[jamil5454]

I just graduated, woohoo.

I'll be majoring in Computer Science, and basically I would like to hear advice from anyone else currently majoring in CS.

Should I get a cheap PC notebook or go ahead and get the iBook for school?

I've already got a PowerMac, and I also have a decent desktop PC I could use in my apartment too, but do I really need the Windows platform on the go? I'll be using my notebook to take notes, study, and most importantly write programs in a comfortable place. I'm hoping I'll be doing mostly Java, as that is platform-independent.

But would it help to run Visual Studio on the go?

Right now, an iBook would cost me around $1000-$1100, while a cheap new Dell notebook would cost under $600. I don't need anything fast, just something to take notes, write papers, write programs, etc.

[His Dudeness]

I have a Dell Inspiron 500m for sale. $400. wink wink nudge nudge.

[jamil5454]

Well, I wouldn't be buying anything before the new iBooks come out, or when school starts, whichever first.

[His Dudeness]

Well, either one would do you just fine. You should erase Windows and put a version of Linux on there. I had Ubuntu on my Dell 8600 for a while. Very nice.

[Mithras]

Mac is great for CS majors; all the unix tools are a godsend. And you won't regret having an iBook when the next Windows virus comes around.

[Cody Dawg]

Get both.

Buy the Dell that His Dudeness mentions (though remember to research the numerous Dell-hatred threads here at MacNN) or another PC and keep a Mac. You'll be ahead of your peers who are only PC-based.

Why choose?

Use both!

[mitchell_pgh]

Ask your professors.

Some are so anti-Mac it's sad.

I had a horrible professor that basically went through a Windows guide.

[starman]

It depends on the curriculum. Straight C or Windows-based GUI stuff? For straight C, you've got gcc/UNIX so you're golden there. From experience, some professors HATE it when you go outside the norm. Check with the school.

Mike

[Millennium]

Find out what platform you will be using for school. If your school uses Windows, then sad to say you will probably be better off with a Windows box. If they use Macs, go with a Mac. If they use Solaris, Linux, or any other Unix flavor, then it's a toss-up between a Mac and a Linux box (of course, you could always get a Mac and dual-boot OSX and Linux, just to cover both possibilities).

The idea behind this is that you will want to be able to do your homework on your own computer. Seriously; this can save you a lot of trouble. Any college will have a lab that you can use, but this has a nasty habit of becoming troublesome right when you don't need it to be.

Might I ask what school you'll be going to? We may be able to get a better picture of what you'll be dealing with.

[TheMosco]

I would find out what kind of tools your school uses most importantly.

I got to WPI (Worcester Polytechnic Institute). For the intro class, they used Scheme which is available for mac os x. For my intro to obecjt oriented program design they used Eclipse which is available for the mac(wasn't manditory but heavily recommended). For my Systems programming class we had to compile out c++ work on the unix shares using gcc so everything there works on the mac. The one class I took that i needed a pc for was my introduction to assembly. We used something called the LC-3 which was a fake language that ran in an emulator. It ran fine in the copy of Virtual PC that I got for 5 bucks with MS office 2005 through our MS site lisence.

I would say if you already have a desktop PC, I would get that ibook when the next revisions come out. It might even be worth selling your mac desktop. I had a home built althon xp system in my room and I have a powerbook G4 that I brought to classes and stuff.

[Rogue 5]

As long as you can take the riddicule you'll get for being a Mac user in a CS major, get the Mac. I basically just told everyone to F-off in the same situation. Macs are superior and always have been and I brought that up with specific examples every time someone talked sh*t. After a while people just leave you along when your class projects run circles around theirs. Stick to what you like and what you know. Don't cave. Proving you can do anything you need on a Mac only furthers the platform. And if by some odd reason you HAVE to do VB, you should switch colleges, cause VB is BS anyway. And if you HAVE to do windows API programming there isn't much way around that, but most CS programs don't lock you into stuff like that. Most of ours were required to run on UNIX.

Good luck and welcome to college!

[Mithras]

FWIW, I'm a PhD student in CS, and more than half of the professors and grad students in my research center (computational learning systems) use Macs. But I agree that you should first make sure that the curriculum isn't designed around Microsoft products for some horrible reason.

[parallax]

At my school a third of the people are CS majors and I'd venture to say that most laptops are mac laptops. I'm a CS major myself and I find that a powerbook works very well for that.

[Millennium]

For the record, my CS program used Solaris boxes. I brought a Mac and dual-booted it and MkLinux back in the days before OSX; once OSX came out I pretty much used that all the time.

[lilrabbit129]

I went through the exact same thing a few years ago. I was one of the first CS majors to get a mac at my University. We used linux for almost everything so OSX seemed like the perfect fit. You get flak for it for about a month. Then after a month, you just start seeing more powerbooks or ibooks start to show up. Now half the CS majors (and grad students) are using Power/i books.

As long as your curriculum isn't completely Windows based, then you're golden.

[goMac]

Depends on the school. Our school is entirely UNIX for engineering, so Powerbooks are the portable of choice in CS.

[fromthecloud]

My CS program does everything on Linux.

I usually have no problems running my code on my Mac.

Plus, I'd use Xcode over vi or emacs any day of the week.

[DeathMan]

In summary, find a program that is Unix based. Why would you want to learn windows programming anyway? All the action is in web services.

