I was at Best Buy and couldn't help myself. I've been looking for a smaller laptop for awhile now but was trying to aim for the 1000 mark or less. My old iBook was just showing too much age even for just browsing the interwebs.
Anyway I couldn't stop myself from buying the new 2.0Ghz Macbook with Best Buy's 18 month 0% deal. I have the cash now but being able to spread it out took away the "Should I now?" feeling. To be honest I'm relieved they didn't have Pro's otherwise I would have been in big trouble with that offer!
So far I have Spore loaded and WoW is still patching. I played in Medium settings at native resolution through the cell level and never noticed any slowdowns, I was impressed by that alone. I'm sure as I get deeper (civ age) things might bog down with more and more textures on the screen at one time though. So far its a speedy little machine though and the perfect size for what I wanted.
Typing is easier than I thought it would be, the keyboard is responsive and no issues there, I just wasn't 100% sold on the way the keyboard is and still am not to an extent. I slide my fingers from key to key and feel myself catching the edges of the top row's keys often. Something I'll get used to and yes I know proper keying means I should do that already!
The touchpad is nice, I am not sure how often I'll use the four finger slide but its nice to know its there, but with the F3 key right there too, is it necessary? People are right in that you sometimes want to click near the top and find you cannot. I think that is just the nature of having such a large touchpad that you try to click where ever your fingers end up. Its not too bad but it is a shame the ENTIRE surface cannot act as buttons, then you could even have had four programmable corners which would have been welcome.
The screen is simply stunning. I didn't realize till my girlfriend asked why it was so dim that it was only on 2 ticks from off. At full brightness this sucker is a blinder. No dead pixels, no bad light leakage. I have absolute no complaints on it.
As others have stated previously the thing is solid. It has a pleasant weight to it. Substantial yet portable, if that makes any sense.
The machine is also by all accounts more quiet than my iBook was. Even in Spore there was nothing more than a hum. The machine does get a bit warm to the touch but nothing like what I experienced sometimes on the palm rests of my iBook. The heat also seems to be more evenly distributed, I'll attribute that to the fact its a big chunk of aluminum heat sink pretending to be the body of a laptop.
I am currently debating purchasing a 4Gb memory kit and a 7200rpm hard drive. The memory I'm sure I'll get. The hard drive, I'm unsure if its worth the cost. Any thoughts on this would be helpful. I am not interested in buying a SSD as I do not have that kind of money to burn.
I'll post more as I play around more and let you know what gaming is like long term tomorrow. As is I really should get to sleep as work is coming upon me quickly.
Anyway I couldn't stop myself from buying the new 2.0Ghz Macbook with Best Buy's 18 month 0% deal. I have the cash now but being able to spread it out took away the "Should I now?" feeling. To be honest I'm relieved they didn't have Pro's otherwise I would have been in big trouble with that offer!
So far I have Spore loaded and WoW is still patching. I played in Medium settings at native resolution through the cell level and never noticed any slowdowns, I was impressed by that alone. I'm sure as I get deeper (civ age) things might bog down with more and more textures on the screen at one time though. So far its a speedy little machine though and the perfect size for what I wanted.
Typing is easier than I thought it would be, the keyboard is responsive and no issues there, I just wasn't 100% sold on the way the keyboard is and still am not to an extent. I slide my fingers from key to key and feel myself catching the edges of the top row's keys often. Something I'll get used to and yes I know proper keying means I should do that already!
The touchpad is nice, I am not sure how often I'll use the four finger slide but its nice to know its there, but with the F3 key right there too, is it necessary? People are right in that you sometimes want to click near the top and find you cannot. I think that is just the nature of having such a large touchpad that you try to click where ever your fingers end up. Its not too bad but it is a shame the ENTIRE surface cannot act as buttons, then you could even have had four programmable corners which would have been welcome.
The screen is simply stunning. I didn't realize till my girlfriend asked why it was so dim that it was only on 2 ticks from off. At full brightness this sucker is a blinder. No dead pixels, no bad light leakage. I have absolute no complaints on it.
As others have stated previously the thing is solid. It has a pleasant weight to it. Substantial yet portable, if that makes any sense.
The machine is also by all accounts more quiet than my iBook was. Even in Spore there was nothing more than a hum. The machine does get a bit warm to the touch but nothing like what I experienced sometimes on the palm rests of my iBook. The heat also seems to be more evenly distributed, I'll attribute that to the fact its a big chunk of aluminum heat sink pretending to be the body of a laptop.
I am currently debating purchasing a 4Gb memory kit and a 7200rpm hard drive. The memory I'm sure I'll get. The hard drive, I'm unsure if its worth the cost. Any thoughts on this would be helpful. I am not interested in buying a SSD as I do not have that kind of money to burn.
I'll post more as I play around more and let you know what gaming is like long term tomorrow. As is I really should get to sleep as work is coming upon me quickly.