About two weeks ago I ordered a new 20″ iMac Core 2 Duo with 2 GB RAM and an 256MB RAM upgrade to the video card. So I’ve since “switched” from a main Windows desktop to an iMac running OS X. Now, those that know me from back in high school will remember a time when I was a Mac Zealot. But around 1997, I got my first PC running Windows 95 and since then, a PC of some type had been my main machine. Some may remember that last year I bought a Mac Mini and had discussed the fact I figured my PC was about to become my secondary machine. Well, that didn’t happen because quite frankly, my PC was much faster at getting things done than the Mini.

Turn the clock forward a bit and Apple computers now use Intel chips and it has made an amazing difference. This iMac is faster than the Core Duo laptop I have running Windows XP and it just feels more at “home”, especially now that OS X is as responsive as Windows. I don’t know how, but Intel has found some magic wonderland to make context switching just faster than other processors.

Since I setup the Mac, I’ve been having a blast using it. In fact, you may notice a correlation to my sudden return to blogging with the purchase of the iMac. I just feel like getting more done on it. It’s such an elegant design with such a small footprint. I have tons more desk space now, and it runs much quieter and cooler than the PC did.

I have purchased Parallels, which is a VM for OS X for running other Intel bases OSes. And yes, I have installed Windows on it for the odd Windows only thing I have. Funny thing, the iMac runs Windows XP faster on Parallels than my actual PC.

Maggie is also much happier now, as I’m not stealing her 17″ iMac Core 2 Duo. Thanks for letting me try it out babe. It got me sold on knowing an iMac for my next computer was the right choice.

Coming soon, a post about the software I’m using that makes life on the Mac just fun.