Mac Computer choices Forum

[schmooky]

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[gma221]

Just wanted to let people know that Best Buy is offering a $150 student discount on Macbooks and iMacs right now (through June 14). Go to http://www.bestbuy.com/studentdeals and sign up with your .edu email address for the coupon. Better than the Apple education discount!

[paayter]

Just wanted to let people know that Best Buy is offering a $150 student discount on Macbooks and iMacs right now (through June 14). Go to http://www.bestbuy.com/studentdeals and sign up with your .edu email address for the coupon. Better than the Apple education discount!

THIS!

probably the best deal you are going to get on a new macbook. id suggest waiting until a sale occurs..so the coupon can stack on the sale. i bought the old macbook air while it was on sale....it was priced 855, and with the 150 coupon was 705. although i would have loved to have sprung for the retina..i wanted that 12 hour battery life.

[03152016]

You can also do the refurb mac thing:
http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/specialdeals/mac

or just load mac os on your intel pc:
http://www.hackintosh.com

[RU5H]

What about dat dualcore processor?

The air has a i5 1.4 ghz, with the powerboost to 2.7 (anyone know if thats just a gimmick or what that even means?)

Pro has i5 2.4 ghz., powerboost to 2.9.

The tech geek at work said that a 1.4 is too slow, and i should up to at least a 1.7 (which is offered as an upgrade on the air with a i7 processor).

If i do that and upgrade to 8gb ram, its essentially the same price as a 13 inch pro for the 256 gb hd (still a $100 difference for the 128 gb hd if i up both to 8gb ram which is interesting). It seems like the 13 inch pro, 256 gb is the best bang for the buck. True or false? Is 1.4 ghz too slow?

[ymmv]

What about dat dualcore processor?

The air has a i5 1.4 ghz, with the powerboost to 2.7 (anyone know if thats just a gimmick or what that even means?)

Pro has i5 2.4 ghz., powerboost to 2.9.

The tech geek at work said that a 1.4 is too slow, and i should up to at least a 1.7 (which is offered as an upgrade on the air with a i7 processor).

If i do that and upgrade to 8gb ram, its essentially the same price as a 13 inch pro for the 256 gb hd (still a $100 difference for the 128 gb hd if i up both to 8gb ram which is interesting). It seems like the 13 inch pro, 256 gb is the best bang for the buck. True or false? Is 1.4 ghz too slow?

"The tech geek at work" is talking out of his ass, unless for some reason you need your laptop to do 3D editing or video rendering or mass-scale code compilation. My Air (a 1.3 GHz Intel Core i5 with 8 GB of RAM) doesn't so much as stutter even when I'm running dozens of applications including Word, Excel, Mail, iTunes, Messenger, Google Drive, my school's mandatory POS antivirus, Caffeine, like 50 Chrome tabs (I have at least that many open right now), and whatever else I happen to have left open at any given moment.
Hell, for what it's worth, I can run Skyrim on this thing on medium settings with numerous mods at a pretty consistently good frame rate, and I can promise you that WestLaw isn't going to tax your system any more than that.

TL;DR - anyone who says an i5 Air is "too slow" for law school has never owned an Air or is completely unfamiliar with the processing needs of 99.9% of law students.

[paayter]

What about dat dualcore processor?

The air has a i5 1.4 ghz, with the powerboost to 2.7 (anyone know if thats just a gimmick or what that even means?)

Pro has i5 2.4 ghz., powerboost to 2.9.

The tech geek at work said that a 1.4 is too slow, and i should up to at least a 1.7 (which is offered as an upgrade on the air with a i7 processor).

If i do that and upgrade to 8gb ram, its essentially the same price as a 13 inch pro for the 256 gb hd (still a $100 difference for the 128 gb hd if i up both to 8gb ram which is interesting). It seems like the 13 inch pro, 256 gb is the best bang for the buck. True or false? Is 1.4 ghz too slow?

dude we are law students...we arent graphic design artists, film editors, hardcore gamers(and if you are buy a desktop)...lol...the only thing id opt for the pro is the retina screen feature especially if ur used to it..it takes a bit to acclimate to non retina screens. but in terms of battery life and weight..and portability it would be the air. although tthe new pros are surprisingly portable and only weight about a half pound more...but that battery life tho on the air.

