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Advice on MacBook purchase

H

Halcyon

macrumors 6502
Original poster
I'm looking into buying a laptop and I think the MacBook will nicely fit my needs. I already have two iMacs (see sig) that I use as my maine machines and the MacBook will not see mayor/continuos use or abuse, that's why I think a PowerBook will be overkill. 13" screen sounds perfect as well as all other specs and dimension are just right for portability.

I rather have the white one over the black one, just for looks nothing else, but would like the extra space that comes with the 250 MB HD. I can order the white one with an upgraded HD to 250 MB and it comes cheaper than buying the black one (which comes stock with the 250 MB HD). This seems rather curious to me, so I was wondering if there's any other differences between the black and white one (I've reread the specs for both machines and it seems that the only difference is the size of the HD, everything else is exactly the same thing). Have I been misquoted on the price, or am I missing something here?

TIA
 
Order the model you want, with the hard drive it ships with. Then order a hard drive from a third party vendor. It will be loads cheaper.
 
I got a 2.16ghz stock then bought 4G RAM, 320 GB HD, & Speck See Through Case (everything shipped), all for less than the mid level MacBook from Apple.
 
Halcyon: Apple charges you $100 for the black coloring. Nothing else. It makes zero sense, but that's how it's set up. So don't worry about buying the white, especially since you like the color better than the black, because it's exactly the same. I also recommend upgrading the hard drive yourself though, it's a lot cheaper.
 
Don't order user upgradable parts (RAM and Hard Drive) from Apple.

It's way cheaper to do it yourself (and it's easy to do, too).

I recommend ifixit.com for guides on the upgrades and newegg.com for ordering the parts.
 
once you upgrade them to the same specs? nope. No difference. Only the black casing. I spent the extra $100 for the black one. I just think it looks a lot cooler, plus I dont want a yellow macbook by the end of the year. 😀
 
Thanks guys. I'll purchase the 2.4GHz white MacBook and when the need arrives I'll get the higher capacity HD from a third party vendor.

One last question. I plan on purchasing the extended Apple Care, but is the warranty voided when you change the drive yourself?

TIA
 
Halcyon said:
One last question. I plan on purchasing the extended Apple Care, but is the warranty voided when you change the drive yourself?
Click to expand...

In my experience, the act of replacing the drive won't void the warranty overall - but they won't cover the 3rd party drive. So if you have a problem w/ something besides the hard drive, you'd be fine - but could replace it w/ the original before you sent it in to be safe.
 
Halcyon said:
Thanks guys. I'll purchase the 2.4GHz white MacBook and when the need arrives I'll get the higher capacity HD from a third party vendor.

One last question. I plan on purchasing the extended Apple Care, but is the warranty voided when you change the drive yourself?

TIA
Click to expand...

No, in the MacBook, the hard drive is a user-replaceable part.
 
If HD space is the priority, I agree you should get white one and then
order the new 320GB/7200 that just came out.
 
also take into consideration, macbooks are provided with 5400 rpm hard drives. if you put a 7200 rpm hd, it might get really hot, as i think that is the reason why they don't put 7200 rpm hd on them.
 
:apple:I would say the White for colorwise because Apple is going to be possibly changing the MacBook's soon to Aluminum so if you like the Plastic, get it now! Also, I mean the White is Apple! If you look at Black, you may think it could be a PC until you see the Apple logo. I personally like the White better because even though it can get a bit dirty, it doesn't show fingerprints.

Also, as other people has said, get the extra space from a third party. Much cheaper!

Buy happy, and enjoy it. 🙂
 
FuuFuu said:
also take into consideration, macbooks are provided with 5400 rpm hard drives. if you put a 7200 rpm hd, it might get really hot, as i think that is the reason why they don't put 7200 rpm hd on them.
Click to expand...

Once I made made mind to purchase the white model and upgrade the drive later on, I had in mind replacing it with a 7200 rpm unit but this seems to be an issue. Searching on other threads and forums many users have expressed their concern over the overheating that might occur if they installed a 7200 rpm disk...but nobody that has actually done it had intervened with an answer on any of these other threads. It would be positive to hear from somebody that has installed one in his machine.

Note: My wife is in Tennessee visiting relatives and they seem to have this early back to school special in which no sale tax is charge on consumer purchases in all retail stores...so she took a quick trip to Nashville and purchased it for me and saved like $160!!!
 
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