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Of course most people here will try to convince you to get a MBP, with an occasional hater mixed in. :p
Last week, I bought my first MBP, windows user up until then.
Even though it's premium price, it hasn't even crossed my mind after I got my hands it, let alone thinking about switching back to win7 or having regrets about not getting a vaio instead.
Now if I actually did get a vaio, I'd probably stil be wondering why I didn't switch to apple and think about all kinds of stuff to justify my vaio purchase.
I'm not saying vaio or win7 are crap or don't get the job done, in fact, for gaming they'll do a better job.
It boils down to what you prefer and how much those aspects weigh in on your decision, if you're focused on specs, price, satisfied with win7, go buy a vaio, if you want better build quality, great service, better design, a new experience with OSX, go for a MBP.
I wanted something more solid, better build than the previous laptops that died on me, (2 HP's and 1 ACER!!), the last one didn't even hold up 5 months...LOL, so I chose a MBP.
no regrets
 
vaio vs. mac - no comparison

I happened to have experienced a new macbook and a new sony vaio in the last couple of weeks. I switched from ibm thinkpad to macbook pro, and my partner bought a sony vaio.

the sony vaio is much cheaper, of course. but let me tell you, there is no comparison whatsoever between the two machines.

the trackpad of the macbook, for one, is just amazing. because I tried the two computers (sony and mac) alongside for at least couple of days, I can say that it makes a whole lot of difference. It just is easy on your hands and nerves, too, because each time I tried to use the trackpad of sony, it ended up doing something totally off.

and the trackpad is just the beginning. i can name a million other things that make the mac a much much better machine. (ease of use, the screen, sounds, speed and reliability, overall the battery performance, the great OS experience in Mac, etc.) also, I know from my thinkpad that it is not just the specs that matter. my thinkpad, which is now quite old, had worse specs than many of the new computers out there, but it actually still runs much better than a lot of them (hps, compaqs, dells, etc.), still holds battery for 2 hours (after five years.). It's a matter of quality of the material and the overall design that brings them together. In those counts, I don't think a Mac is paralleled by any PC, IMHO.
 
It has been a while since I owned my Sony Vaio laptop, but I can tell you for the price (which was expensive compared to known crappy PC laptops), it was crap. Oh, it looked good, but it had chintzy feel that annoyed me every time I used it. The software installed on it was reason alone to stay away. I can't speak to this model (or even the last couple of years of models).
 
Let me clear up a few facts here before I reply. I've been using PC's since DOS 3.1. Always hated Macs and Mac users. Just bought my first MBP.

So a couple of things...

A) Despite what the fanboys say, technically all PC's KILL Macs unless you get a beefed up MacPro for big money. Period.

B) Anyone that says Windows 7 sucks is just silly and doesn't know what they speak of. I had NO problems with Win 98, Vista or 7 at all. Never had a virus ever... It's quite simple to maintain your computer.

C) Windows 7 is VERY easy to use. Unless you have comprehension problems of some sort.

D) The "no virus" argument is silly. There ARE viruses for MacOSX. If you can't keep your computer virus free then perhaps you shouldn't use one.

E) Most mac users (that I have known and I imagine overall) are little more than noobs and desire/need the simplicity of OSX.

So... Why do I have a Mac? It's simple really.

I got tired of owning ugly computers. That and MBP's are now on par with most new computers (minus a few things like USB3). I also got tired of having linux that I made to look like OSX.

My MBP is beautiful and with the i7 + 8gigs of ram it screams too. Could I eek out a little more speed from a PC? Probably. But why...

My Mac has the beauty and ease of use that comes from OSX AND it has a CLI. :D

I'd say go buy the Mac. You'll like it I think... And if you don't you can sell it for darn near the same price you paid for it.

I've had my first Apple for a week and let me tell you. I'm NEVER going back to PC. I may even replace my server with a Mini.

So from one exWindows lover to a currentWindows lover. Try it. You will NOT regret it.


