It's an old model that was given to me, so I didn't plunk down any cash for it, but I look forward to playing around.

(I wasn't planning it, but hopefully it bugs a few people that there's a Zune in this photo)

I had a MBP for a while and they run Windows 7 really well (I found a couple in a skip, they had been dropped and suffered head crashes, but with new drives they ran fine)

If you wanted to bug people you would have took the picture with windows running on it :-)

Looking at the machine and wallpaper, it appears to be running OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, while 10.7 Lion is the current release. Head to the Apple menu and choose About this Mac, and see if it has a Core Duo or a Core 2 Duo processor. If it's a Core Duo, 10.6 is the end of the road. If it says Core 2, it can go to 10.7.

If you do go that route (which is the only way to see the initial iCloud desktop integration), I'd recommend maxing out the RAM in that machine first, which is 4GB I believe. RAM and the hard drive is accessible when you remove the battery, help for that is here: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1651

And as far as the Zune HD, not going to knock it. Especially when it's fully supported on your Mac there, by following this link into the App Store.
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/windows-phone-7-connector/id415571499?mt=12

I do plan on dual booting. This might become my new on-the-job computer to replace my MSI Wind. The only problem is the MacBook weighs a ton in comparison, and I use the netbook a lot to run around troubleshooting networks.


Actually, it's running Leopard: 10.5.8. But the good news is that it's a Core 2 Duo, so I can still go to Lion. I don't have interest in using iCloud, but I would like to keep up to date and get the latest OS version. Still, even though it's cheap, it's not a priority.


Thanks, I'll definitely want to max out the RAM. Where's the best place to get reasonably priced RAM?


Cool. Actually, I really was just doing that to get people's goat. I actually ended my Zune subscription this very month and have switched to Rdio. It sucks, because the Rdio software is pretty bad (with a redesign on the way), and the Zune HD is actually a fabulous music player. I still prefer its interface to any music playback software I've ever used. But I just wasn't using it anymore.


Anyway, Tom, I hope you don't mind but I'm going to have some initial questions about using this thing. Just to ease people's minds: there's a ton to like about the Mac OS. There are some little niggles that I'm going to have, either as a result of what I'm used to or things I honestly see is stuff I don't like, but I look forward to playing around in a new sandbox.

You can pick up VMWare Fusion 4 right now in a MacUpdate bundle with a bunch of other apps for $50 - might be a good alternative to dual booting. I find it a lot more convenient to access Windows in a VM.

I just switched over to Lion as my primary boot OS tonight. I installed it onto a brand new Intel series 520 SSD (240GB) which I also just picked up tonight. Last month one of the last pieces of software I'd been waiting on for an update was finally released, so seeing as I'm supposed to help someone else transition to iCloud, I thought I'd get on it myself.

Ahh, 10.5 and 10.6 wallpapers were so close, the brightness of the picture made it hard to tell

10.5 is basically end of life now. It's not going to see any more patches. Apple tends to support their current OS and the last one only. Moving to at least 10.6 would be a good plan, if not 10.7.

RAM, wherever you normally go for laptop RAM is fine. There is absolutely nothing special about the memory in any Mac, but lots of places like to sell "Mac" memory with a markup. (Well, the one exception is some of the earlier Mac Pros that required specific heatsinks.)

Oh, and regarding dual booting. BootCamp works well, and VMWare Fusion can boot the windows drive into a VM. You end up with the best of both worlds that way, native rebooting if you have to, and the ability to run both side by side, without 2 separate Windows installs. For me, BootCamp is for gaming, though that MacBook probably won't do so well in that regard.

I think I'll be installing 10.8 in a VM sometime next week. Have you done this yet Tom? I'll probably use Parallels since I just picked up a copy of that earlier this month (another bundle deal). At the same time I'll likely try my Fusion 3 WinXP VM in Parallels too.

Any opinions on putting the VM files on SSD?

Ah, that was going to be my next question. I thought I'd heard you could boot cleanly into the OS but also run the same install within OSX. That's what I was looking for. Thanks.

I'll let you guys know if I have anymore questions. Thanks!

