Apple noob with some essential questions.

Hellllllllllllllllooooooo Mac Forums! What's up! I've been lurking here for a couple months to supplement my buying research until today. I figured I'm buying a Macbook Pro soon, so what the heck, I'll join this happy little family.

Anyway, I'm in a real dilemma here. My buddy brought over his 15" Macbook Pro with the 2.4 ghz Core2 a couple days ago, and we checked Crysis out on Boot Camp. Very nice to say the least. So I was dead set on a 2.5 ghz 15" Pro with 512 mb graphics, and 200 gb 7200 rpm hard drive. Problem is, that can only be found around here through Apple.

With tax, my price was going to be around $2,800 with an inCase Neoprene Sleeve.

Now while perusing Newegg.com today, I saw they have a 17" 2.5 ghz machine with specs identical to the 15", with the one exception being a 250 gb. 5200 rpm. hard drive.

Now I want my Macbook to be somewhat portable, but I also want to do gaming via Boot Camp, so my questions are these.:

A. Is the 17" worth the price for the bigger screen and size?

B. Is the a difference and battery life between the 15" and 17"?

C. Would 7200 RPMs vs. 5200 RPMs be a big difference for gaming?


Thanks in advance for all advice. Oh, and for the reason I'm switching? Let's just say I'm tired of having my blood pressure shoot up over Vista's inconsistencies.

What type of work will you do with your mac?

First off, welcome to MF! It is nice to see a fellow Ohioan on here

A. Hmmm...that is really only something you can answer. Are you willing to pay a higher price for it? Personally, I think they are way too big. Unless you are doing work where screen real estate is an absolute must, I would stray away from it. But that is just my opinion on it!

B. The 17" has about .5 hours less battery life, according to Apple.

C. The HD speed is not going to matter much, especially in gaming. Not anything too noticeable, anyway. I personally would not let it change my decision much.

cheesybanana said:

First off, welcome to MF! It is nice to see a fellow Ohioan on here

A. Hmmm...that is really only something you can answer. Are you willing to pay a higher price for it? Personally, I think they are way too big. Unless you are doing work where screen real estate is an absolute must, I would stray away from it. But that is just my opinion on it!

B. The 17" has about .5 hours less battery life, according to Apple.

C. The HD speed is not going to matter much, especially in gaming. Not anything too noticeable, anyway. I personally would not let it change my decision much.

Click to expand...

QFT for cheesybanana! +3
A: 17" is not that portable... more like a "Desktop replacement" to move around the house.
B: See above
C: One thing he may have missed was the 7200 drive will use a little more battery power as it is faster, and if you are not doing encoding or anything you won't notice much of a difference. I'd suggest 5400 if all you do is browse/few games.