Submitted by Tom’s Hardware reviews Apple’s MacBook. “The MacBook offers an excellent design for the money. The unibody construction is second to none, and Apple has done its homework with component selection, choosing best-of-breed technologies such as the Nvidia GeForce 9400M. While the lack of FireWire is disappointing for those who already own external HDDs with IEEE-1394 connections, or own low-latency FireWire external audio boxes for multitrack audio recording, we would rather have seen eSATA as the option for high-speed external storage. Nonetheless, the MacBook offers a robust notebook in Apple’s entry-level product category.”
It’s not hard to tell from the comments section, who the main audience of Tom’s Hardware is.
Was he reviewing the Mac or going on a voyage of self-discovery?
Dull, excessively wordy and “God, who really cares what he thinks?”
I’m probably biased by some of the good points made in the comments section. But what I found was that this article was more useful as a spec list than anything else, and the initial story about the worm didn’t seem like much of a reason to switch to the Mac, all by itself. The worm may be a reason to switch to Linux, reusing the same hardware, but not, per se, a reason to buy all new hardware. I make a habit of reusing as much of my old hardware as I can, until I have a good reason to upgrade, like if I need to some heavy computing; and in that case, I donate my hold hardware to come local club or whatever.
Now, that all being said, I use a MacBook Pro, and I bought a MacBook for my wife. When searching for a new notebook, I quickly ruled out running Linux because I didn’t want the hassle of trying to get wireless to work. (I use Linux on my file/compute server at home.) Today, you can get Ubuntu to figure out most wireless devices, but at the time I got my MBP, I just didn’t have the patience. Also, AT THE TIME, I did a price/performance comparison between the MBP and other PC notebooks, and I found that the MBP offered more for the price. It took about 4 months after that before PC notebooks caught up in performance at a lower price.
At the time I got my wife’s MacBook, Vista was a total disaster. Actually, it still is. So I was willing to pay the extra money to avoid having to use Vista and yet still get things like wireless networking to work without tearing my hair out. It’s one thing to do the sysadmin on my own computer, but she’s so possessive of her computer that I have to beg her to let me do a Time Machine backup. I needed something that she could use and abuse, where I wouldn’t have to worry about it breaking on her or locking up or anything like that. Compared to the Vista computer at work and her old XP machine, her using the MacBook makes my life easier because I don’t have to worry about keeping spyware and antivirus databases up to date (they never seem to be as automatic as you’d like), and licenses up to date, etc. And of course, there’s the gradual slowdown that seems to plague Windows, although that may not be true for Vista. Even now, though, she does occasionally complain about how the Mac UI does something she considers unintuitive compared to Windows, and since she studied usability formally in grad school, I can’t chalk that up to simple lack of familiarity.
In terms of usability and software libraries, I don’t see much difference between Windows and the Mac. I like the LOOK of the Mac UI more, but I can’t recommend that as a reason to pay hundreds of dollars more. There are also a lot of subtleties about the Mac UI that provide affordances that make the experience more pleasant, but those alone are still probably not worth the money. There’s a BIG difference between MacOS and WinXP in terms of system adminstration. As for Vista, I mostly just use the Apps I have to run and avoid doing anything else. All I notice is that many UI actions on Vista seem to have a 1-second latency, although not everything, and it’s consistent as to what does and what doesn’t. I’m told that this is caused by the Aero interface, and if I turn that off, all the slowness will go away. Interestingly, MacOS X does the same sort of compositing window management and yet doesn’t have this kind of latency. I’m more inclined to think that I just have something configured wrong, but the benchmarks come back fast, so I don’t know.
They say that Apple chooses higher quality hardware than other manufacturers. I have friends with PC notebooks who have had nothing but trouble, and I have friends who have had no trouble at all. It depends on the make and luck. Both my wife and I have had some trouble with our Mac notebooks. For her, it was the battery and then the power adaptor. For me, I had problems with overheating that ruined the memories, my wireless interface went bad, and I’ve had to have my battery replaced twice. In all cases, AppleCare was attentive and swift in resolving the issue. When you have to ship your Mac back to Apple for repairs, the empty box arrives over night, you pack it up and ship that day, it arrives at apple the next day, they fix it and ship it that same day, and it arrives at your place the day after. So you’re without your computer for roughly 48 hours. That’s quite amazing compared to my experience with other vendors. Of course, they cover their asses and tell you it can have a 10-day turn-around, but that’s not my experience.
My general preferences for myself are this: For desktops, I prefer to use Ubuntu when I can, but I’ll use Windows when I have to if there’s some app requirement. The hardware’s just so much cheaper, and if you’re building it yourself, you can be sure to choose the best hardware with the best reviews on Newegg. But when it comes to notebooks, I have a preference for Apple.
