Long but hopefully interesting. Left my home in the Philippines to spend 9 months back in the UK taking care of my mother who is having double knee reconstruction.
My family bless them gave me all kinds of reasons why I shouldn’t break up our home Apple system with a Mac Pro, MacBook Air, 3 iPads, 3 iPhones, 3 Apple TV’s and a Thunderbolt RAID back up system so I let it be and travelled with only my trusty IPhone 6.
It soon became apparent that I needed a laptop on the cheap for basic Internet browsing, word processing, spreadsheeting and to fix a long standing problem when High Sierra came out. So how would I achieve it on the cheap?
I went to EBay and bought a late 2009 MacBook white for a hundred quid. Light scratches on the polycarbonate body and the compulsory cracking on the lid hinges. But 4GB RAM, 120GB SSD and a replacement battery with only 148 cycles plus 2011 Microsoft Office loaded.
I sold the 4GB and bought 8GB, a data doubler frame to replace the SuperDrive, added a second 120GB SSD and fitted an after market top and bottom case protector. So what did I get for my 200 quid total outlay?
A great MacBook that does everything I need with a big PLUS. I like to rip the iTunes movies I buy just in case Apple screws my iTunes library at some point in the future. That stopped working on my home system when High Sierra came out, the third party rip software stopped working and they could not find a way around Apple’s encryption.
The MacBook I bought was running El Capitan so I upgraded to Sierra only even though it will happily run High Sierra.
I am doing all my web browsing, word documents, excel spreadsheets and have ripped 40 films all on a 200 quid Mac! OK the fan runs like an aircraft taking off trying to cool the CPU but it worked.
When I head home next year I can probably sell it for what I paid out.
[doublepost=1565303432][/doublepost]Oh 2.66Ghz core Duo processor
My family bless them gave me all kinds of reasons why I shouldn’t break up our home Apple system with a Mac Pro, MacBook Air, 3 iPads, 3 iPhones, 3 Apple TV’s and a Thunderbolt RAID back up system so I let it be and travelled with only my trusty IPhone 6.
It soon became apparent that I needed a laptop on the cheap for basic Internet browsing, word processing, spreadsheeting and to fix a long standing problem when High Sierra came out. So how would I achieve it on the cheap?
I went to EBay and bought a late 2009 MacBook white for a hundred quid. Light scratches on the polycarbonate body and the compulsory cracking on the lid hinges. But 4GB RAM, 120GB SSD and a replacement battery with only 148 cycles plus 2011 Microsoft Office loaded.
I sold the 4GB and bought 8GB, a data doubler frame to replace the SuperDrive, added a second 120GB SSD and fitted an after market top and bottom case protector. So what did I get for my 200 quid total outlay?
A great MacBook that does everything I need with a big PLUS. I like to rip the iTunes movies I buy just in case Apple screws my iTunes library at some point in the future. That stopped working on my home system when High Sierra came out, the third party rip software stopped working and they could not find a way around Apple’s encryption.
The MacBook I bought was running El Capitan so I upgraded to Sierra only even though it will happily run High Sierra.
I am doing all my web browsing, word documents, excel spreadsheets and have ripped 40 films all on a 200 quid Mac! OK the fan runs like an aircraft taking off trying to cool the CPU but it worked.
When I head home next year I can probably sell it for what I paid out.
[doublepost=1565303432][/doublepost]Oh 2.66Ghz core Duo processor