[Closed] Apple Mac questions - working with Windows?

Buy a new laptop, that one is killing hard drives.
Don't drop it.... unless you get a solid state drive only they are the same ones in macs. If you get a solid state only it's more expensive for less space
Get office 365. It works, it's also cloud based now

Use the cloud, it's nothing to be scared of.
Download all the crap off your phone and keep it somewhere else.
If you run out of space on a laptop then use an external drive (or the cloud it's way cheaper)

Normally laptop drives last more than 2 years - are you drop-testing yours on a regular basis ?

The hard drive in a Mac will be no different to the one in a PC, but it will cost you more.

You have been guided towards something which might improve things but the original issue remains if you select wrong product.
Modern hard disks are very robust especially on laptops so you should investigate whether your power source is unreliable or is faulty (the laptop power brick filters most of the power spikes) or you are using the laptop in extreme conditions.
Now iMac is a nice computer but it is nearly unrepairable so you will need to choose model which has 'SSD' and not Fusion drive.

Word and Excel exist on the Mac so unless you've used some of the more esoteric features then you'll be able to use your files. There'll be a bit of "translation" to the Mac's file system but other than that it should all work.

Get a backup strategy sorted. The Mac has this built in, when you connect an external hard drive it asks if you want to use it for Time Machine which is Apple's name for it.

I've an eight year old iMac and I've not filled the hard drive on it yet. The biggest user of disk space are videos and photos, if you don't use that then it takes a long time to fill modern disks.

OK thanks - interesting. No, in answer to your drop questions, never dropped any of the they live in the front room on a table or on the kitchen table, we're both careful. No idea why we kill so many drives. Repairman said possibility was that we are moving them before they've finished shutting down - now careful not to do that.

I hadn't realised that the drive was the same in a mac. mmannerr, how do we investigate the power source point? We do go through a heck of a lot of supposedly long-life bulbs in this house.

No idea why we kill so many drives. Repairman said possibility was that we are moving them before they've finished shutting down - now careful not to do that.

To help with the Excel/Word question, I use both MacOS and Windows 10 and frequently work on the same Excel, Word and Powerpoint files on both operating systems. I've not (yet) encountered any issues with compatibility. [url= https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/store/d/office-365-home/CFQ7TTC0K5DM/007R?gclid=CjwKCAjw87PNBRBAEiwA0XAIr9xGmWaWNEYyqZrsvbQhJXYbd_3VXb8OtOuQbETR0b8cPfqaW8X1XBoCEV4QAvD_BwE&OCID=AID620886_SEM_VSvf8gAAAIXlnqNk:20170904094656:s&s_kwcid=AL!4249!3!193271303424!!!!350598017727!&ef_id=VSvf8gAAAIXlnqNk:20170904094656:s ]Office 365 is £80 per year[/url] for up to 5 devices, and those devices can be Macs, PCs and even tablets.

One solution would be to replace your current, dead HDD, with a solid state drive - SSD. This will speed up things on the laptop and the SDD has no moving parts.

One thing, from the description in the OP - could it be ( wiping software ) that you have simply run out of space on the drive rather than killed it ?

If so, it ain't dead yet, but you need to either clean up or getting a larger capacity drive.

Going back 20 years to the time of MS-DOS then some hard drives needed their read/write heads "parking" when you shut things down but I've not seen a hard drive require the user to do that since Windows came along.

Now iMac is a nice computer but it is nearly unrepairable

That's an outright inaccuracy. If your Mac fails you take it back to where you bought it and it will be repaired or replaced. I was living in another country when Seagate drives were recalled in iMacs and it just meant clicking one extra option in the online process, which, incidentally was instigated by Apple when the risk of failure was identified.

As per previous answers, Mac-version Office software runs very well on OS X nowadays and you're unlikely to experience any compatibility issues.

