I'm finally taking the plunge! Last night, I ordered a 17-inch MacBook Pro, and the

full-bore Adobe Creative Suite. That replaces pretty much all the applications I use except for Quark.

My first foray into System X, and my first upgrade of production software in a LONG time; for example, I'm still running system 9.2.2, Quark 3.3, Illustrator 6, Photoshop 5.5, and Dreamweaver 4.

I figure that if I buy an Intel MacBook and all the software, I can get used to it in the evening on the MacBook without having to learn all new stuff while trying to actually produce work, which I'll do with the old software for a while yet.

I thought I'd get a few more years out of System 9, but my customers are demanding stuff that I simply can't do with the old software.

Cover me, boys, I'm going in!

Redstone

It's an incredibly powerful laptop. Another nice feature is that I can easily connect it to my desktop monitor and use a bluetooth mouse and keyboard and it's basically a desktop machine.

Enjoy and let us know how it is when you get it!

Still stuck with a G4 iBook. No money for new toys.

over that one.

OSX takes a little getting used to, but now I hate going back to OS9

I went full into OSX in 2001. It is Such a pleasure to use, and it won't take long to figure out where things are in the OS.

You should try Indesign. Quark Xpress is over. You'll love the integration with the other Adobe apps. Indesign comes with a set of Quark keyboard shortcuts, but it is well worth it to learn the native shortcuts since so many are shared with Photoshop and Illustrator.

I have the last 17" PowerBook and it is So sweet with OSX! I'll be going Intel in a year or two.

Congrats!

I think you'll really really like it, except for the weight of it. It's really heavy. I would highly recommend getting yourself one of those Chill Mat Fans to put underneath it. It tends to run really hot. I did download a program that adjusts the fan speed on the motherboard to keep it cooler. It works great. I also have a very old 12" G3 Ibook, which I'm actually writing this from. That one is my own. I WISH I could afford to buy a MBP for myself, but thre's this little matter of a silly thing called money getting in the way. LOL The 17" MBP, my work bought for me to use so I can do extra work at home. I'm a typesetter, and use Adobe Creative Suite as well. You'll love In Design CS. I also use Quark 6.52. I still love Quark, but I think it's because most of my jobs at my work are done in Quark. I do the larger publications in InDesign CS though.

I've never figured out however how to run Windows on my MPB. It keeps giving me some weird error message. Ahh that's okay, I really don't like Windows XP anyways.

When I switched over to OSX, I hated it. I couldn't get used to it. I forced myself to use it at home, and not boot up in OS9 anymore. I finally got used to OSX, and now I dint ever want to boot up in OS9, I probably forgot how to use it. LOL
It takes time to get used to it, but you can do it. Just force yourself to use it more and more. Come on, I know you can do it!
I'm assuming your a designer and do web work as well. I dabble in web work just a little bit, but don't really like it.

Much luck to you in your transition. We'll cover you. And don't forgot to use us if you have any questions.

Oceanspirit

I "took the plunge" about 2 months ago and got a 24" iMac. It was, for me too, the first time I'd ever really used OS X (my old beige G3 could technically run it, but only if I ran no apps!)

Give yourself time to get used to OS X. It IS very different, but it took me only a couple of days to find my way around initially, and now I'm in the "lemme see the power users' tricks" mode.

If you get a little frustrated, remember:

You don't have to reboot if an app crashes (and yes, they will still crash)
It's unlikely you'll have to reboot AT ALL unless you install certain apps/updates.
Get hold of a copy of David Pogue's 'OS X the Missing Manual, Tiger Edition" Borrow it if you can. Ordinarily I'd say buy it, but Leopard is coming out in a few mnoths. The book is invaluable.

Rosetta is the PowerPC emulation layer for Intel chips. I would hold out until CS goes native on Intel. PhotoShop is almost there. I just hate to think that you have to buy CS again in a few months when it goes native on Intel to get proper performance.

Maybe they have a cheap path to upgrade.. I'm not sure. I would look into it if I was you.