Hey there , my 1st question.
I need some in depth information regarding the new MacBook pro and
software for it - I am going off to university in september and want
to upgrade my hefty 3.4Ghz p4 1Gb ram gForce 6800 monster of a laptop
to a more convinent macbook pro , now from what I have researched
myself the macbook has more class and is more elegant than Pc's so
therefore I would like to give it a shot !
As a Mac user I can't help but agree with you, you'd be upgrading to a
much better system. However there are issues to take into
consideration, afterall you need to know it'll work.
I will need as much information as possible on the following subjects
1: Transferring my data, I have hundreds of files I need to transfer
to my new mac - Need info on different ways to transfer , what I would
need to do if I got rid of the PC beforehand - therefor how to back
the data up so my new mac could use it.
-- Well in the case that you won't have the PC by the time you have
the mac you'll need to back the data up on either cd, dvd or a hard
disk. The good news is that all are viable options as OS X supports
windows cd and dvd formats, if you wish to use an external hard drive
your best option is to make sure it is partitioned in FAT32, OS X will
have no trouble reading it. NTFS however could be an issue, it is
supported but I'm not entirely sure to what extent.
2: Network functinality - it is crucial that my mac be able to
interact with the universitys network - it does have wifi access, but
how does macbook pro interact with windows shared drives :S ?
-- As previously stated networking in OS X is simple, unbelievably so.
Viewing windows shared drives may be a little tricky (as i experienced
in student accomodation with my powerbook) but it is possible.
3: Applications - I will be doing a course in computer science and
will need to do alot of coding in languages such as java, c++, c#, c,
VBasic and scripting such as php - any good webdevelpment programs
like dreamweaver?
Also any programs similar to bittorrent and www.newsleecher.com ? These are a must.
-- I'm not a programmer, but I do know that X Code is as good as any
programming software you'll find, naturally as OS X is based on BSD
you will find a wealth of GNU programs that may fulfill any of X Codes
shortcomings (not that I'm sure it has any). Dreamweaver and all
macromedia softwares are available for OS X.
As for bittorrent, I use Azureus, and as far as I know there's not a
better bittorrent program out there, it can even find seeds without a
tracker. As for Usenet there are several programs, I can't reccomend
any as I haven't used any. However I could suggest this
http://www.panic.com/unison/ .
Are you planning on living on campus? If so it's likely that your
university will have a proxy, if this is SOCKS proxy you should be ok,
but you may find it will be an HTTP proxy in which case you will have
to tunnel the connection through port 80, this is possible to control
and you may even find it is impossible to use any software online
which doesn't support an HTTP proxy. Google "http tunneling" for more
information. As far as I know (after alot of investigation) the only
way to http tunnel on a mac/unix machine is if you set up a proxy
server (i.e. at home) with server-side software, and use the client
side software on your mac, that would mean going through 2 internet
connections so the likelyhood of getting speeds worth using torrents
or usenet is not good. However this is not a mac issue, you would have
the same probelm on XP but there are more resources for solving the
problem.
4: Linux - will my mac be able to interact with the uni's linux
servers? Can I use a program like putty or is it more difficult?
-- As has been mention, OS X is just BSD with the Aqua GUI, there
won't be a problem.
5: Games - I like to relax and play pc games every so often . What pc
games can the macbook pro play? Can it emulate pc games?
-- It's hard to answer that really, the MacBook Pro has an x86
architecture which will most likely make it easier for game developers
to port to OS X. Also the significant improvement in speed over the
previous macs will mean it is a more feasable gaming machine, so in
the near future there should definetly be more games. Currently you
could run Windows on your mac with virtualpc, or presumably a linux
version of vmware (now that OS X is x86). With virtualpc I doubt
you'll have a problem playing any games, not any more than you would
on a similarly speced PC.
6: Music and Video - I like to download and watch tv in H.D and with
surround sound - these are .ts files or .mpg files , VLC on my pc can
support these , can mac? Also my surround sound speakers have a 3 end
3.5mm cord - front, rear and center as well as optical input - can mac
output surround sound either of these ways? Will mac play all my .ogg
and .wma music okay?
-- The only thing VLC for mac won't play that it plays on windows is
WMV3 files, for them you need to use either the horrible version of
windows media player for mac or you can use Flip4Mac (
http://www.flip4mac.com/ ) which will allow WMV3 files to play in
quicktime. As for surround sound, with the MacBook Pro you only get a
stereo out, for surround sound you will need an external sound card.
ogg and wma will both play in VLC but not iTunes.
7: Hardware - How does the mac look? Screen clarity, keyboard feel,
touchpad ect? How does it feel? Whats the build quality like , will it
damage alot if dropped? Is it light?
-- The look and feel is fantastic, my PowerBook is beautifull, the
screen has a surprisingly good colour depth and brightness (the
MacBook pro has an even brighter screen, as bright as their full size
monitors). The most obvious design flaw of the PowerBook has been
fixed in the MacBook Pro, that was the power chord (mine falls out all
the time, the MacBook Pro has a new connection called 'MagSafe'.)
About dropping, it's solid, it's unlikely to break as I learned from
dropping my PowerBook. What did happen when I dropped it though was
that the aluminium casing bent, round one corner it looks warped, it's
not a big issue. However a bigger drop could make it very hard to
restore and a new casing is expensive.
Any other information would be amazing
-- You mentioned the speed issue. If you've ever read Intel Vs AMD
reviews you'll be well versed in why frequency doesn't necesarily mean
speed. Even the 1.67GHz Intel Duo with outrun your 3.4GHz P4, this is
because it's actually 2 processors on 1 chip, so in reality it's
3.32GHz. Even though that's still a lower frequency it operates faster
because it is a better design. Intel are famed for boosting the
frequencies before the architecture. However it's safe to say the
1.83GHz/2GHz MacBook Pro is a much faster system than your old PC. You
may also want to take note of the difference between the graphics
cards on the 2 models available, the entry level has 128MB of RAM, and
the top spec has 256MB of RAM. With any high end CPU you'll find that
a graphics card is your main limitation, especially for games. In the
past graphics have been the shortfall of the Mac, but the cards in the
MacBook Pros are very good indeed. Also there is an option for a
2.16GHz CPU in the MacBook Pro (personaly I'd say it's excessive but
if you have the money and you want the most out of it you may want to
consider it.)
Thanks for looking , look forward to an answer
Martin
-- I hope I've been a help, let me know if there's anything else you
need to know. I tried to avoid going into too much depth, so as to
keep to relivent issues. Ill be happy to go into more detail on
request however.
Alistair |
