| Computer Related > Macbook Pro | Miscellaneous |
| Thread Author: Skoda | Replies: 15 |
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 20:16
Macbook Pro - Skoda
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Spurred on by the mobile phone thread that's too long to read, here's my top 10 list for why the MacBook Pro is the best laptop ever developed, to date :-) 1. Ergonomics. The keys are just the right spacing apart, no bashing 2 adjacent laptop keys. The wrist rests are out of the way of the large trackpad. The packaging is good, although you cant buy the superior 4:3 format small screens any more (as on the old 12.1" G4 macbook), the 13.3" widescreen is small enough to carry around and big enough to work on. The connectors are all neatly laid out on one side, not hidden a fumble over the other side of the screen at the back, not randomly split out on either side. Just all in one place. It's like the designer cared :-) 2. Looks. It's attractively slender if boring aluminium all over. Still, it's a step up from black plastic. Glossy screens are a pain for those lucky enough to work in sunlight (not me!), they do make movie content more vivid indoors and it's all the more enjoyable to watch for that. 3. Wireless Connectivity. You don't always get the the best room in a hotel for wireless signal. With the MBP, it doesn't really matter. There's no popup boxes exclaiming the end of the world if i don't update my wireless drivers right now. The unfaltering bluetooth is simple to use. 4. Battery life. I shouldn't have to turn off wifi to preserve battery life, so i don't. My MBP doesn't really care. It'll still give me over 5 hours on wifi. Apologies to any Dell laptop users still reading, that alert isn't just your battery out of juice, it's actually died (again!), please send £150 to Mr Dell. 5. Suspend and Resume, while the mac starts faster than any win7 machine in existance, i don't really even want to wait 25 seconds, so i don't. I just close the lid instead of powering off, safe in the knowledge there's a week's juice to keep it in that state, eagerly awaiting me opening the lid so it can impress me by having the Wifi connected and raring to go before i've fully got the lid upright. 6. Speed. It comes out the box with a healthy 4Gb of ram. Coupled with MacOSs fantastic caching and my never rebooting (as per suspend and resume above) every single application opens instantly. It's the small pleasures that count! No cost cutting motherboard as on lesser machines, to suck the life out of what should be a blindingly fast CPU. 7. Reliability. I like that Mr Jobs took the time to test his component choices inside my laptop to make sure they all work properly together. I like that there's never been a single random inexplicable glitch that are still common on other laptops. 8. The small touches. From the lack of moving parts to break (who really want's an opening cdrom drawer in this age) such as the invisible magnetic screen latch, to the magnetic power cord that means tripping over the power cable wont require an insurance claim. 9. The operating system. While windoze 7 is rock solid, it's also a bloater with the worlds most annoying security system and a complete black box when it comes to performance problems. MacOS on the other hand just stays in the background, eagerly waiting to help but prefering to stay out of the limelight, like a good butler. Under the pretty covers it's just a good old fashioned unix box firing on all 12 cylinders. 10. The value for money. Random tips for Iffy (not trying to teach my granny how to suck eggs, just want to make sure he's getting the best out of his): 4 finger swipe on the touchpad, swipe 4 fingers down to show (and switch between) all your open apps. Swipe them up to hide your screen from prying eyes. Swipe them side to side to switch apps faster. 3 finger swipe left (and right) to go back in the web browser. 2 finger swipe you'll definitely already have nailed. How good is the inertia scrolling :-) Press option key (immediately left of space bar) + space bar, type the first few letters of any app you want to open and hit return |
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 20:17
Macbook Pro - Skoda
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>> Spurred on by the mobile phone thread that's too long to read You're having a laugh Skoda! One post and look at the length of this thread already. Sorry! :-( |
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 20:19
Macbook Pro - Zero
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Oh yawn Talk about sycophantic! |
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 20:23
Macbook Pro - Skoda
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| It's the closest i'll get to "yeah, go on then, you were right". I'll take it :-) |
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 20:27
Macbook Pro - Zero
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No, lets face it, its a list to try and justify being ripped off. If it makes you feel better, then fine. |
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 20:38
Macbook Pro - Iffy
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......Random tips for Iffy... Thanks for that. I use the Magic Mouse which is another good reason why the MacBook Pro is the best laptop you can buy. The mouse, for those that don't know, is bluetooth, so nothing to plug into the computer, and has a one piece shell - no smelly wheel. All the functions are done by stroking the shell, and it works brilliantly. I bought the mouse before I realised how good the trackpad is, so the trackpad is yet another reason why.... And there's the backlit keyboard, which comes on automatically. At £1,000, some people might be surprised Skoda mentions value for money. But there are plenty of competing high-end Windows laptops of a similar size for up to twice as much. It's easy enough to spend £1,200 - £1,700 on a top spec Sony Vaio. I've had my MacBook Pro a few months now and it's never missed a beat. Everything just works, and the OS is so intuitive compared to Windows. Lastly my MacBook's aluminium case gets admiring glances when I use it in public, occasionally from some quite bonny lasses. Unless they were smiling at me.... |
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 20:40
Macbook Pro - R.P.
