Macbook, 2 months later

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I have had my Macbook for 2 months now. I can honestly say that this little thing has not only changed my world but made me look at computers totally different. I love booting up and not having to wait for the system tray to load, no popup every 5 minutes telling me to update something, and I love trashing programs I don't really use and never having to worry about them again. My Mac has never crashed on me and I only formatted it and reinstalled everything once because of bootcamp! So I would say it's been a very positive piece of equipment!

Now for the bad! I cannot work when I'm on it. The functions I need are almost all windows based or the laptop isn't powerfull enough. I knew going in that it would not do graphic intensive things but never thought it would be as bad as it has been. The little wheel that comes up to think does it a lot in dreamweaver just to open a file! Loading anything, including a browser, yep, has to think! I hate it thinking all the time, loading a pic, yep thinking! I hate it! Whoever said pc hardware was more expensive can jump off a bridge, I looked at a Dell XPS1210 today with 2gb ram and a nice gpu for $996. The position I'm in is should I sell the Macbook or do you guys think there is something wrong with it? I am leaning toward selling but maybe there is something I'm doing wrong!

<R>
 
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Your Mac's Specs
2011 MBP, i7, 16GB RAM, MBP 2.16Ghz Core Duo, 2GB ram, Dual 867Mhz MDD, 1.75GB ram, ATI 9800 Pro vid
Dreamweaver, until a few days ago, was a PowerPC application. You'd want to get the newly released Universal edition to see speed gains.

I'm not sure about your 'thinking' comments. It could just as easily refer to a network problem based on how I'm reading it.

Considering the Dell store says that model starts at US$1299, you must be using a coupon to get that $996 price. Also watch out. That model comes standard with the same graphics processor (GPU) as the MacBook. Also, Vista is known to be real slow on many systems. I can't imagine it performing well with that GPU. Perhaps you're referring to the upgrade GPU that you'll need to get the Vista Aero experience.

I went through the configuration of that model to get it close to the $1299 MacBook and received a price of $1737 before any discounts. That included upgrading Vista since I don't consider the Home edition comparable to OS X client.
 
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Your Mac's Specs
Black MacBook 2GB, Mac Pro 2.66Ghz 3GB X1900.
Macbook runs like a dog unless you have 1GB or 2GB of RAM.

Like others have said, make sure you run Intel native versions of software, the Activity Monitor tells you if an app is Intel or not.

If you run old PowerPC compiled applications then the application runs under emulation/translation. While the Intel chips have more grunt than the PowerPC, the emulation spends half of its time flipping byte ordering around and PPC used one order and Intel another order (little endian vs big endian).

PPC can switch byte ordering, Intel can't.

Also, it's a laptop! the drives are slower. You should only get a laptop if you truly need a portable computer. There's a performance hit in all areas, disk speed (and life), CPUs are often mobile versions (less power, less performance) etc....
 
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Your Mac's Specs
Black MacBook 2GB, Mac Pro 2.66Ghz 3GB X1900.
Read this review page:

http://www.appleinsider.com/review.php?id=4

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"While iApps and universal-binaries are as snappy as ever, Rosetta apps are very slow -- to the detriment of the entire system. When running just two Rosetta programs in the background -- Photoshop and NetNewsWire -- the whole system slows down significantly. There are even times when the whole computer system will choke, and remain unresponsive for several seconds.

Switching from Safari to Photoshop via the Dock results in about 20 seconds of the dreaded "spinning beach ball" in my experiences. That's with a single 300x125 image loaded in the program. NetNewsWire is also horrifically slow for such a simple application. In fact, it takes about a minute to switch from TextEdit to NetNewsWire and reload my subscriptions."
---------

This is on a iMac 20" and this is the effect running non-Intel code has on your system. Therefore your Macbook isn't to blame, it is the choice of software.
 

bobtomay

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15" MBP '06 2.33 C2D 4GB 10.7; 13" MBA '14 1.8 i7 8GB 10.11; 21" iMac '13 2.9 i5 8GB 10.11; 6S
If you like OS X, would recommend upgrading your RAM to 2GB. You can find the 2GB kits practically everywhere in the range of $140. And upgrading to the latest Dreamweaver which is now Intel native as has been pointed out above.

If you like windows and can get back what you paid for the MacBook and have found that XPS1210 with 2GB for $996 "if it is new or you have hands on access to it prior to purchase", that's what I would recommend. That's pretty hefty discount from Dell website price of $1299 machine + $200 memory upgrade =$1499 minimum for that machine currently. Now keep in mind at that price you are downgrading the CPU one step and getting the same video card as the MacBook. If you found one that has XP on it instead of Vista, would say that would be a plus, but then would also be used. Dunno, for me a used Dell for $1000, no warranty, uh, no thanks - $750 and now it's tempting.
 
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ibook g4, imac 2ghz c2d, mbp 2.4ghz c2d - 10.5.1
I have had my Macbook for 2 months now. I can honestly say that this little thing has not only changed my world but made me look at computers totally different. I love booting up and not having to wait for the system tray to load, no popup every 5 minutes telling me to update something, and I love trashing programs I don't really use and never having to worry about them again. My Mac has never crashed on me and I only formatted it and reinstalled everything once because of bootcamp! So I would say it's been a very positive piece of equipment!

