Maybe I've caught a little of the Apple-Fan-Boy fever, but the new MBP looks great. I've never had an apple computer so wanted to ask about potential compatability issues I might have if I go Apple.

1) I use MS Office often on my current laptop. Will I have any issues with Office for Mac? I mainly use Outlook, Word, and Excel.

My email (Outlook) is synced with my Windows Desktop and my iPhone. Will it sync seemlessly with Office for Mac on a MBP like it does with my current Windows Laptop?


2.) I use a D-Link external hard drive as additional storage (2 identifcal 1TB HD's) and security/backup. Right now, I can move files between my laptop and this D-Link external HD wirelessly with no issues. Will I have any issue connecting wirelessly to my D-Link external HD with a MBP?


What other issues should someone going from Windows to Apple for the 1st time be concerned with?


Thanks in advance!

I use office for Mac and didn't have any problems making the switch. Never ran Outlook though. Any connection your windows box made should be doable by the MBP. I'd suggest getting one of David Pogues Missing Manual books for the OS to make the transition easier.

1) I don't see any reason you'd have issues with Office for Mac, I kinda prefer it over the Windows ones.
2) What's the model?

what's your hdd formatted as? if it's ntfs you wont be able to write to it, only read from it (unless they have changed this? i may be wrong but it's proprietary so i doubt it). you could reformat the hdd though, but you would need to backup all your files or download 3rd party software that will allow you to write to it.

Fat32 reads/writes on both mac and windows so it would probably be best to format a partition as that, so you can transfer files between both with it.

You can do NTFS in OSX, but you need 3rd party apps: http://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/

I'm looking at the 15 Inch MacBook Pro with Retina Display - $2,199


No idea about the HD Formatting (don't even know what Fat32 or NTFS is). Is this something I should check into?

If you're an Outlook power user with a bunch of custom rules for auto sorting emails, some of them may not work correctly in Outlook 2011 - it's still seems a bit buggy at this time. For the average user, however, it should work fine.

The dlink device should work too - it probably runs Linux which will use a format that the Mac can write to - if you post the model number of the d-link someone may be able to verify this.

Thanks Tappy! Making sure the MBP will work with my wireless external D-Link HD is a biggy for me.

Here's the model number and link to the D-Link page with details: D-Link DNS-323 2-Bay Network Storage Enclosure.

This should work fine with your Mac. If you're using the backup tool that came with the dlink, you'll need to use Time Machine (built into OS/X) to backup the Mac to it.

Also, see if there are specific instructions for connecting to the file share with a Mac. If not, before you ditch your Windows machine, take a look at network drive you use to access the d-link. In Windows 7, click Computer, then look at the Network Location section. There should be something like "blahblahxxx(\\blahblahyyy)" next to the drive letter. Make a note of what they are named on your machine.

In OS/X, click Finder, then click Go on the menubar at the top and choose "Connect to Server". For the Server Address type "smb://blahblahyyy/blahblahxxx" (obviously replace these with the actual names you noted from the windows system), then click Connect.

^^ Awesome! Thanks Tappy!