Thinking of going MacBook

Hi I'm after a new laptop and I'm thinking of going Mac but could use some advice. I've never used a Mac before but have used Windows for a very long time. However I'm sick of the constant hassle it brings so a simple Mac sounds great, but I'm not sure.

I'm a big gamer including playing wow, how does the clicking system work and differ - is it true there's no right/left click system or something?
The Mac I'm looking at has 2.53ghz but for an additional £300 I can get 2.6, is it worth the upgrade will I notice the different gaming?
Are macs easy to pick up or confusing, will I have a hard time switching.

Apreciate any help or advice that could be given.

Thanks,
Krosoft.

If your a big gamer, then switching to a Mac would probably not be the best idea. If you mainly just play WoW, then that's perfectly fine. I'm sure some others will tell you to just load Bootcamp on there and play your games through Windows (which you can), but I wouldn't rely on great graphics with the Macbook. If your wanting to do more gaming, I would probably go with an iMac or a Macbook Pro for the better graphics card. I would be more concerned with the graphics card for gaming, rather than the CPU speed as you had asked.

The OS is very easy to learn, I used a Windows PC for a LONG time and switched to Mac. Obviously you won't pick everything up in one day, but you can learn a lot by surfing the Internet and searching these forums. Most of the main "switcher" questions have come up before on here.

There is a right click on a Mac trackpad, but only one physical button. If you put two fingers on the trackpad (as opposed to just one) and click, it will act as a right click. You could also just hook up any old USB mouse and have a left and right click, which is what most people do.

There is WOW for Mac, so you can run that natively instead of using bootcamp. Todd is right about gaming on Macs though. They aren't exactly known for their gaming power.

Doesn't mean that you can't, just means it won't be very enjoyable on the lower end models because you have to set the settings to low.

Thanks for replying. I'm only really interested in playing WoW since I xbox for most games, would it run WoW as good as other Windows computers would? The one I'm looking at is a MacBook Pro 15" with a Nvideo Gforce 9400M. I'm not sure what you mean by Bootcamp but I assume it's some software for running Windows files?

Being a Windows user I'm also concerned about RAM and the processor speed, the upgrade to 2.6 is quite expensive will I notice it at all? My current laptop has 4GB ram which is Windows 7 OS, but still doesn't feel like enough. Is 4GB ram enough to be futureproof?

Thanks again

Krosoft said:

Thanks for replying. I'm only really interested in playing WoW since I xbox for most games, would it run WoW as good as other Windows computers would? The one I'm looking at is a MacBook Pro 15" with a Nvideo Gforce 9400M. I'm not sure what you mean by Bootcamp but I assume it's some software for running Windows files?

Being a Windows user I'm also concerned about RAM and the processor speed, the upgrade to 2.6 is quite expensive will I notice it at all? My current laptop has 4GB ram which is Windows 7 OS, but still doesn't feel like enough. Is 4GB ram enough to be futureproof?

Thanks again

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You should be perfectly fine running WoW on the Macbook Pro. My 2006 MBP can run Half-Life 2 at pretty good speeds. If you play most of your games on Xbox except for WoW then I would go ahead and get the MBP. Heck, a regular old Macbook could probably run WoW pretty good anyways.

Unless your planning on rendering/editing video, I wouldn't suggest paying for the upgraded processor. In my mind it's just not worth it. It would probably shave about 5-10 minutes off of encoding a video. 4BG of RAM is also plenty for what your wanting to do.

Bootcamp is basically an application that allows the computer to install and load a Windows OS (XP, Vista, or 7) onto the computer and run it native to the hardware. That means it would be just as fast as any regular Windows laptop with that same hardware in it. The drawback to Bootcamp, is that you have to partition your hard drive and each time you want to boot into Windows, you have to restart your computer.

Lol well I'm no stranger to restarting my computer. I don't mind partitioning my hard drive, does bootcamp do this? How much extra does bootcamp cost because I'd like to put Win7 on my laptop too.

The problem I face now is which one do I get:

NVIDIA GeForce 9400M graphics or
NVIDIA GeForce 9400M + 9600M GT with 256MB

I know the second will be better, but how much better? Will it make any difference when playing wow?

