Is this a good deal on a 17" MacBook Pro?

[macaddict23]

My college is selling the previous 17" MacBook Pro (Brand New) AND Applecare ($239 value) all for $1899. Considering that the educational price for the current 17" model is $2599 (without Applecare), I'm tempted.

I currently have a Dual-Core 2GHz PowerMac G5 with 4.5GB of ram. I'm wondering which of the two will be faster. My main apps are CS3. I occasionally deal with 150MB+ files in Photoshop.

Thanks!

 

[Blue Velvet]

I bought a 2.33 MBP at about the same time I was using a dual 2.5 G5 PowerMac at work for design work. The MBP was a little faster on straight processing tasks i.e. filters, distilling etc. but far slower on anything that involves lots of disk access including working on large Photoshop files.

If you're proposing swapping one for the other, then the only real substantial gain would be portability and size, in my opinion.

 

[iknowyourider]

It's a great deal. Snow Leopard will run on it too.

 

[techound1]

The portability is really hard to beat and the price is nice. I think you'll hate yourself if you let this one go by.

 

[dal20402]

Go for it. That's a great deal.

The MBP will absolutely roast your G5 in processor- and memory-driven tasks. It will feel even faster, because for some reason the OS X interface is more responsive on Intel machines than on PPC machines of similar horsepower. If you attach a fast FireWire 800 disk, you can also get comparable disk performance.

Make sure to upgrade to 4 GB RAM. Such a powerful machine is really a waste with less than that, unless all you are doing is repetitive processor-driven tasks that don't involve big datasets.

 

[Bigsam411]

Apple refurb last I checked had that model going for 2099 so I say you got a stellar deal on your hands.

 

[kabunaru]

Go for this deal. Could be once in a lifetime.

 

[macaddict23]

There are ten of these deals available.

 

[jdastas]

what college?