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Author: Subject: macbook, to buy or not to buy
hellbent345

posted on 23/1/09 at 08:04 PM Reply With Quote
macbook, to buy or not to buy

wondering about buying a macbook, is it worht spending the extra to get these pretty machines, they are faster and dont crash so often etc or should i go for cheaper windows based machine? i need it to be small and very portable, will be running word based docs on it normally, but cant stand long boot times etc might put engine management software, megasquirt etc in future - dont know if these will work with mac os. also i will b goin to uni next year, i dont know what extra things ill need for that either....

thanks al

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blakep82

posted on 23/1/09 at 08:26 PM Reply With Quote
its a toughie. unless you're doing loads of graphics work, or publishing (where a mac really shines i think) then i'd go with a pc.

if its taking too lpong to boot, just do what i do. my pc lap top goes into hibernation when i close the top. open it up, it wakes up and its ready





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peteday_uk@btinternet.com

posted on 23/1/09 at 08:37 PM Reply With Quote
I think you should go for the mac. I have had mine now for four years now and it's never missed a beat. Word type doc's you can either buy office for mac or a cheaper and just as good (if not better) is i-work. If you are using it for any kind of graphic or video work then they are unbeatable. The startup time from sleep is about a second,but as normal start up is a bit slow although no where near as slow as my wife's windows laptop.

As for the megasquirt software, something you'll have to do research on. Although they are that good it's almost worth buying a very cheap windows based computer just for that.

Pete.

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madmandegge

posted on 23/1/09 at 08:55 PM Reply With Quote
mac gooooooood, they're shiny!

In all seriousness I wish I hadn't got rid of mine, had a black 13" Macbook, nothing's been as good as it since!

[Edited on 23/1/09 by madmandegge]

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eddie99

posted on 23/1/09 at 09:07 PM Reply With Quote
Go For mac and if there are any programs that you cant use with mac software, my friend has got a program that runs windows on tab

Cant beat them from what i've seen

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Benzine

posted on 23/1/09 at 09:30 PM Reply With Quote
My girlfriends mac crashes more than my laptop and is slower and I paid £100 for mine, not 4 figures. Back of the net...

If it's just for word docs etc then there's no need for a mac. My old laptop can still play counterstrike source and other games. I've taken off all the crap I never use and keep it in good order, regular defrags etc and it's flip hot.





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hellbent345

posted on 23/1/09 at 09:30 PM Reply With Quote
thanks for the replies, i think i will spend the extra on a macbook, and hope it lasts a long time!
al

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mr_pr

posted on 23/1/09 at 09:32 PM Reply With Quote
mac mac mac mac....


typing on one now. I use mine for everything including all windows programs that i have to use every so often (no that often)

Many ways of running your windows only apps. Either run boot camp (comes with macs as standard) or use parallels. Costs extra. Personally i would go with boot camp.

If your thinking about buying ring them up. Let them know you are a student. They will give you a better price than a shop or the net. If you can;t wait for delivery over the phone, print the email quote they send you, take it to a shop and they will sell it at that price. I saved 19% that way.







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caber

posted on 23/1/09 at 09:43 PM Reply With Quote
I vote for mac I have been using them for years and they are generally a lot more solid than windows machines. Having said that i am typing this on an Asus EEEPC 901running MacOSX. The EEEPC is just about the right size for full portability and the 901 is fast enough for pretty much everything. They come with a version of Linux installed that is very solid and pretty basic however it is straight forward to load windows and possible though more complicated to to get Mac OSX running, I did it because I am very familiar with OSX and for the challenge Linux is excellent as a fast and stale OS for browsing and simple or even quite complex word processing image manipulation and pretty much anything with the great advantage the software is generally free. It takes a bit of learning to get your head around it and is a lot like a locost in that you can make it into whatever you want with as much effort as you want to put in to it.

Caber

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locogeoff

posted on 23/1/09 at 11:10 PM Reply With Quote
I would second the Asus EEE PC 901 if you're looking for super portability, and as Caber highlights you can choose your OS, I went XP due to the Linux being as rough as a badgers bottom, a collegue of mine with a similar netbook went MacOS without problems. One thing I would say, and it's not a huge problem for me is that the keyboard is slightly smaller than standard so if high speed typing is your goal and you have big fat pudding fingers you may find it tight.

Laptops just seem so heavy, cumbersome, and power hungry these days.

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robertst

posted on 24/1/09 at 12:31 AM Reply With Quote
i've got a black macbook 13" and i have dropped it twice, spilled two pints on it, and it still works just like the day it came out of the box... i tell u these macs are unbreakable!
had a toshiba before it... it just broke out of boredom i guess....

plus the new ones with their unibody thing are irresistible...





Tom

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oliwb

posted on 24/1/09 at 09:19 AM Reply With Quote
Buy it they're great!





If your not living life on the edge you're taking up too much room!

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martyn_16v

posted on 24/1/09 at 12:06 PM Reply With Quote
Macs are overpriced shiny things for fashion slaves

Buy a laptop without an OS and load Ubuntu/Kubuntu/Mint on it, whichever you think looks prettiest






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geoff shep

posted on 24/1/09 at 05:12 PM Reply With Quote
They've just updated the white macbook so it's pretty close to the aluminium spec. You can run windows on it easily so any windows-dependant software is usable.

Whether you use bootcamp or parallels, you still need to purchase a copy of windows itself.

There's a 'student' link on the apple store page.

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mr_pr

posted on 24/1/09 at 09:27 PM Reply With Quote
quote:
Originally posted by geoff shep
There's a 'student' link on the apple store page.


Still not the best student price you can get though. Ring up and they will almost certainly beat it.







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