanksthumb.gif
  • AndyAndy Registered Users Posts: 50,016 Major grins
    edited January 20, 2006
    gubbs wrote:
    David, please can I have some of this free support deal.gif

    Just planning the transfer of files from my sick PC to the mac. In the PC I have a 300GB slave HDD (NTFS) which I'm going to take out and put in 1 of the 2 firewire enclosures I've bought. I've also bought a new and as yet unformatted 300GB drive which I'll put in the other.

    1/ am I right in thinking that for my windows laptop and the mac to be able to read/write the drives they have to be FAT32?
    3/ if that's the case, is it possible to reformat an NTFS drive to FAT32
    4/ There was a 2 but but I was being thick(er):D

    Thanksthumb.gif

    Yes Fat 32 for both. Yes you can format NTFS drive to fat 32.
  • DavidTODavidTO Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 19,160 Major grins
    edited January 20, 2006
    Hey, Gubbs,

    I don't know, but I been told...

    not to trust FAT32.

    It'll be more than fine for transferring files, but I would avoid it for long-term use.

    Another option for long-term file sharing is to use a gigabit ethernet switch and share the drive over the network.
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  • StevenVStevenV Registered Users Posts: 1,174 Major grins
    edited January 20, 2006
    I use Fat32 all the time. see Formatting Big FAT32 Volumes for some assist.
  • DavidTODavidTO Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 19,160 Major grins
    edited January 20, 2006
    StevenV wrote:
    I use Fat32 all the time. see Formatting Big FAT32 Volumes for some assist.


    Great resource. My weak point in all things Mac is that all I really know about is Mac stuff, so when people ask about PC things, I'm a little out of my league.

    I like it that way.
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  • DavidTODavidTO Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 19,160 Major grins
    edited January 21, 2006
    So, Gubbs,

    do you have it yet?
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  • gubbsgubbs Registered Users Posts: 3,166 Major grins
    edited January 21, 2006
    DavidTO wrote:
    So, Gubbs,

    do you have it yet?
    Not Yet :cry
    latest tacking: (GMT) Depart Terminal SHANGHAI, SH, CN 19 Jan 2006 14:10

    Mac tell me I'll have it by Friday, latest. Can't wait!

    Thanks for above advice, and your mac help page, great stuff!
    I've been lying in bed having a rethink headscratch.gif
    I use the laptop mainly for downloading my flash cards to, chimping and some ps editing. As long as I'm able to read the laptop's hd from the mac and then copy files to one of the it's drives I'll be happy. So I might as well just format both the external drives for the mac?
    Oh yea, will my laptop be able to read the mac drives ne_nau.gif
  • ruttrutt Registered Users Posts: 6,511 Major grins
    edited January 21, 2006
    gubbs wrote:
    As long as I'm able to read the laptop's hd from the mac and then copy files to one of the it's drives I'll be happy. So I might as well just format both the external drives for the mac?
    Oh yea, will my laptop be able to read the mac drives ne_nau.gif

    I was going to suggest that. You'll get better stability because the Mac file system is journaled which means that it can survive a crash or a power outtage without damage. NTFS is also journaled, but not FAT.

    Both machines are capable of exporting and importing filesystems from each other. This has nothing to do with whether the filesystems are NTFS, FAT, or HFS+ (Mac). The only downside of formatting your external drives for the Mac is that you won't be able to plug them directly into the windows machine.
    If not now, when?
  • ruttrutt Registered Users Posts: 6,511 Major grins
    edited January 21, 2006
    Macworld has some Mactel benchmarks, including photoshop running under Rosetta: http://www.macworld.com/2006/01/features/imaclabtest1/index1.php

    Too bad. On the other hand, look at the first page. There is every reason to think that the next release of photoshop will result in a very nice performance boost on these machines. Long term, there is every reason to think the higher end machines which use the fastest Intel processors will be real PS monsters. They already are under Windows and there is no reason performace should be worse on OS X; in fact, I'd expect it to be somewhat better in some cases.
    If not now, when?
  • DavidTODavidTO Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 19,160 Major grins
    edited January 21, 2006
    gubbs wrote:
    So I might as well just format both the external drives for the mac?
    Oh yea, will my laptop be able to read the mac drives ne_nau.gif

    Yes, I think you're right. If that's really how you're going to work, then definitely format the drives for the mac. You'll be better off like rutt says with the journaling on. You can access the drives over the network, no problem. Ask Andy. He did that until he went all Mac. And really Gubbs, that's the ultimate goal now, isn't it? :D
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  • jimfjimf Registered Users Posts: 338 Major grins
    edited January 21, 2006
    rutt wrote:
    Both machines are capable of exporting and importing filesystems from each other. This has nothing to do with whether the filesystems are NTFS, FAT, or HFS+ (Mac). The only downside of formatting your external drives for the Mac is that you won't be able to plug them directly into the windows machine.

