Mac Attack

CRAP! So I’m trying to update to the latest version of Final Cut (6.0.2 from 6.0.1) so I can edit some sweet XDcam EX NASCAR footage from Daytona, and I befall such a series of calamities that the thought of the Mac v. PC ads makes me want to throw my G5 at that smug little Warren Cheswick.  I know it’s all crash inspired rage on my part, but still… after spending years on both PCs and Macs I have learned one important lesson. Mac’s crash too…  A LOT!

  The problem truly isn’t the Mac’s fault this time. It’s the fact that since my employer has yet to see fit to allow our “Bad Apples” to join the network with the 50,000 PCs it has online, none of our software gets automatically updated. Soooo… when we find the need to update one piece of software, we get to spend the day downloading every patch and update and reference file Apple has released in the past so many months. Talk about fun.

     It started with the simple download and (attempted) installation of the FCP update . Easy enough. Launch the installer and here comes a message. What? I can’t install this until I’ve upgraded Quicktime? Fine. Back to the PC and download the QT update. Go to install that and another message: Update your OS. DAMN! Fine. back to the PC, download the OSX update, install it. Phew.. it worked! Now lets do QT. Worked like a charm. Finally, I can upgrade Final Cut. Nope. Now it tells me I need to update ProApps. That took two downloads and installs- as the second install is wrapping up I get the freakin’ black curtain of doom. Double crap! Go to reboot the system and all I get is a black screen with lots of unintelligble text on it. One of the only discernible words is “panic”. Nice.

     It’s now 8pm. I normally leave work at 5. Not happy am I. After several failed attempts to get the system to do something besides nothing, I loaded the OS disc into the drive to get it to boot from the DVD. Mr. Mac had different plans however. Once the disc stated to spin up, it shattered; just like Mythbusters said it wouldn’t… ever. But it did. It went in as a solid disc and came out in several jaged pieces. Now I get to learn how to disassemble a G5.

     Once I got the DVD drive removed, taken apart, cleaned out, put back together and the Mac reassembled, I loaded it with a new OS disc and restarted the machine. It comes to life, accepts the new OS install, and I’m back in business- sort of. It’s now 9:30 and I’ve had enough.

 6am the next morning I arrive with neither bright eyes or a bushy tail. Today I get to install a bunch more updates to bring the OS from the disc current as well as reinstall a bunch of software, including the latest version of Final Cut which I almost had completed installation on nearly 24 hours ago. My day is just chock full of frivolity.

   It’s almost 1am and I have everything reinstalled and working, save the Fibre Channel controller. I can finally open the XDcam footage from NASCAR and am beginning to think I might be actually coming close to the point where I’m just around the corner from being able to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Of course, once I get the Fibre Channel fixed, I get to start the upgrade process on our other editing machine…