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biker121

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Hi guys,

I'm pretty new to macrumors, mainly registered to get some opinions on my potential (and possibly soon) purchase of a Retina Macbook pro (i know its gonna be a bit 'OP').

I'm a third year student in computer science and recently obtained a job (as a part of my major) looking to buy a somewhat portable laptop. My experience with computers has mainly been with PCs so far but I don't mind learning new OSs.

I currently use (was gifted/rewarded) an Alienware 15x hooking up to a two displays, which has been used as my desktop for the past 2-3 years as I am not going to lug an extra 9lbs around the campus. This laptop has been used to code basic applications as a part of my degree along with a decent amount of gaming.

This Macbook will be used for school, work, occasional gaming and presentations (to individuals/small groups [4-10]). Tasks like coding, in class notes, assignments (applications, OS related, web development, whatever else there may be). In the near future I intend to learn iOS/mobile and web development as a hobby.

I intend to keep this laptop for (well as long as I can 😛) 3 years before I buy a desktop.

Questions:
1) As far as programming goes, does the Mac OS have any drawbacks as compared to Microsoft windows?
-Eg: coding in a specific language is not possible in OS?
-Eg: web development is noticeably more inconvenient then in windows
2) From what I have been reading, some folks say non-retina compatible applications look horrible on the rMBP.
-does this have any impact on IDEs? Eclipse, text editors, Visual basic
-is the impact big enough that it's unusable?
-is there any way to get around it? -> does scaling/resolution adjustment improve it by any degree?

Any opinions, advice, comments? -I've been looking at this laptop since mid July.

-Biker121
 
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