My suggestions to others depend on their needs and level of expertise. If they’re savvy, I don’t have to give them any advice. If they’re not, I tell them to get a Mac. There’s no mucking around with added software to make the system resistant to viruses (yet), the hardware tends to be highly robust, the OS is lean and robust, and AppleCare is excellent. So when some friend of mine buys a Mac, I am not called upon regularly to help them figure stuff out or deal with something not working right. I get more calls about Linux than I do about a Mac. In the event that something does go wrong with the Mac, I’ll happily go visit them and call up AppleCare on their phone with them. With Windows, if you built the system yourself, there’s no one to call, and if you bought from a vendor, the wait times on the phone are long, and you have to wade through two levels of idiots before you can get help with your problems, not counting the long hold times. With Linux, there’s simply no one to call, the turn-around time when posting to community forums is often too long, and quite often, you’re SOL because there’s just no support for some piece of hardware (e.g. various combo printer/scanners, wireless cards, Verison’s cellular broadband). With a Mac, first-level AppleCare can usually solve the problem, they don’t try to make you feel stupid, they never argue with you, they’re quick to escalate a problem to the next level, and the response time is fast. Since no computer is entirely without problems, I think this is worth the extra money.
Apple is easy to nit-pick, and it’s not always the optimal choice. But in terms of over-all user experience, I find them to have at least marginal superiority in enough different areas to add up to something significant. My friends who have the patience to learn the ins and outs of Linux and Windows can do what they like. I’d rather let the computer manage itself so I can focus my attention on designing graphics chips.
Nice post.
I’ve decided to buy my first Apple. That’s a done deal. I just have to decide which one.
Don’t feel tempted to get the highest-end model. One starts out with this sense of uncertainty as to whether or not the extras will become necessary, and if they do, then you’ll be stuck with something inadequate. The truth is that unless you can find specific needs that you already have that force a choice, then you’re borrowing trouble. Macs are already expensive enough; you don’t need to spend even more on features you won’t use.
I’m a grad student studying AI, and yet the base level MacBook, even the older white MacBook, would be more than adequate for 90% of my needs, especially now that I’ve built a quad-core Linux machine to offload all my heavy computation. One reason I bought the MBP in the first place was that I knew I WOULD be using it for heavy compute (see footnote), but to tell you the truth, I also somewhat fell victim to my own desire to have the cooler computer.
In terms of processor speed, the low-end MacBook is excellent. The memory can be upgraded (I use Firefox because its memory footprint is smaller than Safari). The hard drive is plenty large (use an external USB drive for less frequently used files). The graphics speed is fine even for some demanding games.
The biggest advantages of the MacBook Pro are screen real-estate, screen viewing angle, and LCD switching time. Mostly the display. And the display does make a difference. When using my wife’s MacBook, it feels cramped to me, but she’s used to it, and I’m not, and she makes the dock auto-hide (which helps), and I don’t. If you’re over 50, you might want to get the 17-inch model, because it has even MORE screen space, so you can make your fonts larger and easier on your eyes.
I suggest that you go find some web site that represents the kind of information-all-on-one-screen that you would normally use. A really big Google spreadsheet maybe, and one of those sites like eTrade with a whole bunch of tickers on it or something. Then go to an Apple store, Best Buy, MicroCenter, Fry’s, or whatever has an Apple section, and try that site on a low-end MacBook. If you find that you can make that work for you, then stick with it.
The low-end MacBook is really quite an excellent machine. Apple didn’t use inferior stuff. They just used LESS stuff. You won’t get a more reliable machine or amazingly enhanced experience just by spending more money.
(Footnote: I don’t know about the latest MacBook Pros, but the one I have doesn’t have adequate cooling. I was running SSE-heavy code on both processors, and found that the CPU was getting up to 90 degrees C. While people on Apple forums said this was safe, the effect was that my memory DIMMs were damaged, and the system had stability issues until I figured that out and had them replaced. If you are going to run compute-heavy code for days at a time, first, get yourself a small electric fan for external cooling, and get the smcFanControl utility and set the minimum speed to the maximum. I wish I’d known about that before I went through the hassle.)
Here’s some of the criteria I’m considering.
Performance is the least of my concerns. I played around with the older white book in the Apple store a couple of days ago. It was really plenty fast enough for me. Apple just bumped the specs on their white book, too. It’s not even out in the Apple store yet. I was playing with the older model and it was plenty fast enough.
I’m not paying attention to disk space and ram. I can upgrade my own HD and RAM.
