Well, not exactly a virgin, but I've never gone all the way with a Win PC before. (Yes, I feel soiled. ) I've played around with a few PCs, but all of my computer and graphics experience has been using Macs since OS 7.
Here's the scenario. I'm helping someone at a print shop that does simple graphics for business cards, small print jobs and ads and layout for a local publication that they print. I'm pretty experienced with Illustrator and Photoshop CS4 on my Mac.
They've recently installed CS4, mainly for InDesign, for the publication. Previously they were using Corel 12 and Pagemaker, and most of their huge collection of previous jobs is in those formats.
The hardware setup is some kind of no-name tower, w/ smallish LCD monitor running WinXP. It's slow and that dang hourglass already has me contemplating where on sweaty Ballmer I'd like to shove it.
At first I thought I'd have to figure out Corel Draw and struggled with it for a few hours, then realized that I could save as to AI7 then open up files with AI CS4. And that is pretty much the same as using it on my Mac thankfully.
I keep getting the alt-control stuff mixed up since my fingers keep going to where the command key should be, but I figure I'll get that eventually. I have to delve into Windows to use Outlook for email to customers and IE to go to the occasional web page for something. I also have to attempt to keep their jobs filed in the right place under "My Documents" and find previous jobs. Also using the various print dialog boxes which just seem arcane to me and each driver seems to have a completely different way of doing something, with different names for the same function.
Overall WinXP is fuuuuuugly and doesn't always make sense to my Mac-trained brain. Looking for tips or advice from anyone who has found themselves in a similar situation.
I found myself looking on eBay this evening for a nice, not-too-old used large-screen iMac that I might be able to convince them to buy. That's probably not going to work though.
Here's the scenario. I'm helping someone at a print shop that does simple graphics for business cards, small print jobs and ads and layout for a local publication that they print. I'm pretty experienced with Illustrator and Photoshop CS4 on my Mac.
They've recently installed CS4, mainly for InDesign, for the publication. Previously they were using Corel 12 and Pagemaker, and most of their huge collection of previous jobs is in those formats.
The hardware setup is some kind of no-name tower, w/ smallish LCD monitor running WinXP. It's slow and that dang hourglass already has me contemplating where on sweaty Ballmer I'd like to shove it.
At first I thought I'd have to figure out Corel Draw and struggled with it for a few hours, then realized that I could save as to AI7 then open up files with AI CS4. And that is pretty much the same as using it on my Mac thankfully.
I keep getting the alt-control stuff mixed up since my fingers keep going to where the command key should be, but I figure I'll get that eventually. I have to delve into Windows to use Outlook for email to customers and IE to go to the occasional web page for something. I also have to attempt to keep their jobs filed in the right place under "My Documents" and find previous jobs. Also using the various print dialog boxes which just seem arcane to me and each driver seems to have a completely different way of doing something, with different names for the same function.
Overall WinXP is fuuuuuugly and doesn't always make sense to my Mac-trained brain. Looking for tips or advice from anyone who has found themselves in a similar situation.
I found myself looking on eBay this evening for a nice, not-too-old used large-screen iMac that I might be able to convince them to buy. That's probably not going to work though.