Laptops

Warribs

I'm Canadian, lets get that one out of the way.

I need a laptop for the portability and size when I attend school in the following year to come. But in the mean time I'm buying all the items I need and thus comes the meaning of this thread's creation. I will be going for my BA in Film and Media + making my movies. I need an excellent, fast, reliable and well rounded laptop.

Need it for: Photoshop, Final Cut Pro, some games I guess in my spare time and mad multitasking.

I have no limit for my spending I've been saving, oh yes I have. So...

MacBook Pro 15-inch $2,878.00
3.06GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
4GB 1066MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 2x2GB
500GB Serial ATA Drive @ 7200 rpm
SuperDrive 8x (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)
MacBook Pro 15-inch Antiglare Widescreen Display
Backlit Keyboard (English) / User's Guide
Mini DisplayPort to VGA Adapter
NVIDIA GeForce 9400M + 9600M GT with 512MB

Alienware M15x $2,789
ComponentsGenuine Windows® 7 Ultimate, 64bit, English
Intel Core i7 820QM 1.73GHz (3.06GHz Turbo Mode, 8MB Cache)
McAfee® VirusScan Plus – 30-Day Free Trial (English)
1Yr Ltd Hardware Warranty, InHome Service after Remote Diagnosis
15.6-inch WideHD+ 1600x900 (900p) WLED
4GB Dual Channel DDR3 at 1333MHz
500GB SATAII 7,200RPM
1GB NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 260M

What is your recommendations? I'm really leaning on the macbook pro + parallels

Pitseleh

Easy, Final Cut Pro runs on OSX only.

Get the mac.

My three year old macbook pro dual boots into windows 7 for Left 4 Dead 2 and runs it on VERY high settings. That just shows how long they last. They're great laptops that can run both operating systems vs the alienware which can only run one operating system.

Plus, doing all of your work in OSX and then having to shut it down and booting it in Windows is really helpful to deter procrastination.

Arivia

Yep, go for the MBP. Also, you may want to wait until you have your university email account, then buy it from the educational store - you'll save a chunk of change that way.

dlinfiniti

i would go with the mbp
however, since you are going to be working with media and if you could get by with a windows system depending on the software suite your school wants you to use, you might wanna consider Dell's Business line offerings like a latitude E5500 or the M4400. They don't have apple's sleek unibody design etc, but for the 2.8k you're budgeting for this, you could get a laptop that blows away the apple as well as getting a high res screen (1920x1200) so you can work with your 1080p videos in their native resolution. AFAIK Dell is the only laptop vendor that offers a resolution of 1200 pixels vertical on a 15" laptop. For good laptop advice and info THIS is where I usually go.

saltiness

You'll probably be using Macs in school so go with the MBP to keep things consistent.

underdonk

Holy fucking hell, is that really what you Apple guys are paying for laptops these days?!

Do you know if there is any specific software that you will need to run to work in the classes you will be taking? Common sense tells me that if you're going to be using a bunch of Windows-specific software, it would run much better under native Windows than emulation, especially given the nature of what you will be doing (audio and video work). So, answer this question before you buy something. Could go either way, Windows or OSX.

Also, is there any specific reason it needs to be a laptop? You get so much more desktop for your (weak Canadian) dollar.

wunderbar

to be fair, he's the highest end 15" MacBook Pro money can buy.

Honestly dude, save yourself $300 and go with he 2.8GHz option. You won't notice that much of a difference. And honestly, with apple including more GPU based computing stuff in the OS, it's likely it won't matter much anyway.

Daenris

If you're going to go PC, don't buy the system you have there. I just speced out a better Dell Studio 15 laptop for like $900 less (2.8GHz processor, 8GB RAM, 500GB hard drive, native 1080p screen, Blu-Ray burner, the only major thing the alienware was better on was a 1GB graphics card vs the 512mb ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4570).

dlinfiniti

Daenris wrote: »

If you're going to go PC, don't buy the system you have there. I just speced out a better Dell Studio 15 laptop for like $900 less (2.8GHz processor, 8GB RAM, 500GB hard drive, native 1080p screen, Blu-Ray burner, the only major thing the alienware was better on was a 1GB graphics card vs the 512mb ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4570).

i have the studio 15 and i love it
given his budget though i think he could spring for Dell's Business offerings which i think look a lot nicer (metal chassis and stuff) as well as the standard 4:3 aspect ratio as opposed to the new 16:9 trend (which I hate, i like my vertical space) (its nice to watch movies with but is a pain to multitask and compute with)

underdonk

dlinfiniti wrote: »

Daenris wrote: »

If you're going to go PC, don't buy the system you have there. I just speced out a better Dell Studio 15 laptop for like $900 less (2.8GHz processor, 8GB RAM, 500GB hard drive, native 1080p screen, Blu-Ray burner, the only major thing the alienware was better on was a 1GB graphics card vs the 512mb ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4570).

i have the studio 15 and i love it
given his budget though i think he could spring for Dell's Business offerings which i think look a lot nicer (metal chassis and stuff) as well as the standard 4:3 aspect ratio as opposed to the new 16:9 trend (which I hate, i like my vertical space) (its nice to watch movies with but is a pain to multitask and compute with)

I agree with this. I own a couple of 600 and a couple of 800 series Dell Latitudes and they are solid laptops.

Kistra

I would talk to the school you will be attending. Based on what you will need for classes the answer may become very clear. Also some schools have very weird restrictions on wireless cards so double check with the school before you buy anything because you will want to be able to get on their wireless network.

contraband

dlinfiniti wrote: »

Daenris wrote: »

If you're going to go PC, don't buy the system you have there. I just speced out a better Dell Studio 15 laptop for like $900 less (2.8GHz processor, 8GB RAM, 500GB hard drive, native 1080p screen, Blu-Ray burner, the only major thing the alienware was better on was a 1GB graphics card vs the 512mb ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4570).

i have the studio 15 and i love it
given his budget though i think he could spring for Dell's Business offerings which i think look a lot nicer (metal chassis and stuff) as well as the standard 4:3 aspect ratio as opposed to the new 16:9 trend (which I hate, i like my vertical space) (its nice to watch movies with but is a pain to multitask and compute with)

4:3 hasn't been "standard" for years, and 16:9 isn't a "trend." nobody's losing anything, we're just gaining more horizontal space. i don't see how more closely matching human vision makes something hard to use. keeping two windows open next to each other is easier in 4:3?

ps. get the mbp

dlinfiniti

the way most apps are designed and browsing etc, i find vertical space more valuable than horizontal. I loved my 24" 1600x1200 monitor i had. The 16:10 isn't so bad at 1920x1200, but to me 16:9 at 1920x1080 is just awful to look at

sure, watching movies is better at 16:9 but i spend most of my time on my laptop not watching movies.