is it essential to try out a macbook before buying?

Larnica · 5 May 2008 at 18:59

Bit of a stupid question really

My pc is dead, ready to replace it with a macbook, wont have time to goto the Apple shop for a few weeks yet. Is it worth just going for it and buying one, or do you really think I should wait and go play (Pretty urgent to get one)

Caged · 5 May 2008 at 19:03

I'd say at least get a chance to look at the screen before you buy one. I don't know if they've improved but the one on my late 2006 model is terrible, which for an £800 laptop is laughable.

Larnica · 5 May 2008 at 19:09

Ta Buddy

Was in a rush and forget to mention, got to play with one for about 5 minutes tops. Loved the look and feel of it, and spent 5 minutes trying to close a window I opened

So yeah, dig the look and feel of it, just didnt really get chance to get to grips with the OS.

theheyes · 5 May 2008 at 20:05

My 2006 MacBook is fine. Subjective though, so you might be better having a look.

OS-wise... quirks and niggles are only going to become apparent after a few weeks or even months of use. But these days with Bootcamp what's the worst that could happen?

RoleyBirkin · 5 May 2008 at 23:04

Caged said:
I'd say at least get a chance to look at the screen before you buy one.

Agree.
I've just returned a macbook because of the screen

But not re.quality, but because it was just too darn small. On paper I'd convinced myself it would be ok. But it wasn't.

See it in the flesh imo.

LLBDTiberio · 6 May 2008 at 00:18

Gotta agree with Seraph here, its essential that you have a look at the screen in person and have a play around with the OS first.
Sure it looks nice and all but it is after all, a different OS and you need to be sure it does what you expect from it.
For example, I spent a few hours in an Apple Store figuring out how microsoft formats worked on OSX and asking questions, make a list of things you'd like to try out and ask any concierge in the store, they will happily help you out.

schoey · 6 May 2008 at 07:14

just buy it

Nexus · 6 May 2008 at 12:07

Kind of sounds you like you don't have any specific need as such to buy a Mac laptop... as you haven't mentioned needing one for Mac specific software. If it's purely for a change, then you can't go wrong with the OSX interface, most people love it.

If screen size worries are an issue, there should be plenty of other places to look at them besides an Apple store. John Lewis and some other independent places have them.

wij · 6 May 2008 at 12:21

Main thing I would check you like on the Macbook after the screen is the keyboard, IMO they are horrible and the reason I pay a premium for a MBP but most people seem to like them.

As for the OS, Mac is a joy to use after being a Windows user myself up until about 4 years ago, I still have a machine with Vista on it for gaming although I do everything else on my Mac as it just seems a more sensible way of working.

SoapSurgeon · 6 May 2008 at 13:16

The main thing about Mac OSX that I don't like and feel people should be warned about is its behaviour when dragging a folder into another folder containing a folder with the same name as the folder being dragged (i'm sure there is an easier way of explaining that!!). Anyway, in windows when it warns you and says there is already a folder called the same thing do you want to continue and you click yes, it just merges the two folders. In OSX it just deletes the old one. I found this out the hard way when I wanted to 'merge' my two separate music folders into one location on an external disk. Luckily it moves the old folder to the recycle bin.

I think that is just an accident waiting to happen for ex-windows users...

Having said that I love my macbook so go and buy one!!

itsallaboutyou · 6 May 2008 at 13:20

wij said:
Main thing I would check you like on the Macbook after the screen is the keyboard, IMO they are horrible and the reason I pay a premium for a MBP but most people seem to like them.

I quite like the keyboard on my macbook!

Although, I do use it with a mouse, external keyboard and display most of the time - I cant fault it...

In essence I think I would have preferred a desktop mac - but a mac pro was too much of a stretch for my first mac experience!

I'd agree with the sentiments above though - make sure you're happy with the screen - size, not quality as i'd much prefer my macbook screen over my precision m60

You wont look back though!

SoapSurgeon said:
Luckily it moves the old folder to the recycle bin.

Surely you mean trash!?

Hehe - I know the feeling I still call it that