Getting what you pay for with the MBP?

Do you guys think you are really getting what you pay for with the MBP? A very similarly speced Compal IFL 90 costs around $1700. The MBP I am thinking of getting costs around $2458. For nearly identical specs, am I really getting my monies worth with the MBP?


http://www.powernotebooks.com/configure.php?special=455 Configure it with the same specs as the MBP. It wont save my config.

 

any chance you could post links to the compaq?

as for the question of my money's worth, so far so good. it does everything i could ask, and xp pro .

 

i voted no.
Also the name isnt worth anything.

 

Don't you vote "No" and hate anything that Apple does anyways, mikeymike?

For the same price, you will get a more powerful PC laptop, but there are other things you have to consider. The design of the MacBook Pro is unrivalled. No other PC maker, not even Sony makes laptops that have the great design of the MacBook Pro. The outside look is already fantastic, added with features like two-finger scrolling on the touchpad and the Magsafe power cord, the iSight camera.

The build quality is superb. Apple has top-notch build quality and the customer service is excellent.

Also, iLife is bundled with the MacBook Pro. This suite is awesome - there's no Windows alternative to such a suite. The applications are useful, easy to use and powerful. That would normally cost money.

Other things also to consider is no bloatware - PC vendors can bring down the price of their computers if they load in lots of bloatware onto the operating system. Mac OS X is virtually free of bloatware other than a trial of Microsoft Office, OmniOutliner and Comic Life. Its as easy as uninstalling them to get rid of it. Or they won't distract you anyways even if you leave it there.

 

well , i just sold my MBP to get the new asus c90s.

here's my take on the topic. there's almost nothing on the MAC that you can't do on windows. the only thing that i liked was the ilife suite , iweb and iphoto in particular. it did make it easy to use, but iweb is so worthless if you really want a nice website. it gets really slow and has horrible coding and really hard to export to say dreamweaver to edit. i did like the nice shortcuts and backlit keyboard, but that was about it. after intalled windows xp, i almost never booted to the mac again.

i feel like people who like macs though are not like me. not only am i a gamer, but i also like to multitask. and trust me with the mac, once you start running multiple software it starts to bog down, much more than when i was on windows mode and it crashes just as often as windows.

most of my friends who wants a mac only surf the internet and organize their myspace photos, so i think its perfect for them, but at the same time, it does cost alot more for the same specs. i was looking at a 1999 MBP today and it had decent specs, but the asus c90 had the same specs (pretty much) for about 500 less.

anyways , my point was , if you like being a "mac" user and are willing to pay top dollar for name brand then its no big deal. but i prefer to have both some extra dough and a top notch notebook. btw, apple buy their MBP parts from asus.

 

iWeb is useless. Don't use it. It seems that iWeb turned you off OS X totally.

It depends what you're running; you are most likely running a bunch of PowerPC software on an Intel mac, which would require Rosetta to "translate" the code for the Intel mac to work. It consumes more resources than a Intel-native/Universal application would take. For example, running Microsoft Office 2004 and Adobe Photoshop CS2 and Macromedia Dreamweaver 8 would probably bog down your MBP; they're all resource-heavy tasks and running under Rosetta. But if you ran Photoshop CS3 and Dreamweaver CS3 and with Office 2008 which will be released later this year it won't bog down as much. I multitask on my MacBook perfectly fine; I never crash.

Actually, no. Apple buys their MacBook parts from ASUS. Not the MacBook Pro. By the way.

 

Do you even have an apple computer..?

Cause, if you voted without seeing the features of what the Mac can do, you're really missing out.

 

As far as I know, mikeymike considers everything Apple does to suck. He won't ever get anything Apple. All their ideas are stupid. For some reason he likes to hang around the Apple forum a lot .

 

Nope! I actually own a 20gig iPod. So i dont hate them like you think.
If Sony made the iPhone without a removable battery id be highly critical of them too. But we all know Sony would be smarter than that

And no, i dont hang in the apple forum. My main page for this forum is "New Posts"

 

I voted no because i almost bought the MBP 17" 4 mths ago. Search thru my posting history and you will see lots of my references and my own comparisons to the Sony AR 17"
For me it was a head to head race for which one was better. Unfortunately i didnt want to buy into the overpriced hype.
So i would think the question of this thread relates to me because i actually went thru the research and buying process

 

Wait, mikeymike...did you end up getting the Sony VAIO AR? That's even more overpriced than the MacBook Pro is!!

