Transience
I'm still going to post about GPACW and iLaw, but other things have demanded my attention lately, specifically grading and moving. I've been traipsing all over town requesting boxes, determined not to spend any money on packing materials. I'm completely focused on the new apartment, with all its window light and how great it will look with the accent wall, how good it will smell, the amenities (pool, exercise room), and the general idea of being settled for a couple of years. I don't have a balcony, but I'd still like to buy a couple of plants, probably rosemary and basil. Not many people know this, but I used to be an avid herb gardener when I lived in Tennessee. I grew lavender, lemonbalm, rosemary, dill, thyme, mint, basil, and chives. I was really good at it; I grew some of the plants from seed, and I even kept a garden journal. :) So, although right now I have only about enough intellectual prowess to read articles about the Olsen twins' latest scandalous behavior and to watch movies like Mean Girls (by the way, Krista and Amy, that was fun! Let's do it again sometime.), better blog posts are ahead.
In other news, my tax return was a cool grand, I got a 4.0, and I'm planning on buying a laptop. People are telling me I should get a ThinkPad, but I haven't made a final decision. Recommendations are appreciated.
Edited to add: I also grew sage! How could I forget about my sage? I used to wrap it in bundles using string and hang it up to dry--like the ones you pay $5-7 for in the Wiccan stores. Boy, was I ever crunchy. :)
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I wouldn't mind seeing Mean G
I wouldn't mind seeing Mean Girls myself. But Shrek 2 will be our next movie outing. I've worked extensively on my boss's ThinkPad and I like my Dell laptop more. I think it's the size of it, though, and the fact that all the keys are slightly off. Congrats on the return (ours was so long ago spent, I've forgotten about it!) and the 4.0. :)
-- Michelle Palmer
I'm a Mac slut. So if you're
I'm a Mac slut. So if you're thinking of a ThinkPad, I have nothing useful to add.
The thought of growing things is a nice one. I have vague ambitions toward starting a tomato plant or two in a tub, but have yet to act on them.
Rana
Mac Whoring
Oh, boy, at the referral spam I'm going to get with these words...anyway, I wanted a big bad 17" Mac PowerBook at first, but several good friends who are Mac users or both-users are telling me to go with a ThinkPad. For example, Logie and Laura have had terrible experiences with Macs' locking up all the time, quitting altogether, etc.
Scott's advice?
I wonder if Scott's advice will be the same as it was in this thread. Scott? What do you say? :) Scott and Charlie are my primary gurus.
Locking Up?
Don't know what Logie and Laura are doing, but I'm running OS X on a laptop and on a desktop, and I've had a total of one crash in the 2.5 years since I migrated to OS X: it's rock solid (and seems to work just fine for Jill and Liz and others). I've had to force quit a nonresponsive application sometimes (usually MSIE -- until I moved to Safari and Moz -- and MS Word), but that's as easy as a mouse click. Having a gorgeous and beautifully thought out OS built on top of BSD Unix is wonderful, too, as is not having to worry about all the Windows viruses and worms, not to mention DRM. If you're talking "locking up" and "quitting", I can only conclude they're using OS 9 / Classic -- which, yes, is a legacy OS, and had its problems, and will continue to have more the longer they use it.
I use Win2K at my part-time web maintenance gig and Macs for school and play. Absolutely no contest in terms of reliability: Mac hands down, all the way.
More on Macs
Responding to Scott's advice in the other thread: if you can do it, I'd go for the 15" PowerBook. Faster processor, bigger screen, and that cool-ass light-sensitive backlit keyboard. Having lugged around the little 12" PowerBook at a conference, I'd say avoid the big 17": you don't want to carry counterweights for your other arm around everywhere. And, yes, like Scott says, load up on the RAM, and max it out if you can: this is the one scenario where it's a good idea to buy the RAM pre-installed from Apple, because you don't want to have to open up a PowerBook. The desktops are so easy as to be a joy to upgrade, but the laptops are another story. Also, of course, get the WiFi. I love being able to check my email from outside on the deck, or leaving it on the kitchen counter in case I need to grab a recipe from Epicurious.
If you do decide on a Mac, I'd also recommend waiting a month or two. Apple tends to do its product upgrades in 6-month cycles, often around January/February and around June/July, and those upgrades bring nice price drops on the non-newest models. Rumors sites like MacRumors and ThinkSecret are good for getting an idea of what might be coming down the pipe, and when.
Of course, all of this is coming out of some of the same Mac-slutting Rana mentions, and it may well be that a Windows machine will save you a couple hundred bucks, and that might work better for you. I don't like Windows and all that goes along with it. But the reliability issues you raise really puzzle me, because -- as I noted earlier -- I've never had reliability problems with OS X, and neither has anyone else I know. But with Windows at work, it's a crash a day and viruses for all.
not that i'm a fan of windows , but . . .
well, have been stuck in windows land lately, and i've never had any problems with xp crashing since i installed it over a year ago. only apps that lock up on occassion which, similar to your experience, can be shutdown without restarting the os.
oh, and btw, i do know that steve jobs and company are on board with drm as well. you'll be it seeing on future versions of your mac, unless you switch to yellowdog or mandrake :)
one more thing
not going to get into the mac vs pc comparison, other than to say that my ex had one of the thinkpad t41 series with her previous job. best laptop i've ever had my hands on in terms of design. it just feels different. the dells i've tried--and dells get good ratings--just don't feel the same. if i had to buy a laptop tomorrow and was willing to spend that amount, no question about it for me. oh, and it does have a titanium case.
