The Glade 4.0

Lots of bad comparisons between Mac products and PCs in this thread.

Sass: You're comparing apples and oranges- you're comparing a new generation retina display quasi-ultrabook to a desktop replacement laptop. You can't compare this generation's 17" MBP, but if you look even the last year's model compares pretty favorably to your M17x, especially since you can do the RAM and HD upgrades yourself on it.

In some areas, Macs are overpriced relative to their counterparts. I won't argue that.

I think it's rare that you'd be able to find a legitimate comparable that was half of the price of an Apple computer. And they've been doing a good job of lowering their prices in recent years to be even more competitive.

It's like when people compare a PC desktop to an iMac, but leave out the price of a top quality IPS screen. Just because it's something you don't want to use or don't think is important, doesn't mean it's not a valid part of the pricing.

If the benefits of a Mac (ability to dual boot OSX and Windows, touchpad, available software, design) don't appeal to you, then it's not going to be worth the price. I use both PCs and Macs for a reason, they each have areas in which they are good, and areas in which they aren't as good.

But that doesn't mean that the computers aren't worth the price.

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Darksiege: You are not a god damned vulcan homie.

Not gonna do that. I use windows

Oh, I know i'm comparing apples and oranges, I even mentioned as such, but in his original post RangerDave said he was looking for a desktop replacement, then people were tossing around Macs and the Macbook Pro is the closest thing to a desktop replacement Apple has and it's most definitely not a desktop replacement. I was just pointing out that especially for the reasons he wants a new laptop a Macbook is ridiculously overpriced and for what you can get with a desktop replacement Windows laptop.

And I don't know how last years Macbook could compare more favorably vs the M17x than the current one as it's older and thus even more underpowered in comparison and was still the same old over priced price point when new like all Macs are.

Not true. I replaced my Alienware Aurora desktop with a Macbook Pro last year and haven't looked back, nor have I needed to. MBP fares pretty well even playing on my 42" tv at 1080p. Not saying I could play Crysis maxed out, but... yeah.

You're not comparing the desktop replacement MBP, though. You're comparing the new MBP "retina", which is a new class of ulraportable, imo, not a desktop replacement. Hence the non-user upgradability and SSD.

Heck, I'd say the 2011 MBP 17" is what would be best for a desktop replacement.

It's almost as high powered as your M17x, only a higher clocked Sandy Bridge vs your Ivy, but from the benchmarks between the two, I'm not sure it would perform any worse.

The current 15" pro without the Retina Display would also be a better option. The MBP with the retina display is not a desktop replacement, it's an ultrabook cross.

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Darksiege: You are not a god damned vulcan homie.

Of course, it's worth pointing out that the desktop being replaced is a 10-year old Dell Dimension 4500 with a 2-ghz Pentium 4 chip, 1gb of RAM, a 256mb nVidia Geforce 6600 AGP graphics card, and a 40gb hard drive. Pretty much anything is going to be a huge upgrade at this point!

Haha, yeah. I meant in terms of what I'd consider the "class" of the laptop.

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Darksiege: You are not a god damned vulcan homie.

Lol! That's true, in that case even my older Alienware M11x could be considered a desktop replacement, hehe.

So my takeaway on the MBP vs. non-MBP laptops is:

MBP Pros:

• Beautiful display for video and photos
• Respectable mid- to high-end specs
• Light & portable
• Reliable build quality
• Excellent customer support
• Elegant aesthetics and interface (subjective preference, though)

MBP Cons:

• High-res display actually looks worse for web text and many current applications and games
• Price-to-performance ratio is very high
• Small hard drive capacity (though it is SSD)
• No built-in optical drive
• Not upgradable

In short, if my analysis were purely about the specs, the MBP would be a bad choice given the price, but the less quantifiable aspects may or may not justify the high price depending on personal preference. Yes?

More or less, yes.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

As far as the web text/graphics go, this is not a display issue, it's a browser and website issue. Text looks great in Safari and Chrome already has their retina display update ready. Also, games will be updated I'm sure. Diablo III has already been updated and looks fantastic on a retina display.

Also, keep in mind that there are the *other* non-retina MBPs that don't have some of the con's you mentioned.

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Darksiege: You are not a god damned vulcan homie.

Yeah, the non-retina, $1799 MBP can be upgraded, has a 1680x1050 screen, does have an optical drive, a large (spinning) hard drive, and no HDMI port (though TB -> HDMI converters work just fine for me).

There are six build/size options for the MBP. Since the high end non-retina MBP and the low-end retina MBP are both priced the same at $2199, you just gotta look at the specs/features and decide what's most important to ya.

FWIW, I just today bought a Retina MacBook Pro, since Phe needs a new laptop and she doesn't want a Pro (she wanted an Air, since they're so light, so I get the R-MBP and I give her my Air, which is less than a year old).

Tech shuffle! CHANGE PLACES!

FARSKY REVIEW REQUIRED. I am trying to resist a Retina. You may change my mind.

Please request the un-biased version of the review :p

My only advice is don't get your laptop at Wal-Mart.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I would have never believed it, but my last three big purchases came from Best Buy. I bought a 45" hd lcd tv for the bedroom for 400 bucks. I bought a true stainless steel Samsung fridge with French doors, freezer on bottom, and water/ ice dispenser for 1400.

And now, most recently i decided on this for a gaming laptop: http://m.bestbuy.com/m/e/product/detail ... 8621250769

Not the most powerful graphics processor (it plays star wars and skyrim just fine on high details) or fastest hard drive, but everything else is very nice compared to a lot of the other laptops I've shopped around for. Especially considering the price is 200 to 400 bucks cheaper than the entry level laptops at some other places.

It's super quiet and doesn't get hot. I'm impressed.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

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Les Zombis et les Loups-Garous!

Thanks for all the advice folks. Ultimately decided to go with the new 2.3ghz MBP with retina display. Still waivering between the standard 8gb RAM and the $200 ripoff upgrade to 16gb, since it's not upgradable later. Going to wait a few weeks to pull the trigger after Mountain Lion is released.

In the meantime, I'm planning to replace the bricked mobo and Pentium E5200 processor in my gf's desktop and upgrade the old DDR2 RAM and Radeon 4650 graphics card. Figure I'll go with the Intel Core i3 2100, the ASRock B75 PRO3 mobo, 8gb of G. Skill 1600mhz DDR3 RAM, and a 1gb Gigabyte Radeon 6670. Any thoughts or contrary recommendations? Think there's any issue running that setup plus a basic DVD burner and 5400rpm Western Digital hard drive off our existing 500W psu?