The final assignment in the class I'm teaching this semester was basically: "pick a social issue or news item and respond to it in some way using humour." One of my of students produced this.
For the last year, I'd been hoarding my gold-pressed latinum to buy the ever-imminent new MacBooks and they were finally announced yesterday. Which turned out the be same day I bought a refurb'ed white and plastic MacBook.
I don't care about the aluminium. I don't give a hoot about the new trackpad. I'm not a fan of glossy screens. I could care less about the multi-touch (and I just did and will probably continue to do so at regular intervals). Here's what I care about: a similarly specified refurb'ed white Macbook goes for 250$ CDN less.
The only thing I liked about the upgrade and that gave me a moment's pause was the graphics chip. Diablo 3 is coming out probably next year-ish and well before our next computer upgrade is due so this purchase is going to be the laptop that will allow me to summon Zombie Wall. I'm going to have to rely on Blizzard's usual kindness to lower-end machines and play it on rock-bottom resolutions.
So I decided to get the latest old-school machine and spend the difference on a refurb'ed Time Capsule, which I've been eyeing for nearly as long. It will come in very handy with two laptops in the house. And I can recoup some of its value by selling my old Airport Express and my current USB-anchored external HD.
My reason for writing this is to offer people drooling over this new bejewelled and gilded scarab a way of getting (in my view) a little more bang for your buck.
No kidding. I just had to buy a replacement due to their crappy design. I reinforced my replacement with some electrical tape. I'll be going to get my refund.
In other news, my refurbished MacBook had to have its hard drive AND RAM replaced since I've bought it. So I'm pretty disappointed that Apple QA dropped the ball on that, but I can't complain too much because both repairs were free since it's been <1 yr and done on the spot at the Apple Store in Laval.
I got my MacBook on Friday and have been poking around in it all weekend. I had asked a few questions here and gotten some great responses (thanks, guys!).
I recently ordered a MacBook (the White 2.0). I was going to wait until Leopard came out but the new features don't look all that compelling (other than maybe Spaces). I thought there might also be a hardware update in the next few months but I bought the MacBook refurbished (~$250 less) and any new Macbook wouldn't hit the refurb store for a long time.
This is my 3rd Apple product. iPod nano -> Airport Express -> MacBook. Well played, Apple. Boot Camp was the clincher...
Anyways, I've got a few questions:
1) Browser? Safari seems more than adequate but what about Firefox or Camino? I like the Firefox extensions in Windows. Does that give it a leg up on a Mac as well?
2) Torrent clients? For, um, sharing... improv tips...
3) How much space on the HD does OS X take up? Any useless apps that are typically uninstalled to save space?
I'm sure there will be more to come. Any advice or tips to a Mac n00b are welcome. If I remember, I'll post my impressions.
