So I’m headed off to university in the fall, my dad says he’ll buy me a laptop if I give him my desktop, which is fine with me. I’m considering getting a mac laptop since I will be only doing basic things, no games, and the stability of apple’s OS would be a great bonus (ie not losing my work). My budget is maximum $1500. I know little about macs as I’ve been a PC user since birth except for those old macs at school. Which mac would be ideal for me? Also:
-Will mac’s wireless internet work with PC wireless routers, etc? or will I have to buy that aiport extreme or whatever
-Looking at the ibooks, they come with 256mb of ram, which seems like not enough, and like 97 bucks to upgrade to 512mb ouch!, with OS X Tiger or whatever, is 256mb enough? I would like having at least 512mb though.
Any suggestions/comments will be greatly appreciated.
If you’re going off to university, but your iBook there, it will be cheaper.
The wireless will work with any of the wireless standards (802.11b or g). Again, wait until you get there, because there’s probably already wireless there.
Buy RAM from a third party (canadaram.com) – much cheaper.
Get the 12" – more portable, better screen. Yes, they charge you more for the crappier screen (14" is the same resolution as the 12", so it’s technically a shittier screen, blurrier, etc)
I’ve had an iBook for 3 years, and I’m using it right now. Best computer I’ve ever had.
E-mail me if you get one, and I can get you some software…
Mark, did you check to find the list of programs you’ll be using in the engineering dept? I’ve love to buy an iBook for next year because it’ll be much better for digital photo / video, but next year is Business Admin and the school will likely require us to use Windows Based programs.
VMWARE worked great for me last year for my windows apps that my program required. Memory intensive stuff is kinda slow. I dont know if there is something else for mac (I use linux).
I agree with Mig on the 12" ibook although Mig uses a 12" PB as i have heard. I have had both ibooks and powerbooks 15" and 17". i loved them both. They both have pro’s and con’s… The new 12" ibooks with the slot loading cd rom’s are good but the drives art the best of thing’s. If you do go for a ibook get it stock from apple and don’t buy ram from them they are over priced get it from (canadaram.com) like Mig said. Tiger ROCK’s i played with it on a mac mini and a G5 its a nice os for sure… Also if you can get a nice little external drive to store you precious files onto do a back up once in a while i do min every friday night.
I have a 12" iBook – mine. My work computer (belongs to my employer) is a 12" powerbook. It never moves, though, it drives an external monitor and stuff, so it’s basically my desk computer.
I also have a dual-display dual-G5 at home, but it only gets used when I want to play WoW and surf the web at the same time
Im woundering were is the best place to buy a apple, mac, Ibook, mac mini… MiG I guess your the man to talk too! I too like the new look on the Tiger OS, and would like to try one of these, thanks
MiG, what about the Compusmart store in Terrace? They were really good when I purchased an iPod Shuffle. I was thinking of buying my iBook from them too.