I can speak for the 12" Powerbook...
Clancy,
Apple just released new Powerbooks a month ago (that's when I bought mine). For less than $1500, you get a very fast notebook with built-in wireless (both Airport and Bluetooth), 64MB of dedicated VRAM, and 768 MB of DDR PC2600 RAM. I really like the 12" Powerbook, and I would also recommend the 15" Powerbook as well (although this is pricier, and I've heard reports of screen problems in them--this might have been rectified however). I've not had any problems whatsoever, and OS 10.3 (Panther) is amazingly fast, stable, and elegant. I love the Macintosh, always will, and I never have any problem recommending it. However, sometimes I wish I had bought a Tablet/Notebook hybrid PC Laptop, which are usually light (usually under 4 lbs) and allow the user to use a e-pen to write on the screen. It would highly simplify notetaking in class and would allow for the manual markup of drafts.
Also, PC Notebooks go with the "Let's pack everything in this computer and to hell with elegance and portability". Therefore, most PC Laptops are 8 lbs or more, which doesn't sound like much until you walk across campus with it or up the street. You'll need a chiropractor after that. The 12" PB weighs in under 5 lbs. This might not mean much to you, but I don't own a car, and I bicycle and walk quite a bit.
If you have never used a Mac, it will be different. If you are more comfortable with Windows, I would recommend sticking with what you know unless you have a damn good reason not to. If you are looking at Windows machines, look into Centrino laptops, and don't be fooled by the lower Ghz of the chips. A 1.3Ghz Centrino is the equivalent to about a 2.3-2.6 Ghz Pentium 4. Centrino laptops have better battery life, built-in wireless, and USB 2.0 (instead of the slower USB 1.1). I don't know if the ThinkPad makes a Centrino model, but I do know that Dell does. My friend Jason has a Dell (that I recommended) and, I must admit, it is a nice machine with an absolutely beautiful widescreen. He's had absolutely no problems with it. Make sure you get AT LEAST 512MB of RAM. It's the best thing you can do to speed up your computer.
Windows XP is not as beautiful as Mac OS X. However, Windows has come a long way and does not deserve it's "unfriendly" criticism much anymore. In fact, in some ways, I think XP is much more friendly than OS X, especially where faxing, printing, and word processing are concerned. Also, OpenOffice is native to Windows (and who doesn't love OpenOffice), but you have to run it in X11 in MacOS X (and printing from X11 makes for ugly documents). If you run OS X, you will inevitably have to shell out the money for Microsoft Office 2004, which is a great program, but doesn't do much more than the free OpenOffice.
Anyway, call me if you need anymore advice. I know this is jumbled. Let me know what you decide.
S.
Desktops and Mean Girls
Interesting coincidence: I just had an answering-machine message from my dad that I wrote about at my blog. Dad needs a new desktop (not laptop). Any suggestions?
And, Michelle, I'm kinda interested in seeing Mean Girls, too. I have a good friend who teaches at a high school for troubled kids, and she's very interested in the material and emotional lives of adolescent girls. Plus it looks like a fun movie. Clancy, what's the verdict?
12" PBs are good!
I got a 12" PB a couple of months ago and I have to say that I have to force myself to use anything else. There are lots of open source applications available for it now that it Purrs along (all puns intended) on a UNIX base. I love my PB and the new Dell laptop sits on the desk looking on with jealousy.
Samantha
Macs or a Thinkpad
I always put the question in terms of what laptop will upgrade well... Like hold up with new software coming out etc. Macs are famous for that, and I've heard really good things about the new iBook G4s. The design people at work swear by Powerbooks. Macs in general are considered solid investments - used ones sell for a lot more than used PCs of the same age. Thinkpads are also famous for holding up well over time and upgrading solidly - and are much better built than Dells or (I would say) most of the competing PC brands.
I have an oldish Thinkpad from work, a T21 which still only has somewhere around 600 mhz processor power and not a whole lot of RAM either (since I'm hoping to get a brand new one in a couple months - a T42, think - I got too lazy to upgrade this one,) which still handles new applications like the adobe creative suite or macromedia stuido mx suite decently, as well as Windows XP. And it was definitely not built with that stuff in mind. It's also gotten a hell of a lot of use in its lifetime and is as yet not showing any signs of damage, either internal or external. Although, of course, now that I wrote this down it will just give up its soul about this time tomorrow... But like I said, there are absolutely no signs of problems: no crashes, freezes etc. and the keyboard and screen are also still in really good shape.
Since one only buys a laptop well, not that often... I think durability and upgradablity are really important and worth investing in.
LiL
congratulations
Well done on the 4.0! I know how much it takes at the undergrad level; I can only imagine at the doctorate level.