Mac Software Suggestions - Freeware/Freemium

[sim667]

So I’ve just ordered a new laptop to replace my 12 year old MacBook which almost exclusively runs dodgy downloads…… now I’m a bit older I’m a bit past dodgy downloads and looking at the freeware/freemium offerings.

I’m probably going to buy Ableton, as i do tend to dabble with this a fair bit, but if anyone’s got better suggestions for the following please let me know.

Office - I think I can use this with my uni login, but is libreoffice any good? Or just Google documents?

Photography editor/Raw processor - I’m still chugging away on aperture on my current Mac. I’ll probably keep doing photography on that just because I don’t want to chew up storage on the new one, but I want the ability to on the new one if needed, is darktable any good? Or has anyone just used apple photos for raw processing?

Video editing - Da Vinci Resolve (unless anyone can suggest something better)?

Photoshop alternatives - I’m coming a bit stuck here, lots of people suggest gimp isn’t really that good, seashore and photopea have both been suggested

 

[spitfire]

Not sure on the rest but you get Apples Office equivalents on the mac included so give them a go first.

I still use Office exclusively but that's because work pays for it.

 

[sim667]

Im also crying at the cost of ableton and VST’s

 

[what]

If you are happy to work online I believe the whole office suite is free legit via Microsoft themselves
Try searching word online or Microsoft 365 or something like that

 

[cloudyday]

Black Friday in a few weeks is always good for software prices.

Bitwig is worth a look over Ableton.

Nitro or Photomator for RAW editing.

Affinity Photo mostly replaces Photoshop for me (AP is often on sale). Pixelmator Pro is also good.

Da Vinci is free, I prefer FCP.

Apple Pages works for me for Word stuff (can open and export Word format).

 

[Kid_Eternity]

So I’ve just ordered a new laptop to replace my 12 year old MacBook which almost exclusively runs dodgy downloads…… now I’m a bit older I’m a bit past dodgy downloads and looking at the freeware/freemium offerings.

I’m probably going to buy Ableton, as i do tend to dabble with this a fair bit, but if anyone’s got better suggestions for the following please let me know.

Office - I think I can use this with my uni login, but is libreoffice any good? Or just Google documents?

Photography editor/Raw processor - I’m still chugging away on aperture on my current Mac. I’ll probably keep doing photography on that just because I don’t want to chew up storage on the new one, but I want the ability to on the new one if needed, is darktable any good? Or has anyone just used apple photos for raw processing?

Video editing - Da Vinci Resolve (unless anyone can suggest something better)?

Photoshop alternatives - I’m coming a bit stuck here, lots of people suggest gimp isn’t really that good, seashore and photopea have both been suggested

Photomator Pro is a decent Photoshop replacement

 

[teuchter]

I use the various Affinity apps. As long as they don't transition to a subscription model (they claim they aren't going to) then they are worth the money especially if you take advantage of one of their sales.

Used Darktable for a while for photo processing but am giving up on it I think - partly because it seems to mess up on colour management stuff. I just recently started seeing if apple's own photos app could do what i want. Inconclusive so far.

I use OpenOffice and find it ok but I'm not a heavy user of word processing or spreadsheet type stuff.

Da Vinci I think is amazing for a free thing.

 

[tommers]

Not used it on Apple but Google Docs, Sheets etc are totally fine. Convert to and from MS without any problems.

 

[neonwilderness]

Not sure on the rest but you get Apples Office equivalents on the mac included so give them a go first.

I still use Office exclusively but that's because work pays for it.

This, on both points. I use my work Office account, but Pages is fine for most stuff.

If you're going to be doing a lot of editing then the Adobe photography plan (Photoshop, Lightroom and Bridge, plus the raw editor) is decent if you don't mind paying a tenner a month. I'm yet to find anything free that's as easy and intuitive to use.

There's a good list of stuff here (a mix of free and paid)

GitHub - phmullins/awesome-macos: A curated list of awesome software for Apple's macOS.

A curated list of awesome software for Apple's macOS. - phmullins/awesome-macos

github.com

 

[danski]

Im also crying at the cost of ableton and VST’s

I have a serial left for ableton lite so that’s a foot on the ladder, at least.
Might not have time until the weekend to search though

 

[hiccup]

I think my favourite bit of Mac software is Raycast. It's a launcher, kind of like Alfred, but with a good plugin ecosystem, so you can use it to do loads of stuff. I mainly use it for window management, clipboard history, quick sums, searching Figma files and opening/running various system level stuff. The free version is pretty fully featured, I've not felt the need to pay for it yet.

Raycast - Your shortcut to everything

A collection of powerful productivity tools all within an extendable launcher.

www.raycast.com

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Not used it on Apple but Google Docs, Sheets etc are totally fine. Convert to and from MS without any problems.

This.

 

[sim667]

I have a serial left for ableton lite so that’s a foot on the ladder, at least.
Might not have time until the weekend to search though

Oooh that would be brilliant, i don’t get the computer til the 8th.

That said i may still buy standard as I do get it half price and lite is limited to 16 lanes, so wont use it if I do that.

 

[danski]

Oooh that would be brilliant, i don’t get the computer til the 8th.

That said i may still buy standard as I do get it half price and lite is limited to 16 lanes, so wont use it if I do that.

No worries. I doubt I’ll have any other reason to give it away between now and then so consider it reserved

Give us a shout if you still want it then

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Photomator Pro is a decent Photoshop replacement

Should have written that as Pixelmator Pro, and funny enough they’ve just been bought by Apple. Which tells you how good they are…

 

[sim667]

It may be because I haven't had a new computer in so long, but I'm really liking OS Sequoia

 

[Kid_Eternity]

It may be because I haven't had a new computer in so long, but I'm really liking OS Sequoia

It's pretty solid.

 

[Throbbing Angel]

subscribes

Whilst here - can anyone recommend a Macbook virus scanner or similar.
Have downloaded a free trial of Malwarebytes.
Free is good.

I currently only use a VPN (Nord).

 

[teuchter]

I'd recommend not bothering with any virus scanners.

 

[Throbbing Angel]

I'd recommend not bothering with any virus scanners.

Why's that?