Switching to MacBook Pro.. Please help

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Hello all,

I have been using Windows computers and laptops for my entire life and will be soon switching to MacBook Pro because I am tired paying for anti-viruses and want to explore more in terms of Photography and Music making. I believe getting a Mac will be a good solution?

I am planning to get the MacBook Pro 13" 2011, i5 2.3 Ghz, Intel HD 3000 graphics. On Windows I usually use softwares such as:
-Photoscape
-GIMP
-Adobe Photoshop
-Cool Edit Pro
-Cubase
-Engineering softwares (though for this maybe not all softwares available on Mac platform): Eagle, KeilC, SIMATIC Step7, Qt Creator, etc.
- and I also work with Microcontrollers.

I also like to play games sometimes such as Counter-Strike or Need For Speed.

So, would this MBP suffice for this purpose? Especially in terms of the graphic card because I've heard some bad reviews on it. For Photoshop and Cubase/Cool Edit Pro(if available), would it suffer a bit of lagging or something? I am currently using an HP laptop with ATI Radeon HD 4350 and everything works perfectly and smoothly. I have seen the graphics card hierarchy and surprisingly HD 4350 and Intel HD 3000 are on the same stage. Is that correct?

Is the glossy screen of this MBP annoying? Because some reviews said it is too reflective.

I am sorry for the questions, I just had bad experience with laptops. I had 3 laptops in the past 3 years because of some problems, so I would want my new MBP to last long. At least for 2.5-3 years.

So, thank you very much for your help. :)
 
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Mac Book Pro 15" 2.4 GHz. Core i5 4GB 1067 MHz. DDR-3 Ram
I guess I'll be the first to welcome you to the Mac Forums. I'm a newbie myself as I just switched a short time ago. But these guys (And gals?) have been a great help for me because, like you, I've had nothing but PC's for the last 10 years. And I'm still struggling and I'm a long way from feeling as comfortable on my new Mac as I hope to be a year from now if I live that long.
I'm sorry that I can't really answer your questions, but you will soon have all the help you will need from some very nice folks up here.
And again, welcome to the forum and I hope you enjoy your new MBP!!!
Russ
 
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Thanks for your warm welcome. Well I hope I will get the help I need here :)
 
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21" iMac * 2.8 Ghz Intel Core i7 * 16GB 1333 Mhz DDR3 * 1TB HD *AMD Radeon HD 6770M 512 MB
I would say that since a lot of what you want to do requires a lot of graphics processing power, you should go a step up and get a 15 inch Macbook Pro. It has discrete rather than integrated graphics.

You can also get the 15 inch in the anti-glare model. I personally find the glossy screen WAY too reflective if you're going to be in changing light conditions. I feel that the colors are a little exaggerated or something, and I need color to be accurately represented for video work.

But that's just my two cents. Either way, I LOVE my Mac, after years as an Apple-hating Windows user.
 
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I would say that since a lot of what you want to do requires a lot of graphics processing power, you should go a step up and get a 15 inch Macbook Pro. It has discrete rather than integrated graphics.

You can also get the 15 inch in the anti-glare model. I personally find the glossy screen WAY too reflective if you're going to be in changing light conditions. I feel that the colors are a little exaggerated or something, and I need color to be accurately represented for video work.

But that's just my two cents. Either way, I LOVE my Mac, after years as an Apple-hating Windows user.

The problem is, my budget is not that high, and I don't like the 15" screen. But for my requirements, will the 13" survive? or will it be too much load for that kind of requirements?

Guess I'll end up as a Mac lover too, despite have been hating Mac for years as well.
 
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I have a Macbook Pro 13" and even tho I'm not an avid Photoshop user, I do tend to fire it up every once in a while and let me tell you, it runs perfectly fine. It loads fast, runs smoothly and my 13" doesn't heat up as much as you'd think. The other software, I am not very familiar with so I won't comment on it. As far as gaming goes, I play the occasional games here and there and the Macbook handles it all well without any major hiccups.

I was inclined at first to purchase the 15" but it was too big for my needs and the huge price difference wasn't justifiable. So maybe you should take that into consideration too.
 
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That's what I think too. The 15" is just too big and -for me- out of budget.

By you saying without any major hiccups, did you mean that there are some minors? For the Photoshop, if it really does not heat up and still loads and works fast and smooth, then I think it would be enough. What kind of games do you play?
 
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Well, when I said "without any major hiccups" I was mostly referring to the different games you might be playing. For example, I play Starcraft II and some Lego Star Wars game but they don't push the Macbook to it's limits. I have installed VMWare and have Windows 7 running for all my other gaming needs and well, the games run, but its really CPU intensive and it does make the Macbook hot. So gaming for me on the Macbook is only if I'm really lazy to get up to the main computer or if I'm away from home.

I think Steam is a good alternative even tho I, myself haven't tried it out. Heard good things about it. Look into it if gaming is a must for you.
 
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No,gaming is not necessarily a must to me. Only if there's nothing else I could do with my Mac, which i believe will be very rare. I usually play Counter-Strike or Need For Speed. I'll be looking for Dual-Boot with Windows 7 as well
 
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Yeah dual-booting is awesome on a Macbook Pro. Windows runs really fast (depending on what your doing of course) but for me, the overall experience has been great.
 
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Cool Edit Pro

This may be old news for some but I thought it would be good to log this info here.

Cool Edit Pro (PC only) is now Adobe Audition (Mac & PC) so if you like Cool Edit Pro and like Mac like I do, now you can have it all :)

There is also rumblings that Samplitude might be coming out for Mac in less than a year.

Cheers,

Carey
 

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