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jw nyc

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jan 31, 2008
854
0
So my bday is the 15th and my gf keeps asking me what I want. She said she's willing to spend $400-500 on a gift so I'm throwing the question out to you guys. If you could get anything from the Apple Store for $400-500 what would it be? I have a MBP laptop and not much else from Apple but am curious what else would be worth it to get (not an iPhone...had to switch back to the Blackberry for work related reasons and will be waiting for the 3G version). Any help is appreciated. Thanks.
 
So my bday is the 15th and my gf keeps asking me what I want. She said she's willing to spend $400-500 on a gift so I'm throwing the question out to you guys. If you could get anything from the Apple Store for $400-500 what would it be? I have a MBP laptop and not much else from Apple but am curious what else would be worth it to get (not an iPhone...had to switch back to the Blackberry for work related reasons and will be waiting for the 3G version). Any help is appreciated. Thanks.

If you are waiting for a 3G, THEN DO NOT GET A TOUCH, you won't make the money back, and its going to happen this year (please, don't debate this, just settle it at: if wanting an iPod touch really bad, get it, otherwise we shall assume that the 3G iPhone will be bought this year)

Some Suggestions:
Decent Headphones/earphones
External Hard Drive
Printer
A Gift Card for the iPhone?
A Mac Mini?

It's kinda what you want....
 
Have her save the money. Ten years from now, you won't even remember whatever material crap you blew half a grand on. If you save it for something you truly need instead, you won't regret it when that need comes around.
 
LOL so I think the majority vote is to not get anything from her for my bday and save the money? Sounds like a fun birthday gift and that's EXACTLY the advice on came for macrumors.com for!!!!
 
All right, fine. Here's one I'm in the process of doing!

Why not get a nice Quicksilver Power Mac G4, upgrade it with tons of hard drives, and use it as a server? :)

TO OTHERS: Don't even tell me "blah blah blah mini's better blah blah blah", cause you're wrong.
 
If I were to get a really nice computer speaker system which would you guys recommend?
 
LOL so I think the majority vote is to not get anything from her for my bday and save the money? Sounds like a fun birthday gift and that's EXACTLY the advice on came for macrumors.com for!!!!

You don't need to save the money, but blowing $500 at the Apple Store isn't likely to be very fulfilling, especially if you're having trouble thinking of anything you want. I think that would be the general concensus of most people here.

There are lots of other things to blow money on though; concerts, plays, nice restaurants, etc. All great birthday presents. You could even stretch it into a weekend trip somewhere. That's what I'd do if I had a girl with loads of money.
 
Honestly, I would suggest asking for the cash and saving it or getting a gift card. With all the rumors about Apple updating most of its line of products (computers and iPhone pretty much), nothing right now is really worth buying.

However, I would suggest buying:
-An external hard drive, like 500GB or so...
-External monitor, keyboard, mighty mouse
-the next generation Mac Mini
-take a look around the Apple store for software and see if you want any of that...
-wait for 3G iPhone and get that (this is what I would do...)

A gift card would probably would be the best thing though.

Happy birthday though :)
 
Would the speakers be mainly for listening to music? Perhaps check out the M-Audio Studiophile AV 40's. I use an older model of the same speakers to play around in Garage Band, and am pleased with the sound. Also, Klipsch, and Gigaworks (Creative) make some nice desktop speakers. Good luck on your decision. Your girlfriend must care a lot about you to spend so much money on your birthday. Happy birthday early!
 
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On a serious note, I'll say it again: save your money! If you absolutely must spend a piece of it, spend it on a good time and not on a piece of e-junk. Go to dinner, to the movies, to an amusement park, to the beach, to a lodge in the woods, to a concert, to the theatre, etc. You'll treasure the memories far more if you share an experience together than if you buy some disposable item you won't give a twit about six months from now.
 
If you can't think of anything that you want/need from the apple store, then there's no sense in spending $500 there. Seems like wasted money to me...

Good point...there are a bunch of things I WANT but I was just asking for some suggestions.
 
I kinda like my AppleTV I bought on a whim a few weeks ago. You can kill countless hours watching people show you how to make balloon animals (guilty of blowing an hour of my life on that the other night) on Youtube. I mean, if it's free...... get one of those and then go out to dinner. Else I'd opt for a time capsule.

But seriously, if it were me, I'd have her set up a nice night out, dinner, hotel etc. Memories are better than materials.
 
About the speaker systems, I've heard that the Bose Companion IIs and Harman/kardon Soundsticks are pretty good speakers. I have the JBL Creatures, and while the did cost me $40, they're better than any I've ever used.
 
Anyway, I was thinking about the Apple TV but my main issue is that I can't use it with the DIVX & XVID movies that I download LOL.

That would be a setback. My videos are only ones I've ripped from my own (mainly my kid's) DVDs via handbrake. I haven't looked into it in some time, but I think I recall seeing hacks out there for AppleTV to play other video types.

Not trying to sell you on it, just a neat device, especially when it's 'free'. But it's real nice having my 50 gig audio library available in my living room without needing my iMac on at all.

Never heard of a "Tween". Maybe I'm just too old (32)
 
I was going to say shares of Apple Stock, but then I just checked the share price: $151.44 Ouch, seems kind of high given the current economic state of the US (I'm no stock guru though). If the price drops significantly between now and your birthday, that would always be a nice option since its a gift that will keep giving.

And this is a great thread, just keep the personal attacks to a minimum so it doesn't get locked. I thought you were 15 too when I first read it (I'm dyslexic though so I have a bit of an excuse) LMAO. Anyways, happy birthday, and a big grats on landing a girl who likes to spend money on you--that's not an easy task by any means.
 
To the OP. For $500, I would start with a nice big external hard drive. Something really sleek looking like the MyBook Studio. I think it's got Firewire 800 (400 for sure), so it'll be really fast. You'll still have probably $300 left over that you could use to go on a weekend trip or something. It's your birthday, so go out and buy something for yourself. Who cares if you won't use it 1, 2, or 3 years from now? A birthday present isn't supposed to be an investment in the future, it's supposed to be an impulse buy that'll really enjoy right now.

About the speaker systems, I've heard that the Bose Companion IIs and Harman/kardon Soundsticks are pretty good speakers. I have the JBL Creatures, and while the did cost me $40, they're better than any I've ever used.

I've got the Companion 2's, and they're great for the price (sub $100). But the Companion 5's sound amazing, and I think they're right around the $500 dollar mark, maybe just under. They look great too.
 
So my bday is the 15th and my gf keeps asking me what I want. She said she's willing to spend $400-500 on a gift so I'm throwing the question out to you guys. If you could get anything from the Apple Store for $400-500 what would it be? I have a MBP laptop and not much else from Apple but am curious what else would be worth it to get (not an iPhone...had to switch back to the Blackberry for work related reasons and will be waiting for the 3G version). Any help is appreciated. Thanks.

How about a College Fund??
 
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