Wife's 50th birthday - Macbook Air??

The following forum thread has all you need to know about ripping DVDs and Blurays on a Mac: http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=805573

You can buy the Apple DVD drive for $100 or so, but there are cheaper alternatives. I use Other World Computing (macsales.com).

Macs are great. I have to use Windows 7 at work and just hate it.

Great info. there Mr Tripper - many thanks!

Jonathan,

My other half converted to the Apple way mid last year with a Mac book air (13"). She's very pleased with it and it means we can finally dispose of the only PC in the house (apart from my work laptop - Racetripper i feel your pain) I've had Mac's for the last 11 years. I'm not anti PC - but my Macs just work and allow me to do the things i want to do easily rather than spending time fiddling about getting them to work.

James

I highly recommend the Macbook Air for someone who needs something very lightweight and portable.  My "home" computer has been a Macbook Pro for the past 6 years, and indeed my 6 yr old model is still perfectly fine for me today.  I've never had a pc last me that long.  I don't do any processor-intensive work, and I feel no need to upgrade to something "faster."  My significant other has the first gen. Macbook Air as she needed the portability, and it's been a charm to use for several years now.

That said, the pc world of fast, ultralight laptops is catching up.  My company is getting us all new Lenovo ThinkPads that are very light, with solid state drives, and Windows 7 boots up VERY fast on them.  I'd still rather an Air, but these Lenovos are quite acceptable if one must have a pc.

After years with PCs and indeed writing reviews about them and their software I am a total Mac convert.

You may even want to consider the top spec 11" which is what I use for writing on the move. It's incredibly compact, very easy to use in aeroplane seats without elbow problems and has enough screen real estate for my writing needs. I've ended up using it for much more than I intended because it just works so well and regret not having got the bigger SSD as a result.

You can upgrade the SSD: http://eshop.macsales.com/shop...OWC/Aura_Pro_Express

Hi I have an 11 inch AIr (the latest base model). I've had Macbook and Pro and they are all good. I went for the AIr after ditching an iPad because I like having a key board. 

The air works well and I've used a MacBook superdrive and a cheap samsung DVD drive, they both work very well.

At work I have a windows laptop and at home we have a mix of apple and pc and the apple is by far the easiest to use and maintain.

Big bonus the air starts and shuts really very quick and is very light for travelling.

Good luck

Mrs D got a MacBook Pro 13" at Xmas. Couldn't live without it now. I have inherited her old Thinkpad.

The MacBook is obviously heavier and slighlty more bulky than the Air but she wanted a built-in dvd drive rather than have to connect up an external drive to run dvds. The built-in camera produces first class skype images which was another real plus so she can see the grabdchildren growing up.

The first one we bought had an intermittent fault on the keyboard, but Apple swapped it out for a new one after about 3 weeks.

Cheers

Don

Brilliant posts here and a unanimous vote in favour of Apple by the look of it so we'll pop down to a Mac emporium and take a look.

many thanks to all of you,

Jonathan

I have a 13" AIR circa mid 2011 so not the very latest spec but still pretty speedy IMO. It is my first MAC so like you have lived with the whole PC thing. I love OSX Lion. It came out just after I got my AIR which meant I pretty much ended up learning Mac use with Lion and the swipe actions that make navigation and program switching a breeze. I didn't find it difficult to move from Win XP /Win 7. I still use keypad clicks rather than taps sometimes due to my fingers having 'PC memory' but that works as well so no problem. 

The only comment I would make is to advise you to consider the 256 Gb SSD option, You soon start to use storage up especially with media files and possibly add on programs. I know you can move files off to backup storage but even so I have had to do a bit of house cleaning a couple of times even with 256 Gb.

I don't know if you are prepared to invest in Mac versions of bespoke software. Adobe Photoshop for example and Office but obviously they are not cheap. I don't know whether you are aware you can run PC software by creating a second partition or using software such as 'Parallels' to create a 'window' for it but if that interests you that is another reason for going for the larger SSD capacity.

regards

Geoff

" will mixing O/S cause headaches?"

only when  you have discovered how nice Mac OSX and you have to migrate all the systems to Macs <g>

Not for any technical reason.

Geoff,

Good point re: the solid state HD, the darned things are so expensive I have to confess I was looking at the 128GB solid state drive option because unbelievably the 256GB option adds another £250!!  which seems ridiculous.  I was originally thinking that with the 13 inch air having an sdxc compatible slot we could add sd storage at a later date if it is needed for media etc - any views?

