2012-13 Laptop Discussion

Anyone getting the new MacBook Pros (late-2013)?

I don't know if should be considered a perfect substitute for a laptop, but I have a Microsoft Surface RT and absolutely love it.

Unlike most tablets, it is fully compatible with Microsoft Office, and its battery life is amazing. I recently took a financial statement analysis class and a financial risk management class as part of my alternative transcript, and I was able to successfully use the Surface throughout every step of the way, including some pretty beefy financial valuations.

Being able to just hand a tablet to someone else in a group project to show them your excel / ppt is pretty darn cool.

I don't think it's a perfect substitute for a laptop, but as far as tablets go, it's the best one for business school IMO.

The new Thinkpad T440s is pretty awesome if you're a Windows fan. Great bang for the buck as well.
https://shop.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops/th ... ies/t440s/

I second that! T440s is great!

I'm planning on getting the Surface 2 Pro for grad school. The laptop/tablet aspect of it is very appealing to me. I'll be able to do all the stuff I'd do on my PC but also would have the option to just use it as a tablet. Seems that the battery life of the 2 pro is pretty good (as in good enough to go from 8a-5pm on one charge).

Have you run into any problems with your surface or things I should be aware of before making the purchase? The 2 Pro is pretty expensive but it really seems awesome.

I was about to buy Surface when its price was slashed to $199, recently. Couldn't get it because of some logistical issues. Pro can easily get you through the day on one charge.

The only thing that bothered me (even at that price point) was the Win app store. There are just not enough quality apps. But, again, if your purpose is to work on B-school stuff, that shouldn't be much of a problem.

Just bought a Thinkpad Yoga. Not the cheapest, but it has an excellent keyboard and trackpad, a great screen and a solid metal case. Also, it's thin, light and converts into a tablet. I got the Core i7, 256 SSD, 8Gb build.

I actually bought a new Thinkpad T440p during black friday through an employee discount. Was able to get Intel Core i5-4330M with decent graphics card and 1600x900 resolution. Kept the harddrive and ram to the bare minimum and purchased 2 sticks of 8 GB laptop ram for $100 and 240 gb SSD drive for $110. Total with the after market upgrades came to $1300. Will weigh around 4.5 lbs, have 9 cell battery and have a decently slim form factor at 1.1inches thick according to specs.

I plan to do development work on the machine so I wanted it decently powerful. For MBA specific stuff its a bit much. I havn't used it yet, its still shipping (FYI, shipping from Lenovo takes forever).

Excel on Mac is exactly the same.

I have been working on OS X for the past 5 years (Macbook Pro) and using Lenovo T430 from my office. I must say Excel for Windows is extremely superior interms of intuitiveness and features.

Mac may be having same features but things are very slow - and powerful addons such as PowerPivot (used for relational tables to be used for pivot table) are not available. I'm an apple fan but still when I need to use any Office tool, I start my VMware or use my office laptop.

Even I'm completely split about which laptop to buy. My current Macbook Pro had been upgraded to include one of the fastest SSDs and is still extremely fast, but its 3 years old. Not sure, if I should buy Macbook Air 13/Retina Macbook 13 or buy a Lenovo X1 to avoid any goof-up.

Hoping my confusion would be over once the haswell-powered X1 carbon is released this year. (And hoping the upcoming summer refresh of macbook air is not tempting)

NR91, I have a 2011 macbook pro with an SSD and a bunch of RAM, not worth upgrading when you have a perfectly serviceable machine. Like you I run both win/osX but i use boot camp instead of VMware.

I use a MacBook Air and in current it runs fine..
The 2012 MacBook Air no longer stands as the coolest Mac laptop: that crown has been temporarily stolen by the Retina Display MacBook Pro. Nor is it as unusual. However, it still remains the best example of an ultrathin laptop -- for its construction quality, performance, and ergonomics.
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I also use a Mac Book Pro but how do you deal with Excel on Mac? Do you run parallels? I broke my Mac's screen and now I am wondering whether to have the screen replaced or buy a new laptop outright. Perhaps the second would be better. I am also sceptical of the paralels...

Lenovo tiny Carbons are good. I think they are out with X2 by now. Very light and they work quite well

I'm a second year MBA student and will throw in my 2 cents of advice.

If you are used to having a PC, definitely stick to it. ASUS and Lenovo are the two most common brands for PC's amongst my MBA class.

However, if you are a Mac person you have to options: go back to PC (I wouldn't) or stick to Mac.
I personally prefer Mac, and have had no problems using Mac in b-school. It is true that some software is only compatible with windows, but you can easily install windows in your Mac. Windows runs much better in a MacBook Pro than i've seen it run in any PC. The comparison is particular striking when you run simulations in excel, the Mac is about 10x faster than your average PC.

So my advice is stick to what you like and don't worry too much about "what's best for b-school". If you like Mac, you'll make it work and you won't regret.

Don't get a MacBook Air though.... it may be slow if you have to partition your hard drive to install windows, and tablets are NOT a replacement for laptops.

Hope this helps.

On another note, you guys should check out a site called pymetrics. They are a neuroscience game-based career assessment platform that matches you with industries, companies and ultimately real internship and job opportunities. I found my summer internship through them and thought they were awesome. Wish I had heard about them b4 entering b-school.

https://bit.ly/1JxEviS

I would run windows on the new macbook for ms office - that should work fine.

using the office version for mac becomes better, but in your future office you will most likely use ms office on windows... bear that in mind