Don't wast your money for 70MHz of processing power... 300 pounds for 70 MHz? Noooo way.

Anyway, WoW runs great. I run it on a 2GHz aluminum macbook with 2 gigs of RAM and cap my fps at 30. It runs solid on almost max settings, even in a 40 on 40 Alterac Valley battle.

The mac is very customizable, and you should be able to do anything you want. The clicking system is the same. I like tap to click on mine (one finger left clicks, 2 fingers right clicks... there are other options that you can set up for a right click too, or use a normal mouse).

Anyway questions, just come here. You won't regret switching.

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(just saw your next post)

if you're thinking of getting the dual graphics card, definitely get it. The 9600GT will be leaps and bounds better, even for WoW.

Ah good I was hoping to find a fellow WoW player, which Graphics card does yours use? The dual is with the £300 extra, it's a fair whack of cash I just dunno how much difference it would make, obv the better the better, but if it's gonna be perfectly fine without it I don't wanna waste my cash. The money is a big deal for me since it's so much more than a Windows laptop would cost.

I was worried about switching to Mac a couple of months ago, but I'm very happy with my purchase and will most likely never go back. I have a 17" MBP with the dual graphics and I ran WoW on the heavier card and all high settings running 55-60+ FPS. I have 4GB RAM and 2.8 GHz core 2 duo. As for the switch, it was not difficult at all to get going on the Mac. The OS is pretty easy to figure out and the concept is the same as Windows, just different keys or commands etc. I think you will be very happy with either the regular MacBook or the dual graphics MacBook. If you can afford it, even one of the lower models, I would get the MBP though. Good luck.

Thanks I think I will get the MBP for sure, just unsure weather to get the duel or single graphics - I currently have a 8400M GT in my windows laptop and it runs wow perfect, not on high settings but enough so I don't complain. Is the 9400M as good as this?

I don't mind partitioning my hard drive, does bootcamp do this? How much extra does bootcamp cost because I'd like to put Win7 on my laptop too.

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Boot Camp comes with every Intel Mac computer. You use Boot Camp Assistant to get started and it will guide you through every step, including partitioning.

Hi, I just recently got a Macbook Pro too. Except I have the 13 inch.

WoW runs great under the default "high" settings in WoW with 4GB of RAM.

The 9400M is good enough to play some games, but if you are a serious gamer, you should get the 9600. This will ensure you can play the latest games in decent to great settings (BioShock, Diablo III, SC II, and so on).

Also, you asked about the processor upgrade. The processor upgrade won't affect you that much (Same Front Side Bus and L2 cache). These two things will affect the speed tremendously rather the clock speed.

What will guarantee better VISIBLE gaming performance is upgrading the processor to the 2.8 GHz (which has the 6MB of L2 cache) or upgrading the Video card to the 9600 w/ 512MB.

As far as boot camp is concerned, it comes with all Macs under the "Utilities" folder. It's just a setup assistant which just creates a partition for the Windows installation so you don't have to reinstall EVERYTHING to do install Windows and Mac.

Here's the link to the official Apple support for Boot camp:
Apple - Support - Boot Camp

P.S. - you may also want to check out the gaming section of this forum. There's a unofficial gaming thread which a lot of users posted the best settings they could achieve for playing for the Macbook and Macbook Pro's.

For sure WoW is perfect on the mac my frames are usually 50-80 depending on where I am.

For mac it even has a built in record feature so you don't need fraps or anything and the built in Itunes changer/song viewer is definitely a plus.

and come on, playing wow with trackpad? Get a mouse but whatever suits you. hah.

Thanks for your great responses guys. The Apple community sure is more friendly than the Windows one. Given all the feedback it sounds like the 9400M is more than capable of handling wow with no issues of fps lag or anything so I might just get that one.

@andr3wkim what kind of fps do you get, and do you use addons and max resolution?

I've been wowing with my windows touchpad for years and much prefer it to using a mouse, I hope the buttonless system of Mac won't drive me to a mouse