The 13" i5 Macbook Pro should be fine for you after you update the hard drive on your own. Buy it from Microcenter if you have one in your area. They are selling the 13" i5 Macbook Pro for the same price as the Macbooks until the end of the month.
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MBP 13" for college
- Thread starter crush500
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Does anyone here go to college and use a Macbook Pro along with a Macbook Air? I was thinking that a 17" MBP with an 11" MBA would be a nice setup. Anyone have experience with this?
Are you sure about that "Not Taxing" bit? I honestly don't know what undergrad CS and Physics types do - I was busy hanging out in the Bio building when I was getting my BA - but both MATLAB and Mathematica are more than happy to devour all the resources you give them, and some simulations are remarkably intensive.
Never, ever, ever, ever, ever buy the plastic models. They chip, and while Apple fixes it for free, it's a pain to wait for the repair (which could take days if they don't have the part).
Your best bet is to get a refurb 2.7 13" when they come back. I think they had them for like $1269?
Get the 17 inch 2011 Macbook Pro with 2.3 ghz and 8GB of ram plus 512GB of apple SSD for $4000. It would last you almost 5 years without it being outdated.
$4000 for a laptop...are you serious?
R
I read about several people with this configuration in one of the threads. It makes sense for portability sake, though you need to make sure that you network them so that you can easily share files as needed.
It can be really frustrating to be out and about and realize that you don't have the files that are on the other machine.
R
A 13" 2011 MBP i5 would be practical. While a 15 or 17 (which I own) is not significantly heavier, I would pick a 13".
If you decide to install a database, and/or tomcat server etc. on your machine, you should be OK with 4GB.
If screen real estate is a big issue, I would go bigger, can't comment on the intel GPU, but my old PCs do fine with intel graphics. I presume you have an external monitor, if not, you could get an inexpensive one for a bigger screen.
Microcenter has the $999 deal for the 13. I read that summer may bring the ipod touch deal back, but I would have to assume that you'll lose the current discounts, so it may be a wash!
Good luck with school
If you decide to install a database, and/or tomcat server etc. on your machine, you should be OK with 4GB.
If screen real estate is a big issue, I would go bigger, can't comment on the intel GPU, but my old PCs do fine with intel graphics. I presume you have an external monitor, if not, you could get an inexpensive one for a bigger screen.
Microcenter has the $999 deal for the 13. I read that summer may bring the ipod touch deal back, but I would have to assume that you'll lose the current discounts, so it may be a wash!
Good luck with school
Have you considered a 13" MacBook Air? It's very portable perfect for commuting and traveling to school, and it's quite powerful as well once upgraded with parts
Get the 13" MBP not the MBA. As a college freshmen, what do you use a computer for? Mostly pirating music, watching movies, porn, etc. You will love having a mac and not having to worry about getting viruses...it's like living in the 80's pre-AIDS. I would suggest upgrading to the 500GB hard drive from the base model. You are going to need the space....
Either the 13" or 15" MBP would be perfect for you. As mentioned before, most scientific computing is done on Linux, so running another *nix operating system makes a lot more sense than Windows.
Considering you could be running a lot of CPU-heavy stuff for CS and physics, I wouldn't get the MBA, lovely piece of hardware though it is.
Between the 13" or 15", depends how much you value screen real estate vs. portability, and how much you think you might be doing multi-threaded stuff. Of course, as a CS major, you'll want to master multi-threading eventually, but lots of course work might be fine single-threaded or too difficult to bother with multi-threading just for a HW assignment.
That said, I use the base 15" now; it's not much of a portability problem. I'm a grad student in Stats and do a lot of CS work now; I was a physics major for part of my undergrad; the *nix underpinnings of OS X were very useful in all three. Almost all my professors doing research run either Linux or OS X. (Those more in the applied area can sometimes get by better on Windows.)
Considering you could be running a lot of CPU-heavy stuff for CS and physics, I wouldn't get the MBA, lovely piece of hardware though it is.
Between the 13" or 15", depends how much you value screen real estate vs. portability, and how much you think you might be doing multi-threaded stuff. Of course, as a CS major, you'll want to master multi-threading eventually, but lots of course work might be fine single-threaded or too difficult to bother with multi-threading just for a HW assignment.
