Calling all Mac users

Thinking of getting a Mac Book Pro 15" with the OS 10.5 Snow Leopard and letting the wife have both the desktop and the HP laptop that I currently use. Anyone out there using this. Have you run into any issues? What do you like or dislike about it?

I've been following Chris Pirillo and after hearing some of the things like the Synz my mac and the other behind the scenes features I'd really like to get a mac..

Any thoughts??

P.S. this is all come about because of the iPhone 3GS that both my wife currently has and I am getting. We are really kind of liking the Apple experience more than the PC.

Not looking for a PC suck or Mac blow kind of comments don't I repeat don't start some kind of a fanboy back and forth..

I actually just got one of the newest macbooks a week ago, not the pro unfortunately due to the few hundred extra dollars on the price tag. But totally worth it. I fell in love with my first macbook when I bought it a few years back, and this one is even better. Going with the mid-size pro would probably be a good idea as the 17" are insanely huge once you actually get your hands on them, which can be more of an inconvenience than a benefit.
I also noticed a definite improvement between snow leopard and leopard, so obviously having that on a brand new system would be great.
I'd recommend it even to someone that's never used a mac before. I actually hated macs with a passion prior to just up and buying the macbook when it first came out. Now I hate PCs even though that's what I'm stuck working on as an IT Specialist all day :D


And yes, do expect to get a few mac haters in here, they always come. But when you break it down there are just as many pros and cons on both sides for pc and mac so it always depends on the individual user.

Every body either loves or hates them I am an oddity the lab I manage has many macs (19 pros) I personally own an old I book and a mac pro tower. (the tower of power!) I work with a number of mac book pros I have not heard of a problem of the new ones the return of the firewire port is a boon. What were they thinking when they removed it??! The thing with apple is everything is done for you. It just works out of the box and if you just want it to work it does. The maintenance is super simple repair the permissions every once in a while and make sure the cron tasks are done periodically. There are GNU apps that do them for you or just leave it on and not sleeping over night. If you get into tinkering the system beats with a unix heart and command lines can change a ton of things if you want. If you don't it just works.

The PCs we have, I spend a lot of time messing with to keep them tuned and working all the time it is about ten hours to one 'fixing' pc to mac. The big question is it a tool? Macs are working tools they play games but the titles are limited and slow to be released. If you want a toy buy a PC. If you just want a communication tool, graphics tool, and something that just is friendly to work with get a mac.

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Originally Posted by kitedemon

Every body either loves or hates them I am an oddity the lab I manage has many macs (19 pros) I personally own an old I book and a mac pro tower. (the tower of power!) I work with a number of mac book pros I have not heard of a problem of the new ones the return of the firewire port is a boon. What were they thinking when they removed it??! The thing with apple is everything is done for you. It just works out of the box and if you just want it to work it does. The maintenance is super simple repair the permissions every once in a while and make sure the cron tasks are done periodically. There are GNU apps that do them for you or just leave it on and not sleeping over night. If you get into tinkering the system beats with a unix heart and command lines can change a ton of things if you want. If you don't it just works.

The PCs we have, I spend a lot of time messing with to keep them tuned and working all the time it is about ten hours to one 'fixing' pc to mac. The big question is it a tool? Macs are working tools they play games but the titles are limited and slow to be released. If you want a toy buy a PC. If you just want a communication tool, graphics tool, and something that just is friendly to work with get a mac.

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Totally agreed. But, also to note, now that they make it so easy to install windows using bootcamp on a mac, if you absolutely have to have that game or app that hasn't been released for mac yet, you can still use that sweet little piece of machinery to play it :) Surprisingly my little original macbook could play Unreal Tournament and Quake 3 just as good as any big rig gaming machine. Yes, I fit into just about every category of computer nerd :P

And also yes, I hate having to do the "clean-up" on pcs, and having to reboot every week or so simply to get it to speed up a little bit. I could leave my mac on for a month at a time with no changes in performance what so ever. My pc here at work on the other hand has to be rebooted at least weekly.

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Originally Posted by kitedemon

Every body either loves or hates them I am an oddity the lab I manage has many macs (19 pros) I personally own an old I book and a mac pro tower. (the tower of power!) I work with a number of mac book pros I have not heard of a problem of the new ones the return of the firewire port is a boon. What were they thinking when they removed it??! The thing with apple is everything is done for you. It just works out of the box and if you just want it to work it does. The maintenance is super simple repair the permissions every once in a while and make sure the cron tasks are done periodically. There are GNU apps that do them for you or just leave it on and not sleeping over night. If you get into tinkering the system beats with a unix heart and command lines can change a ton of things if you want. If you don't it just works.

