Should I buy a Mac or a PC?

[Molten]

Originally Posted by s_forbes

I should also mention that I don't really need a laptop for college, I could get by no problem with a desktop computer to do my assignments on. The only benefit I've seen from bringing a laptop to class is that you can keep yourself entertained during boring classes.

100% Agreed. And there is always one playing solitaire.

[AndyB]

I'm entering my 3rd year of college at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville.

I purchased a desktop capable of operating Autodesk software and spent around $900 (including OS and monitor). I was told by a college student before my freshman year that a laptop was unnecessary considering the amount of computers on campus (most of which had Autodesk Inventor and AutoCAD).

I ended up switching majors into Communication Technologies (graphic design/mass media). All of my software (Quark and Adobe Suite) classes are taught on Macs. However, all of the software is also available for PC.

For an incoming freshman, I'd have to recommend a PC. It's the safest choice for software compatibility and it's what the majority of your campus will probably be using. Truthfully, you'll probably be just fine with either a PC or a Mac. It's kind of a personal preference thing. I'd bear in mind that there is always a chance that you'll switch majors... so even if your already going into media, a PC would still be a safe choice.

In the end, Dave has the best idea. Buy a cheap PC that will get you through your first couple of years until you have a better idea of what you'll need from your computer. I'd personally recommend a desktop over a laptop. But I'm on a smaller campus which has a lot of labs. Desktops are going to give you more bang for the buck which will ad to both your performance, and your lifespan. But the desktop vs. laptop argument is a pretty dependent on your campus and living arrangements.

I'll tell you right now. On my campus, if you have a computer that can browse the web and do basic word processing, your fine. My school is also heavily geared towards engineering if that makes a difference.

So to sum up that clusterfudge of a rant:

Keep in mind:
• Which programs you'll want to run
• Plans change
• Campus Size
• On-campus computer/software availability
• Which platform you're already familiar with
• Cost

[petek]

A few observations from the parent of a recent WPI grad (Electrical & Biomed Engg):

I offered to buy her the laptop of her choice as a HS graduation present. The WPI ECE department head was adamant that she should get a PC because their labs were run on them and that some of the EE software was "PC only". My daughter had used both in HS, but strongly preferred the Mac and ended up deciding on a Powerbook. I got her the top spec model at the time (1.67 GHz, 2 GB, Radeon 9700 with 128 MB), which continues to perform well.

As far as the "PC only" software, it also runs on a Unix server which she could log onto, so she had little problem running it from the Mac. There was a bonus there, since it forced her to learn Xterminal and Unix commands, which many of her PC-based classmates only touched on.

Since she did run some of her labs on the lab PCs, you could argue that she got a more well-rounded education in those applications. Then again, some of her PC-toting classmates probably learned more about the inner workings of the PC than she did, which may help them in a PC-centric workplace.

Before she made her choice I spec'ed out a comparable Dell, and it cost just about the same as the Powerbook, once optioned out to a similar hardware level. From the reviews and articles I've read, this us usually the case.

All that said, your case may be different. One can almost always set up a PC for an application for less than a Mac, and some schools do not provide as much support for Macs as they do PCs (for whatever reason).

I can't resist this closing anecdote: When we moved my daughter into her freshman dorm, we set up her network connection on the Mac and she was on the school network in minutes. A little while later, a student came around through the dorm to help get the freshmen's PCs configured and connected. Apparently the IT group expected that few would be able to make all the changes themselves (probably a correct assessment). He poked his head in my daughter's room saw that she had a Mac, and said "Oh, you've got a Mac. You're okay here, right?" (or something to that effect).

[Joe Matt]

Originally Posted by Molten

Why does this discussion always bring out a less then professional atmosphere?

Because you can't take it seriously. Ever. The rational response is "whatever works for you, god speed." Any responses to inaccuracies has to be treated with some levity due to the absurdity of the statements to begin with.

Plus BOOM ROASTED is a joke running through my friends right now.

