MacBook Pro 17" review after 6 months of use

Roughly six months and some change ago I finally purchased a 17" MacBook Pro. At the time I also opted for several upgrades including 4 gigs of ram, the faster of the two available processors, and the 7800 rpm 320 gig hard drive. This setup is probably overkill for a typical user, but I do a lot of graphic intensive work so it was needed. Thanks to student loans I was also able to grab the 24" LCD monitor made just special for MacBooks.

So after using this setup for six months I thought I would write a type of follow up review. How does OS X work after lots of daily use for this amount of time? Has the laptop slowed down like windows does? Any issues pop up? Only these kinds of questions can be answered with time.

In short, I was at one time a loyal windows user. At one time I even hoped that Apple would just go away. Then Mr. Jobs came back to Apple and revived the company like nobody's business. In short, I most likely will never own a PC again. Yes, I like my MacBook that much.

The biggest love I have for my MacBook is the HUGE track pad. I love this thing. I have even stopped using my Wacom Tablet for everything but tasks that need the utmost accuracy. Surfing the web with that track pad is great. Two fingers up or down scroll the page. Three fingers left or right move you forwards or backwards in history, two finger tap for a right click. Four finger up or down swipe to see all open windows/programs and moving the chosen one to the front. It's perfect, easy, and quicker than a mouse. My only gripe is the three finger forward and back swipe isn't as responsive as it should be at times. But all in all this is truly a must have feature and I can't imagine not having it now that I've used it this long. As a side note, it makes going to a tiny PC track pad a nightmare as I'm constantly fighting with it as my fingers intuitively want to use the Apple gestures now.

When Apple says it just works, they mean it. I have an older Epson printer, copier, scanner deal. It will not work with a PC unless you use the included disk to install the software and drivers. With Vista I had to go online and find the Vista drivers after using the disk just to make it work. The entire process takes about a half hour or longer. On a whim I plugged it in to my MacBook Pro and wham, it recognized the printer and printed my pages out. No setup, nothing. Last week I had to print out a resume'. My printer was out of ink so I went next door to borrow my neighbors printer. His was even older and even though the driver for his model wasn't found, I used one that was close from the drop down list and bam, I was in business. This is just something Apple has done right that a PC can only dream of doing at this time.

The speed is still roughly the same as when I first bought it. Sure, at times I get the spinning wheel of death. Nothing is perfect, not even a Mac. Menus fly open, programs load quickly, so the speed side of things is great, still, after six months of heavy usage.

Battery life was never as good as advertised. But then again I don't use my system in the most battery saving way either. I like my screen bright when I edit photos or watch movies. I never use the slower of the two processors. I tried using the slower one for awhile but didn't like it. After being used to the speed of the faster one I just couldn't bring myself to wait those few seconds longer. With ample power around me why bother with it?

So what is a typical usage day for me? I usually have Safari open, Firefox, and iTunes open at all times. When I'm doing graphic design work I will also have open Adobe Bridge, Photoshop, and depending on what I'm working on also Illustrator, Dreamweaver, and sometimes Flash. My MacBook setup handles this with ease. I have the entire Adobe Creative Suite which includes 10 memory hogging programs. I opened and used all of them at once and barely noticed a slowdown in performance. With eight gigs of ram I know it would be even better!

So you may be wondering with all this good what is the bad? Well, the bad for me so far has been minimal. This baby runs hot with usage. At times it is almost uncomfortable on my lap. Sometimes software isn't developed for it as fast as for windows. (I'm still waiting for Chrome, Google!) Although it doesn't happen often, the spinning wheel of death is a pain. With the setup I have it shouldn't happen ever...at least not when all I have open is two browsers and iTunes. Many people hate the glossy screen. After using it for 6 months I like it. It does seem to attract dirt or get a greasy looking spot on it. I'm not sure how this happens as I never touch the screen, but it happens. My biggest gripe really is the keyboard. I miss the number pad to the right. I would have though it would be included on the 17" model due to the extra room. I'm one of those that learned to use it and I miss it not being there.

All in all though, I have found my user experience to be more enjoyable on a Mac than it ever was on a PC. Things just work. I don't have spyware or virus problems, and everything is still as speedy as the day I bought it even though I have loaded up on lots of programs. Sure, the initial investment was a bit higher. But I also got a lot of software included that I would have had to buy with a PC. In the end the cost evens out one way or another. With Apple you pay it up front. With a PC you spread it out a little.