Thinking of getting a MacBook

philhoole

philhoole

philhoole

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I'm thinking of getting a MacBook and its only realistically going to get used for web browsing and little more really.

I had considered a MacBook Pro and a more powerful Wintel notebook but whilst its nice to have a higher spec I'm not sure it is really justified. The last time I bought a laptop I bought a high spec one but never got full use out of it - prefering to do more demading stuff on a desktop.

Anyhow - My only question is with the basic MacBook - Is 512MB enough ? I have no idea how much OSX consumes on its own as this would be my first Mac. As a comparison, I consider 512Mb just enough on a PC for this sort of use.
 
Well as you aren't going to be doing anthing demanding then 512 is essentially fine. However I always like to have a bigger 'comfort zone' when it comes to RAM so if you can stretch to it, stick a gig in there.

:)
 
I have just picked up a the basic 1.8CD/512 Macbook as a little spare computer for messing about with (surfing, email, DVDs, software testing etc.). I have a 24 incher iMac as well but it isn't exactly portable. :p

I have found the Macbook to be absolutely superb, it is silent and quite responsive; worryingly I seem to be using it more than my iMac at the moment. :D I have even installed BootCamp and Windows XP performes more than acceptably, quite fast if you tweak it a bit. Unless you are planning on games or heavy video/photo editing, the entry level is a more than enough for most people. As with all computers, max it out as much as you can afford so if you can go for the 1GB ram model, other than than BUY IT! You WILL NOT be dissappointed. :)
 
Thanks for the advice.

I agree the need for having just a bit more RAM than you think you need. However, my current (failing) laptop only has 512MB with XP and that is enough for the programs I run when online (email,multiple browsers etc - nothing fancy). So I wondered if OSX was just a little bit more greedy than XP really.
 
OS X is a little more greedy on the ram than XP but then again it does so much more and does it better. The main difference you will see is how intuitive OS X is, after a while using Windows becomes a chore and you will yearn to use OS X again.
 
Remember that the on-board graphics will take a 64MB (or more?) chunk of RAM off the bat.

I'd go for 1GB just so that you have the headroom. The CPU is pretty powerful, so it'd be a shame to hold it back in anything other than very basic use, IMO. :)
 
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May I suggest saving youself a fair wad of cash and going linux?

Just managed to get wireless working on my ZV6000 after two days of trying :rolleyes: Thusfar I'm very happy with it. Just need to migrate all of my files over and say "bye bye windows partition!"

If you're interested in going down this (more complex but very satisfying) route, there are plenty of Linux-ers on these forums that will be happy to help.
 
there are many just as well built PC laptops - The apple books my colleagues have have been nothing but trouble build wise.

Also I believe you cannot run OSX and Linux concurrently, its one or the other
 
Name a few PC laptops, other than Sony Vaio's I havn't seen a well built PC laptop.
 
toosepin said:
With a MacBook you could have both...
Click to expand...

;)

And yes get the extra ram, I wish I had im now going to have to pay through the nose for it and there is a waiting time according to the apple site :( .

Never mind I got more than I bargained for with my Macbook anyway I only intended to use it for a bit of surfing and word processing on the train, I now find myself using it for software development because it is better than the university computers, hence the need for extra ram.

Go Macs!
 
PiKe said:
Name a few PC laptops, other than Sony Vaio's I havn't seen a well built PC laptop.
Click to expand...

my samsung, any sony vaio, my friend's dell is pretty nice too.

then again my boss's 6 month old MBP has discoloured and gone through 3 batteries and 2 chargers.
 
Hate said:
my samsung, any sony vaio, my friend's dell is pretty nice too.

then again my boss's 6 month old MBP has discoloured and gone through 3 batteries and 2 chargers.
Click to expand...
We have a samsung here in the office and doesn't seem that well built and isnt very nice to look at. The screen is crap aswell.
 
Afer having an iBook for 3 years 2 months (still working great), a MacBook and a MacBook Pro - I can easily say I've never had _any_ laptop problems.
 
Well i got my Macbook yesterday to replace my Laptop (Windows) and as i said in the gallery thread, i had never used a Mac in my life... OS X is all new to me, so i'm still finding my way :)

Overall i'm very impressed with the laptop itself, very smart looking piece of kit....The brightness and how the vibrant the screen looks is excellent....DVD Playback and sound from the thing is great....I currently only have 512 Meg in the thing but so far but it seems very fast, in the future i probably will invest in a 1 GB stick though....I only plan to use it for surfing, email, photos, DVDs and stuff....No games (except maybe FM2007) and no real editing....The battery life too seems good!

It's the little things that are impressing me most, 2 finger scrolling etc etc but i still have to get use to some things...Not having a Right mouse button feels weird, still getting into the 2 finger tap on the pad instead, closing windows on the left hand side and using the Apple key for copy n paste instead of CTRL....I know i can change that though (and i will)

So far i'm more than impressed :)

/eek - thought i could change cop n paste, i can't...Oh well :D
 
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