P.S. Forgive me if I offend any MacUsers out there. I'm still in that weird area of loving my mac and having disdain for mac users which I now am. :D
 
P.S. Forgive me if I offend any MacUsers out there. I'm still in that weird area of loving my mac and having disdain for mac users which I now am. :D

So your like Gollom, you love and hate the mac at the same time. You'll now be known as Smeigl. Hail Smeigl!!!
 
Most of the people here haven't even used windows 7 so they have no idea what they're talking about

Jump to conclusions much?

You`ll find a huge number of windows and ex-windows users on here.
Oh, Mac vs PC.
There is no bigger waste of time than this argument.
Buy what you want,I don`t care.
 
So your like Gollom, you love and hate the mac at the same time. You'll now be known as Smeigl. Hail Smeigl!!!
It's Gollum and Smeagol. :(

To the OP: I would personally go with the MacBook Pro – I've used a MacBook with 1280x800 for nearly five years and it hasn't given me a problem. While I enjoy the larger resolution my desktop display offers the lower one is not a liability for most of what I do.

Also, the last-generation MBP had integrated graphics, not discrete. :)
 
I have been getting used to Windows 7 on my bootcamp side of things (for playing games, and don't always want to re-boot into OSX), and it really is a nice OS. Much more fluid in design, but still not as aesthetically pleasing as OSX. I am sure that Microsoft will build upon Win7 for the next one and it will be even better.
 
This Sony might be what the new MBP should have been. What you guys/gals think?

As others have said, PCs usually have better hardware specs on paper, but without OS X, you'll never have the same, and much much better, experience, and that's what you're paying for, one way or the other ;)
 
One thing I always had with Windows was the bloody drivers, there is always some problem with them. I hope with the Mac that doesn't occur.

I'm swayed to the MBP, probably base model, than I'll upgrade de RAM and the HDD to a SSD.
 
The only thing you'll get from your Sony is a headache and continuing bills from all the virus software and support you'll be paying for.

Thats for sure. Plus I don't know how he figures Apple was "supposed to" provide the same specs as Sony.
 
I've never known a happy Vaio user, so good luck with that.

I was a very happy Vaio user.

Then I did the unthinkable- and actually clicked on a link on one of those FB viruses (the email from a friend with a link to a picture of you variety), and it wiped my computer out within a week. (I know, I know, I never should have been that stupid, but I had been sleeping 2-4 hours/night for weeks, and the email was from a friend, so I made a dumb move. Still kicking myself for being so naive).

I got an MBPro after- the 2009 silver unibody version. Got it because I could have more confidence in not getting another virus, and because my ex had one and I liked how nice it looked (the screens are just so pretty). This was very important to me as I had lost about 80 hours of work on my masters thesis that had been completed in the week that I had only backed up on my laptop (I know, I know- another lesson learned the hard way- again, with lack of sleep, I didn't do proper protocol re backing up externally).

While I loved my VAIO, I love my MBPro even more. I understand the specs aren't as nice, but I quickly became co-dependent on the MB because of the trackpad, battery life, screen graphics, lack of viruses, and the Spaces feature and the other buttons near it where you can move quickly between windows, quickly access a calculator, weather, etc. This row of buttons and the trackpad alone have saved me countless time and energy. Apple also has nice resale value, which is nice to get when upgrading to a new computer.

What I do miss- the VAIO was smaller and lighter, and packed a good punch for its size. MB Air is appealing to me, but friend's was constantly running the fan and I haven't seen newer versions operate to see if they fixed it since first gen so can't recommend that one myself.

I also miss a better sounding DVD drive. While I find the MBPro drive sounds quirky now, in reality it is a pretty horrific sounding drive.

Finally, I miss a seamless Windows system. I run VMWare Fusion for work and can't stand it (trying to fix that problem now). Even before that, when I just had Bootcamp, I was annoyed when I used it on my Mac. I don't think it necessarily ran Windows worse, but it just felt crappy to use Windows on a Mac- I think moreso because seeing it run on Mac makes me miss Mac OS, whereas if I don't have Mac around I don't get angry at my work PC.

