Wanting a macbook pro for college..

need help figuring out which one would be right for me.Ok, am going college to major communications, so i can work in mainstream film. So I need notebook for my school work, pics, music,and movies. I was thinking of macbook pro would be best for that. Heres the Faq's:


General Questions

1) What is your budget?$2400

2) What size notebook would you prefer?


c. Mainstream; 15" - 16" screen

3) Please select your country's flag as a post icon and tell us what country are you buying this in. america

4) Are there any brands that you prefer or any you really don't like? apple

5) What tasks will you be performing with the notebook?school work, net surfing, games, movies, pics, and music.

6) Will you be taking the notebook with you to different places or leaving it on your desk?yes to school , home, or pretty much were i please

7) Will you be playing games on it; if so, which games?yes, old C&C and new C&C 3, starcaft 2(when it comes out) thats it. I dont play anyother games then that.

8) How many hours of battery life do you need?3+

9) Do you mind buying online without seeing the notebook in person?idm

10) What OS do you prefer? Windows (XP or Vista), Mac OS, Linux, etc.well am use to windows but i can convert to the mac os

Screen Specifics

11) Would you prefer standard or widescreen? wide lol

12) From the choices below, what screen resolutions would you prefer?


Widescreen
d. WXGA or WXGA+ - 1280x768/800 or 1440x900; Wider viewing version of XGA, good for movie viewing or spreadsheets.
e. WSXGA+ - 1680x1050; Wider viewing version of SXGA, good for movie viewing or spreadsheets.
f. WUXGA - 1920x1200; Wider viewing version of UXGA, good for movie viewing or spreadsheets.

13) Do you want a glossy/reflective screen or a matte/non-glossy screen? glossy

Build Quality and Design

14) Are the notebook's looks and stylishness important to you?yea

15) When are you buying this laptop and how long do you want this laptop to last?at least 4 years

Notebook Components

16) How much hard drive space do you want; 40GB to 200GB? 160gb to 200gb

17) Do you need an optical drive? If yes, a DVD-ROM, DVD-CD/RW or DVD-RW drive?
DVD-CD/RW


please help me out.

thnks in advance

 

Hmm. based on your interests and priorities I'd say the MacBook Pro is great for you. You have the budget for it, and the games you listed, two are available for Mac (well, Blizzard simultaneously releases its games, so there will be a Mac version of Starcraft 2) and Command and Conquer 3 is (or will be, I'm not sure if its out yet) available for Mac. If you'd rather, you can also run the games through Boot Camp, which lets you run Windows on your Mac like you would on a PC.

 

if your budget is 2400, then buy the high end 15" macbook pro - $2299 with a student discount - make sure you take advantage of the free printer and free ipod offers (unfortunately these two items are "free" on a rebate... still nice though.)

hmm. the old command and conquer games are pc only i think? if they are, you will need to use either boot camp or parallels to play them.

the new command and conquer 3 is going to be available for the mac soon. starcraft 2 is also going to be released for the mac (if history is any indication of the future).

you could almost get away with not dealing with boot camp with the games you want to play. but boot camp does work perfectly if it comes to that, its just a little bit of a hassle dealing with 2 operating systems.

 

ok, i did do student discount in all, but the tax on it goes over my budget Also does microsoft office come with it? Then there the i work , aperture, etc. and apple protection. I do u think i should get the apple protection? Another thing are any of the preintsallied software worth getting?

 

Do you need iWork and Aperture? If not, don't get them. AppleCare is worth getting. Microsoft Office does not come with it, well, a 30-day trial comes with it. But I'd suggest you use a free office alternative, NeoOffice, either permanently or until the next version of Microsoft Office arrives, which will be later this year. That's Microsoft Office for Mac 2008 by the way (ignore the 2008 part).

 

Well i do take alot of pictures and edit them alot and iwork i thought it would be good for doing school work on

 

I think Microsoft Office would be better for school work than iWork. iWork is great, but its more towards the creative professional side of things. I think iPhoto is good enough; you won't really need Aperture unless you manage thousands of photos and photo editing can be done in Photoshop or GIMP or even through iPhoto, although the tools in iPhoto are limited.

 

thnks for the help

 

ok i know this kinda stupid q, but y is tax so high? I mean it comes to $2800. Ok, since that is above my budget am to go with 15inch 2.2ghz instead of 2.4. Also whats dif between the 128 bit and 256 bit? I mean can it still play C&C 3? Last thing 4mb over doing it or 2mb fine?

 

4MB of RAM isn't over doing. Apple charging out $675 to upgrade to 4MB of RAM is over doing it If you really want 4GB just do it yourself.

 

If you want to save money definitely buy your own RAM and install it. It's very easy to do. If you want to save on tax you can purchase from Macmall, Amazon, etc.

 

Is mac mall safe to order from? has anyone had any experience with it?

 

I love Mac mall. Their service is great and fast shipping.

 

ok, how would u transfer my pics from my pc to the mbp?

 

Don't mean to hijack this thread, but does MacMall offer a student discount?

 

Very simple. You can connect them wirelessly, but even simpler you can just drag all your photos into a flash drive and plug the flash drive in. Open up iPhoto and just drag in photos. Do not mess around with the iPhoto folder in the Pictures section of the Finder. Just do everything from the iPhoto application.

 

if you want to write to the flash drive from the mac, make sure it is formatted as FAT32, not NTFS.