 

Nope, i wasnt looking at the AR with BlueRay
In Canada Sony only sold the AR in 2 versions 4mths ago (AR150 or AR290)
The AR150 was a few hundred $$ cheaper than the MBP at that time. Then i was introduced to the Asus G2's screen

 

The MBP is not overpriced (much). With the student discount, its a pretty solid deal (look at the similar Asus V1s at $1800). The one reason why I do not think the MBP is completely worth the price is its case and form factor. Its fantastic for mobility and style, sure, but it makes so many compromises for it that it really doesn't seem worth it. At the very beginning, it was meltingly hot (its been fixed now, so its less so, but still pretty hot). It doesn't have nearly enough ports. The 128MB VRAM is pathetic; the MBP case probably couldn't accomodate a 512MB 8600M GT, which is why the base model is still at 128MB instead of 256MB. The switch to LED backlight didn't bring a thinner case (not that it isn't thin enough already, but every other notebook that has been moved to LED has become thinner, so it was kinda disappointing that this wasn't as well). The MBP didn't get the magnetic lid that the MB has and styling, though still beautiful, hasn't changed in over 3 years; it still soldiers on with the PowerBook G4's case design and fiddly latch design. The remote should store itself into the ExpressCard slot (like on HP and Dell) instead of being an almost useless separate unit.

On the other hand, it has some fantastic features. Great GPU (lack of VRAM notwithstanding), good specs overall, its the lightest 15.4" out there, its beautiful, can run Windows and OSX, etc. However, those minor, even nitpicky, flaws add up to detract some value from the MBP. Its a good computer, just not totally worth the money. So I give it a 'Somewhat' vote.

And as a side note, I almost purchased a MacBook Pro last summer for $1400. At that price I thought it was completely worth it, but my dad hates Apple computers with a passion. (I got the iMac after the Sony my dad picked for me died of sheer incompetence )

 

Going through research doesn't always mean looking and using the real product.

You should actually try one. Go to any store, and look at each laptop. And you could actually compare the two, and actually see the actual differences, instead of always reading it off the internet...

As what some people said...The internet is not always 100% true.

 

You can use bootcamp to run OSX and Windows, which is an important thing you can do on a Mac. Also, I find that I only boot into Windows to play games. Everything else, I do in OSX.

I am a gamer as well, and am not sure how that matters. The multitasking is something I have not had a problem with yet. Perhaps you and I are using different apps.

Again. I'm not having trouble running multiple apps in OSX or in Windows. I'm not experiencing crashes in either OS either.

Any chance you could post a link to c90? I'm having trouble tracking the specs and price down in order to see how similar the two machines are.

You list the flaws as:

1) Used to be meltingly hot
2) Not enough ports
3) 128MB nVidia is "pathetic"
4) The new screens don't make the laptop any thinner
5) no magnetic lid
6) 3 year old styling

In response:

1) I'm not sure what laptop with a good video card runs cool. This MBP is cooler than the Dell 9400 I just got rid of.
2) I could maybe feel good about having a 3rd USB port. However, I don't know what I'd need it for.
3) Base graphics options are rarely impressive. That said, the 128 8600GT isn't anything to sneaze at. It's a pretty darned good card.
4) A non-issue for me. It's an amazingly thin laptop.
5) You got me there. I do like the magnetic lids
6) I am a huge fan of the minimalist style of the MBP. Too many laptops I've used seem to have really silly, bulky plastic styling.

 

mongoloido,

i wasnt trying to say the mac was inferior whatsoever. i love my mac when i had it for what it could do. the problem i guess i wasn't clear on is the fact that people think macs are these uncrashable machines that run superior to windows.



