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Project · Jun 11, 2006, 10:09 AM

I went to the Apple Store in Yorkdale this saturday...

The Blackbook looks sweet but it wasn't worth it for me. I decided to go for the mid-range model for resale value and the Superdrive would be handy for ripping DVDs.

I decided to hold off on the hard drive until August. The 2GB of RAM is in the mail though.

Star-Fire · Jun 11, 2006, 10:09 AM

Trying to get my parents to replace there aging iBook (see sig) that I bought them with a low end Macbook.

harrisjamieh · Jun 11, 2006, 10:30 AM

Originally Posted by Star-Fire

(see sig) .

Star-Fire · Jun 11, 2006, 10:54 AM

Opps! Took it out, it's a 600 G3 ice book, maxed on ram though 640

PBG4 User · Jun 12, 2006, 03:33 PM

I'm debating whether or not to pick up a MacBook now or wait until August. Either way I'll be picking up the non DVD-R model because like many other people have said here, I have a desktop 16x DL DVD-R (and 2 other DVD-R drives) so I don't need another burner. The $1100 model seems to be by far the best value.

aristobrat · Jun 12, 2006, 10:10 PM

Originally Posted by PBG4 User

The $1100 model seems to be by far the best value.

Esp if you can get it from Amazon ... $100 online rebate and no sales tax (another $50 savings for me).

nickname · Jun 12, 2006, 10:58 PM

Originally Posted by aristobrat

Esp if you can get it from Amazon ... $100 online rebate and no sales tax (another $50 savings for me).

Do you know when that offer will expire, by the way?

aristobrat · Jun 13, 2006, 09:58 AM

It says 6/20, but if it's anything like the rebate on their other Macs, they'll keep redoing it. They're still selling the Intel iMacs that came out in January with a $100 rebate.

grinder · Jun 13, 2006, 10:06 AM

My sister just got the lowest end model and is completely happy with it. I am working on getting her to install 1GB of RAM in it.

PBG4 User · Jun 13, 2006, 11:35 AM

Originally Posted by aristobrat

Esp if you can get it from Amazon ... $100 online rebate and no sales tax (another $50 savings for me).

Oh man, you're killing me.

I'd save $66 in taxes so with the $100 rebate that would cover either a 2GB RAM upgrade or a 120GB HD upgrade or ....

Right now I keep telling myself to wait until August or so to see if the MBs get upgraded with the GMA 965 (Broadwater) chipset. If the MBs get that, that'll probably push me over the edge. Plus I might actually have some money then.

Frans · Jun 17, 2006, 06:45 PM

My wife has the 1,83 Mhz white MacBook, I'm using a black one. We both have 2 Gb RAM. There is no noticeable difference in speed, so if you don't need to burn DVD's than stick to the low end model.

Star-Fire · Jun 17, 2006, 11:55 PM

my parents just got one, its fine for what they do, replaced a 600 g3 ibook, so a marked improvment

Mastrap · Jun 18, 2006, 07:51 AM

I had a SuperDrive in the 12"PB this MB is replacing and I can't remember if I used it even once. I can burn CDs with my iMac at work, but even there I rarely do so - all my backup is to a server and external drives.

If you don't need to write DVDs then the low end MB is great value. I bought it for home use only, email, browsing, a little light web design ever now and then. Upgraded the RAM and am 100% happy with it.

spooney · Jun 18, 2006, 09:07 AM

I've got a 1.83 GHz MacBook on its way to me as we speak. With UK student discount it cost me £680 with the 80GB hard drive upgrade. It would have been well over £100 more for the SuperDrive and slight speed bump, which I'd much rather use towards maxing out the RAM to 2GB. I'm planning to keep my old PC desktop running "headless" so I can still burn DVDs from that for backups etc.

jaydon34 · Jun 18, 2006, 12:34 PM

I have the low end as well. Only thing it really lacks is the superdrive. And I hardly ever burn dvds and its not a dual layer anyways.

wuzup101 · Jun 18, 2006, 03:31 PM

I'm actually considering buying the lowest end macbook to use as a portable so that I can leave my 15" Al powerbook at home. However, the macbook doesn't seem that much smaller than my Al book, I may hold off until the next revision comes around. Buying the lowest end model, as I see it, just makes sense for me. I have a 250gb portable hard drive, 16x DL DVD burner, etc... Buying the cheaper one would allow me to do a 2gb ram upgrade for the price difference between the two white books. I'd really like the sexy black macbook, but apple's gonna have to **** me before I pay an extra ~$150 just for it being black.

My 1.5ghz 15" has lasted me a while, I think I might just let it last me longer and longer. The 15" MBP looks very very nice; however, I really hate aluminum now. It dents way too easy, paint comes off, etc... If I ever buy a MBP it's going to have to be made out of something else or be VERY appealing in some other way.

For right now, as I see it, the lowest end MB is a pretty damn good deal, though a nicer GPU would be nice.

monkeybrain · Jun 18, 2006, 04:01 PM

Originally Posted by spooney

I've got a 1.83 GHz MacBook on its way to me as we speak. With UK student discount it cost me £680 with the 80GB hard drive upgrade. It would have been well over £100 more for the SuperDrive and slight speed bump, which I'd much rather use towards maxing out the RAM to 2GB. I'm planning to keep my old PC desktop running "headless" so I can still burn DVDs from that for backups etc.