[03152016]

You can buy just about any laptop on the market and it'll be powerful enough. Apple doesn't do low end processors anyways; clock speed is a complete non-factor.

FWIW, I'll be using an Asus I bought for $250 two years ago. Threw Ubuntu on it and it runs like a champ.

[RU5H]

What about dat dualcore processor?

The air has a i5 1.4 ghz, with the powerboost to 2.7 (anyone know if thats just a gimmick or what that even means?)

Pro has i5 2.4 ghz., powerboost to 2.9.

The tech geek at work said that a 1.4 is too slow, and i should up to at least a 1.7 (which is offered as an upgrade on the air with a i7 processor).

If i do that and upgrade to 8gb ram, its essentially the same price as a 13 inch pro for the 256 gb hd (still a $100 difference for the 128 gb hd if i up both to 8gb ram which is interesting). It seems like the 13 inch pro, 256 gb is the best bang for the buck. True or false? Is 1.4 ghz too slow?

"The tech geek at work" is talking out of his ass, unless for some reason you need your laptop to do 3D editing or video rendering or mass-scale code compilation. My Air (a 1.3 GHz Intel Core i5 with 8 GB of RAM) doesn't so much as stutter even when I'm running dozens of applications including Word, Excel, Mail, iTunes, Messenger, Google Drive, my school's mandatory POS antivirus, Caffeine, like 50 Chrome tabs (I have at least that many open right now), and whatever else I happen to have left open at any given moment.
Hell, for what it's worth, I can run Skyrim on this thing on medium settings with numerous mods at a pretty consistently good frame rate, and I can promise you that WestLaw isn't going to tax your system any more than that.

TL;DR - anyone who says an i5 Air is "too slow" for law school has never owned an Air or is completely unfamiliar with the processing needs of 99.9% of law students.

Yeah this makes sense. Thanks for the assistance, i know just enough about computers to know that i really dont know anything. Since it sounds like macs last a long time, and they are obviously expensive, i want to make sure i am "future proofing" my purchase as you mentioned before. Sounds like the standard processor is more than adequate. Your post helped. Now gotta decide if i want 128 or 256 gb. Im thinking the cloud will suit my storage needs, but i thought i read about a test that showed that larger hard drives performed downloads/uploads faster....

[ScottRiqui]

Yeah this makes sense. Thanks for the assistance, i know just enough about computers to know that i really dont know anything. Since it sounds like macs last a long time, and they are obviously expensive, i want to make sure i am "future proofing" my purchase as you mentioned before. Sounds like the standard processor is more than adequate. Your post helped. Now gotta decide if i want 128 or 256 gb. Im thinking the cloud will suit my storage needs, but i thought i read about a test that showed that larger hard drives performed downloads/uploads faster....

You can get a long life out of a Mac. Until recently, I was using a 7-year old MacBook Pro, and after installing a solid-state drive, it was running the latest versions of Office, Photoshop, Aperture etc. with no problems, even though it was maxed out at only 3 GB of RAM.

If most of your media storage is going to be on the Cloud, the 128 GB SSD is fine; it won't affect download speeds at all. Any of the SSDs will be stupid-fast compared to the download speed you get from your ISP, or the throughput of your wireless network. You can upgrade the SSD in an Air later if push comes to shove, too.

[rinkrat19]

What about dat dualcore processor?

The air has a i5 1.4 ghz, with the powerboost to 2.7 (anyone know if thats just a gimmick or what that even means?)

Pro has i5 2.4 ghz., powerboost to 2.9.

The tech geek at work said that a 1.4 is too slow, and i should up to at least a 1.7 (which is offered as an upgrade on the air with a i7 processor).

If i do that and upgrade to 8gb ram, its essentially the same price as a 13 inch pro for the 256 gb hd (still a $100 difference for the 128 gb hd if i up both to 8gb ram which is interesting). It seems like the 13 inch pro, 256 gb is the best bang for the buck. True or false? Is 1.4 ghz too slow?

