Refurbished or what

I'm just about to start college in a month and Im obviously looking for a laptop. I play both piano and guitar and really want to record stuff this year. Ive been looking at macbooks for awhile and really like them, the problem is the price. I know they have student discounts, but the one I would get only would give me 50$ dollars off. They also give away a free Ipod nano (but iI already have an Ipod) and I believe my friend also got a printer when he bought his. I saw that one deal in here where if you pay 100$ it gives you a certain percentage of money off, but once again I would only save a couple of dollars. I guess my question is if I should go with a refurbished macbook? What are the pros and cons?

My other idea was to go to Best Buy (they sell macbooks online) and say "The Apple Store is willing to give me a nano and printer plus my student discount...so what will you do for me"

Thanks

 

Check with your university, My university has special pricing with some computer manufactures on certain configurations. I get the regular discount on everything, but then some models will be 30-40% off.

 

Yeah I just checked online, and my school is offering 2-12% discount on Dells, but I could'nt find anything for Apple. I can get better deals on this. So...yeah

 

You can always sell the free iPod and cash the money.

 

You'd probably have a hard time getting Best Buy to even match the student discount, much less give you the iPod deal.

Your best bet at this point is the Apple student pricing; the reason the discount is so small is just because the MacBook is already sort of low-priced (the discounts are more significant on the MBP...... $200-300 or so).

I think the other deal you're talking about is getting an Apple Student Developer (ADC Select) membership for $99. But this doesn't give you a significantly better discount on the MacBook (it does give you a better discount if you wanted to spring for a MBP).

However, with the free iPod deal, you actually can probably do better just getting the regular student price and selling the iPod if you don't want it.

 

With refurbished the 1099 goes to 949. It is a pretty good discount, but probably not enough for me to not get new. However, Apple's refurbs are very good. They test them heavily and many people only buy refurb from Apple and are very happy. So if money is that tight I would not feel bad about a refurb from Apple at all. Also, keep in mind that right out of the box you will get garage band which will be a great start for your recording. I have no idea how much a decent PC equivilant of that program costs, but it would probably be approaching $100. People forget software costs when pricing a Mac. Worst comes to Worst try to wait it out another month or so, or ask for a loan from your parents or something. Good luck either way!

 

I, never owned an Refurbed Apple product, but I'm sure that they meet the same requirements as new ones do before they go out.

Apple tries very hard to keep their customers happy.

 

Honesly, I would just nic the new one ad the free printer with the ipod - sell the ipod (and the printer if you want) online or at college or something for a small discount - just dont open them and list them as new... becasue, well they are. You'd end up getting 150 or 160 for the nano i bet alone. Up to you what to do w the printer - i just got it and its pretty decent.