Spooney, how did you get it for £680? The online education store shows it has £703, and that's before the 80 gig hard disk upgrade.

spooney · Jun 18, 2006, 05:05 PM

Originally Posted by monkeybrain

Spooney, how did you get it for £680? The online education store shows it has £703, and that's before the 80 gig hard disk upgrade.

I just checked again on the store, and the base MacBook without any extras shows as £643.90 for me. That's logged in to my university network over VPN (on summer break at the moment!), in the Apple Store for Higher Education. Not sure why you are getting a different price - are you using the Apple Store for Education? Perhaps the Apple Store for Higher Education and the Apple Store for Education provide different discounts?

monkeybrain · Jun 18, 2006, 06:20 PM

It does seem like they provide different discounts - I had no idea they did. I'm not a student anymore myself, although my flatmate is, but I when I was a student I just used the standard Apple Education Store. I wonder how long this price difference has existed?

Simon · Jun 19, 2006, 12:15 AM

The difference has been there for quite a while here. When I order through the AppleStore for the university I work at, I get about 15% discount. If I just go to the AppleStore and select education, I get about 10%.

PBG4 User · Jun 19, 2006, 01:55 PM

Originally Posted by Simon

The difference has been there for quite a while here. When I order through the AppleStore for the university I work at, I get about 15% discount. If I just go to the AppleStore and select education, I get about 10%.

Basically 10% is the base discount for all educational purchases. Better discounts are given to students/faculty of schools that buy a lot of Macs.

PBG4 User · Jun 20, 2006, 01:31 PM

Bought a returned by previous purchaser base white MacBook last night at the Apple store. They gave me 10% off so the price was <$989.95 before tax. As far as I can tell, the only thing I didn't get were the Apple stickers. I think I can live without the two stickers considering I saved just over $109.

So far I've only reinstalled the OS / included apps to reduce the install to what I wanted so I can only comment on one thing, wireless reception. It is excellent! I found 4 WiFi networks somewhere in the vicinity of my domicile. With my previous wireless laptop, I could only find one of these networks, and that was barely. The MacBook had full strength connections. I was really surprised!

fesdds · Jun 20, 2006, 02:04 PM

I bought 2 low-end macbooks. Upgraded the RAM in one of them. I also have no need to burn DVD's with laptop, have superdrive on all of my desktops. Don't think I would even notice the small speed boost with the 2.0 anyways.

soulboy · Jun 30, 2006, 01:33 PM

Hi, like most people here I purchased the "lowest end" macbook because I could not see any point in paying an extra £150.00 for the mid range or £280.00 for the black one. But fate stepped in, my 1st macbook fell apart (the screen surround came off), the second burnt the coffee table while charging overnight so apple gave me an upgrade for free. But I still say go for the entry model its still a brilliant machine........I have strayed from the darkside, this is my first mac and I love it.......until it burns the flat down........it seems to get a bit hot after a while.......

is this normal??

aristobrat · Jun 30, 2006, 01:51 PM

There are a few threads about MB heat, but IMO, they do run hotter than most other laptops (but cooler than the Mac Book Pros).

iDaver · Jun 30, 2006, 04:38 PM

I don't think my MacBook is any hotter than my old G4 1.33Ghz PowerBook was but I don't push it very hard. If any coffee tables are getting burned while charging, I'd say that's a high potential fire hazard and there should be a recall. Hopefully it's an isolated incident.

Once again, I think Apple has shot themselves in the foot with their design. If they'd just made the MacBook a quarter inch thicker, it could probably be a lot cooler.

aristobrat · Jun 30, 2006, 04:44 PM

I think the current design is fine, but if they lowered the temp at which the fan turns on that it'd help a whole lot!

There's an article where someone's MBP fan ran full-speed all the time and it made the MacBook COLD to the touch. There's got to be something between that extreme and how Apple has it set now that would result in a cooler notebook!

TheCreator · Jul 1, 2006, 01:13 AM

I got the lowend version ordered 2gig of ram and have an external dvd burner and one in my PC.

unixfool · Jul 1, 2006, 11:52 PM

Signature says it all. I wanted the black one bad, but couldn't justify the cost difference between it and the white 2GHz. I did a BTO though, getting the 80GB drive. All I have to do now is reinstall the OS and get rid of some of the unneeded items.

All in all, I may well have been fine with the low-end model, but this will be the last laptop I purchase in awhile, as I've two others with one being just as quick and handy as my new Mac (BTW, this is my first Mac purchase).

I'm very happy with what I've purchased, though.

aristobrat · Jul 2, 2006, 12:39 PM

You're so lucky to have found Mac now.

I bought a mini last summer because I wasn't sure if I'd really like OS X, so I wanted the least expensive box I could get. Ended up loving OS X so much that I upgraded to a 15" G4 PowerBook last October. Fully planned to sit out the first generation of the Intel products, but the day that Apple released Boot Camp, I bought a MacBook Pro. That ended up not working out for me, so now I have a MacBook and love it to death.

I was thinking the other day, .. if I had started w/ the MacBook, I'd have about $3000 extra in credit somewhere.

Anyhow, hope you end up loving OS X and your MacBook as much as I do. The first few weeks were "eh" for me, but I'm fully addicted now. Not being able to use the awesome OS X keyboard shortcuts in Windows or Gnome drives me bonkers sometimes!!!