BTW, I'm probably going to buy this later today. Look right?

Whic revision MacBook is it? Hold down the option key while clicking the Apple menu, and System Information should be the first option. (IF not, About this Mac has the button there). On the first Hardware tab, it will have a Model Identifier entry, something like Macbook3,1.

2GB total ram is going to be a little slow if you do upgrade to 10.7, or want a VM open. While Apple's page may only list 2GB max for your model, any of the Core 2 Duos should actually have a higher max, but some were strange in that the max was 3GB. I forgot about this earlier, but Apple only reported memory configurations they shipped on that page, compared to the true chipset maximum.

http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/macbook/index-macbook.html is a better guide to look at for max ram. If it came with 10.5 (instead of 10.4 on the restore discs), odds are it can go to 4GB or 6GB total.

crucial.com has a memory selector that will point you in the right direction.

That's where I went and it informed me of the type I would need. What I didn't know was how many slots there were and the max amount supported per slot.

Tom, it's showing Macbook2,1

I definitely don't want just 2GB. I just wasn't sure it it had 2 slots or 4 (though most laptops seem to only have 2).

On the left side of the screen it should detail not just the memory type, but the number of slots and the max memory config.
Eg:


Some of the Dell Precision laptops, and presumable similar systems from other makers, have four memory slots, but they are very much the exception, so I doubt the MacBook has more than two. In any case, nice score!

Yeah, I know I can get all that info from Crucial, and I use that often, but I prefer to try to get it directly from the computer in question. And if there's something unusual about this model as Tom implied, I want to make certain.

Okay, then go for a 4GB kit of 2 matched 2GB DIMMS. The laptop is only going to work with 3GB of it, but the matched set is likely easier then trying to buy a 1GB and 2GB stick, and reducing the performance a little bit.

So you don't think that 2GB is the maximum? I was under the impression I couldn't go for any more than that, according to both Crucial's site and the System Information screen...

Nope, 2GB is not the actual maximum. 2GB was the max Apple ever officially sold and supported if you bought RAM through them. But the chipset, and OS will work just fine if you put 2x2 into there. It's not going to use the full 4GB, but it will go up to 3GB. I've had hands on experience with this, as someone in my family has this exact model.

This site also confirms it, along with the explanation why only 3GB will be usable. It's our old friend, the 32 bit memory limit cropping up in the chipset, and needing the 3-4GB window for addressing space.

http://www.everymac.com/ultimate-mac-lookup/?search_keywords=MacBook2,1 (Pick one of them then look at the memory section)

Apple's site has the spec as well. 3GB. I just happened to have looked up the RAM specs for an iMac of the time and it has the same limitations. I also recall the hoopla at the time, not only from Mac users, about systems topping out at 3GB instead of 4.

Matt, don't forget to check out that bundle I mentioned at MacUpdate. Still over a week left on it and you'll get a bunch of software, including VMWare for $50.

Time to stray the topic a bit... Tom, how's your Google-fu as it related to looking up obscure AppleScript info?

I'm finding that a number of mail scripts I've been using forever no longer work in Lion because a certain mail AppleScript property pops an error - even though according to its dictionary it's still supposed to be valid.

This script is supposed to set the selected emails to REPLIED TO. I have another one which sets UN-REPLIED and it fails the same way. Give it a shot on your system and at least I'll be able to tell if it's some problem specific to my setup.



The "was replied to" generates the error - it comes back saying it can't set it to true in this case, or false in the opposite script.

Then why the false reporting in the actual OS?


Well I'm at least used to that, though I'm more used to it being something like ~3.7GB available. Why the difference?

First question, and the most important in order for me to get started using this thing:

Is there an easy way to remap the editing keyboard shortcuts so that they make sense to a Windows user? Please, I don't want this to get into a religious war. It just not something that I think I'll be able to get used to, or even want to get used to. I simply do not like how OSX handles copy/paste and stuff like that. I much prefer how everything pretty much revolves around the Ctrl key in Windows.

You can remap all the modifiers in the Keyboard preference pane inside System Preferences.

I'd suggest however trying to get used to using the command key at its current location. You'll find it's more convenient after a while.

