My Experience of shifting from Windows to M1 Mac

The day Apple announced their new M1 macs, I was very excited to get my hands on them. This is the journey of an all-time Windows guy shifting to the new M1 mac. 🥳🥳

What is the new M1 mac?

In June 2020, Apple announced that they were transitioning from Intel-based x86 chips to their own silicon which would be ARM-based in their WWDC event. At that event, they showed a demo of how powerful this transition would be by using their existing A12Z bionic chip which was being used in the iPad Pro. Later that year, in November 2020, Apple announced their new M1 chip and the new Macbook Air and Macbook Pro using this chip and how powerful M1 is, in their event named “One More Thing” (This phrase is quite significant than you think it is😉). You can view the whole event here.

I am not going to talk about the performance numbers and technical specifications of the M1 chip in this article. This is just about my experience on how I transitioned from Windows to macOS in Macbook Pro M1.

My Old Laptop and New Laptop’s specifications

Old Laptop (Asus Vivobook 15 R542UQ):

1. CPU: Intel i7 8th Generation
2. GPU: Nvidia GeForce 940MX
3. 480 GB WD SSD storage (upgraded)

New Laptop: Apple MacBook Pro M1 512 GB

Shifting Data

As a beginner to the Mac, I was quite confused with the new OS. The file system in Mac is quite different to that of Windows. I would recommend that everyone who is planning to shift to Mac from Windows watches some video on YouTube for understanding Mac’s file system. There are many paid options out there to help you shift your data from one OS to the other. But to save money, I decided to shift everything by myself. The easiest way I could find to shift my data is using some kind of cloud storage. In my old Windows machine, I had everything sorted and organized. This helped me save up a ton of time because otherwise, I would have to find every file all over my OS for useful data. I was having a OneDrive premium account provided by my school which helped me in transferring my data. But if you don’t have any such service, I would recommend using Mega for transferring data as it provides a generous amount of free storage. Another advantage of using cloud storage over traditional pen drives is that you will not have to worry about the file system compatibility of your USB drive. The file system used in Windows is different from that used in Macs. When using cloud storage, you will need to download your files through your Browser. This will solve all the File System compatibility issues. Once my system was ready with all the files, the next step was Apps.

Downloading Applications

M1 chip is a transitioning phase of Apple from Intel to their own silicon and in any kind of transition, it takes a huge amount of time for apps to become compatible. But in this case, the community was quite fast to make changes and most of the apps which I used on Windows were already available on the M1 with native support by the time I bought it. The apps which do not provide native support can be used under Rosetta translation which translates x86 code to native ARM code. Some apps like Microsoft Teams still require Rosetta (as of August 2021). Overall, the app compatibility is an issue and will be an issue for the next couple of months and I was fully aware of the risk involved in buying this laptop. I would prefer that you use websites like isapplesiliconready or doesitarm to check for app compatibility for your workflow and decide accordingly.

This area is just for programming based apps and workflow. If you are interested, continue reading or else you can skip to the next part. When I started configuring my Mac, while reading different articles, I came across the Package Manager HomeBrew. I had heard about it, but I did not use it initially thinking that it would unnecessarily complicate my task. But I was completely wrong. HomeBrew is the best thing ever. And the fact that you can even install third-party apps like Firefox is just amazing. I would recommend everyone to use HomeBrew, regardless of any Mac system you are on. I now use HomeBrew for downloading all my apps and frameworks like NodeJS.

Overall, app compatibility is still an issue on the new MacBooks but it will improve with time. Developers and companies all over the world are working on making their apps native to the new M1 and use its complete potential.

Overall Experience

The overall experience of shifting from Windows to macOS, although lengthy, was quite smooth. And I am loving each and every aspect of the Mac. Everything from the trackpad to the new keyboard and touch bar is amazing to use and I am loving each and every aspect of the laptop. Also as a software developer, the Mac opens new doors for me because now I can build apps for iOS too. As a Flutter Developer, I am quite happy with the decision of buying this laptop because this helps me test and develop apps for both Android and iOS and not being dependent on someone else. A performance boost in my development workflow is an additional bonus. One of the most underrated gains with this laptop is with battery life. Battery backup on this new laptop is just outstanding and compared to my Windows laptop (which I had to plug in every 2 hours), this change is more than welcome. Also, Apple Ecosystem is one thing that was one of the factors while making the decision for buying this Laptop. The connectivity between my iPhone and Macbook makes some tasks much easy and reduces effort. For example, whenever I get phone calls, previously I had to unplug my earphones or disconnect them (if it were Bluetooth) and then connect it with my phone. But now with the Apple ecosystem, I can just pick calls right from my laptop. This, in the bigger picture, saves up a lot of time and energy and does not disconnect/distract you from your current workflow. But with all these pros, there also comes some negative thing about the laptop. Let’s talk about it.

Negatives of the Apple M1

1. App compatibility is one of the obvious downsides of the M1 chip. For example, in one of my class assignments, I had to use VirtualBox to run Kali Linux, but there is no support for any free Virtual Machine Software (Parallels does exist but it is paid). Thankfully, I had my old laptop with me and I completed my assignments on it. (VirtualBox does not work on Rosetta).
2. This issue is not specific to M1 but in general to the Mac. Gaming. I cannot stress much on how gaming is bad for the Mac operating system. I particularly play Valorant on my Windows machine, but it does not support macOS. Also, there is no official support of Steam on the new M1 chip. So if you are a hardcore gamer, I would recommend you not to go with this laptop.
3. App availability is also one minor issue on the Mac. 95% of all the apps are available for the macOS but there are a few apps that are not available for the Mac. One popular example of this is Tally. But it’s the other way round too. For example, Final Cut Pro is one such software that is loved by creators but not supported on Windows.

Final Thoughts

Overall, I am very happy with the decision of buying the new Apple M1 Macbook Pro. It is a fast, performant and battery beast machine. It does have some issues but the laptop, in general, is awesome. One pro tip to anyone who is planning to shift is that you keep both Windows and macOS with you so that in cases where you cannot use your Mac, Windows will be there for you and your workflow isn’t hindered. I use my Windows machine for Gaming and some software like VirtualBox which is not supported on the Mac. I hope this article helped you in some way and narrowed down your decision of whether to buy the new laptop or not.