What would you rather..

Fragil1ty

Fragil1ty

Fragil1ty

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444
So, what would you rather have;

A MBP 13" or a 21.5" iMac.

Going back to Uni in Sept, second year, going to be doing web design, web development and programming so a Mac is a must, but i'm not sure which, i like the portability aspect of the MBP but I also like t he power aspect of the iMac.

Which one should i go for? (considering they're the exact same price).
 
Personally, I'd go with the iMac for the larger resolution. Particularly if doing design work. It's a pain in the ass to be constantly scrolling up and down a piece you're working on. Even when doing (non-graphical) html and css work, I find it annoying on my 13" MBP, because Coda doesn't have code collapsing. So I'm constantly shifting up and down the stylesheet or html document to look at different sections of what I'm working on.

The upside to the MBP is you can of course take it to lectures with you. Though a MacBook Air, with a larger resolution would probably work better.
 
Brian8bit said:
Personally, I'd go with the iMac for the larger resolution. Particularly if doing design work. It's a pain in the ass to be constantly scrolling up and down a piece you're working on. Even when doing (non-graphical) html and css work, I find it annoying on my 13" MBP, because Coda doesn't have code collapsing. So I'm constantly shifting up and down the stylesheet or html document to look at different sections of what I'm working on.

The upside to the MBP is you can of course take it to lectures with you. Though a MacBook Air, with a larger resolution would probably work better.
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I was thinking that also, I've currently got a Mac Mini 2011 model or the late 2010 model, 8GB ram and so on, but that is just not powerful enough for me.

Also, looking at those points that you've made, this would more than likely prove to be much more beneficial due to the fact that I wont have to upgrade for a few years whilst buying the iMac but because of the lack of power behind the MBP, in a year or two I may have to upgrade.

Only downside I see like we've both said is the fact that I cannot take it to lectures with me, for that I may just buy a Netbook, install linux and use that for note taking. Nothing major is needed there.

But yeah, thanks for your insight, i think I'll defiantly be going for the iMac now.
 
I have a 13" MBP. I wouldn't use it for my main machine unless I had a large external monitor to plug it in to. The screen resolution isn't great enough for most IDEs.
 
Fragil1ty said:
So, what would you rather have;

A MBP 13" or a 21.5" iMac.

Going back to Uni in Sept, second year, going to be doing web design, web development and programming so a Mac is a must, but i'm not sure which, i like the portability aspect of the MBP but I also like t he power aspect of the iMac.

Which one should i go for? (considering they're the exact same price).
Click to expand...

Only you can answer that question.

One is a portable computer the other isn't.
 
I also debated over getting the 13" MBP or 21.5" iMac and ended up getting the 13" MBP and hooking it up to my existing 23" LG monitor via HDMI, I get the best of both worlds that way. You could re-use your existing monitor, keyboard and mouse so it would cost no extra, you could then take the MBP to lectures with you and carry on when you got home.

That's what I'd do anyway :)
 
Get a cheapo monitor for £120 (should be able to easily get 22") and get the 13 inch. You will have more screen than the iMac and it will be portable. 13" mac is fine for most coding uses.
 
Fragil1ty said:
Going back to Uni in Sept, second year, going to be doing web design, web development and programming so a Mac is a must, but i'm not sure which, i like the portability aspect of the MBP but I also like t he power aspect of the iMac.
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Im not sure what precludes you from doing web design, web development and programming on a PC but anyway...

Out of the two I would probably go with the MacBook Pro but as others have suggested it would be worth getting an external monitor with decent resolution, but it sounds like you've decided on the iMac. Good thing about the iMac is even though it's a desktop it's still very portable for when you have to shift it around as much as a student does.
 
The iMac.

You're not going to be taking the MBP to lectures realistically. It gives pretty much no benefit over a pen and paper to justify the worry of carrying around a 1k piece of kit. The only benefit of the portability would be occasions where you might want to goto the library (but there's computers already there no doubt), or if you wanted to take it back to your folks at the weekend.

It's really awkward doing any real work on a MBP. The iMac 21.5 allows two full size A4 sheets side by side (iirc), which is my benchmark for a machine capable of doing serious work on.
 
theheyes said:
Im not sure what precludes you from doing web design, web development and programming on a PC but anyway...

Out of the two I would probably go with the MacBook Pro but as others have suggested it would be worth getting an external monitor with decent resolution, but it sounds like you've decided on the iMac. Good thing about the iMac is even though it's a desktop it's still very portable for when you have to shift it around as much as a student does.
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I only really use my PC as a Gaming machine now, I don't like working on it for some strange reason, that's what I use my mac for, it's just feels, I don't know? More friendly.

I do have a nice 21.5" Monitor here with a resolution of 1920x1080, but if I were to carry my PC around all the time, i'd have to bring everything with, the speakers, kb, mouse, tower, etc.

With an iMac it's all built in so it'd just be the iMac + kb/mouse which seems more logical to me.

In the back of my mind, i've always wanted a MBP but getting an iMac, with all that power? I think that's the better option.

Jolteh said:
The iMac.

You're not going to be taking the MBP to lectures realistically. It gives pretty much no benefit over a pen and paper to justify the worry of carrying around a 1k piece of kit. The only benefit of the portability would be occasions where you might want to goto the library (but there's computers already there no doubt), or if you wanted to take it back to your folks at the weekend.

It's really awkward doing any real work on a MBP. The iMac 21.5 allows two full size A4 sheets side by side (iirc), which is my benchmark for a machine capable of doing serious work on.
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To be honest, I think you're right, more often than not i'd be in a rush to get to uni as i over sleep sometimes ;_; lol, and well grabbing the MBP would be the last thing on my mind, not to mention the fact that I wouldn't really want to carry around a £1000 laptop or rather be afraid, incase i knock it or whatever.

I like to work with windows side by side one another, now while this would be accomplishable with a screen, that would already be a factor I wouldn't have to worry about with getting the iMac.

I think the iMac is going to be the viable option here and also, I get a student discount and ALSO, i'm going to be trading my Mac Mini in for apple store credit or just selling it on e-bay, so i should be able to get the iMac fairly cheap.

Comes with thunderbolt now too and a quad core? It'd be like i'm on my PC gaming machine but on my Mac, I'd never have to switch, I think my mind is made up.

iMac 21.5" here I come :>
 
I would've kept the Mini with a monitor along with a MBP, but that's just my rather biased opinion considering I already own a 13" MBP :D
 
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