Evaluating my next laptop purchase

A few years back I was lugging around a fully–loaded 17" Dell Inspirion. The one with the ultra high, wide aspect ratio, resolution. I grew to loath it though. It was too heavy and bulky to carry around. The ridiculous default resolution make it frustrating to use. Increasing the DPI in XP made it unusable. Since then, I vowed to never get a laptop which is either too heavy/bulky, or has a 17" screen.

Last year, when I got my MacBook Pro, I specifically got the 15" model. Thanks to Boot Camp I was able to install Vista which I need for Visual Studio and SQL Server. I started out using Parallels but later switched to VMware's Fusion. I like Fusion's UI better and it seems faster. You can also dedicate a CPU core to the virtual machine. After Leopard came out I was able to bump my RAM from 3GB to 4GB since Leopard is 64–bit. With the extra RAM I rarely dual–boot now. I can run Vista from the Boot Camp partition inside Mac OS X with little to no lag. This works great for me!

Just the other day, I was at a client's site... I did a presentation using Apple's Keynote in OS X, while simultaneous running an ASP.NET application and walking through the source code in Vista. I use Verizon's wireless broadband (Rev. A) for my Internet connection. I can check my e–mail and browse the Web without using their connection. I can also connect to their VPN in Vista while keeping the connection in Mac OS X separate. This really works great for me.

I have nothing but good things to say about my 15" MBP. I only wish I would've given Vista a smaller partition size when I originally set up Boot Camp.

I recommend going with the 15" MBP. Though you may want to wait a while, there is speculation that they will be upgraded soon. Apple will presumably release the 64–bit Boot Camp drivers for Vista 64–bit at the same time. When those drivers come out I'll probably wipe out my 32–bit Vista and install the 64–bit one so that it can take advantage of my 4GB of RAM whenever I dual–boot. I'll also give it a smaller partition size the next time around.

A few weeks ago I dropped my 17" MBP and messed up the LCD display connector. Repair cost was going to run $1400+. I took this as an option to get something a little smaller since that 17" was a beast to lug around (and HOT). So, I went for the 2.2GHz White MB. With my 15% ADC discount that was $250+ than the repair for the 17". That was with the same processor speed but now with 64Bit C2D goodness.

I slapped 4GB from crucial in it and upgraded the HD to a 160GB 7200 from the 17". All in all I love this little guy. The only thing I can't speak to is the gaming as I don't really do much on my laptop. Other than that, it's great!

Seriously, 4GB, 7200 RPM and 22GHz and there is NO diff between that and the 17" for compiles or virtualization.

Well, if you'd want to go down the Apple road once again, I can only say good things about the white macbook. The black one only has a bigger harddrive as far as I can understand, and that's it. It doesn't justify the extra $.

The priciest white macbook is really good looking, very small and powerful enough for ALL my needs, it's my only computer. I use it for Parallels virtualization (Win XP), video editing (Final Cut Pro) making music and so on. The only drawback is that it isn't powerful enough for most new games, due to the graphics card.

Never, ever, ever buy an Apple laptop without AppleCare. The cost of a single repair will easily double or triple the cost of AppleCare.