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Geek Culture / Mac Book Pro Questions....

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Torsten Sorensen
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Joined: 23rd Oct 2005
Location: Seattle, WA
Posted: 26th Oct 2006 08:36
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Hey, I am planning on getting a Mac Book Pro very soon, but... There are three kinds. a $1,999, a $2499.99, and a $2,799.99 with additional customization options. I am going to get a fresh copy of windows XP with SP2 wich I currently do not have so I can run windows on it. I need to know the difference between how well the 1st and 2nd run games. If they are minor differences that really make no differences, or if it is hure and worth the extra $500? I'd like to be able to decide within a few days before I leave on a vacation.

Torsten.

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OSX Using Happy Dude
21
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Joined: 21st Aug 2003
Location: At home
Posted: 26th Oct 2006 11:48
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I presume you mean your going to use Bootcamp to install Windows ? No idea how well they will run, but according to web reports, iMac's run at a very good speed.

Visit my web site for real bangin' stuff. Word.
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Phaelax
DBPro Master
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Joined: 16th Apr 2003
Location: Metropia
Posted: 26th Oct 2006 12:27
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Why do people spend that much money on a Mac just to throw it away by installing Windows? Learn OSX or buy a Dell. Nobody buys a Mac for games anyway.

But if you're going to, get at least the $2500 model. Twice the system memory and twice the GFX card memory. The CPU is also faster, jumping up from 2.16GHz to 2.33GHz.

The $2800 model has 160GB harddrive rather than a 120GB, a 17" screen instead of 15", a slightly faster dvd drive, and an extra usb port. If you don't feel you need the 17" screen, then don't waste another $300 because the extra model features aside from the screen aren't much. (its also 1 pound heavier)

If it were me, I'd get the 17". I bought a 17" G4 powerbook little over a year ago and love the size of the screen on that baby. Only mine came with a mere 512mb of ram, which I upgraded myself because Apple wants a small fortune for upgrading ram in-house.

"Using Unix is the computing equivalent of listening only to music by David Cassidy" - Rob Pike
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Seppuku Arts
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Joined: 18th Aug 2004
Location: Cambridgeshire, England
Posted: 26th Oct 2006 13:46
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Actually I'd find slapping Windows on a Mac handy, I mean I'd be able to use Softimage | XSI as a secondary tool for 3D and other things, also if you're doing game dev, its good for testing your app runs in Windows and so on.

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soapyfish
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Joined: 24th Oct 2003
Location: Yorkshire, England
Posted: 26th Oct 2006 18:01
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Quote: "Apple wants a small fortune for upgrading ram in-house.
"


Just what I was thinking. You can end up paying a LOT extra for things you don't really need with Apple. My ibook could do with an extra gig of RAM but it'd be much cheaper for me to do it myself than to pay Apple to do it.

@Torsten - Personally I'd go for the cheaper one but that's because I'd only end up playing crappy games on it anyway (Warcraft 3's the most taxing game I currently play on my ibook).

If you're paying extra for upgrades that you don't really need or you could do yourself for cheaper then do that. If you think it's worth the extra $500 then go for it.

<º))))><.·´¯`·.Here's to the crazy ones¸.·´¯`·.¸><((((º>
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Nicholas Thompson
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Joined: 6th Sep 2004
Location: Bognor Regis, UK
Posted: 26th Oct 2006 18:27
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The advantage of paying Apple to do it is that if it all goes tits up and breaks the laptop, its their fault and not yours. You get a new laptop out of it AND it doesn't invalidate the warranty. If you do it yourself and bugger the laptop due to static then that £100 you saved could turn into £1000 lost.

To be honest, unless you go to a lot of LAN parties, I see very little point in getting a laptop with the intent of playing games on it. Without a power supply you'll get about an hour of gaming AT BEST out of any laptop. Therefore you need to be near a plug, ie indoors... Which is where your PC would be! Laptop's serve one genuine purpose - to do work on. Mac laptops do that fantastically well. I think Apple know this too - they rarely design their stuff for gaming - they're completely work oriented.

