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May 11, 2006
Windows on MacBookPro
One of the guys in the office bought a MacBookPro for himself a while back, and has been playing with BootCamp and Parallels. I got the chance to boot the machine into Windows to see if my idea of using one as a "mostly Windows" machine has legs.
Problem #1 - no right click using the trackpad. That's kindof a killer - under OSX I've been using SideTrack and have a trackpad tap mapped to right click. There's at least one utility which will give you right click with a mouse-keyboard-combo, but blech. In fact, support for the trackpad basically sucks - no acceleration, no scrolling, nothing - just a generic one button HID mouse.
Problem #2 - power management (or lack thereof). I tried closing the lid, and while the LCD turned off, it turned back on shortly thereafter, and the machine hung trying to standby. I have a feeling this is gonna be a problem no matter what Windows notebook I use. I've completely gotten used to the mac just doing the right thing... Grumble, grumble...
So it's not dead yet, but it's not looking great either.
Another colleague is a Thinkpad fan, so at his urging I checked out the Thinkpads formerly-known-as-IBM, and the T60 doesn't look bad, though it's a bit heavy with the 15" screen, and pretty spendy.
Posted by dberger at May 11, 2006 11:33 AM
Comments
Been using a Thinkpad for about 2.5 years now (through work). My T42 was okay for a while but I did end up having a bunch of hardware problems. (Dead wireless, dead screen, etc.) I finally demanded a replacement that had not gone through someone else's grubby hands and got a T43 with 1G RAM, 70G disk, and a 2Ghz Penium M. The system has been pretty stable except for the HSM software that IBM ships with. Only other challenges have more to do with my IT crew than the machine itself.
Generally happy with the T43. Keyboard feels good (when I use it). Weight isn't too bad. 15" screen seems big at first, but once you get used to 1400x1000, you don't want to go back.
Sleep/Hibernate works as advertised.
-Steve
Posted by: Steve S. at May 11, 2006 2:58 PM