I don't need anything fancy as far as graphics or gaming. I'd mainly use it for Rails and web development.
What do you guys recommend?
There's no feature of the Macbook Pro anyone on my team ever misses. The larger screen is a liability when traveling; at the office, you want a monitor anyways. You're almost never going to be CPU bound, and even if you were, the difference in processor performance is negligible.
Just get the cheapest Macbook and spend the rest of your money on more important things.
Use the $$ you save to buy a big monitor, more ram (coastmemory.com is my fav for the last decade, don't buy from apple), or a better chair.
This becomes particularly important if you want to run a virtual Windows under heavy load or run many virtual machines.
In fact, every Intel Mac runs at least Intel Core, and VT-x very slightly predates Core (you can get P4 parts that have it). It is in fact slightly easier to run a hypervisor on the original Core, and thus the first-gen Macbook, because the Core 2 Duo runs userland in 64 bit mode and the kernel in emulated 32 bit mode, and that's a gross oversimplification made as a small mercy.
In any case, every Macbook sold today --- even the cheapest one --- runs at least Core 2 Duo, which includes not only VT-x but also the advanced I/O stuff Intel did to make TLB flushes not kill performance.
Long story short: you can't buy a Macbook that doesn't do just fine with Parallels or VMWare Fusion.
I was thinking about a 13" white macbook my colleague used to use which I thought had a processor that did not have VT support (as not all Intels do http://www.intel.com/products/processor_number/chart/coreduo...) as there was an issue about it. But, frankly, it sounds like you are probably right and I have made a mistake or am confused (I won't be 100% sure until I can ask him on Monday, and Google is not doing much to help me other than to show how fast HN is being cached - http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&safe=off&sa=X&#... returns this page as the top result minutes after these comments!).
So, good call :)
Things to look for in the order I personally prefer: maximum RAM capacity (prefer high), processor cache size (prefer large, generally), processor multiplier (prefer low), RAM speed (prefer high), processor clock speed (prefer high)
If you don't want to pour over Intel CPU specs, I'd just pick something in the 35th percentile of price and performance. Don't worry about amount of RAM pre-installed or any parameters of the hard drive. If the computer begins to run slow, pay a buddy to find a deal on Mac compatible ram and buy the largest amount your system will use. Keep regular backups. When the hard drive dies pay the same buddy to research the largest and fastest disk that uses less than or equal to the number of watts your current disk does (thermal issues make higher power/heat drives risky).
This is slightly simplified but should give you a system that has the most upgrade potential to protect your investment.
This would be true if you don't care about FireWire or ExpressCards.
I didn't care much much ExpressCards (that changed when I got a Lexar ExpressCard SSD), but I've never been able to live without FireWire.
* The super thin, relatively expensive, stylish one that's limited and hard to expand. (Air)
* The super cheap, relatively unstylish white all-purpose machine. (Original Macbook)
* The cheap, flashy, glassy new one. (Macbook)
* The expensive, flashy, glassy new one with the big screen. (Macbook Pro).
Lack of choices is simultaneously their biggest weakness and strength.
I wish I had gone for the IBM x series instead. They look like they can handle the travel much better.
To keep my white MacBook looking clean, I bought a ProTouch keyboard cover from iSkin, and a "PalmGuard" wristpad covers from Moshi -- and even then, I try to use an external keyboard and mouse as much as possible to reduce wear and tear on the laptop.
I'm glad Apple's brief flirtation with white laptop design is over.
Oh, and asking to pay full price on new OS version that came out only three months after laptop purchase didn't help. This is probably bye bye Mac for me, unless something major changes.
What there is use for is a spindle and multiple USB ports.
I am currently developing on it on a daily basis, 12 hrs at a time (Ruby on Rails too). Macs are really good for Ruby on Rails because they have Ruby built in, and it's easy to use gem to get Rails and all those other goodies.
But if you want to keep yourself up-to-date, you should probably ditch the Ruby that comes with your Mac and use Macports to get the newest Ruby, some new programs are dependent on it, ie. Capistano.
http://paulstamatiou.com/2008/10/29/review-intel-x25-m-80gb-...
http://torvalds-family.blogspot.com/2008/10/so-i-got-one-of-...
I'm waiting a few months until the 160GB version is available (and costs about the same as the current 80MB version).
With the new MacBook/Pros, it's basically whether you want a bigger screen or not, and if you want more GHz of processing power. There are 2.0 and 2.4GHz MacBooks available, $1300 and $1600, respectively, and MacBook Pros start at 2.4 up, starting at $2000.
To put things in perspective, here is what you're getting for $400 more in the MacBook Pro 2.4GHz than the MacBook 2.4GHz:
- bigger screen
- extra NVidia <strike>8600M</strike> 9600M GT graphics card
- FireWire port and ExpressCard port
- and of course, 2" more of real estate.
So the question basically is, 1) do you want 2.0 or 2.4GHz (suggest 2.4), and 2) do you want the bigger screen, and if so, if that is worth $400 to you (along with the other stuff.)
I couldn't justify the additional cost, size/weight and fragility of a MBP over a regular MB, having owned one previously. My productivity doesn't suffer with Spaces and Expose on the 13" widescreen (although this is personal preference), and the external display is a cherry on top of the cake.
Of course, you could also do the same thing with a MBP, but assuming that budget may be a limiting factor and all..
Also, the screen is not only bigger, but much much higher quality in the MBP.
No one is mentioning the MBA?
You'd say the same about Firewire --- except:
* Losing Firewire also costs you "target disk mode", which lets you mount another Mac as an otherwise inert external hard drive, which is hugely helpful for backing up and restoring machines.
* Firewire is the standard remote debugging interface for the Windows kernel, and is an all-around great debugging interface (Firewire itself is basically nothing but a network protocol hooked directly up to a DMA engine); there's no perfect replacement for it that I know of.
It's only useful if you have an old EVDO/3G card that relies on ExpressCard.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0013FLTNS/
In many ways it's better than the new version. IMO it's the best laptop ever made.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231...
Not only is it 4 GB, but it's lower latency than the stock RAM so it's a little bit faster.
http://paulstamatiou.com/2008/10/26/hopping-on-the-new-macbo...
for inbox specials, refurbs, look at apple store. Also
Although I play WoW on it so I wish it was a little faster, and Photoshop takes its time to open, its great for web development! :)
Screen size is what you should be looking for, I wouldn't want the Macbooks screen — so you have 2 choices, the new Macbook Pro 15", or the old Macbook Pro 17". :)
I have not run into any problem with performance for my dev work or for testing using VMWare Fusion running Windows XP and Ubuntu server.