RedMallorca LAB

Macs can sync Mail, Calendars, and even Notes with Android phones and tablets with virtually the same seamless nature as Macs sync through iCloud with other Apple devices like the iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. The only requirement to sync a Mac with an Android device is that you have a Gmail (Google) account, which if you’re using Android you almost certainly do.

If you have set up iCloud before, you will find setting up Android and Google syncing with a Mac to be very similar and just as easy. The process is basically the same as setting up a standard mail account with OS X, and if you haven’t done it yet then Mail app will become active with the Gmail account you use.

• Have the Android device configured with a Gmail account – this varies slightly per Android version and device so we won’t cover that here but chances are good you already have this set up anyway
• On the Mac, open System Preferences from the  Apple menu and click on “Mail, Contacts & Calendars”
• Click on “Gmail” to add the same Google/Gmail account, enter name, email address, and password then choose “Set Up”
• Be sure the checkboxes next to “Mail”, “Notes”, and “Calendar” are checked in the options, these are separate options in OS X Mountain Lion but the same in Lion

Mail syncs practically immediately, and additions to the Notes app in OS X 10.8+ are synced to Android via Gmail and tagged as Notes. As a result, pictures sync between OS X Notes and Gmail this way, despite not doing the same when syncing from OS X to iOS Notes, which in an obvious way makes syncing from a Mac to Android oddly better than to an iPhone, at least for the time being while that limitation exists. Calendars sync between iCal to Google Calendar as expected.

Now that Mail, Notes, and Calendars are syncing between Android and Mac OS X, what about your iTunes music? You can’t do it directly through iTunes itself, but you can sync your iTunes library and all of it’s music to any Android device easily with the free WinAmp app.

Going beyond the usual stuff, you can even move files between OS X and Android devices by using the free official Android File Transfer tool, further demonstrating just how easy and full featured it is to work with an Android device and a Mac.