New Setup, MBA, Mac Mini

[will waters]

HI

I am planning over the next few months to upgrade my setup, i currently only have a macbook, which struggles with what i use it for, and i am starting to haven problems with it (i am moving a lot, however it is still serving as a desktop as well, along with basic gaming machine)

So my idea is:
1) Buy a Macbook air, from amazon (probably 2008 model), this will be used for travelling with me and using simple applications e.g. Word, File Maker Pro, Excel

2) Buy a Mac Mini, I am still not sure what model to get, however i would probably wait until the 2012 model came out?

3) School only runs mac, so i can easily connect to the servers etc (we have Xserve)

4) Or should i just get a Macbook pro?

What would you think this setup would be like for someone at boarding school? Or what would you get?

Will

 

[AdrianK]

What do you currently use your computer for? Hard to recommend anything spec-wise without knowing that.

 

[KylePowers]

What's your price range?

I love the MBA, but I haven't really heard any good things about the '08 model, so I'd look into that first.

Depending on how basic your gaming needs are, I'd go anywhere from a 2011 13in MBA (for fairly basic) to a 15in MBP (for not so basic, since it has a dedicated GPU). Do you have a screen size preference?

I personally like the whole idea of having an ultraportable with me at all times and then having a desktop setup to go along with it, like a monitor, wireless keyboard, wireless mouse, etc. With two computers, you're often splitting up files or not having certain files up to date... which isn't necessarily impossible to manage, but it's definitely easier to just have one hard drive for things.

Speaking of hard drives, do you have a size requirement? The MBA is pretty limited in that aspect.

 

[will waters]

Mbp

I think I have just decided to go with the MBP (13") as I am also saving up for a trip to Nepal in 2013!

Thanks though for replying!