Hi Guys, new to Macs so need advise before I buy...

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Hi everyone, I'm new here. I was considering making a purchase of the Intel Core 2 Duo MacBook (http://www.comet.co.uk/shopcomet/product/443824/APPLE-MB404B-A) but I am a little confused. The guy at Comet said that I would have to buy a Airport Base station in order for my wifi to work as it would not be able to connect to my router which is an 802.11b router (it's old but I'm not good with networking and a friend set mine up for me). Another guy from PC World said this was rubbish as the MacBook has backwards compatibility. Who is correct in this instance?

The other thing is, I was told by a colleague that MacBooks are notorious for wifi problems, and he showed me some posts on forums that were dated 2007, could these problems have been resolved by now? Last article I read said Apple was looking into this in 2007.

Suggestions or feedback would be very much appreciated as I am about to spend someone else's money on a MacBook for them.

Thank you.

Adam.
 
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The other thing is, I was told by a colleague that MacBooks are notorious for wifi problems, and he showed me some posts on forums that were dated 2007
And forums are notorious for containing posts from people that have problems with their computers.

In other words, it wouldn't matter if the post was from last year or last week. Take posts that talk about problems with a grain of salt. They are the minority of users.
 
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The guy from PC World is correct, the hardware is backwards compatible.

You will always see problems on forums, very few people comment on how well their hardware is working.
 
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So if I made the purchase, I could use the MacBook with standard wifi router and even the 802.11b type without having to purchase the Apple Airport base station?
 
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So if I made the purchase, I could use the MacBook with standard wifi router and even the 802.11b type without having to purchase the Apple Airport base station?
Yes, you could do that.
 
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Thank you kindly for your response.

I'll be back shortly after I make the purchase.
 
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So if I made the purchase, I could use the MacBook with standard wifi router and even the 802.11b type without having to purchase the Apple Airport base station?
You could do that, but 801.11b is kinda slow by today's standards. If you could swing it, the Apple Airport Extreme base station is 801.11n compatible (as is the MacBook you're considering buying), which is smokin' fast compared to "B" standards and is very easy to set up. Just my $.02...
 
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You will be far better off making your purchase from an Applestore or a proper Apple reseller.

The ones in Comet and PC World will almost certainly be the older models but at the same price point as the latest ones (They always have been when I've seen them in such places).

Make sure you check the specs before you part with your cash.

EDIT: Forget that, I've just noticed the link to the Comet one is the latest model. Be very, very careful with PC World though.

Personally though, I would buy this C2D Macbook Pro for £929 from the Apple refurb site (They usually are new anyway, just old stock being shifted)

http://store.apple.com/Apple/WebObjects/ukstore.woa/wa/RSLID?nplm=FA895
 

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