"You can use bootcamp to run OSX and Windows, which is an important thing you can do on a Mac. Also, I find that I only boot into Windows to play games. Everything else, I do in OSX."

so that's my point. i play games so im almost always in windows mode. i find that there's nothing else that i need to do that i can't do while i am in windows mode. why switch back to mac os? what are you using that requires it? just curious.

about multitasking - not really a point there except that when i talked to mac users they say their macs never crash =P but i do feel that the windows programs do a little better. but im on skype/ventrilo/WOW/IE 7surfing the internet and watching movies at the same time usually. (that's why we wipe i quess on gruul haha) but i agree with you. neither of OS"s crash much if you know what you are doing.

as for the link to the new c90 - check out gentech's website - i was pricing it today - for a core 2 duo 2.13 ghz, 2 gig of ram, 8600 GT 512 mb video card, 120 gb hardrive at 7200 rpm, 2.0 mp video camera plus other minor things runs for 1570ish. which i would have to compare to the 1999 version of the MBP. though the asus has a higher resolution screen (i think that just depends on your preference though)

as for form factor - i do LOVE the MBP - especially yhe keyboard - love it love it- but i must admit because of its slimness - it gets DARN hot, even after the updates. the asus c90 is not that much heavier - in the 6lbs range i believe. oh and i dont think using a student discount should be considered in the price.as there are plenty of people who would not qualify.

now i know that windows vista copied alot of mac os x features, but that just makes it better for windows users =)

 

Speaking of "Windows Vista copied a lot of MAC OS X features"...You do realize that the Apple OS is based on the Linux..

That's just for extra information if people are interested on the Apple OS.

 

I'm not going into pointless details. I voted yes. I paid almost $3,000 for my 2.4MBP and all the accessories I got, and I have exactly what I need.

 

oh i didnt know that about the mb and asus =P thanks. so office 2008 is coming out? i thought a long time ago that it wasnt coming out? hmm... nice. =) so yeah when i do run the mac intensive stuff it is iweb, with i photo since it goes hand in hand, and surfing the net.

 

I hear ya on that. The Mac vs Windows argument is largely hype from both sides. I just think Mac laptops are, in general, very good machines.

I do gaming on the Windows partition. On the OSX partition, I do my surfing and stuff, then my multitasking of various Adobe Suite programs, IRC, and iTunes. So far, I've had no issues (knock on wood ).

I think the only times my Windows machines have crashed has come as the result of gaming (bad drivers, unpatched game, trying to run anything from EA within it's first 6 months of release, etc... ). In general, I don't think the crashing topic has meant anything since the days of OS 9.x and Windows 95.

Thanks. I'll check it out. Sounds like a nice machine.

Perhaps I'm just coming from the wrong laptop background. I had this great big 17" Dell with a 256mb 7800Go in it, and that thing would absolutely roast (not to mention, blaze through the battery in 90ish minutes). I find that my new MBP runs cooler, weighs about half as much, has better gaming performance, and gets more than double the Dell's battery life.

 

As a recent switcher, I can tell you that the MacBook Pro is not overpriced.

If you look beyond the specs, you will see that the design and build of a MBP is top-notch. It's the little things that make it feel great -- the backlit keyboard, the nice keyboard, the smooth screen hinge, simple design...I could go on and on.

Yes, there are a few laptops that are better for the same money (spec-wise). The examples that come to mind are the Asus G1S, Dell Inspiron 1520, and Sager 2090. They're hideous machines that feel cheap and slapped together. Very little thought went into those machines.

The MBP feels like it is worth $2000. The G1S does not.

PC laptops have a long way to go.

 

Its too bad you have a closed mind and think research is 'only' defined by internet searches

 

yea especially g1s with ist super hideous bezel ,i cant be seen in public with that , and this thing mac being slow, if u are running carbonized soft than it might be slow ,but native soft mac runs super fast and the way os 10 handles memory is just awesome , so macbook pro is blistering fast thank to its os and components and i wanna say to all people out there who want to buy macbookpro and run windows on it dont do it , unless u wanna convert to os 10

 

Just one more thing...the Compal IFL90 weighs about 6.8lbs. with the 9-cell battery, which is more than a full pound heavier than the 5.6lbs. of the MBP. It's also thicker and bulkier, making it less suitable for moving around with.

 

MBP is actually 5.4 lbs.

And yes, boot time into OS X is like <60 seconds. Vista is like 2-2.5 minutes.

 

I boot up my MacBook into OS X in 29 seconds. Yes, I timed it .

