Back to Mac Edition
I’m leaving my job at the end of March (is that how you say getting fired without saying getting fired?) and all my computers are from work so I have to give them back.
Looking at options the new Mac machines seemed like a good fit/value so I picked up a Macbook Air to experiment with (only 103,000 yen with the educator discount -pro tip, the criteria for qualifying as a student/educator is quite broad, and they don’t check in any way).
I mainly just write/browse online/make videos and audio files so I’m hoping the Air will work for all of that and allow me to dock it at work/home while also carrying it around. Go from five computers to one, as it were.
Any tips or advice for a new Mac user?
Immigration feedback
It seems there is a website to submit feedback to the Immigration Services Agency of Japan. If you have ideas, suggestions, complaints, etc. I really recommend submitting them, as they will likely end up in a report at some point and maybe, just maybe, result in change. A bit like voting, if we don’t engage with the system we can’t really complain about it.
The Forum
The Forum is doing well (18,140 posts to date). Here are the latest active threads:
This week’s books
There is an updated 3rd edition of The Expat’s Guide to Growing Old in Japan, by Wm. Penn available on Amazon now. It’s a useful little book filled with information and links about retirement, pensions, death, illness, etc. Not very festive stuff, but could come in handy!
This week’s links
- “being rich is much better than not being rich”: A Simple Framework For Getting Rich
- Lower income renters are struggling in Japan: Renting in the plague years
- Don’t do these five things: Assured misery
- Good reminder now that we can’t really travel any more: Travel Is No Cure for the Mind
- Nice summary: The Toyota Production System: A Love Letter
- I did not know I wanted to know this! More than you want to know about gift cards
- This site looks very promising (European focus): Banker on Wheels
- Lots of background detail but inconclusive: The Omicron Question
- Some perspective: Expected returns over the next decade
- This is fantastic if true: This worker automated his data entry job and received a paycheck for 5 years without actually working
- Really funny, somewhat risque: Tales from the Trenches of Tech Support Hell
- Some good ideas in here: 25 Anti-Mimetic Tactics for Living a Counter-Cultural Life
- Fun or security? Why not both? Enjoying Life Now vs. Enjoying Life in the Future
- The costs of switching tasks is something I am not conscious enough of: Why I Changed My Email Setup
- Always enjoy Scott Galloway’s posts: wonder if we’ll see this spread in Japan too? The last last mile
- This is pretty much a free book from Vitaliy of collected blog posts and writing: Article Almanack 2021
- Love this (has nothing to do with money): Canby Siblings Rack Up Millions of Views with Epic Balloon Game Videos
What do you think? Anything good in there?
The Monday Read, going out to more than 2,452 subscribers each week. Please share this post/email with friends/colleagues who may be interested in it.
If you were forwarded the email you can sign up to the list here.
pant, pant, gasp… (no monday read last week–I was going thru withdrawal!)
Wife uses an Air, & likes it. My first was an SE, one with a floppy drive and a 20MB hard disk.
Think there was a Monday Read last week but it somehow got stuck behind two earlier blog posts on the front page! I missed it at first, too.
I highly recommend the Mac. Got me a MacBook Air last year and I love it. Light, fast, and highly portable. You’re sure to love it. And Mac is simple to use after you get used to it.
Macbook air is fine for light work, but then you have to deal with mac-isms which is a medium-level minus for the platform.
Microsoft’s surface book is goes 1:1 with the portability etc things with macbook air if you don’t want to learn a new operating system.
And honestly, windows does almost everything that macos does and a few things more. I’m not missing mac-specific apps because I’m not a video editor. Just my opinion, nobody can change it, I have both platforms at home (mac for work, win for fun and hobbies).
Just food for thought.
I used a macbook pro that I bought in 2013 every day for all those years with never a problem, and just last month I bought a macbook air.
As I felt it was not healthy to crouch over a laptop anymore, I also bought an HP monitor, a mouse, and an apple magic keyboard which I have connected to my macbook air. The keyboard and the mouse are wireless.
Now I am using the macbook air while it sits closed on a shelf by my desk. It’s a very convenient setup. The monitor is large and I can type and read while sitting back in my chair and without wearing my reading glasses — double-win.
