mac powerbook 15" superdrive or dell inspiron 9200

hi, i was wondering if any of you might be able to help me choose on my next laptop.

want to get a laptop to replace my existing dell, which is on it's last legs, and want it for things like work (office applications), music, dvd/cd burning, verty basic video and photo editing, and general internet use. oh, and the odd game (football manager 2005!).

i generally want about 80GB hard drive, although i could go down to 60BG and get an external one i suppose. i want it to be pretty quick, so 512mb ram should do. not sure about processor though. apart from that, i want it to be wireless, although it's not essential to be really portable, as it'll spend msot of its time at home.

basically, i want a pretty good laptop, and can't decide on whether to go for a mac or another pc. i have been offered a very good deal on a new mac (35-40% off...sounds too good to be true, but it is!), however i have never really used them, and i'm quite concerened that i won't get used to it, or will find it very confusing.

on the other hand, i have a friend who helps repair pcs, etc, and is generally pretty handy when it comes to dealing with pcs, and so he can give me lots of software, etc, which he couldn't do with a mac.

i've basically got it down to the above 2 computers, and was wondering what you all thought, and advice?

please help me choose!

 

have you experience using a mac before??? i have use it along time ago and was very confused when i used it. i guess if you get used to using windows, then switching might be a bit hard but thats just me

 

it's not just you inspiron9200. I've always used a PC and when I had to work in a computer lab that had all Macs I felt stupid not knowing how to help people with certain tasks on the Mac that I knew cold how to do on a PC. I mean, they're not totally different, it's like going from say the U.K. to the U.S. and finding things are just a little different such as driving on the other side of the road. Not like going from Turkmenistan to the U.S. where, well the language and everything else is just totally different.

Point being, there's value in sticking with what you know in terms of OS as well.

 

You just have to look at what applications your going to use. I dont think madden 2005 is going to work for mac. But you have to remember that Mac os is build off freebsd, which is pretty cool. The different between mac and the dell in this case is pretty much personal preference...

 

well, me here, i've use macs a lot in my life, so i can deal with them, but ur case here, its quite obvioius. I'm more of a windows person, and almost everyone else is 2, jus go with the 9200. Think, the only 17 incher with centrino, u get ultimate portability, great graphics card (for madden), nice big screen, everything. Plus easy to use format. The inspiron is the 1 i would go with.

 

thanks guys. i think i'm going to go for the 9200, as it's obviously more familiar.

ps. whats this madden 2005 you talk of? i mean football manager 2005, ie PROPER football![ ]