The PCs we have, I spend a lot of time messing with to keep them tuned and working all the time it is about ten hours to one 'fixing' pc to mac. The big question is it a tool? Macs are working tools they play games but the titles are limited and slow to be released. If you want a toy buy a PC. If you just want a communication tool, graphics tool, and something that just is friendly to work with get a mac.

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Well my main reason for wanting to get this is for the ability to keep my website up to date, and have a good stable system for when I'm on the road. However this would mean that I would need to buy the Mac version of both Photoshop CS5 and Dreamweaver CS4. So it's going to be several months before I do this if at all..

Oh yes, when it comes to web design using that particular software I found that it was integrated much better with the mac than on the pc. I've used both for web and graphic design and got much better results and much higher ease of use on the mac side.

I have that exact mackbook pro... I LOVE it!

Justin

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Originally Posted by Freakie_frog

Well my main reason for wanting to get this is for the ability to keep my website up to date, and have a good stable system for when I'm on the road. However this would mean that I would need to buy the Mac version of both Photoshop CS5 and Dreamweaver CS4. So it's going to be several months before I do this if at all..

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You are aware that Adobe is dropping support for future products starting with CS5 for the Power-PC Macs, right? Make sure whatever you get is Intel based.

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Originally Posted by jfreels

You are aware that Adobe is dropping support for future products starting with CS5 for the Power-PC Macs, right? Make sure whatever you get is Intel based.

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I didn't know this..thanks for the tip

I have a 4 year old MacBook pro and it's worked quite well for me. I'm currently running windows 7 and snow leopard on it. I love how everything just works. You plug in a printer and it prints. None of that finding the drivers crap that windows does.

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Originally Posted by jfreels

You are aware that Adobe is dropping support for future products starting with CS5 for the Power-PC Macs, right? Make sure whatever you get is Intel based.

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Can you even buy those anymore? Mine is 4 years old and has the intel chip.

I would imagine since Adobe just announced this bit of information. I know nothing about Mac's though so you're asking the wrong person.

But being tight with Adobe, I know what they have going on.

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Originally Posted by AndrewGeibel

Can you even buy those anymore? Mine is 4 years old and has the intel chip.

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I believe they stopped using the power-pc platform after first introducing the intel chip in the macbook line. I'm pretty sure even the towers are intel based now.

The last power pc was the G5 of 2005 I think. I have one on my desk at work and it is still faster running photoshop than the new dell laptop work bought for me. Adobe dropping the power pc is no worse than not supporting 98. Not a problem. Aleria bootcamp runs windows well, but who would want to?

Sorry just couldn't help myself it was intended as a joke guys no offence!

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Originally Posted by kitedemon

Aleria bootcamp runs windows well, but who would want to?

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Haha, right there with you on that one.
I haven't had windows installed on one of my macs in almost 2 years now. It seems enough of the gaming companies actually have been realizing that macs are good gaming machines and are releasing them for mac just as fast as pc.

Well that's mainly due to the fact that the requirements for games changes so much. It would be hard to design a game for a Mac because it would potentially only run well on specific versions of Macs and may not work at all going forward. That's been the big issue anyway. I think it's pretty sweet that Mac users now have Steam.

Yeah, it seems now that Apple has started moving more into the mainstream rather than trying to be so "out there" and proprietary, it is becoming a lot easier for the software companies to port the software over with little to no work at all.

I have had a mac book for 3 yrs and I love it. It just works. No locking up or having to mess with things oh and no viruses.

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Originally Posted by Freakie_frog

I didn't know this..thanks for the tip

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This won't affect you at all... unless you are using a mac from several years ago...

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Originally Posted by jkobylka

This won't affect you at all... unless you are using a mac from several years ago...

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I'm only using a pc at this point.. I'd have to buy the mac additions of the programs, or they might be cross platform compatible

I believe most have to be purchased specifically for either pc or mac. But I have seen some packaged with an installer for both, though very rarely. They make more money forcing you to buy a different copy for each than including it for both.

Get the extended warranty. It's expensive, I know, but you really need it: Mac laptops are awesome sauce, but notoriously fragile. With the warranty you're covered for three years for almost anything except pouring your milkshake down the CDROM slot. And even then they might find a way to slide you by.

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Originally Posted by loonunit

Get the extended warranty. It's expensive, I know, but you really need it: Mac laptops are awesome sauce, but notoriously fragile. With the warranty you're covered for three years for almost anything except pouring your milkshake down the CDROM slot. And even then they might find a way to slide you by.

