I've just gone back to study and am in the market for a new laptop. I've surprised myself and am actually considering switching to the dark side by purchasing a 15" Macbook Pro. This is largely to do with my positive experience with my jailbroken iphone that has been the single sexiest piece of equipment i've yet owned.

It’s either a Dell XPS for $1500 or Mac for $2500.

Is the sexiness really worth an extra grand?

Basically all I will be using the laptop for is word, excel and watching porn.

if your only going to be using word and watching porn you only need a netbook or even just a piece of paper, a pen and some vaseline.

First of all, haha @ kappa's sig

Second of all, you need to consider what else you can do with the ~$1000 you'll save by buying a Dell. You could buy an ipad with the leftover cash.

Get a mac. Especially if you are a buffoon. I love my mac.

Get a ipad for at uni, get a desktop for at home. same total price.

When I see people with Ipads i want to throw a brick at them.

The base model 15" MBP is $1999 with an education discount. +117 for higher res screen, or +180 for hi res + anti glare, but even the default res is better than the Dell so I don't think you'd need either. The Mac has a better CPU (i7 vs i5), but worse graphics if you want to game.

Both laptops are probably overkill for your needs. Macbooks do look and feel great, they age well if you want it to last, won't really look dated in a few years time and hold they're value very well compared to windows laptops, so you can chuck it on ebay next upgrade and get a good price for it still. I'm confident that if you spent the extra on the mac you wouldn't feel ripped off anyway. They're a top machine and you defiantly get the feeling you got what you paid for.

Basically all I will be using the laptop for is word, excel and watching porn.

If thats honestly all your using it for, just get a cheap dell.

nah

Rev, you have something on your mind you want to share bud? lol

I have never had sex with a prostitute. Not because I'm above it - just because I really haven't felt the need to. I know if I did have sex with a prostitute I sure as shit would not go down on one.

If PC's do your head in then buy a Mac.

Personally I love the technical and open-hardware aspect of PC's, so I have never bought a Mac.

Get the Dell and $1000 worth of beer.

Seriously, that's a fucken lot of beer.

Do what this man says.

get the dell, chuck the $1000 in the bank, use it to buy a new laptop in 3 years,

Or get the mac, sell it in three years and actually get something for it?

15" MBP $1999 with education discount - Lighter, thiner, higher res screen, better battery life, better build quality (aluminium unibody etc etc)...

Or get the mac, sell it in three years and actually get something for it?

I honestly dont think the resale value is better than the money saved

if you spend 2500 on some, and can sell it in 3 years for 800, you have a laptop or 800 bucks

or spend 1500 on a dell, in 3 years you'll have a laptop, and 1000 plus whatever interest, or a wall of empty glass bottles from the beer, anyway after three years, you can have a laptop + money/beer, or buy an apple and have no beer, or only 800 worth of beer and no laptop

resale is hardly going to be anywhere near the money saved

A mac is a nice idea.
But you will probably end up wanting to run a program that is windows only and so you will probably want to buy fusion/paralleles... and a copy of windows.
So on top of the "MAC" tax you pay a MS tax.

imo get a desktop and an ipad... and probably some piss

I bought the 13" Macbook Pro a few months ago and I'm very happy with it but still don't really understand the Mac OS. I haven't put effort into learning all the shortcuts and how to do things though. That said, I love the build quality of it - the keypads, touchpad, everything is just solid and perfect.

