Trade Windows Laptop for Macbook Pro

[calibrationx]

Hi everyone, I'm new to these forums

This guy is offering to trade me his fairly good condition mid-2010 13.3 macbook pro (MC374LL/A) in exchange for my HP dm3-3012nr and $300.

I've always wanted to try out a mac and I was wondering if this model still has much life in it. Also wondering if the core 2 duos produce a lot of heat. He says the battery has under 200 cycles, which is good I presume. I was also wondering if this model would handle snow leopard well.

I'll pretty much be using this for college work, a little bit of lightroom, and light gaming if it can handle that.

Thanks in advance!

 

[mwkingsandiego]

Trade away HP for MacBook

mid-2010 13.3 macbook pro (MC374LL/A) in exchange for my HP dm3-3012nr and $300. I've always wanted to try out a mac and I was wondering if this model still has much life in it. Also wondering if the core 2 duos produce a lot of heat. He says the battery has under 200 cycles, which is good I presume. I was also wondering if this model would handle snow leopard well.

I'll pretty much be using this for college work, a little bit of lightroom, and light gaming if it can handle that.

The mid-2010 is really only one generation behind (there is a 2011 model but differences are slight), so furture life should not be a problem. Likely to be better actually, than facing Win8 with your current machine. I sitll run a 5 year old MacBook (Core 2 Duo) and a 4 year old Mac Air in my home and they are fine with Lion.

Heat is really not a problem, any more that it is with Windoze laptops, many of which use the same processor. You don't say what clock rate nor how much RAM, both of which will affect speed, particularly RAM. Like Windoze, MacBook will run with 2GB but 4GB will work very much better. If there is less than 4GB still an ok trade, but you might find you want to upgrade soon. Lion wanted more RAM than Snow Leopard in my experience. RAM and hard disk are both user replaceable so you can DIY it (see http://www.macsales.com/ for tips and parts).

Snow Leopard and Lion aren't a problem on even older & slower MacBooks (personal experience), no worries on that score. Again, Win8 on your HP would be more of a worry in my mind.

Assuming "college work" means internet research, word processing, etc - easy as pie (hardly any laptop these days is challenged by that). I don't know what Lightroom is, so no comment; if that's a must-have app, check for a Mac version first, but likely there is something similar or better if there isn't. Gaming depends entirely on what game, Second Life should be no problem at all, very high frame rates on a first person shooter will always be in any laptop - there just isn't space, power or cooling for a mongo graphics engine.

I wasn't entirely clear on who was giving who the $300 but you can go to eBay and see what similar used MacBooks are worth and then decide. If Friend was giving me the $300, I would already be at his house giving up the HP and taking the MacBook

 

[Dhelsdon]

If you can give more info on the specs of the machine, I can advise for lightroom. I run it on my 2011 model MBP with 8GB ram and its smooth as butter.

They say 2GB min for LightRoom 4 so that should give you a general idea..

Mac OS

Multicore Intel processor with 64-bit support
Mac OS X v10.6.8 or v10.7
2GB of RAM
1GB of available hard-disk space
1024x768 display
DVD-ROM drive
Internet connection required for Internet-based services*

 

[calibrationx]

http://www.everymac.com/systems/app...o-2.4-aluminum-13-mid-2010-unibody-specs.html

Core 2 Duo P8600 @ 2.4Ghz
4GB DDR3-1066
250GB 5400RPM HDD
Nvidia 320M