Without wanting to be rude: do the vents in your laptop look very dusty/dirty. Over-heating is one cause of drive failure if the air vents can't do their job or circuit components are coated in dust

As others said, all MS Office stuff works on both platforms. Office 365 online is great.
A SSD in a Mac or PC will be more robust than a spinning hard drive if thats a real issue.

I understand the concern re cloud stuff but something like Dropbox can take away a lot of worries.
Also, an external USB drive is good for stashing pictures, video and music as it takes a load of space.

Your repair man is rubbish. Get a new one. Hard drives don't die every two years, that's bobbins. If yours had died it would have packed up completely, not be limping on when he's removed stuff.

What PC do you have? How much was it? Many PCs now come with tiny hard drives, so if you filled it up (quite easy) then it would have problems. A large part of the benefit of Apple products is that you are forced to spend £1,500 which means you automatically get good quality kit. A £1,500 PC will have just as good kit and probably a higher spec.

don't see why I should pay yet again to Microsoft just to get it working)

You don't. Software is licensed, so you buy a license. You can wipe it and re-install it as many times as you want, you are still entitled to use it.

Pages and Numbers are to Apple what Word and Excel are to Microsoft.

Now I wouldn't say they are like for like, but then unless you are doing complicated stuff in both (things like mail merge or pivot tables for example), then you will probably be happy with the Mac versions.

Hard drives generally have a warranty of 2-5 years, so I would be surprised if it wasn't covered. Modern Solid State drives are more reliable due to having no moving parts, but still I would be dissappointed at a drive not lasting 5 years.

Thanks again everyone. To answer questions:

Hard drive on current pc is about half full, so not a capacity issue; the failure mode was that it completely froze and would not do anything at all. Rebooting resulted in the same issue. It had had several instances in the previous week or so of freezing at login and taking (literally) a couple of hours to slowly log in incredibly slowly. I assumed it was some sort of update endlessly going on. Air vents are clean, I do check them occasionally, and use it on a hard surface.

On the Microsoft licence, we can't find any records of when we bought this licence, so fully admit it's our error in not keeping paperwork, hence thinking we'll have to buy another. Laptop is a Toshiba which came from John Lewis. I'm not wanting to try anything with warranty as we'll have to surrender it and then we wouldn't know who was trying to get our info off the hard drive (same reason as I'm uncomfortable with what little I know about the cloud) - we're very sensitive to privacy.

Really appreciate the help, especially on the compatibility point. Thanks again.

On the Microsoft licence

Office or Windows?

What version of Office are you using?

If your sensitive to privacy then you need to learn about it.
If your PC was nicked it all your stuff would probably be off fairly quickly at this point so time to work out how you store stuff.

everything of ours is on it

Back it up somewhere else then. Now. Restoring from backups is easy, recovering from drive failure is hard (and expensive). Why are you still reading this, go and sort it out.

he's had to wipe off the Microsoft suite so it's barely functional
...
Repairman said possibility was that we are moving them before they've finished shutting down - now careful not to do that.

He's an idiot.

(don't see why I should pay yet again to Microsoft just to get it working

As discussed, you don't need to buy it again if you own the licence. [url= https://www.magicaljellybean.com/keyfinder/ ]Magic Jellybean[/url] will recover the licence key from an existing install (or at least, it would if he hadn't uninstalled it.)

So fed up with discs dying every few years, we want to get something reliable and have been steered towards an iMac.

Hard disks are hard disks, the ones in PCs and Macs are identical.

1) Will we be able to load up our many Word and Excel files onto it? Will those files then function normally? All our historic stuff is in Windows format and work stuff will continue to be.

Your existing stuff isn't in "Windows format," it's in Office format.

Do I need extra software

You'll need to purchase a version of Office for the Mac, the licensing will be different. [url= https://products.office.com/en-gb/office-online/documents-spreadsheets-presentations-office-online ]Office online[/url] is free, however.

don't see why I should pay yet again to Microsoft just to get it working

You don't have to. You can reinstall Windows and Office using the same licences, but if you buy a Mac, you will have to buy a new Office licence. If the hardware you already have is reasonably decent, replacing the hard disk with an SSD and upgrading to Win10 will be much, much cheaper than buying a new Mac and Office licence.

