about to buy my first mac

[bigjnyc]

since buying an iphone last july i've been very impressed with apple products (i've owned numerous ipods as well) and the OSX platform, so i've been reading up and more and more i like what i see and hear.

so i finally decided to sell my PC and buy a macbook, now my only concern is if it will fill all my needs first of all i'm not a PC gamer at all i rarely even touch my PS3. I'm basically a casual user who has a vast music collection using itunes, pictures and a few videos. other than that i surf the web, check email, download pics from digital camera etc. dont really use photoshop, might dabble in movie editing a little bit but certainly not heavy or intensive. I also use microsoft office quite a bit.

the black top of the line macbook is right within my budget at 1499 plus i plan to buy the 4gb package of ram from crucial, bluetooth wireless mighty mouse. And maybe later on a nice external monitor.

my current PC configuration
Dell desktop 3.2ghz, 2gb ram, 300gb HD, vista, cd&dvd burner

so my question is will the macbook be enough for me and my needs or should i hold out and save a little longer for for an imac. i would like to stay in this price range though.

as for desktop vs laptop i would like to try having a laptop as my main PC but i'm not deadset on it.

Thanks in advance for any input.

 

[killmoms]

Sounds like you'd be well served even by a MacBook, considering that its Core 2 Duo will be faster than the CPU (which I assume is a Pentium 4) in your current desktop. With 4GB of RAM it'll fly, and since you don't really need the 3D chipset you won't have any problems there. The only thing you might have trouble with is hard drive space, due to your "vast" iTunes collection, but the MacBooks have user-serviceable hard drives so you could always buy a larger one in the future (and you can always hook up externals).

 

[ucfgrad93]

^^^I agree. I think that the blackbook will suit you well. If you run out of hard drive space, externals are just fine.

 

[bigjnyc]

glad to hear that, hard drive space is not really a big issue i'm only using about 110GB of my current 300GB and i've had it for a while.

 

[BanjoBanker]

As a BlackBook owner I agree that the MacBook is a good fit. You will enjoy the editing capabilities in iPhoto 08 and since you commented you might try video editing, you will fall in love with iMovie. As previously posted, the hard drive ina MacBook is ridiculously easy to swap for a larger one. In my experience you will find the freedom to roam about with a laptop is tough to beat. I have written proposals and reports in coffee shops, libraries and parks. There is always the option of a larger external monitor if screen real estate becomes an issue under certain circumstances.
Enjoy your new Mac and welcome to the club!

 

[dxalfredo]

Don't Get The Macbook Right Now, But If You Really Need Go For It. Or, Just Wait Intil June For The Next Updates. If You Can't Wait That Long Then Go For The Imac.

 

[Nyaos]

Buy i

Get the default MacBook! You can't go wrong for it's price, and will do everything you want to do just as well as the BlackBook. All MacBooks have awesome processors, so you don't need to worry about speed. If you were into photoshop, and other more intensive program, I'd go with the BlackBook. But honestly, you'll be very satisfied with the default MacBook.

Although you might want to wait 2 months for the probable updates.

 

[LouisBlack]

I disagree with waiting. They were only updated a couple of months ago and we won't see any major speed increase until Nehalem in 2009. If you're really worries about paying full price for a computer that'll be slightly slower than one release in a few months, buy from the refurb store.

 

[bigjnyc]

Thanks for all the advice guys i bought the black macbook at the apple store on saturday and i'm extremely happy. its actually alot faster than my 3.2ghz PC was.

 

[LouisBlack]

Excellent. Good going.

And about the speed difference. Pentium 4s were dogs - very high clockspeeds for pretty awful performance...