What else makes the MBP worth buying?

[bli625]

No viruses are a big selling poing, longevity is a key selling point as well. By the way iLife isn't included. I would recommend taking your parents into the Apple store and have one of the people in the black shirts convince your parental units, they are pretty good at doing it.

iLife is included in all new Macs now..

 

[sammy2066]

You enjoy "working" on my MBP more than any other computer. The computer feels sturdy, the trackpad is large and very responsive. I'm just so much more productive on my MBP!

More productivity is a good reason to buy an MBP.

 

[clyde2801]

The durability of the new unibody design could also be a big selling point for them considering how you're going to be using it in a dorm room and hauling it around to classes...

 

[Pegasus665]

Core 2 Duo 1.5 Ghz, 2 GB RAM, HD-DVD, HDMI output, 160 GB HD, Nvidia 8600M GT.

It was pretty solid when I first bought it, I mean now it serves its purpose, gives me 2 hour battery life and I sync my iPhone 3GS with it, sometimes the Windows toolbar freezes, but all it needs is a software revision, like Windows 7. Honestly though if the MBP had just 2 hours battery life, I might not even look at it really. I don't want to say I'm spending this much money for a good battery, but this battery would be nice to have.

Dude, that is pretty well spec'ed notebook there. In all honesty if it's just an excuse to buy a MacBook Pro then go for it. But if you want to get a MacBook Pro as this one is dying/slow etc, you might want to consider 2 things. Get the Windows OS disc whether XP or Vista (AFTER BACKING UP ALL SENSITIVE DATA), put it into the disc drive, reboot and choose "Destructive install" - basically it will wipe the hardrive and reinstall windows afresh.

You shouldn't have any slowdowns.

Secondly, to increase the longevity of the notebook, upgrade the RAM to 3GB (a 2GB stick is £25 here in the UK) and upgrade the harddrive to 250 or 320GB 7200rpm (for £30-45).

Regarding upgrading the operating system, you do realise that installing Windows OS 7 will slow it down as it's meant for the newer generation of notebooks/desktops. Vista is good enough, I'm still running XP. THe Graphics card in your current notebook looks good enough, the newer generation are the 9600M GT.

I've had a couple of virus's, even my harddrive dying 4 days before my spring exams but to be honest, it's never been a problem to warrent a change to Mac.

It depends what you want from your new notebook. If it's just a nice shiny piece of hardware then by all means go for a Mac. But if you want a work/gaming machine then go for something with a little more kick. The American market is bigger than here in the UK so you should find plenty of well spec'ed 15.4" notebooks with the 9650M GT and the up-and-coming Nvidia GT260 M.

In my first reply, I gave you a spec for a 13.3" by Dell with a dedicated GPU.

In the Apple uMBP 13.3", the 9400M comes in the middle of class 3 graphics cards with a 3Dmark06 of 2100 whereas the 9650M GT is mid. class 2 and the 9500M GT in the Dell XP13's, two-thirds of the way from the top in class 2.

My 2 pence anyway.