There are also a few tweaks and issues with running Windows in a MB, like sometimes my caplock is on in Windows even when green light is off on my caplock key, audio didn't work in windows for awhile at first, etc.

It also annoyed me to have to turn off computer to restart in the other OS. I know, I know, this is just being spoiled, but it will be so nice when it is just really easy, seamless, and fast to work between the two.

Finally, because it had great specs, it was still a great machine 3 years after I bought it until the virus, which was also nice. It is so easy to get quickly outdated on a laptop, and it is nice we have such great alternatives to choose from :)

Anyway, hope this helps you consider the pros and cons. I don't mean to bash my MB here, I still love it more than the VAIO, but I wanted you to know all the cons before making a decision in case they are dealbreakers for you. The features I listed that I love are way more important than a silly sounding DVD drive, but for others that may not be true.

Good luck in whatever decision you make!
 
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Why do people even bother asking here these types of questions here. Almost all the people that hang out in this place are biased towards Macs for whatever reason (It's definitely not as great as they would all like you to think)
Most of the people here haven't even used windows 7 so they have no idea what they're talking about
and a lot of the people that complain about Windows Laptops are just angry people who had a bad experience with one before and need somewhere to vent their frustrations. Please I'm begging you don't believe the hype.

My other two machines are windows 7 machines. Both platforms have their strengths, and a normal rational person would understand this. All of my machines run rock solid, and it's probably cause i don't frequent sketchy websites that make Windows machines crap out.. You need to do some more researching and talking to people.
 
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Thats for sure. Plus I don't know how he figures Apple was "supposed to" provide the same specs as Sony.

I guess he assumed judging by the ridiculous amounts of money Apple charges for their products
 
No.

In a word.

I was unaware Sony produced laptops that run OSX--I must have missed that momentous announcement. ;)
 
I've been using PC's since DOS 3.1. Always hated Macs and Mac users. Just bought my first MBP.
If you hate Mac users and Macs computers so much as you say, why the hell did you get a MBP in the first place? Nobody gets anything based only on the way they look, even Apple fanboys.

A) Despite what the fanboys say, technically all PC's KILL Macs unless you get a beefed up MacPro for big money. Period.
That is certainly not true. Most of the notebooks out in the market right now are consumer products with good looking specs, you just have to look at the RAM frequency or the processor cache to picture the bottleneck you're getting. And unless you're installing a powerful Linux distro, you'll never get the same performance from Windows than you'll get with OS X.

B) Anyone that says Windows 7 sucks is just silly and doesn't know what they speak of. I had NO problems with Win 98, Vista or 7 at all. Never had a virus ever... It's quite simple to maintain your computer.
True, but the thing is that you just shouldn't be in the need to maintain a computer with a bunch of security and system cleaning programs running when It should be the OS itself the one looking for himself, not the user.

C) Windows 7 is VERY easy to use. Unless you have comprehension problems of some sort.
Here I agree, is really easy to use until the whole system crashes by an always unknown reason. But I do think that at least the GUI has been improved since XP.

D) The "no virus" argument is silly. There ARE viruses for MacOSX. If you can't keep your computer virus free then perhaps you shouldn't use one.
Wrong. Is impossible to get viruses in OS X due to the structure the system works on (ever heard of UNIX?). You can get troyans (which are not viruses), but you would still need to enter the root password, and there're less than 10 troyans (if so) built for OS X.

E) Most mac users (that I have known and I imagine overall) are little more than noobs and desire/need the simplicity of OSX.
I think I've proved this isn't true, you didn't know the difference between troyans and viruses, and you don't seem to know the behavior of UNIX based systems, when I do. Following that logic you're the noob. But I really prefer to stay cool on that, I have my own opinion when It comes to haters. Plus, simplicity is what (at least I) look at when judging an OS.

