MacBook Pro ??

[jetpilot79]

I have heard so many great things about apple and have always been afraid to try a new OS. Does anyone have any insight into MacBook Pro, especially as it relates to running windows based games? Especially performance in conjunction with Oblivion and SupCom.

 

[ldiamond]

Personally, I wouldnt buy a Mac book pro. They are way overpriced for the performance. Ok, they look nice, they're sleek... if thats what you want and you feel like paying 500$ extra for that, go ahead. Otherwise, go for Clevo, Compal or Asus.

As for the OS, you dont have to use Mac OSX with a mac. All macs are now using Intel processor and the same platforms every other laptops use. So you can install Windows on your MAC if you want. The question is: Are the windows driver stable enough? performant enough? I couldnt tell since I dont own a mac.

Note: If you're gonna buy a Mac Book, dont buy their upgrades, ure better off buying the basic mac and upgrade it urself, much cheaper!

 

[MU_Engineer]

I have heard so many great things about apple and have always been afraid to try a new OS. Does anyone have any insight into MacBook Pro, especially as it relates to running windows based games? Especially performance in conjunction with Oblivion and SupCom.

A MacBook or MacBook Pro has only three things that make it different from any other notebook out there:

1. A TPM chip with Apple's decryption keys inside that lets a user use a non-cracked version of OS X x86 on their computer. This is the only thing that prevents somebody with any other x86 machine from booting OS X, which is something Apple does not want (as they reap most of their computer $$$ from hardware.)

2. EFI rather than a BIOS. This is a little sticky with Windows as Windows requires a BIOS to boot, but there are BIOS emulators that can give Windows enough of a BIOS-like interface to boot. Linux and BSD don't care if it's BIOS or EFI, they can use both.

3. A godawful single-button mouse. That will be painful to use in Windows or any other OS as Crtl+Click doesn't right-click in any other OS (well, you can get a system running X11 to remap that to a right-click, but...) You'll need an external mouse to use another OS on a MacBook.

Otherwise, a MacBook will perform exactly like any other notebook with similar specs, which is pretty much most notebooks of a similar size. So I'd say don't buy a MacBook unless you pretty much only want to run OS X on it as they're more expensive and have a terrible one-button mouse that's bad to use in any other OS. If you simply want to try out another OS, why not give something that's free and runs on anything, such as Linux, BSD UNIX, or Solaris a whirl on a non-Apple notebook? It's much less expensive and will be a tad easier to run Windows on if you don't like the other OS, due to the two-button touchpads and an actual BIOS.

 

[cattlebaron]

I recently bought a MBP for my mother. I had a few days and loaded boot camp and parallels on it with WinXP Pro. It is a solid performer for its hardware. I like its size and weight but miss an internal card reader. I would also have to second MU_Engineer on the whole 1 button touch pad. I got the hang of it but moved to a 2 button external mouse almost immediately. I would say the MBP is about 200-300 over equivalent products and the windows machines wil weight about a pound more for equivalent specs. I know..... I have been looking, see my post http/www.tomshardware.com/forum/49711-35-lightest-8600m-better

Good luck

 

[jetpilot79]

Thanks all, they are way chill looking and I didnt realize the one button thing, but I dont usually use the laptop mouse anyway, I would use my wireless mouse provided it works on MBP. I have read that an apple of similar specs as a windows PC, actually has a very noticable difference, but I couldnt tell if it was for real or just fanboyism.

 

[MU_Engineer]

Thanks all, they are way chill looking and I didnt realize the one button thing, but I dont usually use the laptop mouse anyway, I would use my wireless mouse provided it works on MBP. I have read that an apple of similar specs as a windows PC, actually has a very noticable difference, but I couldnt tell if it was for real or just fanboyism.

OS X does support external mice and in that case, the second button does work. The level of support for mice varies- you'll always get the two buttons and scroll wheel to work, but that 15-button gaming mouse might not have a Max drive, and such only the two main buttons and a scroll wheel will likely work. I don't know if the third button (clicking the scroll wheel) does anything in OS X.

 

[jetpilot79]

OS X does support external mice and in that case, the second button does work. The level of support for mice varies- you'll always get the two buttons and scroll wheel to work, but that 15-button gaming mouse might not have a Max drive, and such only the two main buttons and a scroll wheel will likely work. I don't know if the third button (clicking the scroll wheel) does anything in OS X.

Hey mr. engineer! Do you know anything about Mac outperforming 'game wise' window PCs of the same specs?

 

[MU_Engineer]

Hey mr. engineer! Do you know anything about Mac outperforming 'game wise' window PCs of the same specs?

If you're talking about running a Macintosh version of a game on an x86 Macintosh versus a Windows version of the same game on a non-Macintosh x86 machine, my guess is that the Windows (XP) version runs faster since most ports are not as fast as the original. If you are talking about running a Windows game on an x86 Macintosh with Windows installed versus the same game on a non-Macintosh x86 machine with Windows installed, performance should be identical since the only variables in the previous experiment (the OS and game version) have been eliminated. An x86 Macintosh running Windows isn't any more different from a Dell running Windows than an HP running Windows is.

 

[jetpilot79]

Thanks, I guess I was digging the look of the MBP and the lighted keyboard is really cool! but, I guess I will go for a faster for the money PC... I really really liked the lighted keyboard...