It will take me longer to write this blog than it just took me to set up my new MacBook Air. Remember those days not too long ago when you dreaded getting a new computer because you had to set aside an entire day to migrate everything over and get it all set up? NO MORE!
The battery exploded off the back of my 3 year old MacBook Pro and I took that as a sign that it was finally time to replace the thing – see picture. But I’ve been a little busy the last couple weeks and have avoided it till the last possible moment.
Today my hand was forced. I’m taking off on another work trip tomorrow and I really need to work on some PowerPoint while gone. The iPad isn’t going to cut it. So I took a little trip over to the Apple store just 2 hours ago. I am already back home and fully functional. And I would have saved 20 minutes if I hadn’t tried to argue about our business discount.
Last time I bought a computer (my iMac), I just moved everything over from my MacBook Pro – files, applications, settings, everything. It was very easy, but this time around, I didn’t want to clutter my new little pristine machine with all my photos, files and extra applications from the Desktop, so I decided to start from scratch. I figured this would take a few hours, but I had to do it, so off I went…
After a few minutes of consulting with the sales representative, I settled on the lowest end MacBook Air 13-inch ($1199). Since my primary need over the next few days was going to be PowerPoint, I brought my Office install disk with me to make sure it would allow me to install it on another machine. They plugged me into an external hard drive and it installed no problem. And I was out of there!
When I got home, I seriously just spent 15 minutes finalizing the setup. I downloaded Dropbox and logged into my account. Hazaa… I now have all my documents. I opened Mail and connected to my Thought Ensemble email. I opened iCal and connected to my MobileMe calendar. I opened MobileMe preferences and connected to my contacts. I downloaded Firefox and logged into Facebook, downloaded Skype and logged in. Those 5 simple steps and I now have 98% of what I need.
And this computer is FAST! I’m loving this flash memory. It boots up at unbelievable speed and saves/opens downloaded documents super fast. It feels faster than my practically new iMac, even though I’ve got a much slower processor on here.
Oh happy day.