How Does Thinkorswim Run on Mac?

I am one happy camper – I just bought my first Apple (AAPL) Mac!

My new baby, which will be named something hot like Carmen or Estella, is a lightly-used early-2008 Macbook. It’s also a beast!

My last notebook was a Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) laptop, and it was a dog. Nothing against HP – in fact, I give them an 11 out of 10 when it comes to customer service. I had to send it back a couple of times, and the process was silky smooth – no hassles whatsoever. Gadgets and computers fail all the time, sometimes for no good reason – what counts is how a company treats you once there’s a problem. I’m not fond of their printers, but HP is good people.

Thinkorswim ran pretty smoothly on my PC – until I decided to run a few other programs at the same time. Then things would start to get funky. The computer would regularly freeze for anywhere from 3 to 30 seconds, blast its fan at max volume, or just have weird random hiccups. And I don’t even want to get into what happened with FireFox running as well.

But there’s no comparison to my new Mac.

As I’m writing this, I’m running Thinkorswim, a ton of FireFox windows and tabs, iTunes, iPhoto, and iChat, and my 1.5 year-old Mac is not even coming close to breaking a sweat! No freezes or stutters whatsoever! And the new Apple Macbook is even better than mine, with a better video card, longer battery life, better screen, and a sturdier body.

Using a Mac is like driving a German luxury car – a junker will also get you where you need to go, but the ride will be a heck of a lot bumpier. This keyboard is smooooooooooth to type on, and the trackpad doesn’t suck. Of course, any real mouse is better than any trackpad, even Apple’s.

Back to the point of this column – the Thinkorswim-on-a-Mac experience is simply awesome. Reviewing software is tough, so I keep it simple and focus on the big things.

First, the thinkDesktop software installed itself very quickly without a hitch while all of my other programs ran in the background – no stupid Windows-style orders to close everything. I can’t say much about the process except that it was, um, um, um, perfect! I took out the trash, and by the time I came back, the installation was basically done. When I installed thinkDesktop on a Windows PC, I had to call Thinkorswim for assistance with dealing with Windows’ overly-complex security schemes.

As for its’ actual operation, thinkDesktop still runs fast as hell with no data delays or errors of any kind – not even a speck of goofiness related to my switch to a new computer. One big positive is that on a Mac, it looks great – Macs have incredible displays and the fonts look absolutely beautiful.

I’m never going back to a Microsoft (MSFT) Windows-powered machine. Macs are the rare product that is a better value at a higher price, and the transition is much easier than you think. It took me no time at all to transfer many gigabytes of documents, photos, videos, and music from my PC, and adjusting to the new keyboard layout has been a cinch – after 4 days, I don’t even have to think about whether I need to hold down Command, Option, or FN – I’m just going on instinct now and it’s easy as pie!

If you need a new computer, you owe it to yourself to check out a Mac. The new Apple Macbook is less than a grand at Amazon.com (AMZN).

Yes, you can get a Windows PC for less money, but when you count in things like the cost of security software (unnecessary on a Mac) and wasted productivity, the choice becomes simple – Macs can’t be beat. Amazon has great prices on Macs.

MacMall is another good place to shop for Macs – they also have some pretty sweet deals: