The MacBook Pro has arrived.
On Friday I went to the Galleria and shopped for a MacBook Pro. My goal was to decide between the MacBook and the Pro, immediately seeing the glossy screen as a problem. To me, for reading text, the glossy screen just had too much glare and I can’t imagine trying to use it outdoors. The keyboard on the MacBook was interesting and seemed easy enough to use. The keys themselves are smaller than the Pro and are recessed down into the chassis of the laptop. I did not mind that, but the Pro’s keyboard just seemed easier to use.
The last thing that sold me was the RAM in the MacBook. By default it ships with 512MB but the catch is the fact that it’s spread over two 256MB chips. If you want to upgrade, you have to buy at least two 512 chips to get the full GB of RAM.
Needless to say, I decided on the Pro and I am getting all of my software setup to work the way I want it to. I accidentally set iPhoto to auto-associate itself with my camera and now I cannot figure out how to get it to stop. It’s not that I mind iPhoto, I just don’t want to experience any of the horror stories I’ve read about the library becoming corrupted.
A little side story about my purchase experience. I arrived at the Apple store at 8:30pm, they close at 9pm. I shopped and compared until 8:45pm and decided on the Pro and asked if they could install the RAM that evening. The salesperson was nice and told me they could. He ran to the back to the MacBook Pro and I waited in line to pay. As I came to the register, the time was right at 9pm. The sales person told the manager that he was going to have some RAM installed to which the manager replied, “No, clock-out and leave, they can bring it tomorrow”. I was taken off guard by this because of Apple’s usually great customer service, especially in store. Well, I just decided I would install the RAM myself and headed home. Getting home and opening up the box and popping open the screen for the first time I realized they sent me home with a glossy screen MacBook Pro, something that was not even supposed to be in stores yet. Needless to say, I went back to the store where a group of employees gathered around to see the first glossy MBP in the store. They were really nice and quickly got me a matte screen MBP and installed the RAM, a much better experience the second time around.