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Torsten Sorensen
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Joined: 23rd Oct 2005
Location: Seattle, WA
Posted: 26th Oct 2006 19:21
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Quote: "Nobody buys a Mac for games anyway."

Wrong, posted by someone that works at Gamespot: Here

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Robin
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Joined: 22nd Feb 2003
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 27th Oct 2006 01:31
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Quote: "Without a power supply you'll get about an hour of gaming AT BEST out of any laptop"


I know I keep on bigging up my xps m1210, but with the 9 cell battery, I can get up to 7 hours doing 'ordinary' things. I took it to a friends house the other day and played games for nearly 3 hours before the battery started getting low.

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Dell XPS M1210 12.1" | 2Ghz Duo Core | 2GB DDR2 Ram | 100GB HD | 256MB Geforce Go 7400
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Nicholas Thompson
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Location: Bognor Regis, UK
Posted: 27th Oct 2006 03:24 Edited at: 27th Oct 2006 03:25
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1) How much does it weigh?
2) How hot does it get (especially when charging)
3) How much did it cost?

EDIT: My £800 1 year old iBook can do 7 hours of "ordinaly" stuff on it before the battery gets low. My girlfriend was working on it the other day from about 11am to 5 and the battery was on 25%.. Its been sitting on standby on my desk for 2 days now and it went down to 5% before I plugged it in earlier.

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Robin
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Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 27th Oct 2006 10:49
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1) 2Kg (12.1" screen)
2) Pumps out a nice stream of hot air when gaming , but doesn't get as hot as a macbook pro (I've seen this stated on many a website)
3) £995

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Dell XPS M1210 12.1" | 2Ghz Duo Core | 2GB DDR2 Ram | 100GB HD | 256MB Geforce Go 7400
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Nicholas Thompson
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Location: Bognor Regis, UK
Posted: 30th Oct 2006 13:05
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I bit the bullet at ordered a 17" Mac Book Pro this weekend. I "downgraded" the hard disk from 160Gb to 100Gb because:
1) I dont need extra space ON the laptop, got enough in external forms
2) The 100Gb is 7200rpm compared to the 160's 5400rpm
3) It was £70 cheaper

I also ordered it over the phone which saved me £50 and the also threw in a free colour inkjet printer "worth £60".

Probably gonna bootcamp it up at some point. Just need to get ANOTHER copy of windows...

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Phaelax
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Location: Metropia
Posted: 31st Oct 2006 08:55
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I would've downgraded the harddrive too, for performance reason. 100gb is plenty for a laptop, and plus since you say you got external drives.

Get any student discounts? It saved me $300.

"Using Unix is the computing equivalent of listening only to music by David Cassidy" - Rob Pike
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indi
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Joined: 26th Aug 2002
Location: Earth, Brisbane, Australia
Posted: 31st Oct 2006 09:46
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congrats its a nice machine.
Im waiting for the next series.

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Nicholas Thompson
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Joined: 6th Sep 2004
Location: Bognor Regis, UK
Posted: 31st Oct 2006 10:22
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Quote: "Get any student discounts? It saved me $300."

Dang that's a good saving! Puts my £60 free printer (~$110) into perspective! Unfortunately, my days as a student ended about 3 years ago (or 2... I cant remember). I could have ordered it through my girlfriend though! Doing the LPC technically makes you a student!

@indi - cheers! I cant wait to get it. I assume by next series you mean the next CPU, etc upgrade?

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Nicholas Thompson
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Location: Bognor Regis, UK
Posted: 31st Oct 2006 10:25
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Do Mac Book Pro's suffer the same, slightly annoying, issue as the iBook? As soon as you shut the lid, it goes to sleep. Great for power, but sometimes - JUST SOMETIMES - I want it to stay on, for example, if I'm watching a DivX video on the TV Out - or if I have it setup on my flatscreen and bluetooth keyboard (which I wont want to do on the MacBook as the laptop screen can get more pixels on it than my 17" flat screen.

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