No hard feelings, you're apparently going through some kind of switcher personality disorder :D
 
E) Most mac users (that I have known and I imagine overall) are little more than noobs and desire/need the simplicity of OSX.

Heh.

Nearly my entire research group are "mac fanboys" and I assure you, they can do more with a computer than you can.
 
I guess he assumed judging by the ridiculous amounts of money Apple charges for their products

The pre-release speculations were:
- Lighter MBP
- 1440x900 screen (maybe Matte)
- SSD
- No DVD drive (some predicted blu-ray)
- USB 3.0
- Discrete graphic card

The new Sony S, it's lighter 300gr than the MBP, the screen has a bit higher resolution and is matte, it has a blu-ray as an option, it has USB 3.0 and HDMI, it has a discrete GPU.

The standard GPU is quite weak but it has 512MB of memory which is better than stealing 10% of the RAM and the drivers will be much better than the Intel ones, also for 60€/£ you can get an average GPU with 1GB.

So the title of my post was related to the fact that the Sony meets the MBP upgrade rumours better than the MBP did.
 
Sparknotes Post

Ok, so I'm cutting straight to the chase. I had a Vostro 1510 that I upgraded with a 7200 rpm drive and 256 mb of the nvidia 8400. I wanted to stay under 1000 and get better specs.
It ended up being about the same price as a MacBook and had the same resolution screen and a horrible battery. And now it is slower than the base MacBook and will resell for about 300 maximum.

Also I did dual boot it. I actually preferred windows 7 because the other OS dis not work properly: no sleep, no hibernate, no multi touch.

Windows 7 is solid but occasionally it's a bit Wonky and the hibernate and sleep functions just fail entirely.
 
Jump to conclusions much?

You`ll find a huge number of windows and ex-windows users on here.
Oh, Mac vs PC.
There is no bigger waste of time than this argument.
Buy what you want,I don`t care.
Exactly. I actually use Win 7 more than OS X on my MBP :hides: My work requires windows so I'm stuck. My work ALSO requires OS X at times - there is no other machine that can really do both. I just got the new machine in my sig, it is replacing an almost 4 year old 17" MBP hires anti glare machine that is STILL in pristine condition. Even though it is not a unibody, the build quality is absolutely second to none. I buy Apple laptops because there is no other brand with the build - these machines are literally museum quality.

I will second the Windows vs OS X argument, it is old and stale and both OSes have their place. When it comes to hardware though, you can't beat the quality of Apple. I get that you can't spec out a 13" with a dedicated video card and all that but that is just how Apple rolls.
 
The pre-release speculations were:
- Lighter MBP
- 1440x900 screen (maybe Matte)
- SSD
- No DVD drive (some predicted blu-ray)
- USB 3.0
- Discrete graphic card

The new Sony S, it's lighter 300gr than the MBP, the screen has a bit higher resolution and is matte, it has a blu-ray as an option, it has USB 3.0 and HDMI, it has a discrete GPU.

The standard GPU is quite weak but it has 512MB of memory which is better than stealing 10% of the RAM and the drivers will be much better than the Intel ones, also for 60€/£ you can get an average GPU with 1GB.

So the title of my post was related to the fact that the Sony meets the MBP upgrade rumours better than the MBP did.

I was hoping for the 13" MacBook Pro with a 1440 X 900 screen, and discrete graphics. I considered buying a Sony just as you are, but after switching to a 15" MacBook Pro a week ago, i'd never go back to a PC! And anyone that tells you they never had any issues with Windows 98, Vista, or XP never really used their computer as intended. Windows Vista was the worst OS I have ever used and crashed so many times! You just need to use a MacBook for a few hours to realize how superior they are.. The keyboard, trackpad, and screen are awesome, much better than anything else I've used. It's fast, and extremely stable. I haven't had a single error in Snow Leopard. It just works, and very well! Even though the 13" doesn't have a discrete GPU anymore, it's worth the trade off for the other things you'll love about the MacBook. They look one way on paper, but in real life you would be happier with the MacBook.
 
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