<p>Any of you familiar with a MacBook? I need a laptop before i start school, and I am heavily considering the MacBook Pro.</p>
<p>MacBook’s are a waste of money. All they are is pretty and they charge a hefty price for something that looks good.</p>
<p>I would stick to a tried-and-true platform. Get a Lenovo T400 or a Dell Latitude E6400.</p>
<p>i have a macbook and i love it - that being said, most business work that i’ve done has been on a pc. still, they’re virtually the same (from my financial perspective) and it depends on who you work for and what they say. there were some at my old firm that had pcs and some that had macs, and all were fine.</p>
<p>More than once I have been assigned to use a program for class, and the teacher has said that it will not work on a Mac. Students that had Mac computers had to go to the computer lab to do their assignments. That would be a pain.</p>
<p>I also think that Macs are fine, they look cool and seem simple to use, but they are way too overpriced. In school laptops get beaten up pretty good (at least for me), they get carried everywhere, food eaten by them, filled with music and other crap. I would suggest buying a lesser expensive PC such as a Toshiba or HP, and upgrading in a few years to a nicer model (possibly buy a Mac then).</p>
<p>Why didnt they just run Windows on their Mac?</p>
<p>A laptop is one third the price, will support every application you will use, and will have less of a learning curve than a Mac. Don’t buy into the hype.</p>
<p>There are some applications a user will have problems with but Macs will work if you really want a Mac. Personally, I’d rather just purchase a $400 to $500 computer.</p>
<p>I will be purchasing a PC for the reasons listed above. Would it be nice to have a computer that runs itunes with a lot less hassle so I can just hook up my damn ipod one or twice a week? Yeah, you bet. But not worth the price.</p>
<p>Will be buying a MAC for home use once b-school is done.</p>
<p>If you really want to dish out money for a Mac, go ahead an get one. Personally, I hated the Macbook hype as well, but once I tried one, I couldn’t look back. And snce you’ve already spent quite a sum on your Macbook, go ahead and get a crossover/parallel program. You’ll be able to run every(most?) Windows based programs as long as it doesn’t suck up all your RAM.</p>
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<p>Why even spend a hefty sum on a computer from the get go? What can a Mac do that a Dell E6400 or a Lenovo T400 could not do but at a much cheaper cost? All for the right to look “fancy and sophisticated”?</p>
<p>I’m sorry, I’m a commuter so my laptop is carried around, banged up, used until the batteries die, etc. and you cannot deny the fact that a E6400 or a T400 will not outlast a MacBook.</p>
<p>People buy Macs because it is a quality product. It’s like comparing a Mercedes to a Toyota. The Toyota may be cheaper and still function well, but the Mercedes is more powerful, luxurious, and is a more satisfactory vehicle. As a owner of the Macbook since its introduction, I can tell you that it is overpriced. I believe that Apple should bring down the price to below $1000, but it is a quality product. </p>
<p>Most who have used a Macbook for a while will not go back to the PC. And if running Windows programs is a must, all current Mac computers have Boot Camp, which lets you run Windows. An additional bonus is the fact that a Mac is virtually immune to viruses and it runs much faster than computers with Vista. In my opinion, the compromises are justifiable for the price, but a regular laptop will do you fine for around half the price. </p>
<p>To clarify, some things you do not get from the PC are the ease of using a Mac, iWork (Keynote presentations), and multi-finger gestures (2-finger scrolling). However, PC’s generally don’t cost $1000+ as well.</p>
<p>macbooks are fine and if you consider 700-1200 overpriced then you haven’t looked at very many top of the line laptop pc’s recently.</p>
<p>osx runs on unix and you can pop open a shell and run just about any linux command. Tell me that’s not good for business if you’re in I.T.? Windows has to emulate the shell, bleg! </p>
<p>And with a few gigs of ram you can just dual boot windows or even run it inside a virtual machine in boot camp. Not to mention there are ways of running osx on a non-mac laptop nowadays if you are technically inclined. </p>
<p>You’re familiar with pc? Then I say get the mac and learn it. Being good at both worlds will help you in a pinch. No one in my web classes know anything about pc’s and no one in my business classes know anything about mac’s.</p>
<p>AMGLeague,</p>
<p>Find out which computers your school supports, and buy one of those. If you want a Mac, then buy a Mac (assuming it is a supported computer). Apples to apples comparison between Mac and PC make the Mac more expensive (similar capabilities, etc.). PC’s tend to be more “buggy” because PC’s support a wide variety of 3rd party hardware. Most mac peripherals you have to buy from Apple, so it is easier for the programmers to get out the bugs.</p>
<p>Most schools have recommended configuration at a student discount that you can buy (link to a special web page). Those standard configurations are best supported by the School (they know all the software and hardware), and it should have all the basic software the school wants you to have.</p>
<p>**I advise you to NOT use macbooks in business.</p>
<p>Yes, WE ALL KNOW THERE IS BOOTCAMP.</p>
<p>BUT THERE ARE STILL COMPATIBILITY PROBLEMS.</p>
<p>Take for example my business computers class,
the teacher says that macbooks can run access
and excell, but there are still big problems that
come up with submitting documents and enabling
all of the macros that are programmed into the work.</p>
<p>Plus, a lot of third party programs only run on windows.
And when you try to bootcamp it, stuff glitches.</p>
<p>DO NOT USE MACS IN COLLEGE. DO NOT. I am a student
in the honors college of our business school, and there
are a lot of problems I see with mac kids. It’s horrible.</p>
<p>Yet I get a guilty pleasure out of watching them suffer.</p>
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<p>Do you really want to run the RISK, THE ABSOLUTE RISK
that just ONE thing might glitch. And because of that one
little thing, you can’t do your work in any of your assignments
in a computer class? Do you really want to pay for an
overpriced computer just for that risk? It’s your call.
Just my .02**</p>
<p>Not Really… MacBook is more like for design and stuffs. PC is still the most popular for business.</p>
<p>radronOmega, you can run Windows on the mac and have no problems at all with excel, macros, and the Office suite in general. It’s like a PC either you use Bootcamp (minor trackpad issues might exist) or a virtual machine line Vmware Fusion or Parallels.</p>
<p>yah, but why buy a Mac to run PC??? does that really make sense to you? on top of that… it’s a lot more expensive… plus, you need to buy the softwares… meaning… windows…</p>
<p>I would say no. Most business software in general is going to be made for the PC platform. I have a macbook but I dont use it for any business related stuff. I would stick to PC for that. Macbooks are made for graphic design/art/music and video editing mostly. Mac software is pretty uncommon in the business world. If you get an intel MAC you can dual boot windows though.</p>