Another "Help me decide" thread :)

[Michael73]

I've recently started my own strategic marketing and interactive consulting business. To date, I've been working from home on my early '08 MP. For a variety of reasons, it's time to get out of the house. The funny thing is that with free wireless and a great coffee shop my local public library is a perfect first office / business incubator.

At home I use all the "normal" stuff e.g. mail, calendar, Safari, Firefox but I also have Adobe's CS4 Design Premium suite, MS Office, iWork and iLife '09 as well as VMWare running Windows XP with another couple of apps like MS Office, Quickbooks Pro and some industry specific apps.

I need help deciding between the "low-end" and "high-end" 15" MBP. I've already decided that regardless of what I get, I'm going to get and extra 2GB of RAM (I want a total of 4GB) and a upgrade the standard HDD to the new 500GB 7200RPM drive.

I don't need my MBP to do *everything* my MP can (like video encoding). But, I need to be able to work on most files, do client presentations and generally work mobiley. I'm registered at the local Apple store as a business and they even suggested I could go with just a MB but I'm willing to fork over the extra $ for a larger screen. I figure if I'm going to hole up in the library or a Starbucks all day then I'll really appreciate the bigger screen.

Which laptop would you recommend an why?

 

[ViciousShadow21]

I've recently started my own strategic marketing and interactive consulting business. To date, I've been working from home on my early '08 MP. For a variety of reasons, it's time to get out of the house. The funny thing is that with free wireless and a great coffee shop my local public library is a perfect first office / business incubator.

At home I use all the "normal" stuff e.g. mail, calendar, Safari, Firefox but I also have Adobe's CS4 Design Premium suite, MS Office, iWork and iLife '09 as well as VMWare running Windows XP with another couple of apps like MS Office, Quickbooks Pro and some industry specific apps.

I need help deciding between the "low-end" and "high-end" 15" MBP. I've already decided that regardless of what I get, I'm going to get and extra 2GB of RAM (I want a total of 4GB) and a upgrade the standard HDD to the new 500GB 7200RPM drive.

I don't need my MBP to do *everything* my MP can (like video encoding). But, I need to be able to work on most files, do client presentations and generally work mobiley. I'm registered at the local Apple store as a business and they even suggested I could go with just a MB but I'm willing to fork over the extra $ for a larger screen. I figure if I'm going to hole up in the library or a Starbucks all day then I'll really appreciate the bigger screen.

Which laptop would you recommend an why?

it sounds like all you need is the low end model. you gave the best reason yourself. you have a mac pro and dont need the mbp to do all that much. like you said your only buying it for the larger screen.

 

[rdowns]

Let em get this straight. You want to consult with businesses on strategic marketing but can't decide between 2 models of a computer to buy.

 

[p.luik]

I agree. Low end. Spend that money on buying the hard drive and memory. Im pretty sure you'll have to wait on the hard drive though. Unless you have found a place that has them available?

 

[arkitect]

Let em get this straight. You want to consult with businesses on strategic marketing but can't decide between 2 models of a computer to buy.

*snort*
Oh the humanity.

 

[bossxii]

Let em get this straight. You want to consult with businesses on strategic marketing but can't decide between 2 models of a computer to buy.

I'm sorry but this did make me laugh. Great point.

 

[Michael73]

Let em get this straight. You want to consult with businesses on strategic marketing but can't decide between 2 models of a computer to buy.

There's one in every crowd...

Maybe I should clarify my question...since we all know that third-party RAM is a heck of a lot cheaper than getting it from Apple, it seems like the biggest difference between the low and high ends are a slight difference in clock speed. Under what circumstance would you pay the extra $300-$400 for the higher clock speed and what is the real world difference in app performance that would justify that difference?

Oh, and just for the record, I *can* decide but thought I'd let others weigh in to see if there is a more persuasive argument for one model or the other.

 

[bossxii]

There's one in every crowd...

Maybe I should clarify my question...since we all know that third-party RAM is a heck of a lot cheaper than getting it from Apple, it seems like the biggest difference between the low and high ends are a slight difference in clock speed. Under what circumstance would you pay the extra $300-$400 for the higher clock speed and what is the real world difference in app performance that would justify that difference?

Oh, and just for the record, I *can* decide but thought I'd let others weigh in to see if there is a more persuasive argument for one model or the other.

There more then one of us smarta@@'s in a crowd!

To toss out an idea, I would not spend the money on the processor due to the fact in a year's time it's likely Apple will upgrade to the new Arrondale chipsets which if I recall is suppose to boost C2D perfomance by as much as 50%. I would purchase the ram from a 3rd party vendor, then when Apple updates the new chipset you could move the ram which will likley still be DDR3 over to the new machine.

I purchased the base 17" model with the 2.66 with the same thought process. I can upgrade the HDD to a SSD and Ram if I wish, but the upgrades I make I can move to another machine for a couple of years if Apple is just upgrading processor speeds. I can't upgrade the chips so any money spent is gone, no way to salvage that cost. The fact that Apple computers have a great resale value your going to take a hit on the base model but at least you can move over your performance upgrades until a major change takes place.