External Monitor or Internal HDD?

[jgbhardy]

Right for my birthday I have asked for either an External Monitor or an Internal HDD. I can have one of them with some driving lessons or both and no driving lessons. These will both be for my 13" White Macbook

The HDD is a 500Gb WD Scorpio Blue

The External Monitor
Diagonal Size: 22"
Image Aspect Ratio: 16:10
Image Brightness: 300 cd/m2
Image Contrast Ratio: 1000:1
Interface: DVI,VGA (HD-15)
Max Resolution: 1680 x 1050
Response Time: 5 ms

I should add I am able to get some driving lessons from money elsewhere, I'm not left without driving lessons if I don't choose them.

At the moment I have a very small partition for windows at 20GB and so only have 1.9Gb left for Windows. On my OS X partition I have 26Gb left, with a lot more of my media and files on my external HDD which is 320Gb which also has 20Gb left.

A lot of the time I use my macbook for either basic photoshop or word processing but creative graphic publishing too. On my Windows partition I like to play some of my classic games that I have, but at the moment I can only install one of those games due to space.

[-Ryan-]

I'd go for the monitor and the driving lessons unless you desperately need more storage. The monitor should benefit you in a big way going up from only 13".

[fireshot91]

Well, do you need more space, or a bigger monitor?

I would get the hard drive and driving lessons because well, I need hard drives all the time :)

[iShater]

I concur the monitor and the lessons. You can always save up and get an inexpensive external HD if you really really have to.

[jgbhardy]

I concur the monitor and the lessons. You can always save up and get an inexpensive external HD if you really really have to.

I already have an External HDD at 320Gb, Internal HDD's are less expensive then External ones.

[Dmac77]

Right for my birthday I have asked for either an External Monitor or an Internal HDD. I can have one of them with some driving lessons or both and no driving lessons.

The HDD is a 500Gb WD Blue
The External Monitor is a 22" with 1680 x 1050

Well it really depends on your needs. How much space do you have left on your HDD? Is your current monitor to small? We can't help you unless you give more info.

Also what are the specs on this monitor? Who makes it, what is the the contrast ratio, etc. Also, what do you do with your computer? Do you edit photos, or what?

We need more info.

Is this for your Macbook?

Don

[Dagless]

Monitor and HDD.
Chicks won't give 2 hoots if you can drive and then take them home to see a computer without a large capacity HDD or external monitor.

[jgbhardy]

Well it really depends on your needs. How much space do you have left on your HDD? Is your current monitor to small? We can't help you unless you give more info.

Also what are the specs on this monitor? Who makes it, what is the the contrast ratio, etc. Also, what do you do with your computer? Do you edit photos, or what?

We need more info.

Is this for your Macbook?

Don

Sorry I usually put lots of details into my posts, I have added to the OP.

[Dmac77]

Sorry I usually put lots of details into my posts, I have added to the OP.

It's okay.

IMO, I would get both the monitor and the HDD with your situation. Driving lessons can wait.

Don

[joro]

I see you live in England, but in NC we were required to take driving classes and, best part, they were free! Do you all get any breaks on your insurance if you take the classes or is just mainly for the practice?

[jgbhardy]

I see you live in England, but in NC we were required to take driving classes and, best part, they were free! Do you all get any breaks on your insurance if you take the classes or is just mainly for the practice?

You take the lessons to make sure you can pass the driving exam really, we have a written exam and a practical exam, which is a lot harder then a lot of what I hear from my relatives in America about driving exams. You have to pass both exams to get the license and be able to drive, so there is no point having the insurance if you don't have the license to drive. :P
What exactly did you have to do to get a driving license?

[G5Unit]

I would get both personally, I'm sure with some internet searching you can find a way to still fit in your budget.

I recently purchased a 1tb drive that I've set up with RAID 1 and having your data safe is more important than a monitor I believe.

[fireshot91]

Here in the U.S we have to hold a driving permit (you can drive with a person with a license in the car) for 9 months, pass a written test, and a driving test.

[joro]

Here in the U.S we have to hold a driving permit (you can drive with a person with a license in the car) for 9 months, pass a written test, and a driving test.

This is essentially what I had to do although I thought I had to keep my permit for 12 months (6 months which I could only drive to 9 and the other 6 months for driving anytime).

[fireshot91]

Ah, it probably varies state to state. I only know it for VA.

[zioxide]

Get the hard drive. External monitors are a waste of money unless you're doing work that desperately needs extra screen space.

[twoodcc]

i personally would not buy a monitor that wasn't at least 1080P resolution, so i cannot recommend you to get that monitor