I've been lurking on here for a good while and thought I'd drop a note to say "thanks" to all who contribute here. I finally pulled the trigger and bought a 17" MacBook Pro with matte display and other than the price tag I'm quite happy with the purchase. For all other lurkers who are on the fence, read on for a little more detail on how I arrived at this purchase.
I don't do desktops. Not that I don't like desktop computers, but my lifestyle dictates I need a notebook for day-to-day operations. Considering I'd rather have exactly one computer, I wanted to get something that would serve me well at home and on the road for several years. For this reason I knew I wanted at least the 15" model, so the Pro line was my only option. Fortunately, there's an Apple store about 30 minutes from work so I head down there one day to play with the goodies. I've always loved the glossy display, but after seeing the matte side-by-side with the glossy I knew which one was for me. Yes, the matte isn't as sharp. Yes, the glossy display is gorgeous. But, I couldn't deal with the screen glare and knew this would be a deal-breaker since I would be using my computer in various lighting conditions. Since they don't make the 15" with a matte display, my choice was pretty much made for me by Apple. After three days I'm still tickled with it.
Coming from Windows, there's software I have to run under Windows as there's no Mac version. I knew we had Boot Camp as an option, but I wanted to try a virtual machine first to prevent having to reboot each time I needed a Windows app. Yeah, you have several commercial options, but I chose to try out VirtualBox first (it's free for personal use). So far this little program has worked well for me. It has taken everything I've thrown at it. I don't plan on running Windows games, but all of my Windows apps seem to be working fine under VB.
Moving to a Mac has been fairly painless (except for the wallet hit).
No regrets here.
Cheers!
I don't do desktops. Not that I don't like desktop computers, but my lifestyle dictates I need a notebook for day-to-day operations. Considering I'd rather have exactly one computer, I wanted to get something that would serve me well at home and on the road for several years. For this reason I knew I wanted at least the 15" model, so the Pro line was my only option. Fortunately, there's an Apple store about 30 minutes from work so I head down there one day to play with the goodies. I've always loved the glossy display, but after seeing the matte side-by-side with the glossy I knew which one was for me. Yes, the matte isn't as sharp. Yes, the glossy display is gorgeous. But, I couldn't deal with the screen glare and knew this would be a deal-breaker since I would be using my computer in various lighting conditions. Since they don't make the 15" with a matte display, my choice was pretty much made for me by Apple. After three days I'm still tickled with it.
Coming from Windows, there's software I have to run under Windows as there's no Mac version. I knew we had Boot Camp as an option, but I wanted to try a virtual machine first to prevent having to reboot each time I needed a Windows app. Yeah, you have several commercial options, but I chose to try out VirtualBox first (it's free for personal use). So far this little program has worked well for me. It has taken everything I've thrown at it. I don't plan on running Windows games, but all of my Windows apps seem to be working fine under VB.
Moving to a Mac has been fairly painless (except for the wallet hit).
No regrets here.Cheers!