    If you're talking about attaching a network share then you're right, you can do it either way, although I think you have to turn on Windows Share support in MacOS X. But if you're talking about sharing an attached drive (unplugging it from one computer and plugging it into another) then the only portable format is FAT. To my knowledge OSX does not support NTFS and I'm sure that WinXP does not support HFS+. Everyone supports FAT.

    Unfortunately FAT is a terrible filesystem so I don't recommend it unless you must share the drive. If all you're going to do is copy files back and forth once in awhile, use the network and format the filesystems on the Mac HFS+ and on the XP box NTFS.
    jim frost
    jimf@frostbytes.com
  • ruttrutt Registered Users Posts: 6,511 Major grins
    edited January 21, 2006
    I think that's exactly what I said. In any case, we agree.
    jimf wrote:
    If you're talking about attaching a network share then you're right, you can do it either way, although I think you have to turn on Windows Share support in MacOS X. But if you're talking about sharing an attached drive (unplugging it from one computer and plugging it into another) then the only portable format is FAT. To my knowledge OSX does not support NTFS and I'm sure that WinXP does not support HFS+. Everyone supports FAT.

    Unfortunately FAT is a terrible filesystem so I don't recommend it unless you must share the drive. If all you're going to do is copy files back and forth once in awhile, use the network and format the filesystems on the Mac HFS+ and on the XP box NTFS.
    If not now, when?
  • StevenVStevenV Registered Users Posts: 1,174 Major grins
    edited January 22, 2006
    question: if an external drive's formatted FAT32 and a bunch of suff (commonly referred to as "data," "images," "files," or "documents", but I prefer to use the more technical term "stuff"), and the external drive is attached to a Mac, can OSX's drive manager utility thingie convert to HFS+ without losing any of the data, um I mean stuff?
  • jimfjimf Registered Users Posts: 338 Major grins
    edited January 22, 2006
    StevenV wrote:
    question: if an external drive's formatted FAT32 and a bunch of suff (commonly referred to as "data," "images," "files," or "documents", but I prefer to use the more technical term "stuff"), and the external drive is attached to a Mac, can OSX's drive manager utility thingie convert to HFS+ without losing any of the data, um I mean stuff?

    I don't believe so. I even checked Disk Utility to be sure, doesn't seem to have any conversion capability at all. You'd have to copy it off, reformat, and copy back.

    BTW nice job with the technical jargon.
    jim frost
    jimf@frostbytes.com
  • cabbeycabbey Registered Users Posts: 1,053 Major grins
    edited January 22, 2006
    StevenV wrote:
    question: if an external drive's formatted FAT32 and a bunch of suff (commonly referred to as "data," "images," "files," or "documents", but I prefer to use the more technical term "stuff"), and the external drive is attached to a Mac, can OSX's drive manager utility thingie convert to HFS+ without losing any of the data, um I mean stuff?

    Nope. Disk Utility likes to format every chance it gets. In the PC and Unix spaces, there are tools that can accomplish an inplace migration. They usually do something akin to the following:
    1. resize the existing partition as small as the amount of "stuff" on it will allow.
    2. create a new partition with the new filesystem
    3. move as much data as will fit into the new filesystem
    4. resize the existing partition down, and the new partition up
    5. go back to step 3 untill done
    6. delete the old partition and grow the new one to fill the disk.
    To say the least this is one of those processes where they suggest you have a full backup of your data before you begin. At which point I usually just say to hell with all that and after validating that the backup is good, I toast the old partition and create a new one. :D
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  • StevenVStevenV Registered Users Posts: 1,174 Major grins
    edited January 23, 2006
    thanks, guys
    jimf wrote:
    BTW nice job with the technical jargon.

    it comes with the territory (IT guy since the mid-80's... VMS, Unix, Mac, DOS, Win, MCSE certs, blah blah blah.) :D
  • gubbsgubbs Registered Users Posts: 3,166 Major grins
    edited January 25, 2006
    Got all excited, UPS arrived, but unfortunately he only had one of the two packages. They've lost the imac headscratch.gif, but I have got my applecare!

    An all van message has gone out checking for my missing mac. I hope they find it otherwise I think I'll have to wait for another from Shanghai :cry
  • gubbsgubbs Registered Users Posts: 3,166 Major grins
    edited January 25, 2006
    gubbs wrote:
    Got all excited, UPS arrived, but unfortunately he only had one of the two packages. They've lost the imac headscratch.gif, but I have got my applecare!

    An all van message has gone out checking for my missing mac. I hope they find it otherwise I think I'll have to wait for another from Shanghai :cry

    UPS just came back again, he found it!! :D
  • DavidTODavidTO Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 19,160 Major grins
    edited January 25, 2006
    gubbs wrote:
    UPS just came back again, he found it!! :D


    YAY!
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