An apple a day keeps the IT guys away?
After a frustrating crash of no less than three computers within weeks of each other (two crashed in the typical scenario - they stopped working; one literally crashed when the power cord got caught and the laptop smashed on the ground, shattering the screen), my law firm decided to make the plunge and switch to MAC. Too many hours wasted on troubleshooting the PC problems, re-loading and scrambling to restore data made the worry free claims of mac lovers very appealing.
Yet, almost every lawyer I know uses PCs rather than Macs. Virtually all of my experience has been with windows based PCs. A lot of the software for running a law firm (time management, billing, litigation support software, etc.) is simply not made for Macs. So, I really hesitated. I could purchase some of my software again (buying whole new macintosh versions), but that would multiply the cost of the computer significantly. Well, turns out an inexpensive piece of software called "parallels" can be placed on a mac and basically run a virtual Windows environement. One can load whatever must-have windows software, while keeping the mac operating system intact. For under $80, it seems a great investment.
So far, so good. Networking was a breeze... Even someone with no computer savvy could easily set up their office network using macs with no outside help. A few minor quirks popped up - (for instance, blackberry sync via bluetooth doesn't fully work, but this apparently is a known issue, and it really isn't terribly challenging to plug in a USB cable). However, upgrading to a new operating system while still being able to utilize software on another OS - looks like a good choice so far.
For the small business owner trying to evaluate the best computer system for their business, I'd suggest factoring in the cost and aggrevation of computer crashes and networking issues. The PCs which "crashed" were all relatively new, running Windows XP with a variety of freezing and other problems before they finally breathed no more. My firm spent many hours on networking issues with the PC system - given the utter simplicity of setting up a MAC network, I don't anticipate major networking problems in the future.
Yet, almost every lawyer I know uses PCs rather than Macs. Virtually all of my experience has been with windows based PCs. A lot of the software for running a law firm (time management, billing, litigation support software, etc.) is simply not made for Macs. So, I really hesitated. I could purchase some of my software again (buying whole new macintosh versions), but that would multiply the cost of the computer significantly. Well, turns out an inexpensive piece of software called "parallels" can be placed on a mac and basically run a virtual Windows environement. One can load whatever must-have windows software, while keeping the mac operating system intact. For under $80, it seems a great investment.
So far, so good. Networking was a breeze... Even someone with no computer savvy could easily set up their office network using macs with no outside help. A few minor quirks popped up - (for instance, blackberry sync via bluetooth doesn't fully work, but this apparently is a known issue, and it really isn't terribly challenging to plug in a USB cable). However, upgrading to a new operating system while still being able to utilize software on another OS - looks like a good choice so far.
For the small business owner trying to evaluate the best computer system for their business, I'd suggest factoring in the cost and aggrevation of computer crashes and networking issues. The PCs which "crashed" were all relatively new, running Windows XP with a variety of freezing and other problems before they finally breathed no more. My firm spent many hours on networking issues with the PC system - given the utter simplicity of setting up a MAC network, I don't anticipate major networking problems in the future.
Comments