Help using my new MacBook Pro

[iJuan]

Hello iMore,

Just purchased my first MacBook Pro 13" with Retina, it is the base model because I only plan to use it for web browsing and to try out Yosemite.
However, I have no idea how to use this Mac. Long time windows user, so its very confusing, I definitely like the features and gestures, but posting here to see if I can get more tips and how to. I have an iPhone and 2 iPads so it syncs very well.
Do you all think I made a right decision by purchasing this notebook?

Thanks

 

[Algus]

OS X doesn't require as much maintenance as Windows (as far as defragging, periodic virus scanning, updating, etc.) goes and generally runs much more smoothly since there's only a few hardware setups it runs on and it is optimized for those setups. The tradeoff, of course, is that there's a lot less software available for OS X. Most of us here probably prefer it.

Check out Launchpad on the right end of your launcher. It'll have all your apps in it kind of lack an app drawer in iOS. OS X comes with a lot of software out of the box so you should have a lot of stuff ready to go already. If you click on the Apple icon on the top left corner of the screen, you'll get to your system preferences where you can change all the settings and stuff (like the control panel in Windows)

For the most part Windows and OS X behave in a very similar fashion - windows controls, launching apps, etc. is all pretty much the same. Apps can be tossed on the dock at the bottom, on the desktop, pulled up from

There's an App Store on your launcher already so you can get apps from Apple. You can also install third party software downloaded from the internet (or more old school, on disc but you'd need to have the software on disc and an external DVD drive). Useful apps beyond what you have

Google Chrome - I prefer Safari but Chrome's adblocker is a little better and syncing is better if you use non Apple machines ever
Steam - Often has better pricing than the Apple App Store on games
Flip Player - offers media playback for some restricted Windows video files
Skype - useful for voice/video chat with non Apple users

Really Macs are about as versatile as PCs. Even though there's "less" software available, there are still tons and tons of third party apps out there so for whatever you need your computer to do, it's usually just a matter of finding the right program.

 

[o4liberty]

I find Youtube to be very helpful learning this new operating system it has saved me a lot of time trying to figure some thing out.