I love my Macbook Pro!!!!

[runninkyle17]

Well I wanted a 15.4" notebook that was light and had plenty of power just in case I ever needed that much power.

I have a desktop that runs all my games and most other power intense stuff. I would have gone with the Macbook, but I don't like small screens.

I had a Sony S-series that was nice and everything, but I hated the small screen. So after two weeks of anguish on whether or not to fork out the cash to buy a Macbook Pro....I did it. I must say that I have never been more happy with a laptop purchase.

I have owned at least six laptops through out my college and medical school career so far. It looks like my Macbook Pro will be able to hold me over until it starts to run to slow, which will most likely be at least four or five years since I will mainly use it for classes and what not.

I will also say that I am impressed by the battery life that I get out of it. It I have Wifi on and brightness at the lowest setting (which is plenty bright for me in most situations) I get around 4 hours under average use. If I am downloading files and other stuff I get around 3.75 hours out of it.

XP runs great on it, but the battery life in XP sucks because there is no built-in power saving features. I haven't had time to tweak the power management in XP, but after I do I expect to get at least 3.5 hours out of it under normal use.

I really have not needed to use XP all that much, but I will this summer when I am studying for the boards because some of the presentations I have to watch online I need IE for. Which is a total drag because I prefer Firefox!

Anyway, just thought I would write down my opinions. If anyone has any questions about the Macbook Pro, feel free to ask!

 

[regnez]

You can use IE on a mac, it is just a really old version. I am on an iMac G5 right now staring at the "e" in the dock.

Version 5.2 is what version I have on here.

 

[alimoalem]

Originally posted by: regnez
You can use IE on a mac, it is just a really old version. I am on an iMac G5 right now staring at the "e" in the dock.

Version 5.2 is what version I have on here.

i doubt that would work. i, too, have presentations posted online that requires IE and XP. it doesn't work on macs.

OP, i'm glad you enjoy the laptop. the only thing that really hinders me from getting one is the 15.4" screen; you may like it but i would prefer a 14.1". oh yea, the price is a little too much for me but i may get one in a couple years

 

[runninkyle17]

I have tried out a program called Crossover, but unfortunately they just don't support enough software to justify buying their product.

Parallels is an option because you can easily switch between XP and OSX, but the downside is the fact that Parallels is just a virtual desktop so it hogs a lot of resources.

 

[Commodus]

allmoalem:

Grab a regular MacBook if you don't mind reduced graphics performance. It's still pretty quick for CPU-heavy tasks, it's much smaller (13.3 inches with the same res as a 14-inch model), and it definitely costs less - you're looking at $1499 before student discounts for the best (factory-stock) version, and $1299 if you don't mind one in white with an 80GB drive.

The real kicker is that the regular MacBook is actually very easy to upgrade in terms of storage. You just have to remove the battery and a little L-plate and you can slide the hard drive out without even voiding the warranty... though they won't warrant someone else's hard drive, of course.

 

[Wolfpup]

I *HATE* that the Macbook Pro's hard drive isn't easily replaceable. That's probably my single biggest complaint with it (second being I wish it had a better GPU).

I'm paranoid about sending in a computer for repair with the drive I use-with any laptop I'd want to swap drives when I get it so if it ever does get repaired, I'd just swap back in the original drive before sending it (which would be super hard to do on the Pro, and maybe even void the warranty, not sure).

I'm still trying to decide between a Macbook Pro and Dell's e1705 or m1710 though

 

[Commodus]

The MBP's relatively limited upgrade options are a problem, but right now there's not much reason to hold off anyways: your only real alternatives are the 160GB, 5400RPM drive or the 200GB, 4200RPM drive, regardless of where you shop online. The only real advantage would be to save a bit of money.

 

[alimoalem]

Originally posted by: Commodus
allmoalem:

Grab a regular MacBook if you don't mind reduced graphics performance. It's still pretty quick for CPU-heavy tasks, it's much smaller (13.3 inches with the same res as a 14-inch model), and it definitely costs less - you're looking at $1499 before student discounts for the best (factory-stock) version, and $1299 if you don't mind one in white with an 80GB drive.

