Just bought my first Mac, any suggestions?

Well, I've had my MBP for 2 weeks now and I thought I'd post a little review of it so far, and I'll update in the future as I find out more things, or what have you.

Upon first look, this laptop is clean, and I mean really clean. I forgot how much I really hated the stickers that are placed on the laptop. Great silver color, and it's so simple -- keyboard, speakers, power button, and trackpad -- THAT'S what makes it work for me. Just some little things that are built into the MBP are amazing, the ambient light screen brightness is amazing, but not always what I would like it to be.. no big deal, I can adjust via the F1 and F2 buttons. What's really amazed me is the lighted keyboard. That is such a nice feature to have, reduces strain on my eyes when I may be in a dark room searching for the key I need.. those little things that make the Mac experience so much better for me.

Now, the OS.. very nice. I used an iBook G4 for about a month when the iBooks were first new, so I was a little familiar with the operating system, but I've really played around with as much as I can in this one, and so far, it's just amazing. Everything is so easy to get to.. and coming from a Windows user, I don't know if I'll ever get used to not having an installer for every single program.. the click and drag to the Applications folder.. weird, but very VERY nice.

Performance wise.. absolutely amazing. It's fast.. really fast for what I like it to do (basic internet, iPod, watching DVD's), and it's quiet. The computer I had before this was a HP Pavilion zd8000 17"er.. and if anyone knows those laptops, it sounded like a jet engine taking off compared to this one. One little complaint I have is that the small strip right above the functions keys gets REALLY hot.. so hot that I can't keep my fingers on them (not that I do, just when testing) for more than a few seconds.

Now, I installed Boot Camp because I simply need XP to run a lot of the software that comes with my books at school, and almost all of the accounting software I use runs only on Windows, so I had to go that route. No complaints with that either, installed great (via Slipstream instructions). But since I'm not in school, I haven't used that too often, so I don't have much to say about that.

As far as having to rob a bank to pay for it, I work at a bank.. so yikes! And no, I will not smash it and get a PC, I've had them, and I hate them.

I'm more than 100% happy with my purchase.

Well, that's all I have for now.. if I think of anything else, or have anything else to add, I'll be sure to post back!

Learn to ignore silly stuff like this and Just enjoy all that the Mac can do. Remember this one can do it all Mac, Linux and Windows. No PC will ever run OSX at any price.

The whole world of choice is open to you if you wish to use it.

And you'll find plenty to enjoy with a Net connection and tapping into mac forums

Lockergnome has a good site
/http://channels.lockergnome.com/osx/

Forums are at the bottom, and the news stuff often list new software releases as well as Updates and Reviews.

...except right-click. X-P

or a bluetooth one

Or learn to tap the pad with 2 fingers at once which all do the same thing

Again I use parallels where its not a problem, but for any period when I am doing a lot of work on a notebook, I use an external mouse anyway

And probably an external full size keyboard too

So I would not have a problem.

Oh yes, for games an external monitor .. 19 inch LCD is so much nicer on the eyes

but I'm not turning this into an argument thread. I already made one of those and still regret it. Theres not a whole lot of software you need to get for the mac, I'd try parallels, but as everyone else said, not for gaming. Mess around with OS X, you'll love it, and use XP for all your work until you figure out the simplicitiy of OSX and how great it is to use.

What I meant by saying "natively running windows" was a computer that is destined, if you will, to run Windows. Sorry people. I just don't like Mac hardware.

But I need windows for other clients.

I used to have to have 2 complete seperate systems, Now I can sell of the PC's and just boot windows on the same hardware if I really need to.

So now I can get more and better macs as I have a whole lot less invested in windows hardware.

I think apple will get more sales, not from windows users, but from MAc users who have money left over from no longer having to buy windows boxes too. or Mac lovers who had already blown the budget because they needed a windows box.