Hi Elisabeth;

On my last project, over the course of about a year, the whole team gradually switched from PCs to Macbooks. A few of the guys got the Macbook Pro, and a few of us got basic Macbooks.

I’d recommend the basic Macbook (with extra memory of course). It beats the Macbook Pro on portability (one of the reasons I got it is that I travel a lot more than the guys who got the Macbook Pro), and there doesn’t seem to be much of a difference in performance at all.

The big difference is screen real estate. The 13″ Macbook is usable at 1280 x 800, but having 15″ and 1440 x 900 to work with must be nice.

Hi Elisabeth;

At my last contract, the whole team gradually switched to Macs over the course of about a year. Some of the guys got Macbook Pros, and some of us got the basic Macbook.

I’d recommend the 13″ Macbook. It beats the Macbook Pro on portability (one of the reasons I got it instead of the Pro is that I travel more than the other guys) and the performance difference seems to be negligable.

The only big difference that I can see is in screen real estate. I can survive (even running Eclipse, etc.) with 13″ and 1280 x 800, but your mileage may vary. I find keeping an external monitor handy at home and at the office helps.

I, too, have switched over to Macs recently. I bought an iMac for my birthday and it has practically become part of the family. My wife, who rarely (if ever) used our Linux machine has begun using the iMac more and more. As I search for my next job, one of my big “+” is if they will allow me to own use a Mac as my development machine. All that said, at my current workplace, we all go with MacBook Pros just because of the greater value. Just as you can develop on an iMac, even though they’re not intended for really heavy duty development, a Mac book would do just fine–I still suggest the Pro version–the additional screen real estate is nearly worth the whole price difference–especially if you develop on the road a lot. If most of what you do is around the office, then maybe a MacBook + an external display will get you what you need–but do you buy a Mac display or a a Dell?

Hope the switch goes well. If you get any Mac specific fun going with your testing, please post!

At Socialtext we’re almost all Macs, and we tend to favor either regular MacBooks with maximum RAM or else older G4 MacBook Pros. The general perception is that the Pro is not as good a value as the regular, although some disagree.

I run my Macbook with an extra flat-panel display on my desk, it’s a nice setup.

I’m running Selenium locally every day. I use TextMate, but not Eclipse. I run OpenOffice under X11. ChickenOfTheVNC for a VNC client. I run X-Lite for VOIP. The built-in mike is nice for VOIP and Skype talking. Just talk at the computer, it sounds fine on the other end. It’s all pretty nice.

I’m mostly moved off of XP to a 15″ MacBook pro (a refurb from Apple, which saved several hundred $). My only complaint is battery life. It’s a fine Ruby development platform, though I’m using TextMate instead of Eclipse or IntelliJ.

Hi Elizabeth,

We started moving to the Mac gradually as well. I started by migrating my wife over after a week of too many viruses on Windows (got tired of being tech support). Never had a problem since - she loves it so much she has two of them now (n old G3 “Lamp” and a G4 iBook). I also replaced my desktop at home with an Intel iMac. In fact, this weekend I put the old Windows PC in the garage sans hard disk (hadn’t used it in over a year), ready to go to the next electronic recycling trip.. Muahahahah!

For work I got a 17″ MacBook pro. Works great for me and the screen is nice and big (which helps keep a lot of code in the screen and still be able to see it - my glasses are getting pretty thick). If you have eyesight problems make sure you spend a while looking at the screen to make sure the glossy finish of the regular Macbook doesn’t tire your eyes, especially if you’ll be coding a lot on it. I went with this one because it is my only machine (although I do have a big Dell monitor at work for multiheading while at the office).

Finally, Max out the RAM, but do it after buying the machine if you want to save some cash. Apple tends to charge too much for RAM.

For Desktop app stuff, this has helped me a lot: Get Quicksilver and iGTD (if you’re into the GTD thing). Make a set of smart folders for the name (First Last) of the people you work with often on Mail.app, and use Mail Act-On for quick filing in addition to the usual rules.

For the Unix stuff, I wrote a guide a while back to get you up and running quickly with Ports and such.
http://www.hackerdude.com/2007/04/13/linux-to-os-x-migration-guide/

If you sign your mail with GPGMail see http://www.hackerdude.com/2007/03/27/mailapp-gpgmail-bundle-and-unread-bit/

I didn’t include rails in it (although it’s simple to “port install ruby”, change the path order and take it from there) but you’ve been doing that development already so whether you’re doing via locomotive or via the ports system you’re probably better off with what you’re used to.

Eclipse for the Java stuff, and TextMate which I tend to like better for dynamic languages like Ruby and Javascript. I actually aliased it to vi and set it as the default editor for cvs and such.

At my work there’s a lot of people switching (I was switcher #3). More switch from Windows than Linux so it’s not only Linux cannibalizing either. It’s worth mentioning that a part of my last contract was writing C++ in VIsual Studio and I got it done with Parallels (and then VMWare fusion). Worked great. Now that contract is over and I hibernated the VM on a server for some other time. Hello 40GB of extra room.

Hi,

I bought a Mac Book a month ago. Also made the switch because I needed something reliable, my Dell sack of cack was always breaking. The Mac Book is fine for running eclipse, FitNesse and an app server. I think you’ll be fine for Rails development.

I am not sure, really, how much better macs are. These mac freaks get on my nerves, they are victims of good marketting. I mean, it’s only a computer.

There are only two reasons why you would want a MacBook Pro - 1) larger screen and, 2) a better graphics card.

But larger screen implies “bulkier laptop”. My solution to this is to buy an external LCD and hook it up to the 13″ MB whenever you’re working at home or at work because I don’t think you can really write code with a 13″ screen (atleast I can’t). But it is great for carrying it around, giving presentations and that sorta stuff.

As for the better graphics card, you really need it only if you want to play games (probably on Windows via BootCamp).

In any case, don’t purchase the RAM upgrade from Apple. Just buy it from somewhere else (It is a lot cheaper this way!). If you want to use Parallels, you probably want to get yourself 2 GB like I did. I converted a few months back and I’m having a lot of fun with my 13″ MB and I highly recommend it.

I don’t know how attached you are to Eclipse - but I can’t recommend TextMate highly enough. It’s extremely Ruby friendly (many of the support bundles are written in Ruby).

hi i enjoyed the read