I'm just wary of spending so much money on something that isn't even her main PC but is intended for secondary use - she has a desktop replacement laptop (albeit one that is around 4 yrs old now) which I had assumed until now would remain her main laptop when sitting by the fireside.  Perhaps though the apple experience will be so enjoyable the air might become her default laptop all the time.

We will try and pop in to a store to play with some options.

She does work for an educational charity on the Guildford Uni campus and it looks as though Apple's educational pricing may soften the blow a little!

Thanks for your advice everyone,

Jonathan

I have an older, still excellent MBPro 15 inch, and a new 11" MBAir 256 MB.  Both are great.  But the 11" is a handy size, and I seldom wish I had a bigger display when travelling or on the sofa.

I would recommend going small, if you have good large alternatives at hand.

Good luck.

Nick

I only have the small capacity AIr that was issued last year.

I took the decision not to store too much on it, so have very little music and photos on the machine. 

My iTunes library is stored on a separate drive plus my NAS and is available on that. If I was going away the portable drive is small and light enough to take, plus I could always store tracks on the Air as a temp measure.

As was said the more capacity they get very expensive.

There are rumours that a cheaper Air is on the way, which may mean capacities get bigger for the same money.

In terms of screen size, the 11 is fine, but I am wondering whether a 13 would be useful, but I'd only change if there was a significant change in spec.

Jonathan,

I bought a 13" Macbook Pro for Mrs D at Xmas. We got it with the educational discount which represented about £150 saving on £1,000. But just as imprtantly she got a three year guarantee included as well at no extra cost, which would have cost c.£150 to buy.

Whatever you decide to buy, it should be worth looking at the educational discount option.

Cheers

Don

A new fully-loaded 17-inch MBP is what I'm a-hankerin' for. Mine is now 5 years on. No real reason to change it, but I just want to!

Rumor has it the 17" MBPs will be discontinued altogether. Apple doesn't sell that many of them. I'm a developer, and lots of developers I know like the MacBook Pro, but nearly all the ones I see are 15" and smaller. I personally know one developer who has a 17" and he upgraded to a 15"

$h!t. I hope the screen resolution on the 15" is upgraded, then. I really like/need the 1920 x 1200.

One of the best songs written in the last few years.

By Adele       Rumor Has It 

A bloody computer for her 50th?

Come on man, why not just get her a Hoover or a dishwasher?

I think she'd appreciate something other than a tool, but then you know her better than I do :-)

I once gave my wife an iPad for her birthday. She talked about getting one for months, and couldn't have been more pleased. Next birthday she got jewelry. She was tickled by that too.

Ah, now I recall, mine got a Macbook pro for Xmas but for her birthday just before Xmas I bought her a piece of jewelry she had mentioned a few times since the summer.

She is delighted with both. She can Skype our daughter/grandaughter in Canada as often as she wants, spends hours on Facebook (I think) keeping in touch with her friends and even sort out her photos into some sort of meaningful sequence.

Its a lot, lot more than just a tool.

Cheers

Don

Well folks, I'm remendously grateful to you all for your input - and some of the posts certainly made me smile, although I think I would struggle to better her ex-boyfriend who bought her a sewing machine as a way of ensuring she knew her place!!

After very careful consideration we have decided to go with a Toshiba R830-1GZ because it will be more compatible with her company software, it's only fractionally heavier than a Macbook Air but also has a DVD R/W drive which is handy for boring nights in hotels (I will be using it too!) and it has better connectivity than the Macbook Air - HDMI for instance.  I also didn't like the fact with the Macbook that you're stuck with either a very small non upgradeable hard-drive (128GB) or you have to pay a lot more money for the 256GB SSD whereas the Toshiba can be upgraded from its existing 640GB conventional shock protected hard drive with any number of SSD's should she wish at a later date.  The huge capacity means we can carry photos, videos and uncompressed music with us too.

Finally the Tosh is running a Core I7 chip at 2.5GHz v the Air's 1.7GHz and has 6Gb RAM compared to 4Gb plus USB3 v USB2

The Mac O/S and slick operation was the one remaining obstacle to going the PC route and I hugely admire the Apple interface as well as the slimmer form factor but the faster CPU, spillproof keyboard, 5x bigger hard drive and cost (£649) v around £1100 finally swung it.

Looks like Apple have tempted me again but just not quite enough!

Here's hoping the Toshiba proves a good machine: http://uk.computers.toshiba-eu...6/toshibaShop/false/  It's certainly unique due to its magnesium case in being so light and yet having an optical drive.

Thanks again,

Jonathan

The only problem with your decision is its not a mac, and its nots running osx! Other than that its a fine decision.