Mac Users (not fanboys) Give Me Some Insight

I am getting tired of Windows. Thought about making the jump to a Macbook Pro.

Here are the specs and prices between the MBP and a Dell Studio 15. I used to build my own rigs but I don't have the time or patience anymore. Please look these over and tell me your (rational) thoughts. The screen size is not that big of a deal to me since I will use my 21" Samsung monitor as a second screen for editing.

Macbook Pro 13

• 13" LCD
  
• 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
  
• 4GB 1066MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 2x2GB
  
• 250GB Serial ATA Drive @ 5400 rpm
  
• None
  
• Backlit Keyboard (English) /

• 15" LCD
  
• NEW 2010 Intel® Core™ i5-520M 2.40GHz (2.93Ghz Turbo Mode, 3M cache)
  
• Windows® 7 Home Premium, 64bit
  
• 6GB Shared Dual Channel DDR3 at 1066MHz
  
• 500GB SATA Hard Drive (7200RPM)
  
• ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD 5470, 1GB

Well the Dell looks the stronger performer on paper, but you knew that already.

Frankly the only way to tell is to have a play with the Mac and see if you prefer the software and OS to Windows.

I still use Windows XP on a desktop sometimes but much prefer OS X. But take this with a pinch of salt, it is my preference, you may feel differently.

Why are you fed up with Windows anyway?

Fastest is likely the Dell, because of the processor and hard drive speed if nothing else. RAM might be a wash since Unix and Windows manage memory differently. Reliable, who knows. I tweaked and maintained my Windows machines (back when I had any) to run as efficiently as possible, yet I still ran into problems. Others don't.

There is more to computing than just speed or reliability. Display quality, quality of the internals (e.g. not all sound cards are created equal), build quality, etc, not to mention differences in the OS interface. The Dell probably has inferior internals, and it plainly has inferior construction. Problem is no one lists these things in the spec sheet, so no one can say anything definitive.

Best thing to do is find a friend with a Mac and play with it, or buy the Mac and return it if you don't like it.

Windows 7 is excellent in terms of reliability and stability. Clearly the Dell is going to offer better performance based on the specs and with more ram to play with.

theshape wrote in post #10486467
I am getting tired of Windows. Thought about making the jump to a Macbook Pro.

Here are the specs and prices between the MBP and a Dell Studio 15. I used to build my own rigs but I don't have the time or patience anymore. Please look these over and tell me your (rational) thoughts. The screen size is not that big of a deal to me since I will use my 21" Samsung monitor as a second screen for editing.

Macbook Pro 13

• 13" LCD
  
• 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
  
• 4GB 1066MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 2x2GB
  
• 250GB Serial ATA Drive @ 5400 rpm
  
• None
  
• Backlit Keyboard (English) /

Dell Studio 15

• 15" LCD
  
• NEW 2010 Intel® Core™ i5-520M 2.40GHz (2.93Ghz Turbo Mode, 3M cache)
  
• Windows® 7 Home Premium, 64bit
  
• 6GB Shared Dual Channel DDR3 at 1066MHz
  
• 500GB SATA Hard Drive (7200RPM)
  
• ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD 5470, 1GB

The Mac is $1199.00
The Dell is $ 1054.99

Bigger screen, more RAM with the Dell, but the stability of the Mac? I mainly use PS, LR, ACR and Bridge. I just want the most reliable, fastest of the 2 listed.

Thanks for looking and your input.

Get at least the 15" i5. Simple as that. I highly recommend you upgrade the HDD to 7200RPM and in the future (when you can afford it) get 8GB memory and sell the 4GB that it comes with. Getting a C2D is not a smart future investment.

Look, Mac's are great. I own three and would choose a Mac before a PC any day of the week. I can also understand your dislike of Windows. I'm an IT professional in a primarily PC network of almost 10k computers. I see Windows problems every day! However, Mac's are more expensive. Many people debate the reason's why, but don't mistake price for speed. Budget PC's are always going to be faster at the same cost range. If PC companies made their computers as good as Apple the cost would be about the same. Two examples are HP ENVY and Dell Alienware.

Windows can be pretty stable if it is taken care of, but few people want to deal with learning how to do so.

@Electric Shepherd Just the crashing all the time. I am an XP user, have been for many years. Just tired of it all. My system is old, so it might have partly to do with hardware issues. A few of my friends have Macs and I have used them in the past.

I definitely like the construction of the Macbook as opposed to the Dell. But I do like to bigger better specs of the Dell for the money. I'd have to go up to $1799 to get a 15" screen on the Mac with the i5 proc.

@Toxic I am not too worried about the screen on the laptop itself since I will be editing on my 21" monitor that I already have. This unit would be replacing my 7 yr old desktop I have. I am not too worried about sound either.

@merlin2375 I have heard that Win 7 was really good, just haven't used it yet. I just want really good, fast performance with my Adobe products...

theshape wrote in post #10486820
@merlin2375 I have heard that Win 7 was really good, just haven't used it yet. I just want really good, fast performance with my Adobe products...

Then don't buy that Macbook!