In terms of hardware, my main criteria is screen size. I have an aging Dell Latitude, running Ubuntu. It has a 15.4″ screen. After using it for about 5 years, I’m not sure that I could adapt to the 13″ model. However, when I’m playing around with the 13″, it seems fine. I go back and forth on that.
A feature that the newer pros have that the older ones didn’t is the touch pad with gestures. It’s pretty good, but I think I like having a separate button. I can still use in much the same way as I can a common touchpad. In the long run, I think I would be just as happy (or happier) with the old style. This is a take it or leave it feature for me.
An illuminated keyboard is something offered on some of the pros, but not all of them. If I get a pro, that will be something I will want. It’s not a huge factor for me. I think the lowest price MBP with this feature is $1599.
I guess the biggest concerns for me are battery life and screen size. I’ve considered the new 17″ model. Damn, it’s expensive. It sports 8 hrs of battery life. And, the entire life of the battery is supposed to be much better. I doubt I’ll bite the bullet and get this one.
As for heat…. I felt the bottom of the laptops in the Apple store. None of them were anywhere close to the Dell I use. So, I’m not concerned about heat.
Finally, if it runs OSX, I think I’ll be satisfied. I’m buying an Apple, pretty much for the luxury of using the OS and the applications. I kept telling the guys in the Apple store how cool it was to have bash, vim, ssh and screen installed by default. They were all gui guys and didn’t appreciate it. They just thought I was weird. I tried to explain to them that screen was like “spaces”. They kinda understood that. I love Linux. But, I’m getting tired of having to fix the same things over and over (blame Ubuntu). I’m hoping OSX will be Linux with a better user experience.
I’m also looking forward to developing on OSX. I think that might be fun.
My MacBook Pro had the heat problems. My wife’s MacBook doesn’t seem to suffer the same trouble, except that if you use it on a soft surface that blocks the airflow, it will become unstable. As long as that is clear, it’s just fine. Also, the temperature on the surface of the plastic notebook is more than tolerable, even when doing heavy computation. My aluminum MBP will get too hot, so I’ll run the can control tool and bump up the fan speed, and then it’s fine.
Screen real estate is so personal I really can’t advise. You have to figure out what makes you comfortable.
I thought the new touchpad was weird, but I went and played with it, and it seemed very natural. The whole pad depresses like a button. I think it’s clever because it builds in the button and leaves more area for gestures.
I like OSX for the UNIX features too. Most stuff is there, and I use fink to install anything missing. There are still a few quirks that make me miss things from Linux. For instance, the gcc profiler doesn’t work. But otherwise, I think it’s great to have a UNIX shell easily at hand.
My primary computer right now is an Intel Core Duo 2ghz Macbook I bought 2 and 1/2 years ago. It has gotten the job done pretty well except that I needed to upgrade to 2gigs of ram since I run an XP virtual machine for 1 windows only program (eviews). In my experience OSX 10.4 is more stable than XP SP3 which I use for gaming. However, even if the Mac OS itself rarely crashes itself, I seem to have just as many programs crash on OSX as XP (OpenOffice3 all the time), it just doesn’t take the entire OS or neccesitate something akin to quting and restarting explorer through task manager.
Now for a few things I don’t like. I don’t feel like I have as much control over my computer as with XP unless I go into terminal. For example while with the drop and drag method of install you can install a program in any folder you want, sometimes down the road it expects it to be somewhere where it isn’t. With the package install approach you really don’t have any control where anything goes. I like to keep my programs orgainze by type, so I can easily find things. Not every things is going to be able to fit on the dock with it set to tiny and zoom, and I rather not have to set up an alias for every program and organize all of those.
Specific to the Macbook, I HATE the plastic body. Mine has develeped cracks from where I have rested my hands. The white body always looks dirty no matter how much you clean it.
In 2 1/2 years when I get a new primary computer for work, it most likely will not be a Mac as long as Windows 7 developes as nice as it has been, though this is not to say that I would never get another Mac. It is just that they have not blown me away from my agnostic state towards OS in general, Linux, Windows etc.
Intersting. Lack of ability to configure is one of the things I hate about Windows. I may be spoiled with Linux. Maybe I shouldn’t expect more from OSX. I did find that there was no way (without going 3rd party) to keep one window on top in OSX. That concerned me some. I don’t expect OSX to be as configurable as Linux. But, I do expect OSX to make it easier for me to do what I want.
The white body might bother me, too. But, the ones in the store looked OK. With so many people playing with them, I would have though they would have been more dirty.
Windows gets in my way. Linux gets out of my way, but I pay the price in other ways. I’m hoping that OSX will not get in my way like Windows does, but offer my Linux favorites.
The glossy screen is a non-starter.