Things that were easy about getting the new Powerbook set up:
- Getting it out of the box and turning it on.
- Getting iChat AV working with our camera. We had my in-laws seeing our moving, smiling faces about half an hour after we brought the laptop out of the box. Also, we bought them an iSight and got a tripod for our Sony camera, so we should be able to do full duplex video conferencing after Lisa’s next trip.
- Moving files off my old laptop. I shut the G3 down, started it in FireWire Target mode by holding the T key down immediately after powering it back on, connected it to the G4, and dragged all the stuff over that I wanted.
Things that were more difficult:
- Figuring out the power brick. The G4 comes with a much cooler power supply that includes an optional extension cord that plugs into the modular power brick. It took a few minutes to figure out how the built in electrical prongs slid off and the extension slid on.
- Recovering from our dropped connection when I clicked our pictures to full screen. When we reconnected (audio only), Lisa’s parents told us they still saw a frozen still image.
- Sifting through my old /Library directory to find the right preferences, license files, and support files to make sure I wouldn’t have to re-enter license numbers.
- Moving iTunes over. I had previously discovered where the library files lived, so I was able to copy those over without losing my playlists. I was also able, amusingly, to use the library files and play music directly off the G3’s hard drive while I still had it connected. But I’m going to have to either manually review over 3000 songs and tell iTunes where they live on the G4’s hard drive, or write a script to fix all the locations.
Still, this has been one of the fastest cutovers ever. And I still have almost 30 GB of hard disk space left over.