PLASTICSX Posted May 11, 2014 Report Share Posted May 11, 2014 MacBook Air vs. MacBook Pro vs. PC ?? For current med students, what is your recommendation? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ellorie Posted May 11, 2014 Report Share Posted May 11, 2014 I don't think it matters - whatever you're most comfortable with. I had a PC for a while and then it broke and I bought a MacBook Pro. They both worked just fine for my purposes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Capucine Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 I agree with Ellorie - it doesn't really matter. But if you have to use the bus or subway, the weight of the computer is very important. Don't hurt your back with a super big computer! I think that you can get a PC as good as a macbook for cheaper, but not everyone would agree with me. And at least half my class has a macbook... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mononoke Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 you could always get an ultrabook - it also depends on what else you use the computer for...like gaming or coding Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ArchEnemy Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 Macbook Air for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NLengr Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 What's your finance situation like? If you are borrowing money to pay for it, I'd get something less expensive. It doesn't seem like much now, but with 9 years of interest, the cost adds up. Debt during residency blows. From a functional point of view, there is no difference as to how well they will work for you during med school. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mavrik13 Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 If you want to blend in with everyone else in your class, go for a Macbook Pro. Seems like about 75% of medical students have one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rmorelan Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 MacBook Air vs. MacBook Pro vs. PC ?? For current med students, what is your recommendation? One of my roles as Western was IT rep for the class and school for 4 years. Never found the type of computer anyone had actually mattered as the actual computing needs for anyone in the class were quite small. You need a work processor and a web browser for the most part. It is true a lot of people had macs - but is just because they had access to the means to buy them and they are a bit of style item. I had a PC laptop for 2 years and a mac one for two years. Didn't matter really - get want you want for your own personal reasons more than the school requirements. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NLengr Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 If you want to blend in with everyone else in your class, go for a Macbook Pro. Seems like about 75% of medical students have one. Physicians are the ideal MAC market. Lots of disposable income and light computing needs. They aren't programming or running complex simulations that need modifications etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rmorelan Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 Physicians are the ideal MAC market. Lots of disposable income and light computing needs. They aren't programming or running complex simulations that need modifications etc. exactly - it is status above performance really. Don't get me wrong if you want a mac and you are willing to pay the big market up then sure go ahead - just don't think you actually need a mac for anything. Only reason I got one eventually was as a software engineer I want to make sure there wasn't a platform I didn't know. Plus it will let me drop to a unix shell to get some stuff done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
A-Stark Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 I don't think we can downplay the unix aspect of Mac OS. Even though I'm not really happy about some aspects of Mavericks, it's still better than the alternative in Windows 8. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burrb Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 I bought a gaming laptop and it was heavy and loud ..It eventually got slow and now I use my bf's MacBook Air. For school, get a MacBook Air or Pro. Pro is better but more expensive. You won't really need a PC so don't even bother with that. Tablets are decent for clerkship when you won't be carrying your laptop around, but for classes they are more annoying than helpful. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodyearkl Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 Yup, I'm pretty happy with my MacBook Air. I chose it over the pro because it was lighter. If space is an issue you could always get a portable hard drive to go with it that would add an extra TB when you need it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
A-Stark Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 The thing is, once you outfit a Windows laptop with things like solid state drives and extra RAM you're well into the price point of the comparable Macs. I've been using the same Macbook Pro since the fall of 2009 - probably will get a new one within the next few months. The 13'' Retina MBP pretty much has everything I want once you go to the 256 gb SSD. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
