MAC Book Pro
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I did a clean installation but there was really no reason for me to. I could have just as easily cloned the old drive to the new one with the disk utilities within the OS.
Just went to MicroCenter again... 
For the $200 that they saved me on my MacBook Pro I bought 8GB of RAM (Crucial DDR3-1333 SODIMM) and a WD Scorpio Black (750GB 7200RPM). This should be a nice upgrade! Perhaps I could've saved a couple of dollars by ordering online, but I didn't want to wait till Wednesday.
I am now about to try to install them... Wish me luck!
For the $200 that they saved me on my MacBook Pro I bought 8GB of RAM (Crucial DDR3-1333 SODIMM) and a WD Scorpio Black (750GB 7200RPM). This should be a nice upgrade! Perhaps I could've saved a couple of dollars by ordering online, but I didn't want to wait till Wednesday.
I am now about to try to install them... Wish me luck!
There is also a freeware version like Parallels called Virtual box from what i understand it is very good
That is the one I plan on using if I find a need for it
Just finished the RAM and the Hard Drive installation. It was quick and straightforward, but I did encounter a couple of stumbling blocks with the hard drive:
1. I knew that I would need a miniature Phillips screwdriver for 10 tiny screws on the cover and 2 screws holding the hard drive. What I didn't know that I would also need a miniature Hex tool to unscrew 4 small pins on the sides of the hard drive. I couldn't find a hex tool that small, so I ended up using pliers.
2. The Mac OS X installation program asked me which disk to install to, but offered no choices to select from! That got me puzzled for a moment, but then I realized, that I probably need to format the disk first. I found the disk tools in the menu and "erased" the disk. The rest was easy!
1. I knew that I would need a miniature Phillips screwdriver for 10 tiny screws on the cover and 2 screws holding the hard drive. What I didn't know that I would also need a miniature Hex tool to unscrew 4 small pins on the sides of the hard drive. I couldn't find a hex tool that small, so I ended up using pliers.
2. The Mac OS X installation program asked me which disk to install to, but offered no choices to select from! That got me puzzled for a moment, but then I realized, that I probably need to format the disk first. I found the disk tools in the menu and "erased" the disk. The rest was easy!
I ran into the same problem.
Good to know about the mini Hex tool. I had to go to the store to buy a Phillips #00 for the back cover. Didn't realize they made it that small.
Not only the screws on the back are tiny, but they even go at an angle!
It's interesting to see how tightly everything is packed inside the MacBook Pro. Even the battery is shaped specifically for this laptop!
It's interesting to see how tightly everything is packed inside the MacBook Pro. Even the battery is shaped specifically for this laptop!
Here are the WEI numbers after the upgrade:
Processor: 6.9 - no change
Memory (RAM): 7.4 - way up!
Graphics: 5.9 - marginal improvement
Gaming graphics: 6.3 - no change
Primary hard disk: 5.9 - marginal improvement
Surprisingly, the hard disk index didn't change that much. I think this is because the Windows Experience Index primarily measures the disk transfer rate, rather than seek/access times.
The memory index, however, has improved dramatically: from 5.9 to 7.4! And it looks like the memory upgrade had some positive effect on the graphics performance too.
I guess, the lesson learned, is that even if you don't think you need more RAM for your programs, you may still consider upgrading RAM in order to get better performance.
Spent a week at the Library of Congress using the mbp as my research tool; I have to say I was impressed, and have gotten really comfortable with the machine.
Made heavy use of iPhoto - as I was photographing pages (more than 1000!) from the case files of Justice Harry Blackmun, and a great program called Devonthink for organizing and note-taking. The machine multi-tasked like mad, had tons of files open, never rebooted until I shut down to go to the airport. Very slick.
Made heavy use of iPhoto - as I was photographing pages (more than 1000!) from the case files of Justice Harry Blackmun, and a great program called Devonthink for organizing and note-taking. The machine multi-tasked like mad, had tons of files open, never rebooted until I shut down to go to the airport. Very slick.