"The tech geek at work" is talking out of his ass, unless for some reason you need your laptop to do 3D editing or video rendering or mass-scale code compilation. My Air (a 1.3 GHz Intel Core i5 with 8 GB of RAM) doesn't so much as stutter even when I'm running dozens of applications including Word, Excel, Mail, iTunes, Messenger, Google Drive, my school's mandatory POS antivirus, Caffeine, like 50 Chrome tabs (I have at least that many open right now), and whatever else I happen to have left open at any given moment.
Hell, for what it's worth, I can run Skyrim on this thing on medium settings with numerous mods at a pretty consistently good frame rate, and I can promise you that WestLaw isn't going to tax your system any more than that.

TL;DR - anyone who says an i5 Air is "too slow" for law school has never owned an Air or is completely unfamiliar with the processing needs of 99.9% of law students.

Yeah this makes sense. Thanks for the assistance, i know just enough about computers to know that i really dont know anything. Since it sounds like macs last a long time, and they are obviously expensive, i want to make sure i am "future proofing" my purchase as you mentioned before. Sounds like the standard processor is more than adequate. Your post helped. Now gotta decide if i want 128 or 256 gb. Im thinking the cloud will suit my storage needs, but i thought i read about a test that showed that larger hard drives performed downloads/uploads faster....

Solid state drives would be awesome but I would never buy a computer with only 128 or 256 gb. Cloud storage is all very well and good but you don't always HAVE a network connection, or a fast network connection. It's very easy to fill up a drive that size before you realize you're doing it.

[RU5H]

I just checked my 3 year old tower (my only comp during that time) and i have used 80 gb of space. Not sure i need to spring for 512 with the cloud and with usb drives becoming cheaper and increasing capacity....does anyone in our field need that much space on their internal hd????

[rinkrat19]

I just checked my 3 year old tower (my only comp during that time) and i have used 80 gb of space. Not sure i need to spring for 512 with the cloud and with usb drives becoming cheaper and increasing capacity....does anyone in our field need that much space on their internal hd????

Well, to each his own. I have 12 gb of photos from a 2-week trip I went on in March, so clearly we have different storage needs. (Not to mention iTunes & Flixter movies I have for plane rides.)

[ymmv]

I just checked my 3 year old tower (my only comp during that time) and i have used 80 gb of space. Not sure i need to spring for 512 with the cloud and with usb drives becoming cheaper and increasing capacity....does anyone in our field need that much space on their internal hd????

Again, no. Not unless you plan to store hundreds of high-def movies or install dozens of huge games simultaneously. The entirety of my law school "work product" is contained in a 372 MB subfolder in my Google Drive folder.

[BmoreOrLess]

Just bought a MBA for this year, do I have any need for a CD/DVD drive or will I be good? (Specifically for GULC if anyone knows)

[ymmv]

Just bought a MBA for this year, do I have any need for a CD/DVD drive or will I be good? (Specifically for GULC if anyone knows)

I don't know about GULC specifically, but I can't imagine why you would. I haven't needed to use a CD for, like, six years at least. 700 MB is about a 10-second download these days.

[ScottRiqui]

I just checked my 3 year old tower (my only comp during that time) and i have used 80 gb of space. Not sure i need to spring for 512 with the cloud and with usb drives becoming cheaper and increasing capacity....does anyone in our field need that much space on their internal hd????

It's all personal and user-dependent. I store my music and movies in the cloud, and if I can't get to them temporarily because I don't have a good enough network connection, that's okay. My wife, on the other hand, likes to have everything stored locally and available at any time.

If you're just going to install Office/Evernote/OneNote, you could probably type for the rest of your life and not even fill a 128 GB drive. But games and movies can be a couple of gigs each, so you could fill the drive pretty quickly if that's your thing.

[ManoftheHour]

My friend is selling an 11 inch 2011 Macbook air for $450. Should I get it for law school? I have a 17 inch Macbook Pro but it's pretty inconvenient to lug around.