I do not know how much storage you need but for me I would rather keep all my stuff backup away from the laptop itself. I rather use external drive/USB pen drive/Cloud/CDs. In the event you have a HD failure you still have your files to work on.

I am also looking at a laptop for work and this one interests me as it has SSD and 8GB RAM. [url= https://www.johnlewis.com/lenovo-ideapad-320-laptop-intel-core-i3-8gb-ram-128gb-ssd-14-/p3288129?colour=Denim%20Blue ]From John Lewis.[/url]

Lenovo IdeaPad 320 Laptop, Intel Core i3, 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD, 14", Denim Blue £449.95

As for Microsoft Office I think I would go 365.

Just to clear something up for the OP: Microsoft is a company that makes many things. One of its products is Windows, which is the system your computer uses to run itself. Another is Office, which is Word, Excel and some other stuff. They are bought separaptely and independent.

Cougar - I have always backed up our documents and pictures etc regularly on a remote drive (when I can remember how!), and you're right, I think I meant the Office function when I said Microsoft, but I don't think Office itself is backed up on the remote drive? (I am now totally out of my depth). That means that in effect we now can't access them as we can't get them to open. I will take a look at the Jellybean thing shortly but suspect I will be lost in the opening moments, as I said at the start I have no understanding of this stuff, it's a closed book to me. It means that I can only take what some one (ie the repairman in this case) tells me as I have no means of critically challenging statements.

Step 1 - find a new repairman. From what he is saying I really wouldn't trust him with your docs.
If you have the docs backed up then you can do a re install of everything, did you get a box with office in it?

I think I meant the Office function when I said Microsoft, but I don't think Office itself is backed up on the remote drive?

Office is a program that you install onto your computer. It sits on your hard drive in a special place for programs. You use Word or Excel to open your documents, they sit somewhere else.

Office itself doesn't need backing up - if your computer dies you can simply download another copy from the internet. To activate that downloaded copy, you need your license key (long string of numbers and letters with dashes in it) which is what you actually paid for. If you cannot find this, it can be recovered from your existing computer. If you bought Office from microsoft online then it'll be in an email - if you bought software from a shop, it'll be on the box.

Where do you live btw?

I don't think Office itself is backed up on the remote drive?

No, it doesn't work like that. If he's uninstalled it, it'll need reinstalling like you did when you first bought it.

I will take a look at the Jellybean thing shortly but suspect I will be lost in the opening moments,

Jellybean is simple, you just run it and it looks at the software you have installed and spits out licence keys. Whether there will be sufficient remnants of Office for it to work in your case, I honestly don't know and would be curious to find out.

Where are you geographically?

Yeah, he was straight off the net, never tried him before. These things are absolutely trial and error if you don't know anyone. I will not use the big ones like pc world as I don't trust them not to take all our personal stuff off.

I asked him if we could reinstall Office from the backup and he said no, we'd need the Office licence stuff (which we can't find, we'll have thrown it all out), is that not true then? More confused than ever now, I've no idea who to turn to for help with this......I need to lie down!

PC is sort-of functioning now, it has regular mad moments but the main immediate issue is the lack of Office. And that I don't trust it now.

Thanks Cougar/Molgrips. Chilterns.

Also, +1 for Mike and Molly, they speak sense.

we'd need the Office licence stuff (which we can't find, we'll have thrown it all out), is that not true then?

You do need the key, but you can get it.

Which version of office do you have? Open up Excel or Word then click on help and then about.

Yeah, he was straight off the net, never tried him before. These things are absolutely trial and error if you don't know anyone. I will not use the big ones like pc world as I don't trust them not to take all our personal stuff off.

Oof, you would be at the other end of the country.

Tell you what, would you like me to take a look at it remotely, see if I can suss out what the crack is with it?

Open up Excel or Word then click on help and then about.

