MBPro or Imac 27"

[WishBone]

I'm having second thoughts about my purchase of the new iMac 27" i7 and am now rethinking my decision in favor of a new MBPro 17" and the 24" LED monitor. I have a couple of questions for those current users of their MB Pro's and Apple monitor.

1. How many wires need to be plugged and unplugged to switch between portable and desktop use? Is this a simple and painless deal or will it be a PITA to connect and reconnect? I would use this without the monitor off and on quite frequently. I must admit that I do like the idea of being able to use 2 displays.

2. I plan on adding the 8 GB of ram and an SSD drive to this new 17" MBPro and suspect this should make it at least as fast as my current 24" 2007 iMac. However, I'm unsure of what to use for a connected data drive for the best speed. Any suggestions?

3. I must admit that I'm more than a little concerned about what the new quad core iMacs will be like regarding noise and heat. Am I nuts for even considering the MBPro instead of this?

I am not a real power user, but do use Dreamweaver, PhotoShop, Illustrator quite extensively as well as work with fairly large excel files and databases and mailing software. Any suggestions and other info to help me make my final decision would be most appreciated.

 

[darngooddesign]

Questions like this are curious, do you need a laptop as your primary machine? Or would you be better served with the iMac and a used MacBook?

 

[kryptonianjorel]

I'd get the 27" iMac. laptops are great because they've got some power and they're portable. If you're going to use it at your desk most often, theres no question, get the iMac. You'll appreciate the huge screen and the power of the i7. You won't feel the need to upgrade nearly as early, as that i7 should keep the machine feeling fast for a long time.

 

[WishBone]

Hey darn,

I presently have the new MBPro 13" but may need to pass this on to the spouse as her MBAir (rev A) seems about to explode. So if this happens I will need to have the notebook portability I alluded to above.

 

[airplaneman]

Hey darn,

I presently have the new MBPro 13" but may need to pass this on to the spouse as her MBAir (rev A) seems about to explode. So if this happens I will need to have the notebook portability I alluded to above.

By all means, then, go for the MBP. It's a great machine.

 

[apolloa]

I'm having second thoughts about my purchase of the new iMac 27" i7 and am now rethinking my decision in favor of a new MBPro 17" and the 24" LED monitor. I have a couple of questions for those current users of their MB Pro's and Apple monitor.

1. How many wires need to be plugged and unplugged to switch between portable and desktop use? Is this a simple and painless deal or will it be a PITA to connect and reconnect? I would use this without the monitor off and on quite frequently. I must admit that I do like the idea of being able to use 2 displays.

2. I plan on adding the 8 GB of ram and an SSD drive to this new 17" MBPro and suspect this should make it at least as fast as my current 24" 2007 iMac. However, I'm unsure of what to use for a connected data drive for the best speed. Any suggestions?

3. I must admit that I'm more than a little concerned about what the new quad core iMacs will be like regarding noise and heat. Am I nuts for even considering the MBPro instead of this?

I am not a real power user, but do use Dreamweaver, PhotoShop, Illustrator quite extensively as well as work with fairly large excel files and databases and mailing software. Any suggestions and other info to help me make my final decision would be most appreciated.

I would stick with an iMac reading what you want to do with it. It will give you much more power, however, it would be a total pain to add your own SSD or upgrade the hard drive in, the MB Pro would be a much easier machine to upgrade in that respect.

 

[pinksatin]

I had the same question...

I was considering the same thing...

I thought about waiting for a quad-core MBP but when they released the i7 iMac... I was sold because the display was so large and it could be used as an external display for a MBP in the future...

The cheapest 27'' iMac is like buying a display and getting a computer for free...

 

[WishBone]

I agree about the new iMac being much more powerful and the new 27" screen looks amazing in the store. As I mentioned, I did order one the day they became available.

My reservations come from some previous early release processors for the Macs and iMacs and I would really hate to wind up with something that the fans have to ramp up all the time to keep it cool. I just can't help but be concerned about how they're going to keep this quad and the 4850 cool enough.

 

[Av1o3]

I agree about the new iMac being much more powerful and the new 27" screen looks amazing in the store. As I mentioned, I did order one the day they became available.

My reservations come from some previous early release processors for the Macs and iMacs and I would really hate to wind up with something that the fans have to ramp up all the time to keep it cool. I just can't help but be concerned about how they're going to keep this quad and the 4850 cool enough.

From what I remember reading from a teardown article that they added another bigger heatsink in the imac so that should probably help. Oh yeah and don't forget that the iMac has four ram slots so having 8gb of ram on the iMac will be significantly cheaper than getting it on the mbp

 

[antskip]

Check out the new 27" Imac in a store today.
The screen may be big (even to the extent of wanting to place it farther back so one can see it without looking to the left and to the right), but it is very shiny. Those who do not like mirror-screens will continue to be disappointed.
As for resolution, the 27" Imac screen is much less densely pixeled than the MBPro 17" WUXGA. For clear, dense, text, the more pixels per inch the better. On the other hand, for photographs, the big 27" Imac screen would be amazing (except for the glare/mirroring, of course!). And if you don't mind the lower pixel count per inch, it would be amazing for watching 2 web pages side by side.