I need a new laptop...

[Hamish Gill]

... im replacing this
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI....1520&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT#ht_1443wt_1139

its too big, its not practical and the battery it shite

i want it for lightroom and photoshop so it wants to be pretty snazzy but nothing to special ... its a secondary computer

15" screen would be as big as id need

I dont really want to spend to much ... maybe £400? £500... £600 maybe?

any suggestions?

 

[Pete Askew]

I was going to suggest a MacBook Pro but that would blow your budget out of the water. Unless of course you can find a pre-unibody model secondhand. I have an old 15" MBP and it run PS and LR etc like a dream and is faster at emulating WinXP than my old XP laptop could run it natively (with a similar spec.). Before switching to Mac's I always found Acer laptops to be reliable but pretty unexciting.

And look what's on eBay at the moment:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Macbook-Pro-2...omputing_Apple_Laptops_ET&hash=item2eb3571343

 

[Hamish Gill]

yikes ... a mac .... .... .... erm ...
you know how when you buy lightroom, you get a dual licence ... does that licence allow you to have a pc install and a mac install?

 

[Pete Askew]

Yes. As long as they don't run concurrently (there is no actibation check though). All Adobe licences allow 2 activations (laptop and fixed) but only LR is cross platform. PS needs to be transferred.

 

[Pete Askew]

And if you use an emulator like VMWare Fusion you can install Windows and run PS in that and switch seemlessly between LR and PS on OS X.

http://www.vmware.com/products/fusion/

When I bought my first MBP I wanted to run only Windows (using Bootcamp)and just wanted the robust and snazzy hardware (after reading a review in PCPro). Now I only run Windows under emulation to run the odd application that is not available for Mac. I'm not a Mac evangelist (I use both pretty well equally) but I can certainly see why some people are!

 

[Hamish Gill]

The thing is with macs is the £££ I have nothing against them (I have an iPhone for 1) but why so much money ....
For style basically ... Im not convinced by anyone who tells me they are quicker ...
I work in design ... I'm supposed to be a mac man ... I'm just not sure they offer anything that pcs don't nowadays ...
Don't the run on intel these days anyway? Are they just not glorified pcs ... Correct me if I'm wrong .. Many do ... But I have not heard a well articulated argument for a ma the is backed up with any real evidence?

 

[Chris Dodkin]

MacBook Pro - great build quality, better screens as standard for photo work - nicer OS to work in - IMHO of course

 

[Pete Askew]

I must say the build quality is superb and they are very robust and reliable. Of course the big advantage that Apple have is that they control the hardware. But that means the cost goes up. But my laptop is about 4 years old and, even though I do own a newer 17" one, it is my old 15" that is the workhorse. It gets dragged around everywhere and it just isn't showing its age. Comparing the spend on it with the non-Apple laptops I've owned (worn out, out grew etc) it seems very good value for money. I stuck a new HDD in a few months back (as when shooting with a P45 I was filling the drive) and I don't see why it should not do me another few years yet.

 

[Hamish Gill]

I'm gonna buy this ...http://www.ebuyer.com/product/222269

 

[Pete Askew]

Looks like a perfectly capable laptop. We have used several Lenovo desktops at work and they been fine and have quite nice styling. Will you put extra memory in?

 

[Hamish Gill]

Yeah it can take up to 6gb
There's a chap on AOS suggesting I should get an SSD for it too

 

[Pete Askew]

I'd go for a faster, larger HDD myself (eg see below). All 3 SSD's we've installed in kit have failed in less than 6 months! Even the expensive Kingston one!!

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-352-WD&groupid=1657&catid=1660&subcat=1667