<p>My friend going to NYU Stern, they had a certain recommended laptop... does Michigan's engineering have any certain laptops they recommend? I'm thinking of getting a Macbook pro...</p>
<p>Nope, they say get whatever you prefer. All you're engineering stuff will be done on school computers for the most part anyway.</p>
<p>Get anything you like. A Macbook Pro is fine.</p>
<p>Anything is fine. I think Windows would be easier with some of the software you have to use, but I guess they have the boot camp or whatever now.</p>
<p>It doesn't matter what kind of laptop you have. I used the one that I won at my school's graduation party (no-name brand, Vista basic, $399 sale when I saw it at a store) and it was fine. You will probably do anything that needs a more powerful computer in the computer lab anyway so you don't have to buy expensive software.</p>
<p>Any laptop is fine, but don't buy a Mac.</p>
<p>^disagree.. if you buy a mac, and you're in the engineering school you should know how to dual-boot using bootcamp. And plus, nowadays many programs are mac-friendly.</p>
<p>But is there any reason to buy a Mac other than
A)Wanting to blow a big wad of cash
or
B)Wanting to join the Mac community of pretentious wannabe hipsters</p>
<p>^Wow, let the kid buy what he wants. I use both PC and Mac. I just purchased Macbook pro, and it is excellent. I do lot of music composing and recording, so the Macbook pro was a perfect fit, but if you don't have to do lot of audio or video work, Macbook is fine. Many softwares such as Mathlab is available for MAC, and also with Fusion or Parallels, you can run windows on MAC side by side. Mac is compatible with just about all the PC files, but not vice versa. If you're a PC user, Mac will be just fine. Now that having been said, Macs do cost more, so if you are that concerned about money like chinaismine, you can always get a PC laptop.</p>
<p>Money is not a concern for me, my grandfather is buying me the laptop as a graduation present (price range: around $2200)</p>
<p>If I were you, and I had that kind of budget, I would seriously rethink buying a powerful, desktop-replacement type laptop.</p>
<p>Instead, go with a $1400 desktop, a $300 monitor, and a $500 laptop. That combo will get you 5 times the value that the expensive laptop will get you. The desktop alone will give you about twice the computing power you'll ever want or need. For that much, you're looking at a machine with a blazing fast core 2 duo, at least an nvidia 8800 series card, 4 gb ram, and around 1 tb of space. You're going to love playing games on this.</p>
<p>And with the extra change you can get yourself a nice laptop that will do everything you'll ever want it to do when you're not at home. It's not like you'll ever need to run intensive apps on it while in class or at the library. The big disadvantage is not playing games in class, which is actually a good thing.</p>
<p>who the heck wants to carry around a desktop. Anyways, having a mac does have its potential benefits. as tsukasa says.</p>
<p>If you have the money, do what tetrahedr0n is saying. I could buy a desktop for $1000 that would destroy any macbook pro in any benchmark... then for 1200 you can get a regular macbook if you really want a mac.</p>
<p>Hmm, that is a good idea. But I live in Texas and dragging a desktop there and back home every time I have to leave the dorms for break will become a pain in the @ss... actually i have some family in Michigan, I could keep it there. I dunno, hmmm. I also have a single dorm freshman year, so I wouldn't have to worry about having my desktop stolen.</p>
<p>Damn you guys haha, now I'm considering this idea, argh lol.</p>
<p>Also, I haven't been in the desktop market in a while. Should I look at a Dimension XPS? Also, isn't the top of the line NVIDIA a 9500GTX or so? I dunno haha, the last time I checked on that stuff, the 8800GTS was the highest.</p>
<p>wait a couple days for centrino 2 to come out. Then you'll see a crapload of computers rolling down prices. last time i check 8800GTX was the highest but i don't follow graphics for desktops.</p>
<p>if you have a single dorm, and you don't think you will need a notebook for taking notes or w.e, you can definitely manage with a desktop. What i did was buy a descent, yet cheap, notebook for now, so that when i need/can, I'll buy a desktop. With technology always advancing so fast, I guess i'll just wait for 16X cores to come out. Just a note that personally, i would never buy a mac because it is overpriced.</p>
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dragging a desktop there and back home every time I have to leave the dorms for break will become a pain in the @ss...
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<p>Why would you have to drag the desktop anywhere? I suggest getting a cheapo laptop that you take around everywhere. Leave the desktop in your dorm the whole year. It's not actually that hard to ship home once a year. You can also put it in storage and leave it at school.</p>
<p>For comparison, my roommate had a $3k digital keyboard in our room. It was three or four times bigger than any desktop. He left it in storage during the summer when he was home.</p>