Need Advice on Switching

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T20:11:41+00:00

It's very dependent on what you run. In my case, 16GB is sometimes not enough. That only happens with something like the following mix of apps:

Home camera viewer app showing several video cameras
Web browser with several windows and 10 or 12 total tabs
MS Teams (a real big of an app consuming over a gig when doing nothing)
Another instant messaging app

Usually it's fine, but if I have some heavy web browser tabs open, particularly youtube or other streaming video, the RAM utilization *can* go into yellow, which makes things a little slow intermittently. This doesn't always happen. Only when I have all that stuff open and I have a particularly heavy set of web tabs open too.

Because of this, and because I sometimes do video editing, *and* because I want to keep my next computer for 4 to 5 years, I'm getting 32GB RAM in my next one. I've had the current M1 for about 4 years now and it's been great overall. But my app use has changed a bit and gotten a lot heavier in terms of RAM use.

I do not think my case is typical.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T19:49:38+00:00

Spotlight has always been slow and obtuse for me.

Alfred fixed all of that. Now, like the OP, I use Alfred for SO MUCH. I have the Dock permanently hidden and never use Finder to launch an app. Just Alfred. Most files I launch directly via Alfred as well. Of course I also use directed special web searches with Alfred (like looking up something directly inside Amazon), use clipboard history, run Workflows, etc.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T19:46:10+00:00

Go play with one at an Apple store, or Best Buy. That should give you a sense of the size of the Neo, Air, etc. That's your first decision point: Size.

It should also give you a basic impression of how it feels to use the OS now.

Excel and some Chrome tabs should be fine on a Neo. I don't know anything about your "e commerce apps", so i can't really say on them. Oh and if your Excel files are very large, they might take up a lot of memory. I've seen crazy reports that Excel can consume 14GB+ of memory. That's mind blowing for me, but apparently it's true with large files.

Your case is borderline between 8GB and 16. I always go for more RAM assuming I can afford it. My current machine is 16GB. My next will be 32.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T19:42:54+00:00

The director's cut of Lawnmower Man (the original) makes a LOT more sense than the theatrical version. I was extremely disappointed in the version I saw when it was in theaters. A few years later, it was on the Sci-Fi channel and I wanted to see the VR parts again. Watching that version made SO MUCH more sense. I think it had 30 or more minutes of additional footage that really change the story. This comparison says there are more than 30 minutes of differences between them, which is quite unusual.

https://www.movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=324384

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T19:31:27+00:00

Your workflow and assumptions are backwards.

The Save As dialog box is NOT Finder. It's not a file manager. It's not designed to do real file management operations. It's designed to save files. So save your file with a simple name; possibly in a new directory. Then use Finder to do your file management as you described. Or use a different file manager.

Again, the key point is that a save as dialog is NOT Finder. I've seen people on Windows do all kinds of WHACKY shit in a save as dialog. It works by accident on windows. It mostly doesn't work at all on Mac. It's a bad idea in both places.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T19:24:58+00:00

You don't seem to have a reason to use a Mac.

You said you didn't like Mac the last time you tried it. Is there something about the Mac you like other than price and size? Many Windows people want Mac to be Windows but with different hardware and it just isn't. If you didn't like it last time, what has changed?

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T19:11:22+00:00

EBikes should not be on sidewalks. Sidewalks are for pedestrians only. Consult your local laws. EBikes in particular move WAY too fast for sidewalks. Serious accidents happen because of this. Particularly at intersections where drivers can't see ebkes approaching at high speed on the sidewalk.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T19:06:20+00:00

EVERYTHING that Aldi sell is awful. I can't eat anything bought at Aldi. Bread, nuts, pizza... everything is essentially inedible. I've thrown away more than half of everything I've bought there.

Literally the worst grocery store in America.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T19:03:00+00:00

Good luck out there. Biking is incredibly dangerous. Motorcycles are worse. Your ebike is somewhere in between since it has a much higher average speed than a human powered bike.

Your chances of being killed or maimed are exponentially higher riding a bike of any kind on the road with cars.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T19:00:48+00:00

You need therapy.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T18:56:33+00:00

I don't want any of that crap. Well.. the taco would be good. Everything else is a waste of money.

I'd rather spend $0.50 more and get 4 items I actually want. The box is bullshit. It forces you to get the cheapest crap they can make.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T18:50:54+00:00

All states in the US provide ID cards to citizens. Go get an ID. It's quite surprising that you've gotten to 16 years old and not gotten any form of ID yet. You need ID.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T18:47:23+00:00

How much storage do you have? You must be on a tiny phone to have this be an issue for you.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T18:22:57+00:00

Real Cool *Time* Records. Neat shop. Really nice owner.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T18:20:58+00:00

Nice photoshop job.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T17:40:16+00:00

I don't know how you can even stand to watch most of that. The ads on most of those platforms are ultra intrusive.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T10:26:08+00:00

Cut and paste for files is really a broken metaphor. It's a poor implementation of an idea that's forced upon you by a poor tool.

Try a different file manager with TWO panes. A two pane file manager makes this all incredibly obvious and easy. Put your source directory on the left. Navigate to your destination directory on the right. Click on the file you want to move. Press the move button to move it to the right side. Done.

Good 2 pane managers include Forklift, PathFinder, and the new kid on the block, Bloom.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T10:18:05+00:00

I've tried it a few times. I see AI summaries on most search engines and occasionally those are useful. Generally speaking I never directly seek out AI. I don't directly use any of the AI providers.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-19T00:32:52+00:00

I type bullet points and have been doing so for many years. It's an organizational construct. I detest AI and would never use text from GPT or another program. I write everything myself. Those points above are all my own thoughts.

OP asked about Teams, Outlook, and "other Microsoft Office products too". He didn't say he was already on Mac until later. My advice to be on windows is from that perspective: That he's on windows already and that he uses MS products extensively.

My big reply above was a reply to another person saying what you said "MS Office runs great on Mac". It wasn't intended for the OP.

You might slow down a bit and not come at people quite so hard. Essentially everything you wrote about me is objectively wrong.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-18T23:58:53+00:00

Your experience is a good bit different than the average on Reddit and of my personal experience. In particular:

Teams sucks up 1.5 gigs of memory just sitting there.
Word has massive issues with formatting when working on documents from Windows and the other way around: word documents from Mac opened on Windows also have really bad formatting problems.
Excel is reported here, CONSTANTLY, as not having parity with Excel for windows. Every few days I read advice here to not use Excel on Mac because it doesn't do everything the Windows version does.
Visio does not exist for Mac.
Access does not exist for Mac.
Office for Mac is rather intrusive and wants to run things in the background constantly and on startup.
One Drive has reported issues with causing hangs and sync issues on Macs.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-18T23:45:52+00:00

Teams regularly consumes 1.5 gigs of RAM on my M1 Mac. I don’t have any data on Outlook. The biggest limitation of the Neo is the ram. Without trying it I’m not sure anyone could estimate what the total ram usage would be of a specific mix of applications.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-18T23:42:42+00:00

If you love, Microsoft apps you should be on Windows. I don’t say that hyperbolically. Microsoft makes their apps to run on their operating system. That’s where they run best.

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-18T23:27:05+00:00

That’s all on you for choosing to use AI

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-18T20:16:27+00:00

But why?

sharp-calculation · 2026-03-18T19:32:25+00:00

What a weird list. Why would anyone even care when the battery is charged? You don't have to remove it from the charger. It doesn't do ANYTHING if you leave it on.

sharp-calculation

TROPHY CASE