[ale] Big laptop advice

[Matt Rideout]

My portable (when I need something more than the N810) is a 13" MacBook 
that dual boots Ubuntu 9.04 and OS X 10.5. I have no complaints.

Since Linux doesn't support HFS+ without disabling journaling, and I 
don't fully trust OS X's ext3 support, what I ended up doing was 
creating an HFS+ partition with journaling disabled specifically for 
sharing data between the two OSs. My VMs, Thunderbird profile, Dropbox 
directory, etc are placed in there. VMs are swapped between VMware 
Fusion or VMware Server, depending on what OS I'm running at the time.

Apple's hardware is solid. The MacBook's predecessor was an iBook G4 
which was run over by a car after years of service (don't ask :)). The 
screen was cracked, but everything else continued to function, so it was 
relegated to living room media server duty.

Stop by an Apple Store with an Ubuntu Live CD, and they'll probably let 
you try it out on a MacBook Pro. The Live CD works just fine on my MacBook.

When I bought the MacBook, getting the minimum RAM and hard drive 
configuration, then dropping in 4GB and 500GB replacements saved a 
couple hundred dollars vs getting the upgrades direct.

Mike Harrison wrote, On 06/06/2009 01:29 PM:
> On Sat, 6 Jun 2009, Jeff Hubbs wrote:
>
>   
>> A few months ago, we got a Toshiba Qosmio with an 18.1" screen for my 
>> daughter; she likes playing Sims 2 and plans to edit video.  It's definitely 
>> a desktop replacement...no, wait - it's a DESK replacement.  No idea how it 
>> would do under any Linux distribution but as big laptop hardware with a nice 
>> screen, it certainly answers the mail.
>>     
>
>
> I'm down to the Asus 18.4" monster.. (awesome machine)..
>
> or a Sony one.. (pretty, but I've had driver issues in the past)
>
> and eyeing a MacBook Pro 17" with the Matte screen.
>
> Anyone dual-booting into Ubuntu on a Macbook Pro?
> If so: How is it working for you?
>
>
>
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