Originally Posted by s_forbes

If I were going into college now and needed a new laptop I would almost certainly not buy a Mac. I can't rationalize spending so much on a computer when you can get one with similar hardware for half as much (again, I'm a cheapskate).

{citation needed}

Also, a MacBook hard drive can be replaced at home. In your roomie's case he had to remove the battery, two screws, and slide the old out out, put the new one in.

[MrForbes]

Originally Posted by Joe Matt

{citation needed}

A trip to Best Buy (the only local store that sells Macs)

[Joe Matt]

Originally Posted by squirrel

A trip to Best Buy (the only local store that sells Macs)

So you've price matched within the past month like I have when shopping for a new computer? Or are you just making noise? Because I go to hp.com, dell.com, etc and do a comparative shopping for their machines and I find that I can't get a 13" MBP for the same price from Dell or HP, and that's just the hardware, lets compare with additional video, audio, web, and dvd creating applications that come with iLife will add at least another $200 to the price of a PC.

[J-Brock]

You get what you pay for.

[MrForbes]

Last weekend we went to Best Buy, and looked at a nice 15" Sony for well under $1000, and the nearest thing Mac sold was about $1800....maybe Steve can give you a more detailed report.

When we were looking at lower end laptops there was nothing available from Mac for under $1000, and plenty of PC types for $300-500.

If you feel you need Mac software, then you definitely need to spend the extra money and get a Mac. No way would you be happy with MS/open source software.

[Chris is me]

With the student discount on Apple's website, the price evens out. Any other time they cost more than PCs.

[MrForbes]

Originally Posted by J-Brock

You get what you pay for.

hmmmm...I'd say it's more of a sure thing that you won't get what you don't pay for.

[artdutra04]

Some people will fight all day long saying their side is better, cheaper, faster, more efficient, etc, or just plainly, "best". They may also use snide comments about the other side, claiming they are buying overpriced gizmos or useless, virus-infested piles of sludge to name a few.

Yet as my favorite example, a Chevy Malibu and a BMW M3 will both get you from point A to point B, just as would a Toyota Camry and a Ford F250. Yet everyone buys different cars for different reasons. Some like really opening up the throttle on the curvy mountain roads when the cops aren't looking, while others just need to commute to work and back, while still others need to haul six cords of firewood every day. No one in their right mind will argue with someone all day long about how their car is superior to someone else's car. Different people have different needs and desires, so they buy different cars. Same goes for computers - there is no overall "best" computer or OS - just what is best for that particular person.

So my advice is that since the majority of people have experience using Windows, go to an Apple Store or Best Buy or borrow a friend's Mac and use it for at least 20-30 hours to really get a feel for the OS. (Why so many hours? Windows, OSX, and Linux are all structured differently. It can take 20-30 hours to really become familiar with how each operating system operates. Put a lifelong Mac user in front of Windows for one hour, and a lifelong Windows user in front of OSX or Linux for an hour, and I guarantee they'll both be equally frustrated and annoyed. Only after you get past the initial getting-familiar-with-the-OS-stage will you be able to fully experience the true OS user environment). Only after you've experienced the all the options, can you decide what is best for you.


One comment I will say though is that you do get what you pay for. On the Windows side, Lenovo Thinkpads and some of the Dell and HP workstation-class notebook and desktop computers are amazing, and of similar quality (and price) as Macs. And for any engineering college work, any computer cheaper than ~$1000 to ~$1200 will really be at a disadvantage. (Trust me, I went through the first two years of college with a $800 Dell Inspiron laptop...) As for engineering work, the Mac to Windows ratio I've seen at WPI seems to range from 1:3 to 1:4 (e.g. much higher than average), with about half of the Windows computers being Lenovo Thinkpads. So chum up the extra bucks and get a quality Thinkpad T400/T500/W500 or Macbook Pro (or a Dell or HP workstation class computer), because once you graduate into an engineering job, you should have no problems with the price.

