We are at war in this house – the rebel MAC user vs. the stable PC user. Daughter is like a scout – a double agent – working both sides. Well, that’s how she started. Now, however, after being shown the evidence, she is wearing PC colors and fighting on the RIGHT side – the PC user’s side. 

And guess who uses the PC in this house.

Yes. That would be me.

Hubby, however, believes everyone should use a mac. I believe if everyone uses a mac, soon no one will use their brains because they’ll all turn to mush since using a MAC can drive you mad with very little effort. I know this because I’ve spent the past week trying to balance my NEED to use a MAC with my ease of using a PC, and ‘mad’ isn’t a strong enough word to describe its affect on me.

Daughter performed in a play last Friday at our end-of-year picnic with the homeschoolers. Hubby filmed the play and we promised to deliver copies of the film in a couple of days. Hubby had no idea I wanted to edit said video but thought we’d just copy the tape as is and send it on. Not a problem, really. He’s a professional photographer, so the unedited tape was good. My thought was to put titles and music on it just to make it fun, ya know?

Fun?

I have Microsoft Movie Maker in my PC. I used it for the first time a couple of weeks ago when I made a book trailer for my WIP. Do I need a book trailer? Certainly not, my book isn’t even close to completion let alone publication. But I had a blast making the trailer. It was amazingly easy and made me feel creative. Fun stuff.

I figured if I can do that, I can edit a simple play. Not so, said the Sony Video Cam that didn’t come with the proper cord to transfer video tape to my computer. So… we transferred the film onto hubby’s MAC – and that, like Fort Sumter, started the war.

After days and hours – in fact, nearly a week – of trying to work with MAC’s iMovie, I can honestly say I question the sanity of those who use it regularly. The ease of use with Microsoft Movie Maker is only enhanced by the options and quality of the final product.

After using a PC for more than a decade, switching to MAC is like moving to some distant galaxy. Yeah, life form there has to eat and breathe, but nothing else there is the same. So it is with MAC. I kept closing the program when I wanted to enlarge it – yes the buttons are in reverse. There is no desktop view – all the open ‘windows’ disappear until you run the mouse close to the bottom of the screen, then they pop up and wave around – it’s a visual display that’ll seer spin your eyes.  The program it’s self needs time to acknowledge each and every change you make – and you must manually make every change. In PC’s Movie Maker, you can drop an image into the area you want then stretch it to fit just so. Done. Transitions can be added the very same way – drag and drop. With iMovie, each action must be ‘rendered’ before another action can be performed. And if you want to add a transition, then you must first adjust the images before and after – and each step requires rendering. If you’ve made a mistake, you must redo the entire adjust, wait, snore, and test process before going on.

The video is done and it’s nice. BUT for all the hours spent and f-bombs dropped, the end does not justify the means. I will never yell at my PC again – not for freezing up. Not for flashing ‘not responding’ when I’m trying to save an hour’s worth of typing. Not for shutting down unexpectedly. Now that I realize how hard I work my machine and just how much I demand of it, I will appreciate what it does for me and snicker inside when someone else says they own a MAC. See… from personal experience, I know that Apple Mac is really Bill Gates’ creation. It’s his way of eliminating the traitors – those who will not use a PC because they want balance in the market. It’s a brilliant idea, actually, but I do believe PC users should be handed this warning with every new upgrade they download so they never venture into forbidden and dangerous territory.

So… if you are a MAC user, take heed. Though you might believe it is an easier machine to use, beware the evil within.

<sigh>

And because you’ve stuck with me this far, reading all these words, I’m attaching a link to the book trailer I made on my PC, as some visual relief. 🙂

Just click on the photo below.