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I'm a huge believer in extended warranties as they have saved my bacon more times than I can count..By all rights I should have paid for three Blackberrys by now. But thanks to the extra 69.99 at checkout I didn't have to..

I have a Macbook Pro upgraded to Snow Leopard. Have had the same machine for 3 years now and have never had a problem.

You get what you pay for. I love it.

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Originally Posted by loonunit

Get the extended warranty. It's expensive, I know, but you really need it: Mac laptops are awesome sauce, but notoriously fragile. With the warranty you're covered for three years for almost anything except pouring your milkshake down the CDROM slot. And even then they might find a way to slide you by.

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For those that don't know about it yet, screw Apple's ridiculous warranty price. Go with squaretrade.com their prices warranty any and all brands of any type of electronics for amazing prices. They also include stuff like spill or accidental drops, which Apple's warranty won't. And flat out, if they can't fix it, they will refund you the original purchase price of the item.

I bought the 3 year extended warranty from squaretrade for my Apple timecapsule and am glad I did. I just wish I would have done the same with my first macbook.

One thing to remember with macs as well, there isn't nearly as much support for them as for windows pc's, its gotten a ton better over the years, but if you have to have it fixed you can't just take it apart and fix it yourself or take it to... *gags* Geeksquad..... You're pretty much stuck with your warranty, this may be different in bigger states but there is only 1 mac repair shop in all of the salt lake valley, once your warranty runs out make sure you've got someplace to take it to have it looked at if it craps out.

Don't be fooled by the people that say that you don't have to worry about virus's with macs either... Yes mac's are less prone to virus's because the mac OS doesn't share a common registry and the web browser isn't integrated (which is the biggest flaw with windows as far as malware/virus's go), but they are still out there :devilish:.

So ya got one with one of the new Intel processing chips? i5 I think?

Dude I'm jealous. :D

You'll be happy with your Mac. They do take some getting used to if you're an avid winders user, but in time you'll be glad you made the switch. :gj:

I don't really know to much about my mac it is the white 13'' laptop. But I do like it. The only thing that is a huge dissapointment is that numbers is not the same as excel in the fact that it doesn't have a data analysis pack. (that I can find anyway) so for my biostats I am going to have to purchase excel for my mac. :(

I would say if you can go with the 15'' the 13'' is a little small for a screen size but it is very portable. My mac is fast and I love the wireless access feature. This is only the 3rd computer I have ever owned the last one was a PC that I purchased in 2002 and I would upgrade the hardware every couple of years.

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Originally Posted by kellysballs

I am going to have to purchase excel for my mac. :(

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I think Open Office has Excel capabilities. gonna download it and try it out now and let ya know :)

OK Yeah it does have a spreadsheet editor that can be saved as an excel file...but I just re-read your post and realized you said something about a "data analysis pack" - what exactly is that? what are you trying to do?

I have a 13" MB Pro running Snow leopard (10.6) and its great! No problems, I get about 5 hrs of battery life with moderate use. The newer ones are supposed to get even longer battery use. No issues what so ever.

The casing is also REALLY sturdy. I had a thick textbook fall off a shelf onto mine (luckily it was closed) and it put a big dent in the casing, but the screen and everything else was unaffected. I wouldn't intentionally drop it, but I have confidence that the case is sturdy enough to offer a good amount of protection. This is good, especially since I bring mine everywhere and after the first month I started just tossing/dropping it into my back pack.

I also use mine extensively with Adobe CS4 and they all run great and really quickly. So using it for that sort of thing shouldn't be an issue.

Just get it. You won't be disappointed. Apple makes top notch laptops. They're pricey, but you get what you pay for.

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Originally Posted by David802

One thing to remember with macs as well, there isn't nearly as much support for them as for windows pc's, its gotten a ton better over the years, but if you have to have it fixed you can't just take it apart and fix it yourself or take it to... *gags* Geeksquad..... You're pretty much stuck with your warranty, this may be different in bigger states but there is only 1 mac repair shop in all of the salt lake valley, once your warranty runs out make sure you've got someplace to take it to have it looked at if it craps out.

Don't be fooled by the people that say that you don't have to worry about virus's with macs either... Yes mac's are less prone to virus's because the mac OS doesn't share a common registry and the web browser isn't integrated (which is the biggest flaw with windows as far as malware/virus's go), but they are still out there :devilish:.

