A few Macbook questions

[chimpy]

My dad is debating whether to get a Macbook or a similarly priced 'normal' laptop (Philips), but I have a couple of questions about Macbooks.

1. They have no PC card slot, right? Well, my dad was planning to get a 3G card so he could access the internet anywhere (ie. in the car). They only come in PC card form afaik, so are there any USB > PC card adapters or anything? Or is there any other way? The less bulk, the better.

2. I heard you can also install Windows XP on it using 'Bootcamp'. How easy is this to do, and how do you tell it to start windows or osx? Like, is there a simple choice when you first turn it on? Is it like having 2 different OSes, completely independant of each other? As this is going to used by my dad (who isn't that good with computers tbh), I don't want it to be complicated at all.

3. Which would you recommend for my dad, who won't use it for anything too demanding, but does want a PC card slot (either through a SMALL adapter or not). The reason I'd like him to get a macbook is because it appears that now it's basically like having a normal windows laptop, as well as a mac laptop. If that isn't the case, I'll just get him a windows one. I'd like to try out osx as I never have properly before, so I'm curious as to how to use it and stuff. It's also damn sexy, and pretty portable.

Thanks.

 

[jodoog]

They are very nice machines (slightly overpriced considering their specs...) but makes up for it in software and "coolness." To answer question no2, it is simple to load bootcamp and when you start up your computer, it asks you whether you want to start in xp or mac os x...very simple. It is also rated to perform very highly while running xp.

Good luck

Joe

 

[mshan]

Get him the Macbook (though you might want to wait till after September 12 - Apple is having some sort of conference overseas and may be introducing Merom processors).

I got my dad an iMac and it works great for photo and video editing. Everything just works out of the box, is well integrated, and is useful.

Plus memory and the hard drive are both user upgradeable!

🙂

 

[chimpy]

OK thanks. Yeah I was thinking they were a little overpriced, but then again they do look really sweet, and I wanna (properly) try out OSX sometime.

About my first set of questions: I meant a 'PCMCIA slot', as in the slot in the side of most laptops (but not macbooks). I'll go searching for a USB adapter one, but iirc, the last time I looked they were around £150 >_<

Oops, another question: can I just use ANY Wndows XP Home/Pro disc? Like, if it works on a PC, it would work on a macbook? Cuz I've got a couple in my room, so if I can just use that it would be great.

Keep the replies coming btw!

 

[chimpy]

Grr, after having a look, it seems USB > PCMCIA adapters are very expensive, and not particularly good. Also there's the extra bulk. Apple should just include the slots tbh, then I'd have got him a macbook. Well, I'll just get him the 'normal' laptop then.

I'll still be getting a Macbook when I go to uni though 😛 Shame it's a couple of years off.

 

[Estrella]

no, the disc must have sp2 on it.

I almost never use windows on my mbp. If you are a basic PC user then a mac can do everything you need and better. Why does everyone not seem to get the fact that when you buy a mac you are paying for the great design and software, not just a flimsy box with components?

From what your dad needs, I would just get him a reg laptop for your price range.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: Estrella
no, the disc must have sp2 on it.

I almost never use windows on my mbp. If you are a basic PC user then a mac can do everything you need and better. Why does everyone not seem to get the fact that when you buy a mac you are paying for the great design and software, not just a flimsy box with components?

From what your dad needs, I would just get him a reg laptop for your price range.

not true. Get a program called parallels for Mac and you can install any OS you want and choose which you want to run using little Virtual machines. Basically it reserves some space on the HDD and runs the OS in a window or you can switch it to full screen. When the space is used up it will allow you to select whether or not to use more HDD space as necessary. It supports Windows XP SP1 and then you can just download and install SP2. You can run any flavor of Linux, FreeBSD, Windows 3.11, Windoes 95/98/me, Windows server software etc etc

Right now when you buy a Macbook you get Parallels for mac for free through a mail in rebate. It's really alot more friendly than Bootcamp. Parallels allows you to run Windows on top of MacOSX and you can switch between OSX and Windows by pressing alt-tab and share files between either OS. I would recommend downloading and installing Bootcamp to burn the Apple driver disk to install into Windows anyway, but I would recommend parallels over Bootcamp for running Windows.