[kupan787]

I am in my 4th year as a CS major, and so far my Mac has been perfectly fine for 95% of all my work. My school recently switched over from a C++ base to Java, but that hasn't changed anything as far as platform is concerned. The only problem I ran into was for a "Computer Organization" class. We needed to run a program called LogicWorks (and VeriLog), which I don't believe have Mac versions (I could be wrong). Yes there was lab access, but it is always easier (in my opinion) to do the work on your own time at your place, rather than fight over lab time and space. I ended up building a cheap desktop PC for this (and the occasional game...), and I think I spent about $600.

Also, I have a senior project class this next year, which is done in groups. While I could probably get by on my mac, it might be easier if I was using the same IDE as the rest of my group. One of my instructors mentioned that he had seen a group of mac users get together for the project, so that is always an option as well.

[ghporter]

As stated earlier, find out what the school uses. Not only what hardware the profs use, but what their software is too. In order to get my school to authorize a C class at the extension campus I attended, the CS chair had to show an application for C, so he built a graphics class around GKS-a C-based graphics kernel. (Yes it was THAT long ago.) Since it was Windows/x86 based, we had to go with Windows machines. That beat the heck out of learning on a VAX! If he'd been able to, I think he would have pushed for Linux-based everything (particularly in the OS class!), but that was ten years ago, and Linux wasn't really established yet.

Get what will work with what the curriculum demands. Maybe you'll wind up with a Windows laptop (I wouldn't get a desktop for this!), and have to deal with some clunkiness because of it, but the point is not brand loyalty, the point is getting the educational benefit you're paying for. When you graduate you can do whatever you want to with this theoretical computer, but until then, go with what you NEED to do the work.

[Mithras]

Of course, if you wait a year, you can get a Mac laptop that also runs Windows.

[OwlBoy]

Originally Posted by Mithras

Of course, if you wait a year, you can get a Mac laptop that also runs Windows.

[olePigeon]

Depends on the professor and what you're learning.

If your professor doesn't care too much, than pretty much anything except .NET and Microsoft Visual Basic, and you're good to go with a Mac.

[JoshuaZ]

My two CS major roomies both had Macs, and they loved having them. But as everyone keeps saying it depends on the school.

[ASIMO]

Sorry, but you will find little help here. We major in lesbians, vegetables, Canadians, babes, beer, and railroad mischievousness in this forum.

Try the Powerbook forum.

[jamil5454]

Originally Posted by ASIMO

Sorry, but you will find little help here. We major in lesbians, vegetables, Canadians, babes, beer, and railroad mischievousness in this forum.

Try the Powerbook forum.

Heh thanks.

Wow, the lounge is the place to post if you want opinions. Geez, I posted yesterday and come back this morning to huge crapload of advice. But it's good advice.

I should mention that I already have a rev.C DP2.0 PowerMac G5, so I'd still have OS X. And I'm working on making my bedroom as comfortable as possible, so it'll be a nice place to work/study. AND I still have a nice PC box (just not a laptop) to put Windows/Linux on. But I think I will get an iBook, mainly because I already have VirtualPC. If we're required to use VS.NET, I can run it through VirtualPC, and if it runs too slow or whatever I'll just run it on my PC box back in the apartment. With the Mac, you can run Linux, OS X, and Windows (via VPC) all on one machine.

But I'm having second thoughts on the right time to purchase. If I can hold off till Intel iBooks, that would be to my advantage. My first year of school anyway is going to be at ACC (Since I didn't apply to UT on time), so I won't NEED a laptop then. If I wait a year and get a Mactel laptop, I could get the AppleCare and the 3 years would run out just as I was graduating.

I'm moving in tomorrow, and I still need a job. So that comes first.

Anyway, thanks for the advice.

[nonhuman]

I graduated in CS last year. Used a mac the whole time, had no problems.

The only potential issue is if you do any Java work. Java for Mac or Linux PPC is usually a ways behind what's available on Windows/Linux x86.

If you've already got a PowerMac and a PC and just want a laptop, I'd definitely go with a PowerBook or iBook. But your idea of waiting for a Mactel sounds good too. It'll make sure you can always have the most current software on all three OSs.

[waffffffle]

I had Macs all through college, CS engineer at Princeton. The department is very unix-centric, but we were often required to be sure that I work compiled on the school's solaris servers. This only caused a problem for me in one class, Introduction to Programming Systems, since the it was all about writing SPAC assembly and similar stuff. In that case I wrote in Project Builder (now Xcode) off my SMB share, and had an ssh session open to compile and debug. The main issue there is of course that a Mac is PPC and not SPARC and when I wasn't doing assembly it turned out that a number of the system library files were in different locations.

I found that over my time in the department OS X really took hold. Practically all the professors have a Mac of some sort. Half the students have PowerBooks now. However I was certainly a pioneer when I tried doing my freshman CS work using the OS X public beta.

[tikki]

I use my iBook for most of my CS work. Unfortunately, some classes have sold their sole to .Net, which makes it difficult. I have a Compaq for that stuff though.

[jamil5454]

Looks like an iBook it is. I guess I'll just wait and get the Mactel, and hopefully I won't regret a rev. A machine. My laptop needs shouldn't be too demanding during the next year.

Thizanks fo da 'vise.

[ManOfSteal]

I'd go with Adobe for all your CS needs.

[lilrabbit129]

Good choice with waiting. I have a 12" PB 867mhz and love it, but with intel based PBs and iBooks on the horizon, a little waiting could do a lot of good.