Roblog

The experience has been exhilarating, as I expected. Some highlights:

• The computer is a model of simplicity. I lifted it out of its box, plugged in the power cord, and turned it on. The wireless keyboard and mouse were recognized ("paired" in Bluetooth lingo) as part of the startup procedures. With the CPU enclosure mounted behind the monitor, there are no extraneous cable connecting to everything.
• The 20" monitor is gorgeous! The LCD monitor supports 1650 x 1050, and it's wonderful having so much screen real estate to use. The monitor itself is mounted on a stand shaped like an upside-down seven. It's nicely balanced on the stand so that I can tilt it up and down with ease.
• The ballyhooed System Migration Tool that would in theory allow me to easily transfer all my computer settings from my old computer to my new one did not work. It appears that it didn't because my G3 was too old to support going into Firewire target disk mode. At any rate, I hadn't set my mind on doing it that way anyway, since this way I can start from scratch and make sure the new computer didn't have any extraneous junk from the old computer on it. I'm just using my external Firewire drive as an intermediary.
• I didn't have a name ready for my hard disk. My first computer's hard disk (my Macintosh IIcx) I called "Ooh Ooh Ooh!" because that's the sound I made when I got it. My next computer (PowerMac 7100/80) I called "Eee Eee Eee!", I think. My most recent computer (PowerMac B&W G3) was "Naboo" for the planet featured in Star Wars Episode I. I decided on "Smooth" for the iMac just because that's what adjective came to mind for my new computer. We'll see if that lasts or if I get inspired to change it.
• It is so quiet! The intake is on the bottom of the screen (pointing down at the desk) and there is a small exhaust slit on the top of the back. That apparently is sufficient to cool the G5 processor.
• It's fast, but not "blow my socks off" fast. It's certainly plenty fast to do what I want it to do. I know, though, that the nature of the iMac as a consumer machine is that it will not age quite as gracefully as my past computers.
• The DVD burner works great! We produced a short DVD with three slideshows on it for some friends of ours. It took us just 2 hours to get the final product (we already had the music in iTunes picked out and the pictures in iPhoto). My next project will be to burn a DVD slideshow of my sister's wedding pictures and send it to her.
• I am enjoying my EyeTV product, too. I've already used it to record NFL Primetime while we had company over when Donna also wanted to record 60 Minutes on the VCR. I plan on collecting all the Eagles' game highlights from Primetime and compiling them onto a DVD. That's assuming they continue their winning ways and I would want to go back and review the season.
• I also got the upgraded Photoshop version (CS). I haven't played with it much yet (although I can see its potential to save me some time editing my photos), but it's nice not having to go back into the Classic environment to run my old Photoshop version 6. Because of this (and the fast launch times) I now have Photoshop come up when I double-click a picture in iPhoto.

I still have two things to do to complete my migration to my new iMac:

• Backup my Zip disks onto a DVD (only my old G3 has a zip drive)
• Transfer the DRM ownership of my purchased iTunes songs to my iMac (but I don't need my old computer for this unless I want to deauthorize it)