Using playbook with a mac

Hi,

I have a playbook and back it up (when I remember :)) using my very old pc. I also have sideloaded android apps using the google chrome add-on (but not many). Also copy photos from the playbook onto the computer.

I am thinking of replacing my pc with a new mac mini.

Will blackberry desktop work ok with mountain lion os x? (Apple would no doubt prefer me to get an ipad mini but I don't want one :) - and nor could I afford it either after buying a new mini). Will I still be able to use a the google chrome sideloading loading extension?

Originally Posted by wimbly

Hi,

I have a playbook and back it up (when I remember :)) using my very old pc. I also have sideloaded android apps using the google chrome add-on (but not many). Also copy photos from the playbook onto the computer.

I am thinking of replacing my pc with a new mac mini.

Will blackberry desktop work ok with mountain lion os x? (Apple would no doubt prefer me to get an ipad mini but I don't want one :) - and nor could I afford it either after buying a new mini). Will I still be able to use a the google chrome sideloading loading extension?

Yes, it works fine with Mountain Lion and the Chrome extension works. There are also many other ways of transferring files, I often use Dropbox, you can use WiFi file transfer, etc. The only sorts of things that won't work are a few apps that require Windows, like Flix, and sideloading methods that run a Windows program as part of the process.

Thanks. That's good to know.

works fine for me with my macbook and mountain lion. blackberry desktop backups take an age, but sideloading all good. generally either wifi browsing of pb files or when attached via cable and transferring to the media folder is quite painfully slow. but using wifi transfer apps for the same purpose is faster.

You should take a look at localbar2. You need a proxy so I use squidman, its easy to setup and will liberate you of the mac to install bar files.

I haven't side-loaded anything yet but transferring files from my mac to my PB is a doddle just dragging and dropping within finder. Blackberry desktop manager works fine too but I believe it isn't quite as good on a mac as it is on a PC. IT only gives you the option to sync pictures through iphoto and music through itunes. It backs up and updates great though.

edit; Sorry, should have said I'm using the latest version of Mountain Lion and it works fine.

I have to beleive it's a filesystem related issue because direct file transfer is a LOT faster on windows...

Parallels ftw

I just plug into usb and wait for it to show up as a shared device and drag and drop as usual.I've never used the blackberry desktop do-dah.

I'm using the Playbook with a Mac running Snow Leopard. Blackberry Desktop stuff is OK but file transfers using the built-in Wi-fi file sharing feature are agonizingly slow, peaking at 2 MBps or 16 Mbps on a 802.11n connection. Other SMB servers on the same network are much faster.

I've tried all sorts of changes to my router settings (WMM on/off, 20/40Mhz band, TKIP/AES encryption on WPA2, using only 802.11b/g) but the speed stays slow. I wonder if using a Windows VM running Blackberry Desktop would make it faster.

For sideloading I use Playbook_tools in Terminal based on this tutorial: How to load Android apps on your BlackBerry PlayBook from your Mac | CrackBerry.com

Depending on the speed of your internet and file size and the number of file transfer. It's pretty easy to do wireless transfer. Just don't sit in front of your computer and keep staring at the download meter. Leave that to your cat.:p