I don't understand how you could ever recommend a macbook for "hardware to price ratio". They usually cost at least 50% more than a Lenovo, and maybe my experiences and those of my friends have been unusual, but they generally seem to be pretty poor. Battery life is atrocious, all sorts of display problems, same hard drive problems that every OEM has. Lap-burning heat. Ridiculously expensive power bricks. Poor wi-fi antenna (my Lenovo's antenna is sickeningly good.)

I gotta give them credit though, their magnetic power cord connector is nice. I haven't gotten to play with the multitouch pad either, that might be nice.

None of those are true, except that the magnetic power cord connector truly is sweet. I get 4-5 hours of battery time, the wireless range is good, the Macbook Pro is quieter than the Lenovo, it gets as hot as any other laptop, and saying the Macbook Pro has the same "hard drive problems everybody else has" is a pointless argument.

My MB consistently gets a wifi signal in an office building where all the Lenovos seem to need an Ethernet tether once they get 6 inches away from the prime areas.

Not sure what display problems you refer to (honestly curious), both my MBP and MB seem to have displays as good as any other laptop. My other hobby is digital photography (Canon EOS5D, L glass, etc.), so I'm working with Aperture or Photoshop a lot, the only "display" issues I'd note is that the laptop LCDs don't calibrate as nicely as my external Apple cinema displays.

thank you for that completely anecdotal evaluation of apple's hardware. My personal experience has been different, however, unless you have some kind of defects-per-million data or some such, I'll stick with what I said, it mostly comes down to personal preference. Anyway I didn't intend to get into a useless argument. My point, as I've stated before, was that you seemed to be not considering a decent OS to go with the thinkpad

Ha, yeah, this subject is as close to religion as you get here. I more than anything wanted to see how far I'd get down-modded for saying something bad about Apple. Even though I think it's true (Apple's hardware really is pretty poor and expensive) based on what I'd consider a large anecdotal sample size, and just using each for a little bit, I was just curious to see what happened. I'm shocked to still be in the positive.

I don't see why most of the people here would have any problem criticizing apple. Like say, on all their evil attempts at music industry domination, restrictive apis and what not. We do admit they make some sexy hardware tough.

You're applying logic to religion. It just doesn't work that way.

That's correct - the first thing I would do with the Thinkpad is install Ubuntu, so it's more of a hardware question for me.

If you're open to different operating systems, and a student, it sounds like you could tolerate a not-so-premium setup if it came to that. I'm guessing you're not really a gamer, and probably not doing extreme graphics or video work. In that case, a Thinkpad or MBP might be overkill. Alternatives:

1. Look for cheaper Linux laptops from Dell or HP. I get the feeling that the laptop as we know it is going to change significantly within the next couple of years, at the very least with solid-state hard drives, so why bother with a top-of-the-line machine right now? And, you'll probably be making a lot more money once you're out of school, so you'll be tempted to splurge then anyway.

2. Get one of these newfangled ultra-portables like the Asus eeePC or Everex Cloudbook. (I've been eying the Cloudbook myself.) If this programming thing becomes a habit for you then you might also develop the habit of collecting computers. In that case you could have a "serious" (but still semi-cheap) desktop computer at home, with a decent-sized display and hard drive, do most of your work on it, and also use it as a server of some sort in your home. The ultra-portable would be for, ya know, laptop stuff.

(Disclaimer: I'm laughably frugal, and my company also supplies me with a real laptop -- a Thinkpad R61 -- which I like.)

Unless you plan on replacing your laptop regularly or not taking it places, buying an HP or Dell may not be the most frugal decision. Apples and Thinkpads have metal frames that keep internal components from flexing and breaking solder joints[0]. Dells, HPs and most other cheaper laptops don't. I don't have any hard data for it, but I think laptops with frames last longer. I know several people who's computational needs aren't demanding who are still using iBooks and Thinkpads made in 2000.

[0] iBooks seem to break the BGAs on their video chips a lot anyway, but I don't think any new Apples have that problem.

> but many aspects of how you define superiority come down > to personal preference I guess

If you get a macbook then you don't have easy access to right or middle mouse buttons on the standard hardware. This sucks for linux. My experience of configuring X to hack keyboard buttons into being extra mouse buttons has been mixed, and I'd recommend thinking long and hard about buying an Apple for linux purposes. Sure, you can get an external mouse, but you could also just get a thinkpad.