Hello to the person who is thinking of making the switch to mac: I did this about a year ago and here are my thoughts. First of all, the reason I switched was similar to that of other people, my PC became inoperable one to many times and it was at a time when I was to have begun an online teaching assignment. I came very close to losing my job because getting the PC laptop repaired/replaced and then everything restored took so long. It was a total disaster!
The learning curve was steep for me and it took about two months to return to any semblance of efficiency. I am sure it is shorter for many people and longer for others. So, during the transition, it would be helpful to allow for the time and energy it will take to learn the new system and screen reader. There are fantastic resources on this list for getting help. These include several people who are authorised by Apple to teach the Mac using Voiceover. Keep in mind however, that Apple does not pay for this training and although it is reasonably priced, this is one area where Apple could do better. I live close to an Apple store and although I had the One to One training the first year I had my Mac, I did not renew it. I found that the trainers were very knowledgeable about the Mac but not about Voiceover. I receive far superior information from this list without leaving home. If you live near an Apple store you also have access to something called a Genious Bar. If you are having some difficulty with your computer, after an upgrade for example, you can take it to them and get it sorted out for free. Apple has phone support which others on this list have much more experience with than I do. In general, working with and maintaining the Mac is a much more streamlined process than a PC. For example, my disk drive bit the dust the last time I was working in India. Because I have Apple Care, it was replaced with no charge but I found that the restoration process was a thousand times easier and less time-consuming than it ever was on the PC. Apple has Time Machine which makes a backup of your disk including data which you use to restore the system. If you haven't backed up in a while, it even reminds you to do it. So, if you do switch to the Mac, be sure and allow yourself time to integrate the new knowledge systematically. I for one, would never even consider returning to using a PC. But if for some reason I had to, I would either use bootcamp or VM Fusion instead of going back to a computer environment which is so unstable and unpredictable. To me, using a PC became unviable in my work environment so it had to go. The only thing I find more difficult with Mac is using Skype. On the PC you can use GW Connect which manages voice and text chatting tasks very well. When I called GW Micro to ask them if they would make a Mac version, I thought they were going to hang up on me. So, that is the only compromise I feel I have made. Good luck with your decision and keep asking us questions. Jean -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MacVisionaries" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to macvisionaries@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
