13in Macbook vs 20in iMac

[B3N]

OK, so I'm now thinking about going 2 feet in when upgrading my PC and going to the dark/light side. The thing is that I'm torn between the 13in Macbook and the 20in iMac. In terms of spec there's not much in it, but they both have their significant advantages.

The Macbook is nice and portable which means I can take it on assignments/jobs/holidays/around the house, although the small screen could make photoshop (the purpose for the upgrade) a little harder unless it's hooked to my 17in monitor.

The iMac is cheaper, saving money I can spend on software and has got a beautiful and large 20in screen, although it's lacking the advantages of the Macbook. ?!?!?!

Anyone doing some heavy PS on a new Macbook? How does it stand up in terms of performance/screen size?

[Relise]

Not a direct answer to your question but might have relevance...

Check out my thread on the differences between the 24" iMac and 20" iMac
- should be here http://pistonheads.co.uk/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&amp...

Interesting points on the difference between the 20" screen and the 24" screen so bear this in mind while choosing.

I ended up buying a 24" and am very, very happy with it!!!

[B3N]

I read that thread - I'm interested to know if there is a difference between the 20" and 24" screen quality still. I think I'm going to take a trip to the Apple store on Wednesday to have a chat with them.

I can get Student discount but I'm going use that to haggle a few extra bits into the price if I buy it from store.

[Olivero]

B3N said:

I read that thread - I'm interested to know if there is a difference between the 20" and 24" screen quality still. I think I'm going to take a trip to the Apple store on Wednesday to have a chat with them.

I can get Student discount but I'm going use that to haggle a few extra bits into the price if I buy it from store.

The quality is the same from both screens. The big thing you need to work out is if you can live with a glossy screen, I can't but only because I do lots of photo retouching. Apple screens are made by LG and to the same standard as others out there. Apple care is well worth it when something goes wrong. Also it is worth getting the screen calabrated.

[sjg]

I went for Macbook. It spends most of the time on my desk attached to a 24" monitor which works very well - the only limiting factor really is disk speed.

[Relise]

Olivero said:

The quality is the same from both screens. The big thing you need to work out is if you can live with a glossy screen, I can't but only because I do lots of photo retouching. Apple screens are made by LG and to the same standard as others out there. Apple care is well worth it when something goes wrong. Also it is worth getting the screen calabrated.

Apparently the 2 screens are different and do have a difference in quality - according to the guy in the Apple store when I checked them out. I also compared the same sample photo on both and to my eyes the 24" looked better.

See the macworld review:

http://www.macworld.com/article/133332/2008/05/alu...

"Screen and video

The 20- and 24-inch iMacs

Apple hasn’t changed the iMac’s glossy screen. While the 24-inch iMac has an 8-bit wide-screen TFT active-matrix LCD that displays millions of colors, the 20-inch iMacs use 6-bit wide-screen TFT active-matrix LCDs, achieving millions of colors by dithering. And like the previous 20-inch iMac, the new 20-inch iMacs show strong color and contrast shifts when viewed at an angle instead of straight on."

The best advice is to pop down to the store and have a look for yourself, I did that with a fairly open mind and came away definitely wanting the 24".

[Olivero]

Relise said:

Olivero said:

The quality is the same from both screens. The big thing you need to work out is if you can live with a glossy screen, I can't but only because I do lots of photo retouching. Apple screens are made by LG and to the same standard as others out there. Apple care is well worth it when something goes wrong. Also it is worth getting the screen calabrated.

Apparently the 2 screens are different and do have a difference in quality - according to the guy in the Apple store when I checked them out. I also compared the same sample photo on both and to my eyes the 24" looked better.

See the macworld review:

http://www.macworld.com/article/133332/2008/05/alu...

"Screen and video

Ah, ok. I stand corrected. Might have been thinking about the stand alone screens.

Agree about the 24inch. Size does matter.

The 20- and 24-inch iMacs

Apple hasn’t changed the iMac’s glossy screen. While the 24-inch iMac has an 8-bit wide-screen TFT active-matrix LCD that displays millions of colors, the 20-inch iMacs use 6-bit wide-screen TFT active-matrix LCDs, achieving millions of colors by dithering. And like the previous 20-inch iMac, the new 20-inch iMacs show strong color and contrast shifts when viewed at an angle instead of straight on."

The best advice is to pop down to the store and have a look for yourself, I did that with a fairly open mind and came away definitely wanting the 24".

[mhill]

if you get student discount then buy it over the phone as you will get Apple care for £50 which is a real steal and well worth it, over the phone you can haggle and they wil throw things in. My sister got some free Logitech speakers (worth £120) and a upgraded on the RAM to 2GB and a 120gb hard drive.
The new MacBooks have just been updated with new graphics chipsets where as the iMac has the old macbook internals though tis is set to be updated at Macworld in January.

[philworrall]

IF you are doing video note that the new macbook does not now suport fireware which used to be the standard for video. Apple recon that the newer video cameras are working off the latest USB which they do support. ALL other Macs still have firewire.

Once converted to the LIGHT, you will never go back to a PC.

HTH


Phil W

[B3N]

Thanks for the info guys and gals.

Just threw a spanner in - I was going to go for PS Elements thinking it would be good enough for my needs. I'm currently running a less-than-kosher copy of Win PS CS2 (Full) which has got me used to the nice extended features. i.e Action, LAB processing, channels etc, which are missing in PSe. I'm stretching to afford a Mac, let a lone another few hundred to get the required PS version.

I wonder how good my haggling will be in the Apple store tonight... (I'll be taking the gf - she's better at it than me!)

[Relise]

Hope it went well B3N, did you manage to haggle them down???

Have you considered Aperture 2? It's very different to PS but has rave reviews. I've just downloaded the 30-Day trial and am going through it. So far I really like it, but I haven't tried too much yet!

One thing I like is that it keeps the original photo as a master then just records any changes in a database so you don't have to store loads of huge PS files! If you then want a copy of the tweaked image you just export it. Any changes you do make do not affect the original in any way and I think the full version of the software is only about £130....

[B3N]

Started off in John Lewis as they do both Mac and non Mac. After seeing the 13in macbook in the flesh, with an eye to buy this time, I didn't think the screen was great.

With the complications of photoshop etc, I'm afraid to say that I've ended up with an HP laptop with Vista on it. It came fully spec'd with 4GB and a Blue-Ray drive for £775. I thought I would be able to persevere with Vista, but I did spend most of last night swearing at it. I'll keep on trying. I couldn't even get it to connect to my wireless network!?! Grrrr.

Me and the gf are quite happy that we'll get an iMac after we've bought a house (the tight budget is due to some agressive house deposit saving). I the mean time the laptop will be increadibly functional until then, if it survives.

On the subject of Apeture/Lightroom, I've been using Google Picasa for years now and that's done me really well with my first pass edits. I think I'll be downloading the trial of Lightroom to see quite how much more powerful it is than Picasa.