As Maxxum said go with at least an i5, whether the Dell or another Macbook is your choice. You didn't say if you need the portability just that you were going to use a second screen. Does it have to be a laptop?

I have both, side by side, an Intel iMac running Leopard and a PC quad core running Windows 7 64 bit. Both of them crash just as much as one does or the other. I've lost hours of work on one machine and the other trying the same project over the weekend. Using Win 7, Windows Live Movie Maker, locked the system up and lost about an hour's worth of work, while I admit I was using a Beta version of Movie Maker 4, it had worked just fine 'til that point. I got so upset I switch over to my iMac to try to do the same thing using OS X iMovie and just about an hour into it, the program crashed, closed and I lost all the work I had put into it.

The only difference with the experience mentioned above is that the Mac just crashed the program and the Windows machine just froze completely having to push the reset button. All I had on my project was pictures and 1080p videos from my T2i, I was in the process of making a presentation, adding effects, transitions, titles, music, etc.

For what is worth, both systems are great, my PC is faster but is also newer Technology, it actually runs circle around my Mac but it's like comparing a new BMW M5 to a 4 year old Ford Mustang. I bought PC parts and put a powerful system together for a fraction of the cost of a new Mac Pro. You'll always get more for your money with a PC (Windows) than a Mac, Apple gear is very expensive and unless I start making much more money or they bring down the price of their Pro line I don't see myself buying their hardware anytime soon.

Apple OS X is a pleasure to use and I think is better than Windows 7 in many ways, I just wish I could run their OS on my own hardware without having to pay them 3 times more for stuff I know I can buy way cheaper. At the end of the day, it's just a tool for me, it's a means and methods, nothing more, buy whatever your pockets can afford, I don't think you can go wrong either way, just be prepared to spend more with Apple and specially if you have to buy new software like Photoshop or the new Lightroom.

I run Windows 7 & OS X on both my MBP and desktop.

I've had instances with programs in OS X where they would crash more than when using them in Windows. I've personally not had any problems in Vista or 7. Why do I own a MBP and why did I go through the trouble of putting OS X on my desktop? I use certain programs for photo, video, and audio editing that are not available on Win7.

I have a 13" MBP, running it for about a year now. Absolutely the single best computer I've ever used. No problems worth mentioning. I installed a copy of VMWare so I can run Linux and windoz inside VM's when needed. One suggestion, buy the biggest 7200 rpm drive you can find (Hitachi makes a 500g), and install it as a replacement for the default drive. Put the old drive in a little external box with a FW port on it, and use it for Time Machine backups.

I have the 13" MBP and it's awesome. I also use a home constructed desktop with Win x64 and it's awesome. I just prefer using the Mac. Both are reliable and in fact all my computers have been. A lot is to do with how you look after the OS rather than the OS itself. The Mac screen is really excellent and so is the keyboard. The trackpad is also very usable whereas I've never had a trackpad I ever used on Win laptops.

Simple - which do you prefer?

@MaxxuM sounds like me - I support PCs and their problems day in day out, and have nothing but Macs at home. I used to build my own machines, upgrade them, play with them and just got sick of the effort. I bought a first gen Macbook and never looked back.

I like OSX. I use Aperture. Macs make sense for me - the extra $100 here or there, the extra CPU cycles here or there aren't so big of a deal to me that I'd switch now.

theshape wrote in post #10486820
@Toxic I am not too worried about the screen on the laptop itself since I will be editing on my 21" monitor that I already have. This unit would be replacing my 7 yr old desktop I have. I am not too worried about sound either.

Well, if you're buying a laptop, wouldn't you be using it for other tasks, too? If you aren't, you might as well buy another tower. Used Mac Pro, hackintosh, or another Windows machine will get you more power and interchangeable parts.

enrigonz wrote in post #10486908
I bought PC parts and put a powerful system together for a fraction of the cost of a new Mac Pro. You'll always get more for your money with a PC (Windows) than a Mac, Apple gear is very expensive and unless I start making much more money or they bring down the price of their Pro line I don't see myself buying their hardware anytime soon.

Thought I'd point out that Mac Pros use server-grade parts, so unless you bought server parts, that explains much of the price difference.

Windows 7 is as stable as OSX from my personal experience. (I've actually had more serious problems from OSX than Windows 7)

I also hear Adobe CS is also a bit quicker on PC's so If that's the majority of your work then the Dell seems best.
If you could get a better MBP I'd go for it they are gorgeous laptops, otherwise stick to the dell.


BTW, does anyone else find the new MBP mousepad horrible? I've been using a macbook the past few days and it is way more difficult to use than a conventional mousepad... weird.

benesotor wrote in post #10488669
BTW, does anyone else find the new MBP mousepad horrible? I've been using a macbook the past few days and it is way more difficult to use than a conventional mousepad... weird.

Depends on what I'm doing. Overall though, I really like the features the pad offers. I find myself wanting a track pad on my Mac Pro sometimes. For PS, FCS and iWork stuff I work much better with a mouse. I've programed my Logitech VX and MX to access Spaces/Expose on MP and MBP.