I bought it on education discount and got a free ipod touch which i sold so it was a good deal for me. I also installed an SSD - never tried it without the SSD but it's pretty damn quick now - 17sec bootup. If you can spare the coin you cant really go wrong with a MPB but I would never buy a laptop over 13".

so i just went thru and spec a dell 15" xps in silver

win 7 ultimate
2nd gen i7 (2.3ghz, or TB 3.4)
HD led screen
backlit keyboard (because it a nice touch)
8gig ram, 1333MHz,
normal 750gig hd
Blu ray burner
2gb geforce 540m
5.1 audio
9 cell battery (for that extra life)
tv tuner (it was like 40bucks extra)

$2561.48, not to bad for around the same price as the mac (but this option give you no spare beer money)

yes the mac is good, the girl ended up with a mac air (which meant i ended up with an SSD, so i was happy) and she is happy with it, but wasn't happy about the dosh spent, (she is suffering a little buyer remorse but mostly down to the price factor)

i look at it this way, if this was a car, it is like asking should i spent $X on a c class merc or $Y on a falcon, well, you could spend $X on a G6E turbo, which has lots of good points over the merc,

the merc has a better build, but are you going to really use it more than 5 years, if not, the ford will do

you could get the falcon and spend the rest on beer (and in if this was the real case, the difference between the dollar values would keep you drunk so long if will be time to get a new car by the time you sober up)

both do the same job at the end of the day, are you going to be using it more than 4 hours a day?, if so get the up spec'ed dell or the apple, if not save your pennies and get drunk

oh and much like the merc/apple ford/dell, you'll get to see want options/features are on their way

like the very old saying goes, wanna see what windows is going to look like, buy a mac,

and as teq/rockitman have kinda hinted, there is a learning curve, but it should take long to get into,

i would still save the money unless your going to be using it alot, both play porn pretty good

Get a ipad for at uni, get a desktop for at home. same total price.

there's sense in this.

Tho copius' argument is sound also.

I like the look of the 11" Macs atm, I think that'll be my next lappy.

if I were going to uni today (and the uni supported iPads like the ACT uni's do) you'd be mad not to consider one...

Yeah this probably sounds stupid but for my uses I can't really ever seeing having to upgrade this macbook pro in the foreseeable future. I just use net and office on it, nothing too intensive, and with the SSD everything is instant. Haven't even looked into the specs to see if you can even game on it...

I play portal2 on mine, under OSX
i dual boot to windows but i rarely bother unless I need to run some obscure app that only runs under winblows

I just use vmware fusion for that, used to dual boot but windows is a battery whore.

If you don't need the high resolution of the 15" display or the graphics card just go the 13" MacBook Pro. You'll have a portable, kick-arse and refined laptop with awesome build-quality and still have 1.2k leftover! That's just $200 shy from a 21.5" iMac or a gaming desktop PC!

RockitMan, when you're in Finder (Mac OS X's Explorer) and there's a file you want to preview without opening the associated program just hit the space bar, then hit it again to escape. Also, make sure you use the four finger gestures on the trackpad. Swipe up with four fingers pushes all windows aside to reveal the desktop; swipe down goes in to expose to show all windows.

three fingers left & right will go forward/back with your browser

I always enable 3 finger dragging personally. And tap to click is must.

Macbook Pros are right at the end of the product cycle so if you want a really fast mac with little or no issues, this is the one to get.

Not really, its only been 85 days since update:

Recommendation
Neutral - Mid-product cycle
Last Release
February 24, 2011
Days Since Update
85 (Avg = 201)

http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#MacBook_Pro

why not just use one finger dragging?
it's right under tap to click

I used it for a while but found it activating accidentally a lot.

Four fingers down is also a winner.

I should try that tap to click option as the only thing that doesn't work so well for is dragging stuff.... but other than that the trackpad is awesome.......

Spook you still on the hate wagon hey

Just buy the 15" some ram and swap out the optical drive for an ssd and bracket from owc

My next computer that isn't for work will run linux. My next phone which isn't for work will be an android.

Only get a mac if you are a total faggot who hates money.

thats like saying only buy a mercedes if you are a fag who hates money
they're more expensive than a commodore but they do the same thing, one is just better than the other

learn to love it

haters gunna hate

buy whatever the fuck you want.

I have a Dell Laptop, I dont like it.
I have a Asus Laptop, I dont like it.
I have a gaming PC, I like it.
I have only ever owned a ipod nano, and that about the most experience i have with apple,