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| The case can be very cold. |
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 20:43
Macbook Pro - Iffy
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Oh, and I forgot to add it has the best sound of any laptop I've ever heard. That's not saying much, but at least it's listenable. |
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 21:16
Macbook Pro - movilogo
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My Windows Vista computer takes 45 seconds for cold boot, 30 seconds to wake up from hibernation. Fedora Linux running from USB takes just 15 seconds to show desktop! Only thing good about Mac is battery life indeed better. But the money it costs, one can afford 3 laptops in that price :o) |
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New Sun 9 Jan 11 15:44
Macbook Pro - paulb
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>> The case can be very cold. >> Especially on the bare knees at 6am - possibly a little too much info there, but it's true. |
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 21:35
Macbook Pro - corax
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>> Lastly my MacBook's aluminium case gets admiring glances when I use it in public, occasionally >> from some quite bonny lasses. >> >> Unless they were smiling at me.... You don't try to catch reflections of yourself against shop windows while holding it do you? It's the nerd equivalent of the poser in the Audi TT convertible. :) |
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 22:54
Macbook Pro - Statistical Outlier
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I think the price differential is overstated by most. I recently specced up a 15" Macbook Pro against an equivalent Dell 15" machine. The Mac was a grand total of $300 more, but had a better screen (which tipped it in the end) and that differential also included that I had to buy office for the Mac while we had a Windows license. It's certainly true you can buy a Windows laptop for £300, my gf has one, and once we spent another £50 on more RAM it was/is perfectly servicable if you ignore its tendency to power off randomly every few hours. Not a patch on the Mac tho. My 13" Mac has a better screen than my desktop, runs about 8 hours with wifi on and no attempt to preserve power, and the trackpad is now a must have for me. I would say it's worth every penny (and I put my own cash where my mouth is). Like the iPhone, it just works and fades into the background. Desktop though? I've said it before and I'll say again, I'd still buy Windows for a desktop machine. I don't think there's anything in it between Mac OS and Windows 7, although Mac can do more out of the box, both can be set up to work without any problems. Last edited by: Statistical Outlier on Fri 7 Jan 11 at 22:55
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New Fri 7 Jan 11 23:31
Macbook Pro - rtj70
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>> It's certainly true you can buy a Windows laptop for £300 The same can be said about cars I suppose, albeit second hand. My next car could cost say £3000 or I go the company car route and have one for £20-30k. I'm probably going to do the latter again. >> Desktop though? I've said it before and I'll say again, I'd still buy Windows for a desktop machine I suppose you mainly make this decision based on price. But if you already have a Mac laptop then a nice monitor and Bluetooth keyboard and mouse is all you'd need in the office. |
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New Sat 8 Jan 11 09:03
Macbook Pro - diddy1234
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In a world of interactivity and connectivity I suspect the operating system will soon be irrelevant. This is already happening in the world of smart phones (Android phones come to mind). I have used various pc's running Ubuntu, Windows 7 and a few Mac OS's and they all do things in a different way but achieve the same goal. |
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New Sat 8 Jan 11 13:30
Macbook Pro - Iffy
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And another thing.... MacBook Pros are easier to keep clean because their sleek design has fewer nooks and crannies. |
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New Sun 9 Jan 11 14:34
Macbook Pro - paulb
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MacBook Air. Now THERE's a piece of kit. ;-) Some folk will never like Macs, because they don't agree with the Apple ethos or don't like the platform, or the price of the kit or whatever - that's fine: it would be a very strange world if we all liked the same stuff. Where Apple score in my view, though, is that the machines are very very nice just to operate. Plus it's interesting how our iMac with a 3.06 GHz Core i3 seems to do everything faster than my work's brand-new Lenovo ThinkPad with a Core i5 and the same amount of memory. And the Lenovo is (as far as I can gather) very highly thought of as a machine. I used to enjoy tinkering with computers just to see how they worked - these days, though, I want something that GsTFOWI. |
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