Macbook v PC laptop

[Mrskbpw]

I'm a Mac girl through and through. I've always used Macs at work and we've got a Mac at home. Though I did once buy a (cheap) PC laptop and it lasted about a year of very casual use before it broke.

Our desktop home Mac is now 9 years old and is really on its last legs. We're desperate for a new one. What we want is a Macbook Pro, but they're very expensive.

Can anyone tell me about PC laptops? They're so much cheaper than Macs that it makes me suspicious.

Why are they so cheap?
Do they last as long as Macs?
Are they very different?
Would using a Mac at work and a PC at home confuse me?

I look at laptops online and just don't understand them - then I look at the Macbooks and it all makes sense. I'm wondering if this alone makes it worth the money?!

A lot of good questions.

There are lots of reasons why Windows laptops are cheaper than Mac ones. One of which is because there's a lot more hardware vendors for Windows machines so that drives prices down. This wider array of components is also the reasons why Windows machines don't tend to have the 'it just works' factor of Mac ones.

There was a thread recently on Geeky Stuff which pointed out that for the same spec of Macbook and Windows laptop the price difference is not actually that great. Apple just don't make low-spec (i.e. cheap) devices.

I use Windows at work and a Mac at home and I have no problems switching between the two, but I work in IT so if I did, I would probably get the sack :) They are not a million miles apart but you could get frustrated learning all the differences.

Do you do work stuff at home? Obviously one of the bigger differences is the software that's available to run on both types of machine. I do have a copy of Microsoft Office on my Macbook although there are plenty of alternatives to this. A lot of what I do between home and work is done via Google Drive and Evernote anyway, one of which is purely web-based and the other has clients for Mac and Windows (as well as mobile devices).

It also depends on what you want to do at home. If it's mostly web browsing and watching videos, a tablet (iPad or otherwise) might be sufficient, along with a cheapo Windows laptop to do the grunt stuff.

All things being equal, I would save up for a Macbook and hope your existing machine keeps going that long, or buy a cheapo Windows laptop now and give yourself longer to save up (and possibly more incentive to do so, depending on how much you end up hating Windows )

Does it have to be a laptop ? For maybe 200 quid, you could get an iMac, on Ebay.

OK, not a shiny new computer to unwrap and love from being the first user, but there have been some great systems listed on Ebay this year - I should know as I have 2x 17" and 3x 20" iMacs, all s/h.

Some came with MS Office or Photoshop installed, some use Intel CPU (which lets me run the Chrome browser) the others are PowerPC , but in my view what might have been spent on a single system will pay for 2 or 3 good value older systems, if funds limit what you can spend.

There was a thread recently on Geeky Stuff which pointed out that for the same spec of Macbook and Windows laptop the price difference is not actually that great.
That thread actually said you could buy a windows laptop with the same spec as a Macbook for about £450 which is half the price of the cheapest Macbook.

Mrskbpw, it sounds to me like if you are used to macs, trust mac's and have had good experiences with Mac's then that alone is a good enough reason.

Yes you will pay more. And I think you can easily argue that the difference you pay is down to the following:

• Design. Apple products tend to look amazing, someone had to design it and it makes people want it. It's marketed as a luxury product so people are willing to pay more.

• Hardware. Mac's tend to have better quality components in. So for example the Retina screen. You won't find that elsewhere. SSD hard drives will make the machine way faster than your standard laptop.

• Customer service. Apple customer service is absolutely great. The standard every tech company should aspire to. But they can only afford to do that because they make more than a couple of dollars a PC.

They're so much cheaper than Macs that it makes me suspicious.

That's because you're used to over-paying for your computers so when something offers better more bang for the buck you're simply not recognising it. The guts of Apple computers are no different to other manufacturers. Same processors, same chipsets, same memory, same video cards etc. Foxconn, who makes most of Apple's products, also makes laptops for many of the PC manufacturers as well.

Admittedly Apple does push the technology a bit on displays and packaging and their after-sales service can be very good which is useful as overall Apple quality control is nothing special. But Apple also has literally billions in the bank that it's amassed on the profits from its over-priced products.

All that aside, ff you're used to Macs then you'll hate moving to a PC.

It's not that PCs are cheap (some are) it's that Macs are ridiculously expensive. Personally I'd never consider paying twice as much for a machine which is so incompatible with the rest of the world. I paid £400 for a PC 6 years ago with a decent spec. I've never had any problems with it. None. No viruses, no hardware failures, etc. I simply don't understand why I should be paying nearer a grand for the same experience.

This is very enlightening - thank you!

