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July 18, 2006
My Mother-in-Law's Mac Mini
I finally convinced my mother-in-law that her computer, a 1999 Pentium III running Windows ME, needed replacing. She wasn't too resistant, as it was getting pretty dodgy -- frequent lock-ups and it was slooooow.
Given that she wasn't terribly invested in Windows and generally used her PC only for web browsing and webmail, I suggested she consider a Mac mini. She already had a decent 19" CRT monitor and speakers, so the mini seemed like a good prospect.
This past weekend, when we were visiting her, she and I visited the Apple store to check them out. Within 15 minutes of seeing it in action, she was convinced that this was a good idea, so we left the store toting a Core Solo mini, a Super Mighty Mouse, and a Mac keyboard.
Back at her home, I set everything up. Setup took about 15 minutes; most of that was removing Apple's notoriously meticulous packaging. Once turned on and connected to her DSL, the mini needed to download updates for what seemed like every stinking application on it (nearly a gig worth!) -- that took about 3 hours to complete. But then, she was ready to go. The ease of setup really was impressive.
As this was my first real hands-on experience with a Mac, especially OS X, I was anxious to see how easy it really was. As a 15-year exclusive user of Windows, I have to admit that I found the lack of a right-click a bit disconcerting -- I constantly felt like I should be able to pop up a context menu. Other than that, I really liked the responsiveness and overall look-and-feel -- things did what they seemed like they should and stuff was where it seemed like it should be. What tickled my mother-in-law the most at first was the fact that this little, teensy, nearly-silent white box replaced her ginormous, wheezing, gray HP tower.
Will I become a Mac convert? Well, probably not. I am very efficient at getting Windows machines to do what I want, and I don't have any serious complaints about Windows XP, so I don't feel an urge to abandon the platform. However, with that said, if the Shuttle PC that currently serves as our home theater PC suddenly gives out, I would be quite tempted to replace it with a Core Duo Mac mini. Knowing that Macs and Windows machines can get along on the same network without a lot of muss and fuss makes that option a lot more palatable than it was in the days of Dave.
So, my hat's off to Apple and Steve Jobs -- you guys really do know what you're doing and I hope that more people explore you as a reasonable option for their computing needs. Macs deserve at least consideration, if not a good hard look, especially by those who aren't already heavily invested (in terms of $$ or knowledge) in Windows.
Comments
Get any kind of two (or more) button mouse and your mother will have contectual menus. I use a Kensington mini mouse on my laptop. The Apple mouses seem pretty lame.
Posted by: HankH at July 18, 2006 11:33 AM
If by super mouse, you meant mighty mouse, that does have a right click button. Macs have two button functionality, they just don't have two buttons. Control-click works just as well anyway, although perhaps not with at actual keyboard-mouse setup, unlike the laptop setup.
Posted by: mike at July 18, 2006 10:14 PM
Mike: Thanks, I fixed that reference. And yeah, I remember seeing that you _could_ set it up for 2-button operation, but given that I wanted this thing to be as simple as possible for my mother-in-law, I kept it configured as the default single-button setup (she liked that idea as she was often confused by right-click/left-click instructions).
Posted by: Craig at July 20, 2006 10:40 AM