The Excel or Word that the "repair man" uninstalled? (-:

I will not use the big ones like pc world as I don't trust them not to take all our personal stuff off.

Unless you have home-made sex tapes or classified military information, your documents are of no interest to anybody.

your documents are of no interest to anybody.

They'll almost certainly delete them, though. Which shouldn't be a problem as they're all backed up, right?

well I wasn't going to ask him that...

To try to answer: Nothing "dodgy" of course but tax and money info, and general domestic stuff - all documents. I am just very private.

Yes, Word and Excel are wiped off.

Cougar - that's very kind indeed, thank you. I'll send you a private message. He put something on it called Open Office which is very clunky.

Given your uses / techie knowledge, I would say that whilst an Apple product may appear to be the *easier/simpler* option as spouted by many, I don't think that the expense of one is justified in your case, nor is the new learning curve of an Apple worth it either. They are similar ... but different at the same time, and you could easily be out of your depth for a while learning an Apple.

Your uses could easily be served by a cheaper, but still perfectly decent
build quality product that is windows based. ( I'm thinking the likes of a Dell, Lenovo etc etc )

FWIW, I have had an iMac for years, and have just bought a windows laptop. I don't now feel that Apple's are that much easier than windows, and in many ways Apple are behind the times with the user interface of handling files. (different topic)

As for stuff in the cloud ... your email is already in the cloud ... it always has been ... the same emails that have been sending your word documents to other people ... so its no big stretch to have those documents stored in a filesystem the cloud too. As said above, if your that worried out privacy, then you need to learn about it and not be out of your depth, and manage it fully.

The Microsoft environment is pretty mature now where you're login into windows will also log into the MS cloud system (onedrive) and emails (outlook.com) etc. The stuff stored in MS's cloud is also encrypted for security as well. So its fairly OK.

He put something on it called Open Office which is very clunky.

Good grief. That does not make sense to me.

He put something on it called Open Office which is very clunky.

It should still open your existing documents though?

Good grief. That does not make sense to me.

Makes perfect sense to me, I explained this on the previous page. He's an idiot.

Yes it does open them but they don't seem to work very well, ie functionality etc.

Thanks fisha, very thoughtful. I do try not to send files etc for that reason. Wasn't aware the cloud was encrypted, I just assume it is safer not to use at all - one less potential hole. And now I know what OneDrive is that used to keep popping up annoyingly!

The cloud isn't really a security risk as such. Hackers are unlikely to attack Microsoft directly like that. The only thing you have to do is read the terms and conditions and make sure you agree with them - it's more about what Microsoft are going to do with the data than criminals.

I'll go back to the point I made before, you need to educate yourself.
If he wanted to your PC guy could have happily installed a nice cloud program or backdoor to upload all your files.. would take minutes.
Your laptop gets nicked all your docs are out there.

In reality work out what you have? Bank statements? They probably came from the cloud/email etc.

Pages and Numbers are to Apple what Word and Excel are to Microsoft.

I agree with most of what's written in this thread, but not the above.

Whilst you can use Pages / Numbers on a Mac to do similar things to Word / Excel, I wouldn't recommend it. The Mac version of MS Office is great these days and has all the functionality of the Windows versions. Pages and Numbers use different files which you (usually) can't read from non-Mac PCs and the functionality is not as good (especially Numbers). I think Pages / Numbers are free these days so there is that argument for using them vs Office. But if you want everything to work smoothly / simply - get Office.

P.S. iCloud is amazing. For 79p/month, all my important documents and photos are automatically backed up and synced across devices (iPhone / iPad / Mac). Dropbox etc are similar. Well worth it.

EDIT: This will also solve your iPhone's memory problems.

P.P.S. Typed from my 6 year old Mac laptop which hasn't skipped a beat and still runs very snappily

P.P.P.S. Agree with the above - you can get a decent Windows PC and avoid most of the issues you're experiencing.

how do we investigate the power source point? We do go through a heck of a lot of supposedly long-life bulbs in this house.

