Theory on why MacBooks are the go-to laptop for college students

[matthewtet]

I think it was because it used to be that they had to get a macbook for the build quality to be able to last through collage or university but nowadays there are things like the zenbook, aspire s7 or dell xps range. most of these are equaly or more powerfull than a macbook, are about the same build quality and most of them are cheaper than most macbooks depending on what config of these ultrabooks u go for. tada... no-one needs a macbook anymore.

[matthewtet]

How old is this? 20 years? 30 years?

 

Take a look at this piece of beauty:

have a look at this goddess of a laptop

[MrSuperb]

have a look at this goddess of a laptop

asus

 

meh ... there imho are/were better looking windows laptops ...

[ViruZ_HUN]

my school macbook costed 1000 euro and have a 256 mb GPU from nvidia and a Core 3 duo. i was paying for the emblem and the style not fot the preformence

[AustinTheIntern]

my school macbook costed 1000 euro and have a 256 mb GPU from nvidia and a Core 3 duo. i was paying for the emblem and the style not fot the preformence

You can get performance in current-day MacBooks!

[Canoas]

They are? Over here barely anyone has a mac.. Then again usually engineering students can read the specs on a computer.

[mr moose]

They are? Over here barely anyone has a mac.. Then again usually engineering students can read the specs on a computer.

It's funny you say that, When walking around one of the uni's here in Victoria, there seemed to be a divide between the social sciences and engineering sciences. Apple products all over education and welfare while dell, acer, toshiba etc around engineering. 

 

My theory is that the social science people understand how fashion works and the importance of image to professional credibility. While the engineers understand how computers work. 

[AustinTheIntern]

It's funny you say that, When walking around one of the uni's here in Victoria, there seemed to be a divide between the social sciences and engineering sciences. Apple products all over education and welfare while dell, acer, toshiba etc around engineering. 

 

My theory is that the social science people understand how fashion works and the importance of image to professional credibility. While the engineers understand how computers work. 

Yeah I guess it depends on what class you walk into. I know in high school, if you walk into any room, the majority of the students will have iPhones.

[flibberdipper]

Yeah I guess it depends on what class you walk into. I know in high school, if you walk into any room, the majority of the students will have iPhones.

Except in my school, where Android and Apple duke it out, but excluding phones and laptops, Apple owns my school.

[AustinTheIntern]

Except in my school, where Android and Apple duke it out, but excluding phones and laptops, Apple owns my school.

Yeah thats what Im saying, a lot of students are leaning towards Apple products..

[Giddyguy]

Because they are a recognizable brand and a status symbol. They are also pretty reliable and have good construction, battery, and a screen. Honestly though, the first reason is why 80% of college students get macbooks, many people don't care/know much about specs and such.

[laxer]

Most people get Macbooks because their friends have macbooks...

 

I was honestly somewhat surprised to see a lot of my fellow CS majors have macbooks...

 

Then again, most of them wiped it and put some distro on it...

 

I like Macs, I however could not justify the price markup on them...

 

I will stick with my cheap second hand laptop for school and my desktop for everything else.

[Ps_domingo]

Cause they are all hipsters.. 

Ok I think it's like this. 
 

One is popularity and connotation of apple as a brand. 

second is not everybody games

third is looks

fourth is OS preference

[Samuroot1987]

Its apple. Nuff said. if i could put win7 on without bootcamp and run it with a thunderbolt GPU and haswell, Cant forget that. I'd be set.

[mr moose]

Its apple. Nuff said. if i could put win7 on without bootcamp and run it with a thunderbolt GPU and haswell, Cant forget that. I'd be set.

Why would you do that?  You could get a cheap laptop and decent gaming pc for the same cost of the macbook,  because a macbook with an external GPU and screen is probably less portable than an ITX with screen..

[Samuroot1987]

Why would you do that?  You could get a cheap laptop and decent gaming pc for the same cost of the macbook,  because a macbook with an external GPU and screen is probably less portable than an ITX with screen..

 

Beacasue i can, Well, if i had a job.

[dklhs90]

It has goods and bads even for collage students. As a windows user I have used excel for the majority of my life and when getting a macbook i got a office package instead of apples alternative because i was more familiar to office packages. One problem I encountered was that the apple compatible version of excel was not at all good for data analysis compared to the stock windows office excel. As I moved up higher I new use SPSS for data analysis on my windows desktop but I can say that apple microsoft office is not a winodws microsoft office replacement.

[k1llampt]

For the same price you get a beefy mGPU with a terrible screen and resolution. Razer Blade is well designed, I'll give it that. It, to me, is the gaming version of a Macbook. But people don't buy Macbooks to game.

 

And what laptop are you talking about that's $1500 with a 750GB HDD? Cheapest MBP + 750GB is $1300. A MBA can have an i7, 8GB RAM, 512GB SSD, 12 hour battery life, and cost about $

 I see having an ipad, iphone, or mac product as more of a status symbol than anything. Yes they are great for designing and music production, but its the software that makes that good, not the hardware. 

 

I never said macbooks are for gaming. People buy macbooks because they look "cool" or for production environments, and as I said its the software that makes those good, not the hardware.

http://store.apple.com/us/buy-mac/macbook-pro?product=MD102LL/A&step=config btw here is the MBP with the 750 gb hdd for $1500. 

[k1llampt]

Just to add, I just bought a laptop with a quad core intel processor for $25 bucks the only thing wrong with it was it needed a new hard drive. I bought a 1tb WD scorpio black, and a 256gb ssd. so for about $250 bucks i have a baller ass laptop.

[Kirihuna]

 

 I see having an ipad, iphone, or mac product as more of a status symbol than anything. Yes they are great for designing and music production, but its the software that makes that good, not the hardware. 

 

I never said macbooks are for gaming. People buy macbooks because they look "cool" or for production environments, and as I said its the software that makes those good, not the hardware.

http://store.apple.com/us/buy-mac/macbook-pro?product=MD102LL/A&step=config btw here is the MBP with the 750 gb hdd for $1500. 

 

http://store.apple.com/us/buy-mac/macbook-pro?product=MD101LL/A&step=config

 

$1,200. 750GB HDD is only $100 more.

[k1llampt]

yes 

 

http://store.apple.com/us/buy-mac/macbook-pro?product=MD101LL/A&step=config

 

$1,200. 750GB HDD is only $100 more.

yes and it also has 4gb of ram vs the 8gb in the other one, an i5 vs an i7, and is still 1300. 

[CwGoh]

Because Macbooks are extremely well built.  They were the first CONSUMER laptop that wasn't built like crap and looked gorgeous (macbook pros/airs).

 

Also:

-great battery life

-BEST trackpad

-most comfortable keyboard

 

I'd say the older ThinkPad laptops have better keyboards.

[Guest Gazzer96]

If you need a laptop for going to college, there is something even better than a Mac: http://www.dell.com/uk/p/xps-13-l321x-mlk/pd

 

You get an SSD, best sound system ever with full control on bass, treble, surround etc., long battery life, 8GB of DRAM the lot.

[Kirihuna]

yes 

 

yes and it also has 4gb of ram vs the 8gb in the other one, an i5 vs an i7, and is still 1300. 

We were talking about the cheapest MBP.

 

Cheapest.

[k1llampt]

and what rel

 

We were talking about the cheapest MBP.

 

Cheapest.

and what relevance does this have to why people are buying macs. because I can say that people are NOT buying macs because they are cheap lol.