We both sometimes work at home - and that involves Word mostly for me, but also InDesign occasionally, and InDesign often for my husband. Does that even run on a PC?

In the time we've had our Mac, my parents have had two desktop PCs, both of which were repaired more than once. But like someone pointed out, our desktop Mac was massively expensive (bought when my husband worked from home full-time) and you can't really compare that to a £300 PC.

I think we'll end up sticking with a Mac and hanging on until we can save up for a Macbook. But you never know...

Well I've never had a Macbook but I own an iMac. I paid a grand for it when I could easily get a PC for half that price.

So why did I do that? Especially since I am technical enough to look after my own PC.

Well firstly it looks gorgeous. I admit that!

But also unlike my PC which needs an armful of cables, the iMac is all built in. The only wire is the power cable.

The screen is simply sublime and the standard for others to aspire to. As a semi-pro photographer, accurate colour and good quality screen is essential. Plus the screen is what I am staring at for hours. So why compromise on a crap screen to save a few quid?

The rest...it just works. It doesn't make a fuss. I put it to sleep & wake it up. It does it. Windows has always been a bit hit & miss. Sometimes it will wake....other times not.

2.5 years later and it's still nippy and hasn't slowed itself down unlike Windows.

Lastly for me I like the idea of the kids learning to use MacOS and Windows. They now can use both operating systems without even thinking which is which.

All good points, niceguy - particularly about the start-up times. My work laptop drives me crazy with how long it takes to get going compared to the Mac.

apple tend to make top end kit, and charge around the same as other manufacturers to for top end kit. Just look at the price of some of the higher end Dell or sony ultrabooks.

Plus, as apple is much more integrated, they get by on less memory and slower CPUs than windows tends to require, meaning that any mac will do the job where most cheaper PCs or laptops will need more memory to work well, particularly for graphics or creative stuff.

Every mac I have had lasted far longer than any PCs, which have all needed upgrading in about a year - I have only just stopped using a powerPC iMac I bought in 2001 since the browsers don't run Education City (bloody flash), which the kids use for school.

If I were you, I'd save for a macbook or look for second hand or refurbished units. Many employers run the apple epp scheme which gives a small discount (better than nothing) and if you are self employed and using it for work you can probably offset it against tax.

Oh, and the iCloud syncing between macs and other apple products is awesome. Update a phone number on your computer and it updates everything else immediately.

Would just like to point out that syncing in the non Apple world is just as good. If I update a phone number or calendar entry on my computer, for example, it also updates all my Android devices. iCloud is far from being unique to Apple.

trashcansinatra

Plus, as apple is much more integrated, they get by on less memory and slower CPUs than windows tends to require, meaning that any mac will do the job where most cheaper PCs or laptops will need more memory to work well, particularly for graphics or creative stuff.

Nonsense. A cursory glance at the hardware specifications for your average Mac show that they use the same processor as a PC and have the same amount of RAM.

They have slower hard disks (5400RPM drives), though, which is a retrograde step IMO.

Every mac I have had lasted far longer than any PCs, which have all needed upgrading in about a year - I have only just stopped using a powerPC iMac I bought in 2001 since the browsers don't run Education City (bloody flash), which the kids use for school.

You make it sound as though doing simple cheap upgrades to your home computer is a bad thing. Just because Apple won't let you upgrade your Mac, doesn't mean it's wrong to do so.

Apple do 'let' you upgrade.

We have 3 MacBooks at home, 2 of which are coming up 7 years old, the other 3 years old. All more than able to deal with anything you can chuck at them. My brother and father have had 4 laptops and a desktop each in that time. I don't know anyone who has had a PC last more than 18 months and not thrown it at the wall.

Well, every PC laptop I've ever had has lasted about 18 months (just going outside warranty) before developing a major fault - and they cost about £400 at the time. I then got so fed up I bought a MacBook in Jan 2007 (aluminium shell rather than plastic) - 6 years later the battery still lasts 4hrs+ and I've had no faults with it whatsoever, even after dropping it several times. A sample size of 1 is rather small though! Both DH and I work in IT and even my DH (who hates Apple with a vengence) has to comment that his highend Toshiba looks/feels flimsy compared to my tank MacBook .

Saying that, laptop tech has moved on a lot in the last 5 years, so the differences are a lot less. Also, you'd be hard-pressed to find a new PC laptop that didn't come with Windows 8 these days, which may factor into your equation if you really hate the new Windows desktop.

I had my last Toshiba laptop (running Vista, no less) for three years. It was fine. My mum's now got it as her 7 or 8yo laptop was starting to struggle.

The only people I know who have laptops that only last 12-18 months are teenagers who mistreat them.