 

No other notebook manufacturer offered a notebook that was 1" thin, 5.4lbs, with an LED screen, and is equipped with a 2.4ghz c2d and nvidia 8600. Sure other notebook manufacturers offer better specs for a cheaper price, but it is a ***** to lug around.

 

I use my MBP to control our ground station in tracking satellites. When I'm not there we're using Mac Minis. Those do well, but lag if somebody starts using them. I use MacDoppler Cocoa, iSpectrum, and Garage Band simultaneously to track and record data from the satellites(there's quite a bit of in-house software running also). Even doing all of this the MBP still breezes through it.

So, yes, I got what I paid for.

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=37199

Over 40% of NBR members think the new MacBook Pro is way overpriced.

 

I'm guessing most of those have never actually used one, especially not for an extended period of time.

For the components, yes it is slightly overpriced. When you factor in build quality, OS awesomeness, and a Customer Service experience that'll give you joygasms, then it becomes very cheap again.

Now factor in buying from apple.com, you get a free $100 printer, and $200 off an iPod, and if you're a student/teacher or a business buying in bulk then you get even more money taken off! That equates to a damn good deal!

 

When did companies stop giving out free MS Office with new computers? Free PowerPoint, Excel, Word and Access would be nice. Currently no company offers free MS office. Dell used to supply free MS Office Home edition, unfortunately they stopped. I would prefer free MS Office to an iPod or a printer.

 

I'd prefer free MS Office in most situations, but I'd rather they didn't bundle some outdated 2004 version in this case, since the 2008 version isn't out yet.

On PCs, if they include Office 2007, it'd be awesome but..no one does

I loved the iPod nano deal - was going to ebay it but decided I liked it enough to keep.

As for the printer...well....the selection of printers for that rebate is abysmal. I'd much rather they gave it for some decent laser printers or whatnot instead of the photo stuff they offered

That said, I got one for the heck of it to sell.

 

Actually OSX is based on UNIX and spotlight, one of the major features of Tiger came a year after Google Desktop.

 

OS X basically is a custom flavor of UNIX with a nice GUI in it.

 

Exactly I've bought one and I'm extremely happy with it. I'm sure there are a few other manufacturers offering similar spec laptops for less. It's equally true to say that there are several offering the same spec for more.

Apple just like Sony are trying to sell their laptops as premium consumer items. Actually when I looked at the price of the MBP it didn't seem too unreasonable.

I spend my time developing software for .net and java platforms mainly on 2003/Linux. The MBP is running all of these perfectly.

 

Right, I thought that the Linux was pronounced as "UNIX".. Blah, I'm confused.

 

hah, i thought every self-respecting mac geek knew what unix was?

anyway, i seriously considered buying the MBP twice, with it's awesome features and intuitive design, how could you lose? However, even with student discount, i couldn't justify the price.

My problems with the MBP:
1. The keyboard is nice and solid, but backlighting is kind of useless thanks to that new, bright led-lit screen, i can find the keys quite easily. The keyboard, especially on the 17" model seems extremely weird centered in the middle of a gigantic space like something is missing.

2. I have no use for OSX, i'd be running vista or xp on it full time, because, as already stated, everything works with both OSes. I want to keep using all my programs and not have to use new ones. Vista adds a lot of features that, for most users, take care of ilife. (granted garageband rocks though) Windows movie maker HD works fine for home users and dvd maker. WMP 11, imho is better than itunes. Iphoto is taken care of with the my pictures folder in the shell itself with thumbnail scaling, metadata, folders, retouching, and slideshows, i see no use for launching a seperate, cpu-using program.
All of that to say i'm $120 more in the hole for an OEM vista liscense on top of the price of the MBP.

3. The hard drive in a MBP is a pain to swap out if you ever wanna uprade, it involves taking apart the whole thing to add a 7200rpm drive.

4. "Viruses" and "Crashing"... not a problem on my computers, unless i did something stupid myself... don't surf porn, google with care, and don't open retarded email attachments.

5. get a second mouse button... please... stop being different!!!! The two-fingered thing is absolutely awesome, and i wish i had it, but i'd rather have a second button instead.

6. front row is cool, but it lacks PVR functionality, and as already noted, the remote doesn't exactly fit in the expresscard slot.