One other thing, I was in the Manuscript Reading Room of the Library of Congress, and I kind of kept tabs on the types of computers people were using. Every day there were about 10 to 20 people researching in the room, and while I only saw one iPad (w/wireless keyboard), the mac to pc breakdown was almost 50/50. Now, I realize that the sample is kind of biased, and there are only 50M mbp's in the wild, but the single most popular device over three days was the mb and/or mbp. Not that it matters. Just curious.
Ilya said:You know, it's like when you buy a brand new car, you then suddenly start noticing how many people are driving the same brand. Doesn't matter what brand.
I know, I just thought it was interesting.
Sent from my iPad using SatelliteGuys
MacBook Pro as a Windows PC
After using the MacBook Pro 13" for more than a week, I am really getting used to it. It is growing on me.
The Mac OS was rather easy to learn. I still have a long way to go, but so far everything was pretty straightforward (once I figured out how to do a click on the trackpad )
I have absolutely no plans (and so far see no reason) to convert from Windows to Mac OS as my main OS (most of the software I use is Windows-based anyway), but I do want to learn Mac OS, mostly as a development platform for iOS apps. That's why I bought this computer in the first place.
And since I have the MacBook Pro now, I am really tempted by the idea to use one laptop for both Mac OS and as my main Windows laptop too. So I have upgraded the RAM and the hard drive, installed Windows on a separate boot partition (via the Boot Camp) and have begun my experiment of using the MacBook Pro as a Windows PC.
So far, so good! Not the ideal Windows computer by any means, but surprisingly not too bad either. Here are some of my initial observations running Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit:
Overall performance is actually pretty good for a 13" laptop with integrated graphics. The new Intel Sandy Bridge architecture deserves a lot of credit in both performance and power savings: I easily get around 5 hours of battery life in Windows, running basic productivity software. Yet Windows Experience Index scores are pretty good (6.9 for CPU! And that's with a dual-core i5!)
Feature wise, the computer is reasonably well-equipped, in spite of its small size: 1280x800 display, built-in HD webcam, SDXC card slot, HDMI output (via Mini DisplayPort adapter).
At the same time, certain essential things are missing: no ExpressCard slot, no eSATA, no USB 3.0. It does have the new Thunderbolt interface, which has a great potential, but for now it's pretty-much useless, as there are almost no devices on the market that support it. I would definitely prefer USB 3.0 or at least eSATA. So, for external drives I will have to use USB 2.0 or FireWire.
The laptop looks sleek and feels very solid, thanks to its aluminum unibody design. What I don't like though is the hard sharp edges - rather painful for my palms! And I don't care about the glossy screen, which reflects any light behind me. I would prefer a non-reflective screen if I had a choice. The keyboard is ok, but not great: my old Dell Latitude has a much better keyboard. I like the backlit keys though.
The biggest problem for a Windows user is that some essential keys are missing on the keyboard: PgUp, PgDn, Insert, Delete, Home, End, PrintScreen, etc. You can use some special key combinations to achieve the same result (sometimes involving 4 if not 5 buttons!), but this requires some getting used to.
The trackpad is good, especially in its gesture support. In just a few days I became addicted to the two-finger scroll gesture - I now use it all the time instead of PgUp/PgDn buttons and often catch myself trying this gesture on other laptops. However, the trackpad driver in Windows is not as good as the one in Mac OS and the default settings are not good at all: I had to enable the tap-to-click functionality, the right-click mappings and to reduce the scroll-speed for the two-finger scroll. After fine-tuning the driver settings, the trackpad became useable, but still not as good as in Mac OS. I am still struggling with the drag-and-drop for example, which was never a problem for me on any other laptop designed for Windows. I really hope the driver will be improved eventually. For now, I prefer a mouse.
Other than the trackpad driver, I haven't encountered any serious issues with the Windows drivers provided by Apple. However, there are no Windows applications included, other than the Boot Camp Control Panel (nothing for the webcam, nothing for the DVD drive), so you have to rely on Windows itself, or some third-party applications.
I had one issue with an external USB drive: for some reason there was no way to eject the drive, instead there was some strange option to eject the USB keyboard and the trackpad(!) Weird!