Every business I've ever worked in had typically planned to only replace laptops every three to four years. The same cycle that they replaced desktop PCs and Macs. I genuinely do not recognise this "Macs last forever, PCs are junk in less than 2 years" thing.

My six year old PC has had a multitude of problems and I sometimes feel like throwing it out of the window. Currently coveting a MacBook Pro but the cost is high...can't justify it at the moment as saving to do a post-grad course.

But did you know you can sometimes get them refurbished on the Apple website a little cheaper? Also, last year - in June - just before the latest versions came out, the then current MacBooks were dropped in price by an average of £200 so that may be the case again this year. Wish I'd got one last summer.

Even if we pretend for a moment that Macs do last longer. They cost considerably more (Similar spec Toshiba Laptop vs Top Mac book pro currently £1200 vs £2300). There is no way I am ever going to part money with such a disgusting excuse for a company as Apple. Their products are over priced, their advertising is about as close as I've seen to a Scientology sect, they are insanely arrogant and their patent tactics right now are both bullish and telling of their inability to innovate in the current market. I think they forget sometimes that there was one man who made them and now he's not here any more, they just look stupid (note the ease with which Samsung ridiculed them in the Galaxy S3 advertising campaign).

"Apple do 'let' you upgrade."

Not on their laptops they don't, not any more. It's likely the next model of iMac will go the same way.

There are zero Apple-approved upgrade options for the MacBook Air for instance. Need more storage or a bit more memory? Tough. Throw it away and buy a new one. There are a few after-market SSD upgrade options but they'll void your warranty and Apple make it deliberately and unnecessarily difficult to open the case. Pentalobe security screws? It's a sodding laptop, not the initiator for a nuclear weapon.

There are also zero Apple-approved upgrade options for the new MacBook Pro With Retina Display(tm). Need more memory? Tough. Throw it away and buy a new one. Need more storage? Buy a warranty-voiding after-market upgrade option because Apple don't supply a legit one, then buy a special screwdriver to take out Apple's ridiculous "special" screws, and hope you don't damage anything important because the entire screen assembly is glued together into one lump and the batteries are glued to the case. Nice.

iFixit (a website that publishes repair guides for pretty much everything but primarily Apple fanboys) has deemed the MacBook Pro With Retina Display(tm)(R)(c) "the least repairable laptop we've ever taken apart".

Quite an achievement really.

GwendolineMaryLacey

Apple do 'let' you upgrade.

We have 3 MacBooks at home, 2 of which are coming up 7 years old, the other 3 years old.

Then your experience is totally out of date. Try sticking so much as a replacement battery in a modern Macbook, or a stick of RAM in their desktop machine.

All more than able to deal with anything you can chuck at them. My brother and father have had 4 laptops and a desktop each in that time. I don't know anyone who has had a PC last more than 18 months and not thrown it at the wall.

Then your field of experience must be extremely narrow. I see clients every day with PCs which have lasted for 5, 6, 7 years.

ive worked in IT fo over 10 years, and pc's are great for the professional world ...but for home use, windows is an absolute croak of shite imo, thats why i have a mac at home

ive also partitoned my mac so i can run windows in parallel it allows me to install software i need for work at home

i would never go back to a pc for home use, neither would my dog

Used a PC for work and home for years and years but DD talked me into getting a MacBook Pro. I still wanted to use my windows SW so purchased Parallels 7 and Windows 7. Would I buy a PC again? Yes Am I happy with my Mac? Yes but only while I can use some of the SW that is only available on a PC. The build quality of a Mac is far superior to any found on a PC, in my opinion, but the cost ohhhhh the cost. Learning how to use a Mac is a real problem, but Utube has many tutorials which I use all the time. Not much help I know, but if price is a major issue, go with the PC.

VinegarTits

ive worked in IT fo over 10 years, and pc's are great for the professional world ...but for home use, windows is an absolute croak of shite imo, thats why i have a mac at home

You've worked in IT for 10 years and you didn't know Macs couldn't be upgraded? And you don't know anyone who has had a PC last more than 18 months?

What aspect of IT do you work in?

flatpackhamster

'VinegarTits

ive worked in IT fo over 10 years, and pc's are great for the professional world ...but for home use, windows is an absolute croak of shite imo, thats why i have a mac at home

You've worked in IT for 10 years and you didn't know Macs couldn't be upgraded? And you don't know anyone who has had a PC last more than 18 months?

What aspect of IT do you work in? '

i suggest you read the thread properly love...

...then when you dont find any comments from me saying 'Macs couldn't be upgraded? And i don't know anyone who has had a PC last more than 18 months?' come back and ill accept your apology