Also, if you are going for ME, look for models with serious graphics cards, such as the NVIDIA Quadro or ATI FireGL. If you thought SolidWorks or Inventor or Pro|E worked great on your consumer class NVidia Geforce or similar ATI GPUs, prepare to be amazed when using a x64 OS, x64 software, and workstation GPU.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Asus for the PC flavored option, I have two and you seem to get a lot for the price!. My older Asus F3 series I guess has been retired to be my desktop now and my laptop for the road is my newer Asus G50V. What made me look at Asus is because I work in news use and are rapidly expanding the use of live video streaming/encoding and that means graphics and these are laptops geared towards gaming so a bit better resources.

So far so good, physically they are not Thinkpad or toughbook tough but I have had no major problems as all and we who work in news are not always so gentle with equipment.

I "almost" went Mac a few years back but there were a couple of things that even under bootcamp were not guaranteed to work and since I needed those programs for work I couldn't take the chance on.

If I was going into school for video production, graphics, editing then yes I would probably go Mac but one thing about a PC that I like is when something goes wrong you can fix it, working under the hood keeps you're skills current and I kinda like that sometimes.

One thing I try and do if I can afford it at the time is buy they highest end laptop I can just to help future-proof me for a few years to come, for example I have no troubles at all running Vista because of that.

M

Originally Posted by artdutra04

Some people will fight all day long saying their side is better, cheaper, faster, more efficient, etc, or just plainly, "best". They may also use snide comments about the other side, claiming they are buying overpriced gizmos or useless, virus-infested piles of sludge to name a few.

Yet as my favorite example, a Chevy Malibu and a BMW M3 will both get you from point A to point B, just as would a Toyota Camry and a Ford F250. Yet everyone buys different cars for different reasons. Some like really opening up the throttle on the curvy mountain roads when the cops aren't looking, while others just need to commute to work and back, while still others need to haul six cords of firewood every day. No one in their right mind will argue with someone all day long about how their car is superior to someone else's car. Different people have different needs and desires, so they buy different cars. Same goes for computers - there is no overall "best" computer or OS - just what is best for that particular person.

So my advice is that since the majority of people have experience using Windows, go to an Apple Store or Best Buy or borrow a friend's Mac and use it for at least 20-30 hours to really get a feel for the OS. (Why so many hours? Windows, OSX, and Linux are all structured differently. It can take 20-30 hours to really become familiar with how each operating system operates. Put a lifelong Mac user in front of Windows for one hour, and a lifelong Windows user in front of OSX or Linux for an hour, and I guarantee they'll both be equally frustrated and annoyed. Only after you get past the initial getting-familiar-with-the-OS-stage will you be able to fully experience the true OS user environment). Only after you've experienced the all the options, can you decide what is best for you.


One comment I will say though is that you do get what you pay for. On the Windows side, Lenovo Thinkpads and some of the Dell and HP workstation-class notebook and desktop computers are amazing, and of similar quality (and price) as Macs. And for any engineering college work, any computer cheaper than ~$1000 to ~$1200 will really be at a disadvantage. (Trust me, I went through the first two years of college with a $800 Dell Inspiron laptop...) As for engineering work, the Mac to Windows ratio I've seen at WPI seems to range from 1:3 to 1:4 (e.g. much higher than average), with about half of the Windows computers being Lenovo Thinkpads. So chum up the extra bucks and get a quality Thinkpad T400/T500/W500 or Macbook Pro (or a Dell or HP workstation class computer), because once you graduate into an engineering job, you should have no problems with the price.

Also, if you are going for ME, look for models with serious graphics cards, such as the NVIDIA Quadro or ATI FireGL. If you thought SolidWorks or Inventor or Pro|E worked great on your consumer class NVidia Geforce or similar ATI GPUs, prepare to be amazed when using a x64 OS, x64 software, and workstation GPU.

[FTC G-FORCE]

GET A PC!

[Wiz]

Mac

Much less hassle

[21Jake21]

Lets not forget Macs you can also put windows on
so win win for mac