Now for the bad! I cannot work when I'm on it. The functions I need are almost all windows based or the laptop isn't powerfull enough. I knew going in that it would not do graphic intensive things but never thought it would be as bad as it has been. The little wheel that comes up to think does it a lot in dreamweaver just to open a file! Loading anything, including a browser, yep, has to think! I hate it thinking all the time, loading a pic, yep thinking! I hate it! Whoever said pc hardware was more expensive can jump off a bridge, I looked at a Dell XPS1210 today with 2gb ram and a nice gpu for $996. The position I'm in is should I sell the Macbook or do you guys think there is something wrong with it? I am leaning toward selling but maybe there is something I'm doing wrong!

<R>

the dreamweaver thing could be to do with ram or with rosseta - i dont know if dreamweaver is universal ?

anyone else know ?
 
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Black MacBook 2GB, Mac Pro 2.66Ghz 3GB X1900.
If you like windows and can get back what you paid for the MacBook and have found that XPS1210 with 2GB for $996.

Why not use bootcamp and run Windows on the Mac instead of selling it?

You then get the advantage of a well designed laptop. Better than some Dell rubbish.
 
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I have 1gb of ram in my macbook now. I have Dreamweaver 8, I have been waiting for CS3. I wouldn't think Dreamweaver would run slow on the Macbook but it does. If I click too fast the macbook brings up the spinning wheel of color like it's thinking. My network has nothing to do with it, my mac does better with my wireless than my pc.
 
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I recently upgraded from 512MB to 2GB. I'm on a 1.83GHz MBP. The difference in RAM is night and day. Apps load up in an instant. I use Parallel to run any XP applications. I use it for MS Money and my CPA test prep software. Runs like a champ.

If you are having problems, your best bet is RAM upgrade.
 
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So I guess the majority is saying to put another $150 into it and upgrade to 2gb of ram. I do need a laptop, I go to college, use it at work, and I use it when I show off website layouts to current clients. I have a desktop at home with dual screens where I do most of my work, I just wanted something nice to compliment that setup. I bought the Mac thinking it would do me better than the pc, it has except for being slow. I will try the upgrade and if I don't like it still I know apple retain a lot of their value so I will sell it. FYI, the Dell was a refurb unit, I have bought and used Dell refurbs at work and at home for years.

Thanks,
Ryan
 

cwa107


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14" MacBook Pro M1 Pro, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD
So I guess the majority is saying to put another $150 into it and upgrade to 2gb of ram. I do need a laptop, I go to college, use it at work, and I use it when I show off website layouts to current clients. I have a desktop at home with dual screens where I do most of my work, I just wanted something nice to compliment that setup. I bought the Mac thinking it would do me better than the pc, it has except for being slow. I will try the upgrade and if I don't like it still I know apple retain a lot of their value so I will sell it. FYI, the Dell was a refurb unit, I have bought and used Dell refurbs at work and at home for years.

Thanks,
Ryan

It depends. 2GB is nice, but 1GB should be sufficient for most tasks. If you only have 512MB, it should be a significant upgrade. If you've already got 1GB and you're still seeing lousy performance, I would imagine it's your apps running under Rosetta that are the problem.
 
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As cheap as RAM is right now, only those on the tightest of tight budgets should anything less than 2GB, IMO...
 
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Your Mac's Specs
15" 2014 MacBook Pro, i7 2.5Ghz, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD; iPad 3, iPhone 6
If you have 512m now, you may as well go for 2GB rather than 1GB now and then upgrade again in the future. It's best to upgrade the RAM in equal pairs.

Mine recently got upgraded to 2GB from 1GB and the different is significant.
 
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Sorta off topic and I'm new to Macs. In the near future I plan on getting the 24" IMac. Is it possible to upgrade the hard drive and the optical drive on it? I'm not too worried about the graphics card since I don't play that much PC games anymore. I'm sure the video card is integrated into the mobo or is it? My concerns are the hard drive if I do choose a upgrading to a larger one like the 500gig and faster speed optical drive if I ever need one.
 
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2011 MBP, i7, 16GB RAM, MBP 2.16Ghz Core Duo, 2GB ram, Dual 867Mhz MDD, 1.75GB ram, ATI 9800 Pro vid
Sorta off topic... Is it possible to upgrade the hard drive and the optical drive... I'm sure the video card is integrated
You can upgrade the hard drive and I would think the optical as long as you find a part that fits properly. There probably are or will be third parties selling such parts.

I've heard that the video card is a separate part plugged into the motherboard and uses some new standard interface. If true, that means there is an opportunity for a third party to sell an improved card. So far none exist.
 
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Black MacBook 2GB, Mac Pro 2.66Ghz 3GB X1900.
Hard drives are 2.5 inch SATA drives. Optical drives are slot loading ones, you see them on ebay as upgrades for the Mac Mini.

The graphics chip is integrated into the chipset, it's not removable. iMac 24 has a module for the graphics but it's not a standard module and there's none for sale elsewhere.
 
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Thanks for the feedback guys. I was worried that I wouldn't be able to upgrade the hard drive or optical drive but I feel relieved that I can.

Should I go for the 500 gig or stay with the 250 gig? I want to seriously get into video editing, photography and graphics when I get my IMac. Plus on my current PC I have about 40 gigs of mp3s that I ripped from my CD collection and others I downloaded. I also download anime via torrents. I'm sure not if 500 gigs is going overboard but I learned that video files can take up hard drive space real quickly.
 

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