Mac question....(installing aim/stuff)

[ghostfaced]

i just bought my mac today and i went through lookin for stuff i use on a daily ie. Firefox, Aim, MSN ect. and i came into a problem with trying to install aim. when i downloaded the file off of aim.com (4.7 for macs the newest one) it was a .bin file and when i tried to install it, it loaded excel and did some wierd shit.... figured id update my macbook thinkin it might be the problem tried it again and same thing happend..... was wondering if anyone here might know what to do.

also when i installed firefox it has this external hard drive lookin thing on my desktop with the firefox logo on the top and when i restarted my computer because of the update it was gone and had to double click on the installer again or something? i dont know im so confused;;;;; i use macs at school so i kinda know whats goin on but installing stuff on here is totally new to me

[theo]

Ok, are you new to mac entirely? Or just haven't messed with OSX much?

Anway I can answer your questions for the most part.

when i downloaded the file off of aim.com (4.7 for macs the newest one) it was a .bin file and when i tried to install it, it loaded excel and did some wierd shit

.bin is like the old .zip for mac. Most programs don't use it or even recognize it anymore. You might have to go online and find a program that specifically opens .bin files.

That being said, if you want to use AIM I highly suggest running Adium Its free, highly customizable, and supports like 10 different chat platforms. I use it to run AIM Yahoo and Gmail Chat all under one window.

(Edit: To reinforce that, you should take note that the "current" version of AIM for Mac is from 2004. Thats pretty damn old)

also when i installed firefox it has this external hard drive lookin thing on my desktop with the firefox logo on the top and when i restarted my computer because of the update it was gone and had to double click on the installer again or something?

That "external drive lookin thing" is a mounted disk image. Many mac programs are bundled in such a way. To "install" the program, first you double-click the disk image file (filename.dmg) which mounts the image to your computer. It is now treated as if it were an actual drive connected to your computer. Now look inside it, you will find the program. Drag and drop the progam to your Applications folder. Finally, you may un-mount the disk image because you don't need it anymore.

I hope that helps.

[ghostfaced]

:D :D :D :D thanks!!! yeah im not quite too familiar with macs yet, like i said i use it for school because i video edit (which is what i plan to do with my laptop as soon as i get all the shit i need installed) but im not really familiar with installing :D thanks a ton again :D

[Kriz]

Don't like iChat? It supports AIM accounts!

I can't imagine using the official AIM nowadays, the old client used to throw ads at me like I cared. Hell, I used ICQ to avoid it.

[Ddz]

I use iChat and I swear by it. It should come with your mac.

[Aladwar]

Adium > All. SuffitExpander (which is linked on Apple's OS X downloads site) is a great application that can expand pretty much any compressed file format, I'd suggest you download that as soon as possible. Other than that, yeah, go with Adium. iChat AV is still much better than the official AIM client anyways.

[budd]

Another vote for Adium here. Love it.