Making The Switch And Leaping From An Open Window
By Mr.e

My desk looks a bit strange these days. Where normally one computer hummed, buzzed and lately clanked along, two now jostle for supremacy. It’s the weirdest thing; for me anyway.

On the left side of my desk the eye glides over the rounded shape of a modern design wonder.

On the right side lurks another design, an ancient system of many components. The latter, takes up one third of the desk space. Seen so close together, these systems provide an interesting look at two extremes of the computing age. "Huh …Wow, " is all I can utter.

Less than a month ago I took the plunge and went into debt for one of those non beige and kinda’ funky looking computers. I must also admit that I've been infatuated with this particular model for a while and felt that the time was ripe to switch operating systems allegiances. Besides, the day after I went to the store to see what I’d need to get if I made this switch, ‘the other’ system began to act very erratically.

It may have sensed something was up.

Seriously, I'm not kidding folks, it would not start the following morning. When I did get it to start, I was reluctant to turn it off for fear of losing all the stuff I had on there. Now there are no more a:, b: or c: drives to switch between.

As most avid amateur or professional photographers will tell you, once you've chosen your particular camera systems, you don't easily change, unless ‘the other’ leading brand manages to convince you that their product is in fact better than what you're currently using. That is what happened here. Guilty as charged, I was converted. Secretly I’d been convinced for years, but actually going ahead and making the swap earlier just wasn't in the application folder.

This switch could be compared to exchanging your very cheapen clunky Trabant (ex-East German vehicle) for the new VW Beetle. Utterly astonishing! Sure, there will be many that would vehemently disagree with this choice. It is a personal thing. The fact that we have these choices when it comes to computer systems is wonderful.

If adapting to a new system were not enough of an impediment, there are also the friendly ribs from my personal analytical engine consultant/miracle worker to contend with. Seems I'm the butt of some humorous repartee re: new records broken for the slowest time to get on the Internet and experiencing problems where I have no business having them. It could very well be, but then I've never had my head set on being the quickest computer user.

What with days hacked up between home based tasks, taking care of a rapidly growing human and getting a bit of work done on the new computer. Any brilliant techno knowledge breakthroughs will have to wait.

Getting used to the new operating system will take time, but so far the excitement far outweighs any small and sometimes maddening difficulties I'm stumbling over. I can't wait to start running with this thing.

Suffice it to say that this machine is blazingly fast; capable of performing 'multiple' tasks at once. Stuff I didn't know it ‘could’ do. After many long days and bleary-eyed nights spent looking around I'm still feeling like a little kid alone in some immense and sequestered museum. The last words of my personal computer consultant (after the post purchase visit) are still ringing in my ears: "Don’t worry, you can’t do anything to this thing." I wonder.

By the way, I picked a blue one and when I did get up enough courage to lick it, it tasted like plastic; not at all like the flavor I’d been sold on.