That's an outright inaccuracy. If your Mac fails you take it back to where you bought it and it will be repaired or replaced.

If OP is frying hard disks I wouldn't recommend Fusion Drive / HDD Macs. Even with SSD + AppleCare and TimeMachine it would be slightly risky.

I can't imagine it's anything the OP is doing that is causing hard discs to die. If they even are dying, then it's either a) bad luck or b) poor equipment. Yes, Macs are hard to fix, but he won't get into the same situation.

P.S. Does the OP even mean iMac? I think he wants a laptop? I assumed he was (incorrectly) using the term iMac to describe an Apple computer?

It's possible that the OP is not frying hard disks. Maybe his computer has had problems, the 'repair man' has told him the hard disk has failed, and this has temporarily fixed the computer because it's required a rebuild in the process.

At work we had one guy killing his laptops more often than anyone else, at least partial reason was that he was using them in his country house with energy provided old generator. Bigger reason might have been that his house wasn't too clean - cat hair and dust balls collected to 1 year old machine is pretty good hint about that.

I've just had a quick look at this.

TL;DR, the hard disk is indeed failing. It looks like the repairman uninstalled pretty much every piece of software he could lay his hands on, then handed it back going "the disk is broken, you need a new laptop." 🙄

I've left it running chkdsk and sfc scans, hopefully that should stabilise it for a while if it's just a couple of bad blocks rather than properly knackered. I'll check back after lunch.

Oh yeah, and no dice with extracting the Office key, which I kind of expected but it was worth checking.

Good work Cougar!

lol at the irony of someone who was super-concerned about privacy and file security handing over complete control of his computer (VPN?) to someone who approached him on the internet 😆

(I'm sure Cougar is well-intentioned)

Did you at least make the offer...

"Before I take a look, do you have any dwarf-porn on your laptop ?"

"No, of course not, why would you even ask that? Its disgusting"

"Oh, OK, would you like some ?"

A vicar checks into a hotel. "I hope the porn channel is disabled," he says. The hotelier replies, "no, it's just the regular kind, you pervert."

(I'm sure Cougar is well-intentioned)

Of course.

ION, anyone want the OP's credit card details? PM me.

it's OK I got that when I told him he needed a new hard drive

lol at the irony of someone who was super-concerned about privacy and file security handing over complete control of his computer (VPN?) to someone who approached him on the internet

Indeed.

Hard to say that the OP did the wrong thing, because we all know how decent Cougar is - but really, probably shouldn't have done it!

All done.

For those who care: sfc came back clean and chkdsk didn't return anything of consequence. It's looking like the disk is sodded though, it's crunching away. The OP's going to pick up an SSD in the next couple of days and is downloading the W10 installer to USB.

Swapping the drive on this model looks to be a ton of screws to remove the bottom half of the case, then it's pretty straight-forward to get the drive out.

Apologies to have gone quiet; I've been somewhat busy trying to sort the pc and also doing job interviews. Being asked this morning for a revised cv (helpful comments made to be fair) by first thing Monday fried my own personal hard drive in my head!

Right. All thanks to Cougar, I know you all know already but he's a superstar. SSD ordered (I now know what one is!), deep breath taken and back off and installed......and nothing. Wouldn't boot as "no driver". Frantic scramble to John Lewis tech support - "leave it with us, but it's probably toast". Another random repair place said the same - and laughed that I'd even tried. Came home, basil fawlty style mad panic, then back off again (thanks Cougar) and I could see that I hadn't got it on the contacts properly. I'd been trying not to handle the drive so had wrapped it in tissue paper and couldn't see properly. Turned it on again and......voom! Loaded up windows 10 and Office and it's away, so fast now, on in seconds rather than the previous 10-15 minutes. A hugely improved and repaired pc for £250.

So thanks for all your help and a huge thanks to Cougar for patience with an IT idiot. I've just got to get my head round the cloud now.......!