neuron39

There is a short thread in MIT 2011 about this, but let's start a new one. Snively wrote about this on the MIT blog recently as well.

Assuming one buys an Apple MacBook Pro, is the Intel 2.4 processing speed sufficient, or is 2.5 or 2.6 clearly necessary? Glossy or antiglare screen?

One thing not really talked about is the student discount; be aware that it's $100 with the MacBook and $200 with the MacBook Pro. Also, a Canon 3500 printer will be free with the laptop purchase (via rebate).

LauraN

Seriously, any new computer you buy is going to have "enough" processing power to accomplish whatever you need.

If you're one of those people who likes impressing others with how fast your computer is, feel free to continue this discussion- but otherwise, it really doesn't matter.

PiperXP

Heck, there are even people who survive off Athena alone. You'll be fine =D.

differential

Depends on what you want to do. If all you want to do is write emails, listen to music, watch movies, write documents, and some basic stuff, then go for just about any laptop.

If you are interested in some very cool EECS stuff you might want to do on your own, then look a little more carefully into the exact technology you are investing in. Not all processors are built equal, and some of the newer ones are coming out with exciting new technology (specifically some of the new extended instruction sets, deeper pipelines, better caching, etc). Also look at what operating systems your notebook can run, whether you have programmable graphics cards (such as NVidia's CUDA framework), etc. Not that you need an awesome computer to do EECS at all.

neuron39

Thanks for the comments so far.
One other question: is a printer necessary?

PiperXP

Nah, a lot of people's printers gather dust on a shelf. You can print as much as you want off any Athena computer. I do have my own printer - it turned out to be convenient for printing out the occasional pset - but definitely not needed.