So here we go: I don't need OSX, and don't like it (personal preference, i've used it extensively), hardware has some quirks that are annoying, and finally i have to spend $120 more to run the OS i like. (well unless i run fedora, but that's a different story)

I love the MBP's design and features, and almost got one, especially when the added the new santa rosa line, with 8600m gts, i don't hate macs, but i don't think i'm in the market for one, too darn expensive for what you get! Me and my friend have been battling mac vs pc since about 5th grade, and have come to the conclusion that they both work... just not for everyone.

I wound up buying a hp dv9500t with 2 hard drive bays, a num pad, vista, santa rosa, 8600m graphics, and spent about 1k less than i would have with the MBP... so in my case, no it's not worth the price...
(though if anyone wants to lower the price, or give me one, that'd be rockin! it's a beast of a machine, and in a small package)

 

Well, I respect your answer and I would do the same if I had the same opinion and thoughts . Running Windows full-time on a Mac is frankly, useless. Better you run Windows on a PC than spend extra to get Windows later to run on the Mac. I can't stress this enough: if you plan to run Windows full-time, because you have no use for OS X or you just can't use it or you don't like it, don't get a Mac.

 

IMO no. $1000 in savings outweighs any benefits a Mac might have. I might be bias (I've never* had a good experience with a Mac, but than again I only use them at school and kids will find a way to f*** ANYTHING up...)... If you're worried about viruses use common sense. Don't download pirated crap or open attachments from people you dont know...

*Of course by never I dont mean never, I mean enough-that-its-made-me-avoid-Macs-like-the-plague

 

I just bought a MBP 2.4ghz for medical school. I will most likely use it primarily under windows. My logic is that I could not find a more portable, powerful, well built, good looking laptop anywhere else. I have no problems running it as a windows machine. I don't know why that is such a taboo around here. It is a great product, offers great performance and mobility, great looks and build quality. Why the operating system matters, I don't know.

 

I have a MBP and I am quite happy with it but if I paid full price I'd say it's overpriced. here are the most annoying things:

- Only 2 USB ports
- No Magnetic lid
- Wireless range SUCKS because of the metal case !!!
- doesn't feel very sturdy
- dvi / vga port only with adapter
- graphics isnt an issue to me


I paid $1599 for a refurbished MBP and I think that was good value but I'd never pay full price, thats so overpriced.

 

It's not a taboo per se, but since the topic of the thread is "Getting what you pay for with the MBP?" and there are already criticisms of how expensive the MBP is, it's not cost-effective for most people to buy a MBP solely for Windows use.

Disadvantages:

1. Cost. Although many people will pay for Vista to have as an extra OS anyway, if you decide not to use OSX at all, then the price that you paid for the software itself, as well as the right to use the only machine with that OS, is wasted. Price of OSX: $129. Price of being able to use OSX: whatever the premium that Apple charges as being the only company to make machines that can run it.

2. Space. Laptop HDD space is rather limited. OSX itself will take anywhere from 5-20GB of space, + extra space on the partition since you never want to fill one up 100%. This is a partition that you would never want to delete, but almost never use, since there may come a time when boot camp drivers update and you may need to access it again.

3. Compatibility. Although it's assumed that once Boot Camp is no longer in beta, there will be full driver compatibility, this is not the case now - especially for 64-bit Vista installations. Certain features, such as the ambient light sensors, do not work in Windows. Battery saving features also do not work.

4. Machine. You're running a Mac machine. The keyboard is designed for OSX, and certain vital keys are not where they would be on a PC - there are equivalents, but it's still a bit different.

5. Support. If you call Microsoft with any problem and they even so much hear that you're running this via Boot Camp, they'll simply toss the blame onto Apple and say you're running Vista on an unsupported system. Apple of course will also not provide support for Vista. Basically this means you're screwed from official support.

In the end, it basically means you're paying more, while wasting a portion of your investment, to use a product that's not as efficient at running what you want (Vista only).

This isn't a huge huge deal though, it's up to you how much you're willing to pay for what you get. Also, no one uses every function of their computer 100% anyway, so it's not a huge deal that there's software on your system that you never use.

Otherwise, it just feels a bit wasteful.

 

Very informative overview!

 

I voted yes. Although it looks all purdy and delicate, it's actually very durable. Everything functions perfectly no matter how much crap you download onto your hard drive, and it's great for audio applications.