I broke down and bought a new iMac: the 20-inch 2.4. I've been using my Powerbook 15-inch for more than two years now and it has become in large part an integral part of wherever we were living at the moment: Siena, Florence, Paris, Maine, wherever. The Powerbook was our lifeline to the rest of the world.
But I knew that someday we were going to have spring for a new computer. The service plan on the Powerbook is up in January and the logic board needs replacing. It was only a matter of time before the Powerbook became relegated to our backup computer.
So, after much hemming and hawing I called Billy D. back in Vermont some weeks ago. Over the many years that we lived in central Vermont we always bought our computer "stuff" through a local reseller -- and the benefits were always palpable: great service and advice over the phone whenever I needed it, which, on occasion, was often and urgent.
But then I had a change of heart, or at least a change of mind: I would do this myself. Buy it in New Hampshire and save more than a hundred bucks in taxes, install everything myself, migrate the files myself, do it myself in other words.
On Wednesday we drove to Salem to the Apple Store in the mall there (right off I-93 in fact), walked in, and was met by the "concierge."
"May I help you?"
"You bet. I want to buy a new iMac."
"Right this way, please."
A few minutes later a guy walks over, asks me a few questions and fifteen minutes after that I walked out with a brand-new iMac.
The key is knowing what you want right off. I did my research online and knew which model I wanted, and, equally important, what I wanted with it. Since there is no discount for buying a new box with more stuff in it, and since Apple RAM and additional storage are terribly expensive, my thinking is buy the basics and add as you think necessary. For me I wanted just iWork ($79) and the extended Applecare plan ($169).
(I had purchased my 4 gigs of RAM from OWC -- Apple RAM is outrageously expensive for reasons that seem to escape most rational people. I'll add an extra hard drive for "Time Machine," the backup component of Leopard. Other than that, I'm pretty much set.”)
And speaking of Leopard, the salesman informed me that Leopard may or may not be installed on the computer.
"Really? I asked.
"Yep" (this is New Hampshire). He remarked that on many of the boxes for the laptops if Leopard was not on the screen on the side of the box then it may not be preinstalled. He suspected that might be true of the iMacs as well. Anyway the DVD with the new OS is in the box of course; it just may not be installed is all.
"So Tiger is on the computer then?"
"Yep."
I thought that was great news in fact. It took a bit of pressure off of having to spend time on a brand-new learning curve so soon.
Oh, and I have an appointment to bring the Powerbook into the Apple Store in Providence next Mondya. It will get shipping off to Apple and come back with a new logic board and I'll reload my RAM into it. (Apple always removes third-party RAM. No I don't know why. Because they are sometimes insane I suppose.)
And speaking of RAM, I'm still awaiting my RAM. Naturally I still haven't taken the computer out of the box, so of course I still don't know if Leopard is installed or not.
Stay tuned!
But I knew that someday we were going to have spring for a new computer. The service plan on the Powerbook is up in January and the logic board needs replacing. It was only a matter of time before the Powerbook became relegated to our backup computer.
So, after much hemming and hawing I called Billy D. back in Vermont some weeks ago. Over the many years that we lived in central Vermont we always bought our computer "stuff" through a local reseller -- and the benefits were always palpable: great service and advice over the phone whenever I needed it, which, on occasion, was often and urgent.
But then I had a change of heart, or at least a change of mind: I would do this myself. Buy it in New Hampshire and save more than a hundred bucks in taxes, install everything myself, migrate the files myself, do it myself in other words.
On Wednesday we drove to Salem to the Apple Store in the mall there (right off I-93 in fact), walked in, and was met by the "concierge."
"May I help you?"
"You bet. I want to buy a new iMac."
"Right this way, please."
A few minutes later a guy walks over, asks me a few questions and fifteen minutes after that I walked out with a brand-new iMac.
The key is knowing what you want right off. I did my research online and knew which model I wanted, and, equally important, what I wanted with it. Since there is no discount for buying a new box with more stuff in it, and since Apple RAM and additional storage are terribly expensive, my thinking is buy the basics and add as you think necessary. For me I wanted just iWork ($79) and the extended Applecare plan ($169).
(I had purchased my 4 gigs of RAM from OWC -- Apple RAM is outrageously expensive for reasons that seem to escape most rational people. I'll add an extra hard drive for "Time Machine," the backup component of Leopard. Other than that, I'm pretty much set.”)
And speaking of Leopard, the salesman informed me that Leopard may or may not be installed on the computer.
"Really? I asked.
"Yep" (this is New Hampshire). He remarked that on many of the boxes for the laptops if Leopard was not on the screen on the side of the box then it may not be preinstalled. He suspected that might be true of the iMacs as well. Anyway the DVD with the new OS is in the box of course; it just may not be installed is all.
"So Tiger is on the computer then?""Yep."
I thought that was great news in fact. It took a bit of pressure off of having to spend time on a brand-new learning curve so soon.
Oh, and I have an appointment to bring the Powerbook into the Apple Store in Providence next Mondya. It will get shipping off to Apple and come back with a new logic board and I'll reload my RAM into it. (Apple always removes third-party RAM. No I don't know why. Because they are sometimes insane I suppose.)
And speaking of RAM, I'm still awaiting my RAM. Naturally I still haven't taken the computer out of the box, so of course I still don't know if Leopard is installed or not.
Stay tuned!
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