The real kicker is that the regular MacBook is actually very easy to upgrade in terms of storage. You just have to remove the battery and a little L-plate and you can slide the hard drive out without even voiding the warranty... though they won't warrant someone else's hard drive, of course.

i'm not going to be doing anything cpu-heavy, just regular college stuff. and actually i did consider the macbook before i got my HP (i can still return it though so still looking for better deals).

my preference is the 13.3-14.1" range for screens so the size is not a problem. what really turns me off about the macbook is the keyboard. it's really childish. my friend has one and every time i see it i think to myself "could they have made it any more childish?" i forgot the name of Apple's event they have at the beginning of each year but i was hoping they would release an update to the design during the event, which they didn't. the macbook pro, however, i do like

 

[TheStu]

Personally, I love the Macbook keyboard... I tend to not like laptop keyboards, but this one is very nice. I type really heavy, and since the macbook keyboard is so solidly set into the machine, I dont feel the whole thing flexing when I type. The whole machine is put together very solidly, none of the squeaks or twists that some of my classmates machines have.

 

[Wolfpup]

I wish I could use the Macbook keyboard more-just to see if I could stand it. It seems like the keys are all flat, and would be annoying. But the 5 seconds I used one while helping someone get on our wireless network it seemed decent.

I noticed Sony's comparable laptops had flat, weird keys too...so maybe it's the "thing".

I'm not sure how they seem "childish" though, just...weird.

Eh, but moot point since I want a bigger screen and a decent GPU, even if just to run OS X's nifty features better (assuming I got a Macbook of course )

 

[Walzber813]

My roomate has a MacBook pro, I loooove it.

 

[alimoalem]

i have nothing against it being flat and the keyboard is solidly built; my issue is each key is individually set with a separation between each key. check the picture in this link (the picture under the prices).

 

[TMoney468]

I've been working at my internship between my 17" Macbook Pro C2D and a Dell XPS 17" C2D and I have to say, the MBP is so much better. This is coming from a long-time Windows user. The first think I noticed was the screen on the Dell...it was glossy like my MBP, but the corners of the screen appeared darked and curved a little bit than the rest of the screen. Overall construction, the MBP takes it hands down. I actually can't stand to work on the XPS any more, and preface my notebook instead. Taking a quick look at the prices, they're both around the same price and besides gaming, the MBP is such a better machine. And yes I know XPS are generally gaming machines, so I don't know why they bought it for web design and such.

 

[runninkyle17]

I am still loving my MBP. I don't use it for gaming b/c I have a desktop and a 42" monitor for that. The only real buying points for me was the 15.4" screen, and the overall feel compared to my wife's Macbook.

Don't get me wrong, the macbook is a great budget notebook (and it is budget especially since the build quality is so good); but I just have to have the bigger screen to suit my needs. Plus the keyboard on the Macbook bugs me and the MBP keyboard is silky smooth. Almost as good as my old IBM keyboard and just as good if not better than my old Acer Ferrari keyboard.

The only real problem I have had is getting used to the trackpad (during very fine movements my fingers are still not used to how the cursor moves, but give it a couple more weeks and it will be just fine).

 

[VooDooAddict]

Originally posted by: runninkyle17
Parallels is an option because you can easily switch between XP and OSX, but the downside is the fact that Parallels is just a virtual desktop so it hogs a lot of resources.

Have you tried Parallels?

I use VM constantly on an XP machine ... for more virtual XP machines, W2k Server Machines and a lonely Linux virtual machine.

As long as you aren't exceeding your resources or always running intense background processes I find it really slows down performance very little.

How much RAM did you get?

 

[TheStu]

I agree with voodoo on this one, if you only have 512MB RAM then you might as well not even bother with parallels. But with 1 GB of RAM in my machine I can run parallels, Word 2k4 (which is a PPC app) Mail, Firefox, iTunes, iChat, emacs, textedit, jgrasp, xcode, terminal, address book, iCal all open at once (in OS X), in windows I have firefox, Word 2k7 and a couple other small apps. I know this because that was what I did last night while working on a project, I had to get the file from Windows, but it wouldn't convert from the 2k7 to the 2k4 format when I just grabbed it off my Windows partition, so I booted it up parallels to re-save the file. I had all this open for a few hours and didn't notice much if any slow down.

I had it open for so long cuz I had forgotten to close parallels

 

[runninkyle17]

With the new update to parallels everything is running fine and the trackpad movements are fixed. The only thing that really bugs me is that macdrive does not work within parallels.

Since I mainly only use parallels for using internet explorer if a presentation doesn't work in firefox or safari this isn't a big deal to me, but hopefully they find a fix soon.