Help me decide if a MBP 17 (2011) is right for me

Hello all,

This would be my first Mac purchase ever, so I was hoping that you could help me with a couple questions. I will be doing audio production, and programming using Dreamweaver and other Adobe stuff.

1. How is the keyboard? I know this may seem trivial in the grand scheme, but I am going to be typing on this thing for 5-8 hours a day, and a good keyboard is crucial.

2. How easy is it to run VMs? Can you do it in OSX or do you need to do it in Windows 7 via bootcamp?

3. I like the fact that they still offer a 1920x1200 screen. How good is their glossy screen? How about the matte screen?

4. Apple care is freakin expensive, but since I am unfamiliar with OSX and Macs in general, I don't know if I could troubleshoot it myself. Is it worth the 240 bucks?

5. Any chance Diablo 3 will run on this, even if it's in Windows?

If you could help me out with those questions, I would appreciate it. Any other words of wisdom are also welcome. Thanks in advance.

 

personalyl I love the keyboards built in... they are great. Some people hate them... so theres no way for us to know what is good for you.

you can run VMware Fusion, Parallels, or VirtualBox all on Mac OS X and use almost any OS in the VM you want...

this is personal preference too. I like how the glossy looks, color-wise, much better, but its MUCH more likely to get reflections depending on your lighting.

Applecare is more than just support, its upping your hardware warranty from 1 year to 3 years as well. You'll get decent support if you have an Apple Store nearby. If you have to do it all online with shipping in machines for hardware issues, its not quite as good, but still on average better support than most other computer companies.

I'm sure Diablo 3 will run just fine on this in Mac OS X and Windows.

 

Cool, thanks. Yeah, keyboard function is more important to me than most, since I will be using it sooo much. I would love to hear input from others too.

 

> 1. How is the keyboard? I know this may seem trivial in the grand
> scheme, but I am going to be typing on this thing for 5-8 hours a day,
> and a good keyboard is crucial.

My son has the 2010 MBP 15 and he spends a few hours on it and he hasn't
made any comments to me on the keyboard so I'm assuming that it isn't an
issue for me. I personally prefer a keyboard with articulated keys (I'm
a software engineer) and prefer the older-style keys that are rounded and
flush with each other. If you're going to spend that much time, perhaps
you'd be better off with an external keyboard and mouse. I carry around
an external Apple Keyboard and trackpad or mouse if I'm going to be doing
extended work on the MacBook Pro.

> 2. How easy is it to run VMs? Can you do it in OSX or do you need to
> do it in Windows 7 via bootcamp?

You can do it either way. Windows 7 is Windows 7 - no real issue
installing VMs.

I just installed Ubuntu on my 2008 MBP under Snow Leopard. No
problems. My system only has 4 GB but it seems to run fine. I'd get 8
GB if you're going to be running multiple VMs or if you're going to be
running Windows 7.

> 3. I like the fact that they still offer a 1920x1200 screen. How good
> is their glossy screen? How about the matte screen?

My son has the antiglare high-res on the 15 inch and it looks fine.

> 4. Apple care is freakin expensive, but since I am unfamiliar with
> OSX and Macs in general, I don't know if I could troubleshoot it
> myself. Is it worth the 240 bucks?

I have AppleCare on one system and that's only because of the nVidia
mess. Apple did take care of customers by extending the warranty. I
didn't buy it on three of my systems and only one had a hardware issue
that would have been taken care of by AppleCare. I guess that it's a
hard decision. In general, I don't buy insurance on electronics. If it
is going to be used in a rough environment (say, a college student is
going to be tossing it in a backpack quite a bit), then I'd say yes.

BTW, that 2008 MBP with a problem (DVD-drive) is now the family spare.
If someone needs work on theirs, then they can just use the spare while
theirs is in the repair shop.

 

I would say that the island style chicle keyboards are becoming more common these days. An Acer nettop I purchased came with a wireless keyboard that uses those styles of keys. Some manufacturers stick to broader keys that are flush (or concave), some go with the classic design, and others use this chicle island style.

The best thing you can do is go down to your local store (whether it be Best Buy or an Apple Store) and try the keyboard out. They will let you play with the machines at any store so you can try typing things out. It literally took me all of 2 seconds to get used to the island style chicle keys and I now prefer them.

I purchased a 13" Core i7 MacBook Pro a few days ago (it will be in tomorrow along with my Philips #00 screwdriver and 8GB of RAM) and I did not purchase AppleCare right away. I will eventually purchase it (later this year) but you have a full year from the purchase date to buy AppleCare. You don't have to buy it from Apple either so long as it is the correct AppleCare "package." There are third party sellers on eBay that offer it for a lot less and you can apply it to your MBP.