Anyway, these are just my initial impressions. I am going to continue using the MacBook Pro as a Windows computer for another month or so, before I make my final verdict, on weather I can live with it as a dual-OS laptop, or whether I do need a separate laptop for Windows. For now, I have rather mixed feelings: not a perfect Windows laptop, but usable nevertheless.
After using the MacBook Pro 13" for more than a week, I am really getting used to it. It is growing on me.
The Mac OS was rather easy to learn. I still have a long way to go, but so far everything was pretty straightforward (once I figured out how to do a click on the trackpad
)I have absolutely no plans (and so far see no reason) to convert from Windows to Mac OS as my main OS (most of the software I use is Windows-based anyway), but I do want to learn Mac OS, mostly as a development platform for iOS apps. That's why I bought this computer in the first place.
And since I have the MacBook Pro now, I am really tempted by the idea to use one laptop for both Mac OS and as my main Windows laptop too. So I have upgraded the RAM and the hard drive, installed Windows on a separate boot partition (via the Boot Camp) and have begun my experiment of using the MacBook Pro as a Windows PC.
So far, so good! Not the ideal Windows computer by any means, but surprisingly not too bad either. Here are some of my initial observations running Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit:
Overall performance is actually pretty good for a 13" laptop with integrated graphics. The new Intel Sandy Bridge architecture deserves a lot of credit in both performance and power savings: I easily get around 5 hours of battery life in Windows, running basic productivity software. Yet Windows Experience Index scores are pretty good (6.9 for CPU! And that's with a dual-core i5!)
Feature wise, the computer is reasonably well-equipped, in spite of its small size: 1280x800 display, built-in HD webcam, SDXC card slot, HDMI output (via Mini DisplayPort adapter).
At the same time, certain essential things are missing: no ExpressCard slot, no eSATA, no USB 3.0. It does have the new Thunderbolt interface, which has a great potential, but for now it's pretty-much useless, as there are almost no devices on the market that support it. I would definitely prefer USB 3.0 or at least eSATA. So, for external drives I will have to use USB 2.0 or FireWire.
The laptop looks sleek and feels very solid, thanks to its aluminum unibody design. What I don't like though is the hard sharp edges - rather painful for my palms! And I don't care about the glossy screen, which reflects any light behind me. I would prefer a non-reflective screen if I had a choice. The keyboard is ok, but not great: my old Dell Latitude has a much better keyboard. I like the backlit keys though.
The biggest problem for a Windows user is that some essential keys are missing on the keyboard: PgUp, PgDn, Insert, Delete, Home, End, PrintScreen, etc. You can use some special key combinations to achieve the same result (sometimes involving 4 if not 5 buttons!), but this requires some getting used to.
The trackpad is good, especially in its gesture support. In just a few days I became addicted to the two-finger scroll gesture - I now use it all the time instead of PgUp/PgDn buttons and often catch myself trying this gesture on other laptops. However, the trackpad driver in Windows is not as good as the one in Mac OS and the default settings are not good at all: I had to enable the tap-to-click functionality, the right-click mappings and to reduce the scroll-speed for the two-finger scroll. After fine-tuning the driver settings, the trackpad became useable, but still not as good as in Mac OS. I am still struggling with the drag-and-drop for example, which was never a problem for me on any other laptop designed for Windows. I really hope the driver will be improved eventually. For now, I prefer a mouse.
Other than the trackpad driver, I haven't encountered any serious issues with the Windows drivers provided by Apple. However, there are no Windows applications included, other than the Boot Camp Control Panel (nothing for the webcam, nothing for the DVD drive), so you have to rely on Windows itself, or some third-party applications.
I had one issue with an external USB drive: for some reason there was no way to eject the drive, instead there was some strange option to eject the USB keyboard and the trackpad(!) Weird!
Anyway, these are just my initial impressions. I am going to continue using the MacBook Pro as a Windows computer for another month or so, before I make my final verdict, on weather I can live with it as a dual-OS laptop, or whether I do need a separate laptop for Windows. For now, I have rather mixed feelings: not a perfect Windows laptop, but usable nevertheless.
