Is a macbook pro good for student use?

your mom does the job well enough, but thanks

Right, but I'm not sure why you decided to focus on my post for this instead of the original post I was replying to. There are advantages to both for workflow, I've said it many times. Surely your post is just as relevant for the person who thinks that using Touchpad shortcuts is superior to alt tab - you sure this isn't just another example of your bias? In this specific case, using Windows is a lot more efficient, I'm not sure why you would even try to deny that. You can compare documents with two mouse swipes after finding the documents (vs. Mac OS resizing the Windows) and you can switch between documents with literally one click (vs Mac OS one swipe).

If you want to "question why popular Linux distros use the same methods as OSX" then maybe you'd also like to take off your fanboy goggles and question why KDE for instance uses the same dock style as Windows or why Gnome uses a start menu instead of opening applications from the "Applications" tab in their file browser and realize that ultimately it doesn't mean very much.


Though industries where you work a lot (in this case, I'm referring to investment banking where people spend 80-100 hours per week in front of their computers) use Windows because for heavy work it's better.

I was using it because someone else cited it before me and because Dell's site allows you to match the specs well enough to prove my point :P

Yes, only those who cannot afford one will say no.

What percentage of PC users buy a mac but then decide to go back to a PC? None. There's a reason why...

The point you tried to prove by excluding the fact the MBPR has an SSD and then justifying it because you don't think SSDs are worth it whilst also excluding the fact I said "they're pretty much identical in price with edu discount

ok your edu discount is 25% (vs the standard 15%)

the prices weren't "identical" with the SSD on BOTH computers, your Mac still came out as £80 more expensive

and just because you can somehow get a 25% discount on the Mac doesn't mean most people on here can and just because I wouldn't buy an SSD (on a PC, I actually have the choice) doesn't mean that I didn't provide you with an equally specced Dell which came in at a cheaper price.

and it's not like the SSD was the only feature that you could tweak on the Dell to make the price differences bigger. remember, we did this comparison entirely using your specifications. If we were to flip the script and let me pick a base machine and have you match it spec for spec, I'm pretty sure that even with your whopping 25% discount we'd see an even larger difference than £80

Apologies I haven't expressed that point clear enough. The person I quoted said that "any laptop/computer running intel can also run OSX". Granted I was off the mark slightly by saying it needs identical parts, but one still needs to select their parts or choice of laptop prior to buying if they want a hackingtosh, no? It's not a case of /any/ Intel hardware being capable of running OSX efficiently, or so I have always assumed this to be the case. Of course there is no point in buying a desktop, what I was trying to say that a hackingtosh has to be thought out and selected prior to the buying of parts. It's not a case of building a desktop or buying a laptop, then 12 months later deciding to put OSX on the tower and it to work efficiently (unless you got lucky).

The point about professionals is more about just how stable they are. I haven't used one so I have no room to comment, but even with the progression in the community which will be able to fix issues you run into, I still have reservations to just how flawless OSX run on them. Assuming a professional needs to use OSX for their living, I do question whether the saving made on a hackingtosh does actually negate the fact a Mac is running 'native' (for want of a better word to describe it) OSX.

A mother's got to do what a mother's got to do in order to put food on the table I guess. She's just that great a woman, would never let her kids go hungry

I've just asked her actually, she thinks we've found a solution to your problem:

http://www.vbhcs.org/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=24026&cn=1

I hope you find the help you desperately seek mate and remember, many men with your problem have gone on to lead perfectly healthy, happy lives. That Thai place definitely wouldn't judge you too much, don't worry x

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A mother's got to do what a mother's got to do in order to put food on the table I guess. She's just that great a woman, would never let her kids go hungry

1. documents and software aren't always the "right size", stop trying to make excuses for this. getting it to be half of your screen is the best possible fit if you're trying to read a document.
2. one click is "equivalent" to a swipe here, but two swipes is faster than resizing the windows manually. hence, of the two ways on offer here, one is equal (switching between the documents) and one is faster on a PC (putting the documents next to each other). give up already, you've lost this battle. you're a fanboy because you're unwilling to concede even minor points like this and instead defend every misguided feature.
3. that's the point retard. linux distros draw from both OSes and come up with stuff themselves. the precise point I was making in my first post which was in response to you naming one feature of OSX that existed in "the most common linux distros". I've always said that both OSes have plusses and minuses, the fact that you're defending a point which by all accounts you should have conceded ages ago means that while you say you agree with that, you really don't seem to.
4. point 1 is not valid for IBD, point 2: the most common program is Office and various add ons to Office. trust me, if it were possible to use Office more efficiently on a Mac, the software producers making support software such as Factset would move as soon as any bank said it was considering OSX.
5. I didn't say because IBs use Windows it's better, I said because heavy users use Windows more it's better for HEAVY USE. (ie more efficient for heavy users).

Of course, because one has to understand that the MBPR is offering a bit more than the Alienware in relation to dimensions, weight, battery and of course the selling point of the screen which is why it will be a bit more expensive. Actually no with the standard 14% edu discount it is £1528 and £80 more expensive than your Alienware, as above keep in mind the obvious advantages one gets for that £80. I didn't use edu discount to get my 25%. Are you honestly telling me if you were entitled to the discount (or indeed have access to it, like everybody does if they fancy a quick google before they buy) and didn't care for gaming you would still choose the Alienware at £80 less? Come on. The MBPR for a student or anyone using the discount offers the best value for money.

We didn't do it on MY specifications. We did it on the Macbook Pro Retina specifications. I can't help it if Apple want to put in an SSD.

If you want to flip the script go for it. I never bothered looking at other OEMs. I would be curious myself to see how much other OEMs currently charge for a 2.3 i7, 256gb SSD, 1gb GT650m, 8gb ram with a long battery life.

Edit: I never said 'identical' you exclude my pretty much beforehand. I think a 5% variance within prices is reasonable, don't you? And for the record I've never claimed that Apple's other notebooks (other than their Macbook Air line) are priced the same as a Windows box. I just said that for what the MBPR offers, it is very aggressively priced.

Yeah, but when we did the comparison for a non-Retina Macbook I seem to recall a bigger difference? And edu store price wasn't 1528, I ran it using "school settings (instead of a uni) and the price was 16something? I posted it in the thread anyhow...

anyway doing a quick search now to see if I can easily customise any of these computers

Your mom never goes hungry after she's done with me, but how the rest of the family gets fed through that process I don't want to know.

They're not 'overpriced', they're priced proportionately to their quality.
That doesn't mean it's necessarily right for you.
Macs aren't very good for gaming unless you run Windows on it, so I'd be more inclined to save money and get a Windows laptop with a dedicated graphics card.

Macs also hold their value really well.

source please? lots of apple fanboys seem to think macs break down less than normal computers, but it isn't true

Yeah I saw your cMBP comparison which is why if you want to go back I admitted that it had largely been gimped this refresh. Which I can only put down to trying to force sales of the MBPR.

I think we have hit a bit of a dead end here over the use of 'edu discount'. By edu I mean the standard university discount of 14%. School/college discount is 8%.