I bit the bullet and bought a Mac Mini for the office. What a piece of cake to set up. (Not that I didn’t expect it to be easy.) Just about $380 at Microcenter for the 1.83 machine with 1GB RAM and a small hard drive. But who cares.
Take it out of the box, plug in a DVI cable, attach keyboard and mouse (whatever I had sitting around), plug in network cable, and turn it on. The music plays, the screen shows some silly movie (which I’ll call “Ta Da!), and it sets itself up.
Type a couple of keys on the keyboard so that OSX can figure out which driver to load, run a bunch of updates, install iLife ‘09, and you’re pretty much done. And unlike a Windows install, not one error message!
I’m always impressed by the Apple packaging — even down to the rounded edges on the styrofoam and the plastic wrap on each piece of electronics. Someone is thinking through the entire experience and they do a fantastic job.
I know I’m about the 10 millionth person to discover the beauty of the Mac, but I think further praise is due here. I still prefer Ubuntu and that’s what I plan to keep running on my machines, but I just ordered another Mini for home.
Now to tackle the Ram Upgrade. Maybe the hard drive, too.