How to Choose a Mac
From Applepedia
The perfect Mac for you depends on your needs, wants, and expectations. This article serves only as a starting point for researching the Mac line. Please review Apple's Hardware products for further details of a particular product.
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MacBook
The consumer-level portable laptop designed for most common uses. Not designed for professional-level usage or gaming.
To consider:
- The MacBook is oriented for common tasks and uses, such as web browsing, instant messaging, and word processing.
- Built-in iSight camera is great for self-portraits through Photo Booth and video chat through iChat AV.
- Intel Core Duo processor ensures fast performance and good battery life, as well as possible usage of Windows if desired.
MacBook Pro
The professional-level portable laptop for powerful mobile usage, professional audio/video services, and gaming.
To Consider:
- Better than MacBook counterpart in most aspects including processor speed, video performance, expandable through ExpressCard, and audio.
- Oriented towards "power users" and specific professions that require more system resources than what consumer-level products can provide.
- Able to use heavy resource-dependent software with little slowdown in overall performance.
Mac Mini
Perfect for the Mac-curious who already has a monitor, keyboard, etc. If you don't have those bits, an iMac is generally a better deal.
To consider:
- Small and efficient. Uses include but not limited to a regular computer, a home theater media hub, and automobile entertainment system.
- There's neither video in nor audio in, though these things can be added via USB or Firewire.
- Besides the RAM, it's very hard to upgrade.
iMac
Where's the computer?
Mac Pro
Top-of-the-line Mac workstation with obscene amounts of processing power. All models have 2 dual-core Xeon processors.
To consider:
- Large aluminum tower. Does not include a monitor, but does let you install up to 4 graphics cards!
- PCI-E, hard drives, and memory are all expandable.