Ok, I need more help. Address Book (in Lion with iCloud) is driving me UP THE WALL.

In its preferences I can clearly see that I have both iCloud and "On My Mac" local accounts. However, if I try adding a group, it ALWAYS goes into iCloud. I'd like to set up an address group that's local only so that it will not be synced to other devices and I simply can't figure out how to do it.

The other PITA is that let's say I want to get rid of a group and all its associated addresses... There's no way to do this. If you delete the group it doesn't actually delete any contacts. So now you'll be left with potential duplicates or at the very least extra contacts that you may not want. All listed in the "All Contacts" view. Good luck trying to figure out which ones were the ones belonging to that group.

The workaround I found was to export every group you want to keep to a vcard, then delete ALL addresses and all groups, re-create the groups you want and then import the vcards you previously exported.

An unrelated issue I'm having is when bringing up search results in Google from the Apple discussions forum (some links only), clicking through won't let me see the discussions. I'm prompted to re-verify my AppleID password and then it always fails due to an "unknown error" - arrgh! Already tried deleting cookies. And the login works fine for the developer pages and iTunes.

Found a work-around for the Address Book "On My Mac" issue - a thread about the OPPOSITE problem led me to it.

In preferences if you select "On My Mac" to be the default account, then you will see the entry in the Address Book for "On My Mac"suddenly appear if it was previously missing - then you can create local groups. After that you can put the default back to iCloud and the local "On My Mac" category remains. IMO, this is a bug - since it was listed as an account in prefs, it should have always appeared in the list in Address Book's UI.

I disagree, but a debate would be pointless.

You haven't been at it for a while, so disagreeing right now is pointless. I didn't say it would be more convenient now. It won't. But I've been using Mac OS for over 15 years, all the while also using Windows. And I was primarily a Windows user until switching my own personal machine to a Mac in 2004. I didn't form the opinion lightly. I know from convenience.

Anyway, you can make the changes you want in the place I mentioned. Then the more you use the machine with the keyboard, you'll soon start to see what I mean.

On a side note, I just turned off Lion's default "natural" scroll direction. I tried it for a few days and thought Id keep trying it until I got used to it. It was become more automatic, but it's anything but natural. I'm not going to train myself to deal with something I don't agree with. It was a stupid decision, a senseless paradigm and the people at Apple who thought about putting it into the OS, let alone making it the default, have their heads up their asses. There is no argument to be made advocating this. It's just wrong. The track pad controls the mouse cursor and all movement is relative to that premise. Therefore the traditional scroll movements are the natural ones. The input is not being done to the physical page or objects that are moving, and this behavior falls apart all over the place.

Nice score Matt, I have the same model in white. Still goes well although battery life is pretty poor now.

I got mine to replace a Windows desktop that was shitting me to tears, and I haven't looked back (although I do have Parallels ).

I was very pleased to hear about that, but it turns out it doesn't do anything useful. It can swap over the Control and Command keys completely, but it can't make it so that the same modifier key is used for C and V in text editors, and for ^C and ^D in terminals (and XEmacs).

Though unlike you and perhaps Dignan, I'm not at all interested in the most effective way to be a long-term MacOS user. I'm temporarily lumbered with the blasted thing because of the (arbitrary?) difficulty of cross-compiling for Iphone from anything else, and I want to be through the experience and out the other side as rapidly and frictionlessly as possible, while doing the minimum possible damage to my muscle memory of how to operate ever other desktop in the world.

Peter

KeyRemap4MacBook should be able to do what you want.

Sure it can. You can re-assign keystrokes for any application using Keyboard Preferences, including the creation of keystrokes for menu items that didn't previously have any.

The caveat is that there has to be a menu item for what you're assigning a keystroke to. Otherwise you'll have to use third-party software to make a macro or rebind.

Though I don't know why you'd want to do something so ridiculous, even if you don't plan to continue using the Mac. I don't have any issues moving between Windows systems and Mac OS, and I certainly wouldn't want to merge the keys used for copy/paste with those used for a break signal in a terminal. Both functions are useful.