[pmangels17]

I'd like to provide a bit of insight from the perspective of an engineering student.

I have an older (~5 years) MacBook Pro running OSX 10.8, which I love, and it is great for bringing to class, because it is portable, and the trackpad is unrivalled in quality. I use it mainly for web browsing and MS Office work, but it can even handle Matlab, though not once things start getting really crazy. It is my day-to-day machine, and it serves that purpose fantastically.

However, it simply cannot handle everything I throw at it. Which is why I am shifting towards my Lenovo Y510p (which I also love) running Windows 8.1. My Mac struggles with heavier programs, and doesn't support some of the software that I need for class and for my upcoming internship. My Lenovo, on the other hand, plows through software like SolidWorks and MasterCAM, though in my case, this comes at the expense of portability, though you can get lighter machines that will still run the programs you need.

If you are a prospective engineering student, and you are looking to buy a computer for college, I wholeheartedly urge you to purchase a capable Windows machine, or overpay for a MacBook Pro Retina (the better specs cost $$$) and dual-boot Windows. If you go into engineering, in my opinion, Windows is the easiest and best way to make sure you can do anything you need to do.