Mac Book Pro experience

Got a new Mac Book pro at my work place about a fortnight back. Should say, the overall experience till date has been awesome. The Pro book is reasonably power packed, running an Intel processor @ 2.4 GHz wtih 2GB of RAM. The system also boasts a 256 MB NVIDIA graphics card supporting a max resolution of 1440*900. Other prime features of the notebook includes a LED backlit keypad and the Firewire ports.

There were a few things that I didn’t quite like as well. The first and foremost is the number of USB ports – Just 2 of them. Having used Dell at work and at home, I am very used to most of the ports/slots (mainly ethernet and power) at the rear side of the laptops. The Mac Book Pro however is very different in that all the ports/slots are on either side of the notebook. I personally found it clumsy and inconvenient with this arrangement.

The biggest setback for me which I am trying to overcome till date however is the keys and its layout. No Home, End, Insert, Delete, Page Up and Page Down keys – this has crippled my navigation a lot. The re-arranged CTRL, ALT and APPLE keys also add to my typing woes. That said, the keypad has a great touch. It feel really good to type with it. And here are other things that could have been better with this notebook given its price (costed over a Lakh Indian Rupees):

1. The Battery life is around 2:30 Hrs which definitely can be improved (my Dell D610 used to do more than that)
2. The following portions of the notebook heats up a lot on continuous usage – The place between the keypad the laptop edge (where we rest our palm) and more importantly, the portion near the Function keys at the top.

I found the following pre-packaged software very useful with the Mac – The Dictionary and the Stickies app ( there surely should be much more but haven’t explored a lot as yet).

Will post more as I get used to this sleek notebook.