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Although people may still say that, also a myth. I was just as easily, if not more easily, able to take apart my first macbook, which was actually the first notebook I had ever attempted to work on internally, and found it super easy. I replaced the entire keyboard area of mine with the black one since I got tired of the staining issues, and replaced the bluetooth wire since they were having issues with the way they routed the original. It was super easy. But obviously for those that aren't used to digging around in the internals of a computer, yes, you would have to try to find a speciality shop that actually has people "smart" enough to work on a mac.
I think they've just been so over-hyped that people don't really realize that they're just computers too, same exact things in both to make them run, Apple has just found a slightly more efficient way of doing both the hardware and the software side of it. But down to basics, they are the same.
Also, just throwing this out there, there ARE supposed to be viruses out there for mac, but 1. they actually seem to make the news of any tech website the day they show up. 2. they usually only end up on your system if you've been naughty and are downloading things that you're supposed to pay for. Considering the OP is talking right from the beginning about buying the software, I don't see him in danger on that front. And even for someone like me that downloads absolutely everything I can get my hands on because I'm poor, still no viruses :D

But in summary, yes, it is still best to get yourself a good extended warranty unless you are used to doing the hands on tearing into computer work yourself because it can be more difficult to find a repair shop that can do it, and when you do they charge more than the :rage: thing is worth in the first place just to get it running again.

I just ran across this post. I'm crippled and my pc was running really slow. So I decided to get back into macs after leaving them back in 96.I now have a 27" imac quadro and I'm loving it. No more temp internet dumping, cookie dumping. Steve has come a long was since 96.And get this. If you never run windows on a mac you never have to buy a anti virus thats money saved. So yes buy the mac.

Macs are pretty much easy to take apart and fix. I remember taking apart a LC II I believe that was the brand. I'm kind of dating myself lol. I thought it would be hard. That was easy this stuff gets smaller and easier. Why do you think there are so many computer geeks out there getting paid. For something you could have fixed by yourself. Just my 2 cents:)

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Originally Posted by Aleria

Although people may still say that, also a myth. I was just as easily, if not more easily, able to take apart my first macbook, which was actually the first notebook I had ever attempted to work on internally, and found it super easy. I replaced the entire keyboard area of mine with the black one since I got tired of the staining issues, and replaced the bluetooth wire since they were having issues with the way they routed the original. It was super easy. But obviously for those that aren't used to digging around in the internals of a computer, yes, you would have to try to find a speciality shop that actually has people "smart" enough to work on a mac.
I think they've just been so over-hyped that people don't really realize that they're just computers too, same exact things in both to make them run, Apple has just found a slightly more efficient way of doing both the hardware and the software side of it. But down to basics, they are the same.
Also, just throwing this out there, there ARE supposed to be viruses out there for mac, but 1. they actually seem to make the news of any tech website the day they show up. 2. they usually only end up on your system if you've been naughty and are downloading things that you're supposed to pay for. Considering the OP is talking right from the beginning about buying the software, I don't see him in danger on that front. And even for someone like me that downloads absolutely everything I can get my hands on because I'm poor, still no viruses :D

But in summary, yes, it is still best to get yourself a good extended warranty unless you are used to doing the hands on tearing into computer work yourself because it can be more difficult to find a repair shop that can do it, and when you do they charge more than the :rage: thing is worth in the first place just to get it running again.

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Had one since September for school and now I cannot live without it. I recommend them to everyone. I have had no trouble. Long battery life. Quick start up. Super user friendly. Etc etc etc.
Hopefully I will also be joining the iPhone club this summer.

I went to a Macbook 1.5 years ago after using PC's for 15 or so years. WOW.
Macs just work. I will never switch back to a PC.

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Originally Posted by David802

One thing to remember with macs as well, there isn't nearly as much support for them as for windows pc's, its gotten a ton better over the years, but if you have to have it fixed you can't just take it apart and fix it yourself or take it to... *gags* Geeksquad..... You're pretty much stuck with your warranty, this may be different in bigger states but there is only 1 mac repair shop in all of the salt lake valley, once your warranty runs out make sure you've got someplace to take it to have it looked at if it craps out.

Don't be fooled by the people that say that you don't have to worry about virus's with macs either... Yes mac's are less prone to virus's because the mac OS doesn't share a common registry and the web browser isn't integrated (which is the biggest flaw with windows as far as malware/virus's go), but they are still out there :devilish:.

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Why not? I've replaced a few parts on my MacBook Pro by myself. You can find parts not only cheaper than they would be through apple but also step by step guides with pictures on how to replace anything in the whole computer.