You don't need a MacBook Pro. The bottom of the line MacBook will work
fine for crystallography ($999).
On the other hand, my experience with Ubuntu is that it is also fine
for crystallography software. The only real issues are hardware
drivers (especially video, sound, & wireless). But if you buy from a
vendor that supports Linux, then your laptop will probably come with
these drivers already working.
Note that the bottom of the line "Gazelle Ultra" from System76 is a
CoreDuo. Speaking from experience, you will notice the speed bump
moving to the Core2Duo. Also note that Bluetooth is extra.
I don't think that Macs are a bad value when you stack up features and
do a fair comparison. I've been using them almost exclusively for
crystallography for many years now.
James
On Feb 19, 2009, at 7:47 PM, Stephen Weeks wrote:
Dear BBers,
I would like to treat myself to a new laptop which will be my
primary use machine (i.e I want to run all the usual crystallography
packages, hopefully write a few papers, watch Lost online and pay
the bills when needs be). Although I am an ardent Apple fan I find
it difficult to justify forking out $2000 plus for a MacBook Pro so
as an alternative I've been looking into buying a machine running
Linux. During my comparison shopping studies I came across the small
company System76 (http://system76.com) that sell reasonably priced
machines that come with Ubuntu 8.1 (Intrepid Ibex) preinstalled.
My two questions are (i) Does anybody have any experience with
machines from this company ? (ii) Other than the Bltwish and 64bit
issues can I (compile) install and run CCP4, Arp/Warp, XDS Mosflm,
Coot and Pymol on this version of Ubuntu ? I don't mind tinkering
around a bit to get things to work as that's part of the fun.
Cheers Stephen
--
Stephen Weeks, Ph. D.
Drexel University College of Medicine
Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
Room 10102 New College Building
245 N. 15th St.
Philadelphia, PA 19102
Phone: (+) 215-762-7316
Fax: (+) 215-762-4452