[random number]

I just checked my 3 year old tower (my only comp during that time) and i have used 80 gb of space. Not sure i need to spring for 512 with the cloud and with usb drives becoming cheaper and increasing capacity....does anyone in our field need that much space on their internal hd????

It's all personal and user-dependent. I store my music and movies in the cloud, and if I can't get to them temporarily because I don't have a good enough network connection, that's okay. My wife, on the other hand, likes to have everything stored locally and available at any time.

If you're just going to install Office/Evernote/OneNote, you could probably type for the rest of your life and not even fill a 128 GB drive. But games and movies can be a couple of gigs each, so you could fill the drive pretty quickly if that's your thing.

Basically this. If you are concerned just buy a 1TB internal HHD (less than $60) for long term storage of big files (games, video files, etc) and use the smaller drive for whatever you're currently working on. My tower has a 2TB HHD paired with a 128 SSD and it works great.

[ymmv]

My friend is selling an 11 inch 2011 Macbook air for $450. Should I get it for law school? I have a 17 inch Macbook Pro but it's pretty inconvenient to lug around.

That could be a decent deal, depending on the condition, but I briefly owned an 11 inch and found it a bit of an eye-strain for any use other than taking notes. Unless you don't mind hooking up to an external monitor for any extended use - especially legal writing assignments and anything WestLaw-reference heavy - I would hold out for a 13 inch. They're almost the same weight anyway, and the 13 inch gets significantly better battery life now.

[03152016]

SSD is a good investment. Laptops get bumped around a lot and physical hard drives are one of the first failure points. If you want more storage space you can always buy a 1 TB external drive for your media and move files to your SSD as needed.

You'll probably want to buy an external anyways, for backup. Anything worth saving is worth saving three times -- on your laptop, on a local backup (external drive, SD card, writable media, USB stick), and on a cloud backup (Carbonite, Mozy, or something simple like DropBox or iCloud). Most systems are automated and storage is cheap; even if you only need it once you'll be glad you took the time to set it up, and you'll feel better knowing your data is safe.

[ManoftheHour]

My friend is selling an 11 inch 2011 Macbook air for $450. Should I get it for law school? I have a 17 inch Macbook Pro but it's pretty inconvenient to lug around.

That could be a decent deal, depending on the condition, but I briefly owned an 11 inch and found it a bit of an eye-strain for any use other than taking notes. Unless you don't mind hooking up to an external monitor for any extended use - especially legal writing assignments and anything WestLaw-reference heavy - I would hold out for a 13 inch. They're almost the same weight anyway, and the 13 inch gets significantly better battery life now.

Thanks. Yeah, it's in great condition and comes with the charger and everything. I think I'm going to get it. I'm going to use it mostly for taking notes and for work for the next 3 months. The fact that it's 11 and not 13 inches is actually a pro for me. I use the 17 inch Macbook Pro for everything else.

[BmoreOrLess]

Just bought a MBA for this year, do I have any need for a CD/DVD drive or will I be good? (Specifically for GULC if anyone knows)

I don't know about GULC specifically, but I can't imagine why you would. I haven't needed to use a CD for, like, six years at least. 700 MB is about a 10-second download these days.

Word, that's what I figured.

[yossarian]

Mac nerds!!

Should I buy a Macbook Air this summer? Or is there an advantage to holding out until Yosemite (maybe Oct)? Also, back in summer 2008 they ran all kinds of student specials to get the college kids in the summer. I assume they don't do that anymore? Or should I be holding out for a sale?

[ymmv]

Mac nerds!!

Should I buy a Macbook Air this summer? Or is there an advantage to holding out until Yosemite (maybe Oct)? Also, back in summer 2008 they ran all kinds of student specials to get the college kids in the summer. I assume they don't do that anymore? Or should I be holding out for a sale?

Best Buy is having a good student sale right now, like $150-200 off MacBooks combined with student rate. Good time to buy an MBA since they recently updated. Also see if you can get your hands on one of the 10% off movers coupons.

The one caveat to this deal is that BestBuy only sells 4GB models, which for me is not ideal given my atrocious habit of having 50 tabs and 20 apps open at any given time.