That said, I use the base 15" now; it's not much of a portability problem. I'm a grad student in Stats and do a lot of CS work now; I was a physics major for part of my undergrad; the *nix underpinnings of OS X were very useful in all three. Almost all my professors doing research run either Linux or OS X. (Those more in the applied area can sometimes get by better on Windows.)
You won't be doing a lot of heavy lifting as a CS or Physics major.
If I were in your position I would just install Linux on your laptop. It will give you all the benefits of Mac OS X (stability, no viruses) for much less. For Java, Linux is a better development environment anyway. Try Ubuntu or Debian and see if you like it.
If you are CS or Physics major you should know how to use Linux anyway.
You can run Eclipse, Matlab and Mathematica on Linux perfectly fine.
If money is an issue avoid getting a Macbook Pro. It is an unnecessary luxury. I am already kicking myself for getting a Macbook Pro last year.
You can't overstate the following:
CS IS NOT A CPU intensive major! Most of your programs will compile extremely fast! Probably a netbook is sufficient!
If I were in your position I would just install Linux on your laptop. It will give you all the benefits of Mac OS X (stability, no viruses) for much less. For Java, Linux is a better development environment anyway. Try Ubuntu or Debian and see if you like it.
If you are CS or Physics major you should know how to use Linux anyway.
You can run Eclipse, Matlab and Mathematica on Linux perfectly fine.
If money is an issue avoid getting a Macbook Pro. It is an unnecessary luxury. I am already kicking myself for getting a Macbook Pro last year.
You can't overstate the following:
CS IS NOT A CPU intensive major! Most of your programs will compile extremely fast! Probably a netbook is sufficient!
not true, im in college and carry my 15 in a sleeve everyday in my backpack, and it literally weighs exactly 1 pound more than my previous 13 uMB. I do not notice the weight at all. i feel like i have the exact same computer even when i pull it out of the sleeve, then i open the lid. and well
sorry my first post wasn't at all relevant to you but this post is. When do you plan on buying this computer? I know you want a small portable computer so have you considered the AIR? Now i know you probably don't want an out-dated C2D processor, but apple is refreshing the AIRs very, very soon
http://www.appleinsider.com/article...n_of_thunderbolt_macbook_airs_next_month.html
and these new AIRs IMHO are in everyway better than the 13 MBP.
Screen resolution is way better. The only downfall is HD space, but with an external Thunderbolt HD (appearing this summer) that wont be an issue because the I/O speeds will be just so dang fast.
Anyways, for FWIW, i honestly think you should purchase an 11 or 13 inch AIR. good luck!
Keep it portable and buy the Base model 13inch i5 and buy a external monitor
and a Lacie rugged 1TB external hard drive has this is what i have done.
And still be cheaper than the 13 inch Air base model.
Apparently Lacie are working on a Thunder bolt connecter, for what its worth.
and a Lacie rugged 1TB external hard drive has this is what i have done.
And still be cheaper than the 13 inch Air base model.
Apparently Lacie are working on a Thunder bolt connecter, for what its worth.
At first, yes.
But later on, it depends what classes you're taking. Once you start dealing with more complex algorithms or very large datasets, the time it takes to run your programs for a single homework assignment can start being measured in hours or even days. At least that's how it's been with my machine learning course.
Of course, chances are you'll have access to a department server to run this stuff on, but there are plenty of courses and situations in CS or physics that are extremely CPU-intensive. It's good to be prepared for that if you end up finding yourself interested in these areas. A netbook wouldn't even be able to load a lot of the datasets I get for my assignments into memory.
Of course if you meant the heavy lifting may not be done on your machine, then that's definitely a good point to consider. Personally, I like to be able to work on projects even when I don't have internet access.
Hmmm, how well did you do in college?
I think it is about a bit more than you posted here....
R
I completely agree. Once you start those 300 and 400 level classes, you'll be doing a lot more intensive stuff then you did in the introduction classes. Think databases and OS.
Also, OP, if you can afford it, I suggest the macbook air as well if you're looking at the 13 inch variety. The flash memory will have similiar read speeds as SSD although write will be slower. And the screen on the air is much better with a higher ppi. Personally, I feel the resolution of the 13" mbp is horrible.
the new toshiba and samsung flash storage in the airs give great write speeds as well as great reads. i'm getting roughly 200mb/s for both read and write, which is a HUGE boost over the 7200rpm HDD. i recommend the 13 inch air, its an incredible machine
http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook-Pro-15-Inch-Unibody-Early-2011-Teardown/4990/1
Can you see why not now?