Getting a macbook pro 13" for school

hi i purchased a dv6tqe but since i will start college in 2 months i think i will return it and opt for something smaller. So i decided to get a macbook pro 13" but hi have a few questions.

Do you find it too small? i will use it for school (homework, writing papers etc) and sometimes i will use it for long hours and i was afraid that the screen would look to small

How hard it's the transition from Windows to Mac? i never used macs and i think i want to do the transition but how hard is it to really get used to it?

Will office work fine? i am a finance major and i will probably use a lot and a lot of excel but how is the version for mac? really different, i don't care if its better i am afraid it will be different and i won't able to follow my professor in class

Any deal or coupon? at the apple store is at 1099$ with the student discount and i wish they offered the free ipod but they just give a free itunes card, which i don't really need. So any deal or coupon?

thank you

 

The transition isn't so bad. But if you are going to be a finance major one thing to note is that Excel for mac is still pretty lacking. There are a lot of stuff thats still missing from the mac version important scripts and toolboxes. Whenever I have to use Excel for my Econ classes I always to boot into windows cause whatever my package or toolbox that my professor is using is not supported on mac. I know a lot of people who like the size of a 13" laptop compared to a 15" but that is personal preference. I would never trade my 15" MBP for a 13'.

 

Based on my own experience, the transition was very easy. Mac OS X is not a very crowded or complex system to learn, and the consistent UI design of the OS helps a lot in that regard. System maintenance is non-existent and managing programs is a matter of dragging them to the Applications or Trash folder.

 

what about excel? i will take a few classes based on excel and i am afraid it would be a different version

 

Excel a different version on the Mac yes... but its basically the same. If they are explaining where things are in a Menu, you might have to look in a slightly different place, but as far as the main spreadsheet operations, as long as you have MS Office 2011, there shouldn't be a problem.

 

For a young adult/teen in 2011, the transition isn't hard. Just play around with it for a week and you'll be an expert.

 

For the core services excel it works but more likely than not your finance professors will want you do install certain toolkits / packages and more likely than not they will not be made for macs.

 

you can learn the entire mac osx system in like 2 weeks and be comfortable where everything is. there is alot of similarities between the two. the only exception is installing and uninstalling.