Any Negatives, and Help Me Decide (Laptops)

Evoss

Evoss

Evoss

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Hey all,

I have been a PC user since day one and haven't really got into the Mac world and am on the edge of taking the plunge.

One of the reasons for going down the mac route is battery life, as at the moment I have a high spec Vaio but i'm lucky if it lasts for two hours, so its useless as a laptop.

I want to know if in this day and age, are people having any problems switching over to Macs? I know in the past there were compatibility issues, but have they been phased out now?

Also, I am not sure if to get the Pro or the Air (13"), is there any reason to sway one way or another?


Cheers for any helpful feedback,

Evoss
 
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It depends what you need it for.

In terms of performance, there shouldn't be a huge amount between the 1.7GHz Air and the 2.3GHz MPB.

Connectivity can be awkward on the Air, with no ethernet port, but I'm sure that's not even a consideration for many people these days.

Beyond that, I went for a MBP over an Air because I wanted to connect up two external monitors at my desk, because I wanted quad core and slightly decent graphics.

If I could have lived without those things, and I was choosing between a MBP 13" and an air, I'd choose the air.
 
Battery life has been amazing, iv got a 2.4 year old 15" mbp which is still able to last best part of 2 hours from its original 4 with 900 cycles (wish it could do 4 hours still)

You can stick windows on it anyway if your struggling but osx is pretty easy to pick up if you just go along with its functions and see :) (just depends what you want to do or play)

The air looks awesome (13") but has no dvd drive built in and is a little slower (heat), when the 13" pro won't be quite as light and has a lower resolution screen.

I like the air as the 13" pro really needs a resolution bump.
 
I am going to be using it for University tasks; programming, web design/PS, note taking in lectures etc...

When I travel/go home I may use it to play a game on if the time ever arises. I take it the Air would not be sufficient for this?

I want the Air for its lightness and how slim it is.
I want the Pro as it is more flexible and has a black bezel instead of the silver one.

If I went for the Pro, I would probably go for the 15" model over the 13".
 
The Air should be good for all of that bar the games, but even then it depends what games you want to play really.
 
If you buy a MacBook and put Windows on it, generally the battery life will suffer and you will get much less than advertised. Although despite this it will still be comparable to a "good" PC-laptop.

I hated Macs for programming, but your mileage may vary with that.
 
MikeHiow said:
The Air should be good for all of that bar the games, but even then it depends what games you want to play really.
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The one major factor that I dont like, which is quite petty is that the Air does not have the black bezel that the MBP has.


theheyes said:
I hated Macs for programming, but your mileage may vary with that.
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Why did you hate Macs for programming?
 
I like the mac for development, but then it depends what you're doing.

PHP, Python, Ruby, C etc. and the POSIX/BSD environment that the mac provides should offer a nice touch. It helps if you find a nice IDE too - I'm quite liking Sublime2 at the moment.

The bezel is a bit petty to be honest - you end up with the same silver when you go for the high-res anti-glare screen on the MBP, too.

It's certainly a hang-up that I'd be prepared to forget about if I had to hump a laptop around uni for three years - the air will definitely help here.
 
I bought my first Mac this month. Lifelong Windows user who took the plunge and bought the 13" Pro.

Things which I like:

- Build quality. I thought my previous Vaio laptop was well-made, but it has nothing on the MBP. I can appreciate the MBP as an object as much as I can as a computer.

- Battery life. 7-8 hours of light browsing or note-taking can't be sneered at. I'm finding OS X to be a great OS for mobile use - it doesn't necessarily do things which Windows doesn't, but things like going into sleep mode when the lid is closed just seem to work more smoothly.

- Silence at idle. Speaks for itself, really.

- The trackpad. The size of it and the finger gestures make a genuine difference to productivity - it really makes using a laptop feel less burdensome than it did previously.

- Compatibility has been good, although I haven't tested it with anything particularly obscure. Certainly my HP printer and my Canon scanner installed, if anything, more seamlessly than they did on Windows.

Things which I don't like:

- There's still the odd Windows app which I miss. For instance, I haven't really found a good Mac alternative to IrfanView.

- MS Office on Mac works fine, but just feels a little slow and clunky, particularly when opening and saving files. The best comparison I can make is that it's like using iTunes on Windows compared to using it on a Mac.

- Screen resolution is a bit on the low side. I went for the Pro for the faster CPU and larger hard drive, but having the same resolution as I had on my 5-year-old Vaio isn't that great.

- My biggest problem by far is the keyboard. I really miss the page-up, page-down, home and delete buttons, and the control key is in the wrong place, as are the @ and " keys. But the bigger problem is the OS X keyboard shortcuts, which drive me crazy because they're so illogical.

Want to open a file or folder in the Finder (Mac equivalent of Explorer)? You can't use the enter key - that would be far too sensible. You have to press Cmd+O. Want to lock your machine from the keyboard? You can't. Want to switch between windows? You can press Cmd+Tab, but that only switches applications, so if you want to switch windows within an application, you need Cmd+` instead - a distinction which seems fairly arbitrary to me.

I'm gradually getting there, but as somebody who uses keyboard shortcuts a lot, this has been the biggest frustration. Overall, though, it's a great machine and I'd recommend it.
 
I think it's Fn+Up/Down? Which is stupid, since those keys are on opposite sides of the keyboard, and I don't want to have to use both hands just to page up and down!

Then Cmd+Up/Down seems to be the equivalent of Home and End. But Fn+Left/Right seems to do the same thing, which is also illogical - why didn't they pick either left/right or up/down?

Neither is as bad as the Cmd+O thing, though. I curse the person who thought that was a good idea every time I use the Finder!
 
Just remember, the 13" Macbook Pro is £999.

Only do this if you are 100% certain you want one.

If you are doing this just to 'try out a mac' then I suggest going to the Apple Store and having a play about with them for a good while before making the purchase. Be careful, that is a lot of money and you don't want it go to waste.
 
Mattus said:
I think it's Fn+Up/Down? Which is stupid, since those keys are on opposite sides of the keyboard, and I don't want to have to use both hands just to page up and down!

Then Cmd+Up/Down seems to be the equivalent of Home and End. But Fn+Left/Right seems to do the same thing, which is also illogical - why didn't they pick either left/right or up/down?

Neither is as bad as the Cmd+O thing, though. I curse the person who thought that was a good idea every time I use the Finder!
Click to expand...

Oh my bad its fn up for page up fn down for page down, fn left for home and fn right for end.

Bit odd but it makes the keyboard layout work, can't remember the one for hash personally but I like the keyboard too much not to care (it is a very nice keyboard to type on)
 
I think I will wait for the 2012 models as apparently there are going to be some big changes, not just internal like the last two models of the pro/air
 
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