osteogeek Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 One thing worth mentioning is for people at Mac - our lectures are recorded and posted online for us to watch later (as, I'm sure, are lectures at most schools), but ours are done with Microsoft Silverlight, which means that to use all of the features, you need to watch them on Internet Explorer. So, for example, since I have a MacBook Air, I can't play the lectures at 1.5 speed, which would be REALLY nice. A lot of people don't come to LGS and watch them online later, and I'm sure if I did that (instead of going in person), I'd be really annoyed at not being able to speed them up. Of course, the solution to that is to go watch them on the PCs in the library. That being said, I love my Macbook Air and am glad I have it (bought it for grad school and it's still going strong almost 3 years later), but I don't think it really matters that much in terms of what you need to do on it. Definitely a personal preference thing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ellorie Posted May 12, 2014 Report Share Posted May 12, 2014 For what it's worth, I got an iPad midway through second year and I LOVED it for taking notes on. I used a pdf annotator to make notes directly on the slides using an attached keyboard. It made my backpack super light and my life much easier. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rmorelan Posted May 13, 2014 Report Share Posted May 13, 2014 One thing worth mentioning is for people at Mac - our lectures are recorded and posted online for us to watch later (as, I'm sure, are lectures at most schools), but ours are done with Microsoft Silverlight, which means that to use all of the features, you need to watch them on Internet Explorer. So, for example, since I have a MacBook Air, I can't play the lectures at 1.5 speed, which would be REALLY nice. A lot of people don't come to LGS and watch them online later, and I'm sure if I did that (instead of going in person), I'd be really annoyed at not being able to speed them up. Of course, the solution to that is to go watch them on the PCs in the library. That being said, I love my Macbook Air and am glad I have it (bought it for grad school and it's still going strong almost 3 years later), but I don't think it really matters that much in terms of what you need to do on it. Definitely a personal preference thing. I suppose you could duel boot the thing, or use paradox to run a version of windows within the OX. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
A-Stark Posted May 13, 2014 Report Share Posted May 13, 2014 Or use the version of Silverlight available for Mac OS... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amichel Posted May 13, 2014 Report Share Posted May 13, 2014 Or use the version of Silverlight available for Mac OS... I was wondering... ahah. Maybe it doesn't have that feature? I'm sure they've thought of that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dr. Brule Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 I have a ginormous gaming laptop (with sweet keys that light up any colour I darned well choose!) that in no way will be able to fit into the med backpacks, so I think I'll be stuck with my Targus monstrosity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhoenixFlare500 Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 I have a ginormous gaming laptop (with sweet keys that light up any colour I darned well choose!) that in no way will be able to fit into the med backpacks, so I think I'll be stuck with my Targus monstrosity. The backpacks can fit basically a 17" frame. Or at least an oversized 15" gaming laptop that's apparently the size of many 17" ones. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dr. Brule Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 The backpacks can fit basically a 17" frame. Or at least an oversized 15" gaming laptop that's apparently the size of many 17" ones. Oh that might work then. Mine's 17". Maybe I can do some fabric engineering and make it fit if there's a problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
osteogeek Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 I suppose you could duel boot the thing, or use paradox to run a version of windows within the OX. Haha definitely possible... but I go to lectures so it's not worth it to me to go through all that work for the maybe one lecture a month that I miss and have to watch later. I think some people do this though! Or use the version of Silverlight available for Mac OS... It's a silverlight player embedded in our Medportal site - as far as I know there's no way to open the videos in another app or external sourcen(though I've heard some people talking about doing something with the source code and being able to get it into VLC). That would be nice though! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmatt1122 Posted May 15, 2014 Report Share Posted May 15, 2014 For what it's worth, I got an iPad midway through second year and I LOVED it for taking notes on. I used a pdf annotator to make notes directly on the slides using an attached keyboard. It made my backpack super light and my life much easier. This is exactly what I was thinking of doing. Being able to handwrite brief notes / sketch out figures would be perfect for me as long as lecturers provide PDF copies of slides. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodyearkl Posted May 15, 2014 Report Share Posted May 15, 2014 This is exactly what I was thinking of doing. Being able to handwrite brief notes / sketch out figures would be perfect for me as long as lecturers provide PDF copies of slides. I've tried it in the past and found it got annoying, even with a bluetooth keyboard. The iPad is just not the same if you are used to using a keyboard. My solution (for grad school and now med school) is the Macbook Air (nice and light) with a 1TB mini external hard drive and PDF Reader X (It's maybe $10) for note annotation. I also really like the bluetooth magic mouse with the touchpad on the mouse face so that you can use gestures. That being said, the one cool thing about the iPad is that you can store digital copies of your textbooks on it so you always have them with you and can reference without booting up your laptop. There is also this awesome anatomy app that is totally worth the $20 https://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/essential-anatomy-3/id596684220?mt=8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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