Skip to main content
First Day

Started today with coffee in bed until 9am, then got down to business.

Earlier this week, after being notified I would be leaving my employer, I decided to take advantage of the company's Employee Purchase Plan (EPP) with Apple. I walked into the Ridgedale Apple Store and picked out a Mac Pro dual Xeon quad-core 2.8GHz CPU, an Apple Wireless Keyboard, a couple of 20" Apple Cinema Displays, and the 10-user edition of Mac OS X Server. I decided that, as part of defining my work, I needed to make sure my productivity wasn't hampered by under-powered technology.  I want to be able to do some serious computing, and there's nothing more powerful and affordable than the Mac Pro.

I'm happy to say that I'm writing this entry on my new Mac Pro, although I haven't yet installed Mac OS X Server (that'll come later, once I've planned out disk partitioning and digital workspace mechanics).

Working (and Living) Green

One of the things I've neglected up to now is taking advantage of the extensive power management features of Mac OS X (I know, I know, you'll find many of the same features in other operating systems, and I'll discuss Windows stuff in the future).  For starters, I've set the kids' eMac, my Mac mini, and the Mac Pro to sleep at 10pm and whenever the systems have been inactive for an hour (laptops - my wife's MacBook and my iBook)are exempt from sleep schedule as they're almost always put to sleep when not in use).  The screens are already set to sleep after 10 minutes of inactivity; if only our TVs had similar features (yeah, I'm sure some of the new ones probably do, but we're not upgrading anytime soon...business and positive cash-flow are top priority now, not entertainment).

Things still on my to-do list:
  • Configure storage on the Mac Pro
  • Install and configure Mac OS X Server on Mac Pro
  • Migrate work stuff to Mac Pro from the Mac mini
  • More things that I can't think of right now...
Watch tomorrow's episode as I engage warp drive and we jump to hyperspace ;).
Labels:

Comments

Saqib Ali said…
Wow. That is a fancy machine. What do you plan on using it for?
Sat Jan 17, 03:56:00 PM CST
Tom Hannigan said…
Hey Joe,

Tom dropped by to say hi and hope all is well with you and yours.

Interesting week, I think we talked to the same messenger on Wednesday :).

Keep us all updated on how things progress with the new computer.

Take care, Tom.
Mon Jan 19, 08:25:00 AM CST
Joe said…
Saqib, I plan to run various VMs to test configurations of technologies I'm interested in. Also plan to do some web development and media editing.

Tom, thanks for the comment. Best of luck!
Mon Jan 26, 03:46:00 PM CST
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

On My Own - Doing It By The Numbers Over the weekend I got my first call on a consulting opportunity.  A few calls later I realized something - I hadn't figured out how to price my "product!" It's pretty hard for someone to buy something (or even determine whether they're interested) if they don't know the price. Of course, that realization came after I nailed down something even more important...my resume. I promised lots of friends, colleagues and former co-workers that I'd let them know how things are going, so I plan to catalog the steps in my process here on my blog in the unlikely event that someone else decides to pursue a similar path. I know this has probably all been written about before, but some of us are just too darned bull-headed to learn lessons from other people and need to make our own mistakes, carve our own paths. Step #1 - Define Your Product (aka Update Your Resume) I know most people probably keep their resumes current by looking at
4 comments
Read more
InfoWorld published this excellent brief overview video on cloud computing. Worth a look if you're in the dark about the cloud!
21 comments
Read more
GullFOSS - Sun Microsystems joins porting effort for OpenOffice.org for Mac We can only hope that there'll be some excellent cross-pollination between Sun's team and the folks at NeoOffice . NeoOffice has done a good job of delivering added value to OOo, and it would be a shame to see that good work fall by the wayside as the OOo core evolves to include its own Mac-native UX. I'm sure mine is not the only voice encouraging the teams to find ways to cooperate and bring the best of both to OpenOffice's Mac user community.
5 comments
Read more