If/when I travel, it’s easy enough to bring along the small macbook air.
For a while at work, I used a powerbook just below and in front of an external monitor, for some extra real estate–similar to this: https://435070-1363125-raikfcquaxqncofqfm.stackpathdns.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/MAcbook_ExternalMonitor01.jpg
Position the monitor a little higher, set the laptop on a stand to tilt it properly. With the right monitor settings, they work together, and the cursor moves from one to the other. Content up on the big screen, some desktop stuff below.
The new MacBook Air (with the M1 chip) is probably the best computer that can do everything you listed and more. Just got mine earlier this year, and so far it’s been great. If you have any questions on what software to use for your purposes, just send me a reply. – the new chip basically is still picky on what software it’s compatible with. It can handle most of previous software, with the occasional odd one out.
yes, I got M1 Macbook Air and its great value for money
I used to be a windows user, I got sick of all the pop ups and other issues. Went to Mac and no regrets. I still have a W10 computer but hardly use it. I find all the native free apps are much better than what you get with windows out of the box (the mail app, music (GarageBand) photo app, iMovie (video editing). With the possible exception of PowerPoint I find the free Apple office suit is very good and in amazing integration with your other devices is the icing on the cake. Mac are often more expensive than some windows machines but in general they last longer and have a better resale value.
As for advice, MacMost.com, Tech Talk America (both are free) and theMacUdotcom is cheap and well worth it, it has some free videos
1. Back up! (Now you’re responsible for your own PC, don’t expect anyone else to do it for you). You should have cloud (I use polarbackup.com) as well as a local backup.
2. Install an anti-virus. Recently more malware is targeting MacOS. I use Malwarebytes on the free tier, so I remind myself to run a manual scan. If you want to pay for a subscription, I won’t stop you.
3. Alfred. The Mac utility I use the most. Better than Spotlight and does much more, but I use it mainly to find stuff across all my 15 Macs scattered about the castle.
I have a 2015 Intel MacBook Air that I got in 2016. First of all, you have to forget about most of what you knew using Windows. macOS is very intuitive but you may run up against something you can’t do which you could on Windows. Yes, Apple hardware is very good. I replaced the 256GB SSD with a 512GB one I got on Amazon. My Mac has gotten slow over the years and I’m planning on putting Linux Mint on it once I can no longer upgrade macOS. Good luck with it!
Go and buy “Forklift” by Binary nights right now, for 66% off. It’s a dual pane file manager. I have used it every day for 5 years. For $10, it’s a no brainer. No affiliate links or relationship to them, it is just a solid app.
https://binarynights.com/
Also, get an external monitor and the app, Moon for windows management. Again, massive productivity increases.
Other highly recommended apps:
Daisy Disk (see where those big files are)
A Better Finder Renamer (incredibly powerful file Renamer, if you are dealing with a lot of batch renaming). This comes in a great bundle with several other apps and they do educator deals. I just bought lifetime upgrades as I use it so much
That app is MOOM, not “Moon”.
Again, no affiliation with any of the apps. I have just use most daily for at least five years and can’t live without them.
You already made the leap to a new computer, but some universities will let you buy the computer for depreciation value. If you were attached to the old machine.
That’s a good point! I’ll ask about keeping one or two of my current ones 😀
Well, lots of “apple supporters”, so just my 2 Yen:
bought a refurbished Lenovo way back in time (7 years) and it’s still going very strong.
For daughter’s English learning I decided to get a new Laptop with touchscreen. Ended up with yet another Lenovo and so far nothing to complain about. If you’re looking for price / value, I’d say don’t go with apple, NEC, Fujitsu and so on.
But that just my personal opinion!
I much prefer to use Mac. But I can do Windows as long as the OS is in English. I bought a purple iMac in September, retiring the mid-2010 which could only upgrade to High Sierra and several apps were no longer supported.
I second the suggestion to get, at least, anti-virus software. And it is well worth your time to go through all of the settings.
If the computer you use for work is not too old (<4-5 years) and you would still use it, you could ask if they would sell it to you (and tell them what it is worth).