After having made fun of Mac users for most of my life, I find myself now a proud owner of a 13″ Macbook Pro. How the heck did this happen?

The Mac hatred probably all started with my father, a bona fide anti-Mac guy. Like a lot of kids I took after my father’s tendencies, so when he scoffed at something Apple-related, I would too. My father still sees a lot of Apple’s principles and ways of doing things as arrogant and far too proprietary. Want to hook up to a display? Buy our specialized MiniDisplay Port to DVI converter! Most any PC would simply feature a DVI port on the device, but Macs have to juice every dollar they can from the customer. Apple is a lot like the cool kid in high school who is charming, good-looking, and does everything his (or her) way and everybody goes along with it because they’re enthralled by the coolness. The funny thing is: now that I’ve bought this Macbook and showed him the quality, even he’s thinking of getting one as his next laptop (the blame rests squarely on Vista’s buggy shoulders).

One thing that I’ve noticed is that I’m having a lot more fun using this new Macbook — and I don’t think it’s just because it’s new (although, hey, I could be wrong). I don’t have anything against Windows XP, but I don’t remember having a good time using it. It was a good tool for launching games and programs like MS Word, but any fun I had with a new computer had a lot more to do with the satisfaction of having built my own desktop or from buying new components — it never had anything to do with the OS. I suppose Windows 7 is trying to fix a lot of that with their focus on a tighter and more integrated interface, but the Mac feels like it’s already there. I’m not going to do a feature-by-feature run down as to why I think the Mac is more pleasurable to use, but I really enjoy how all the applications work well together and how the UI slides into place in ways that were previously only seen with WindowBlinds on the PC.

But all the hype around the Mac software wasn’t what drew me to the platform — it was the hardware.  One of the qualities I wanted in a new laptop was something that looked and felt like a premium machine, since most anything above the $900 price range (read: above Netbook range) would meet my modest technical requirements. My sister uses a 15″ ASUS N50 that’s quite capable for gaming and a great little desktop replacement, but it just feels too plasticky. A tour of the local Best Buy and Sony shops only showed me more of the same — a lot of powerful hardware wrapped up in a plastic shell.

I know it’s ironic coming from a guy who wants to upgrade to a new plastic iPhone 3GS, but the point is that I wanted a machine that would feel solid and look gorgeous. Something made out of metal, like a Terminator without the killer instinct. After a fair amount of googling I had narrowed the choices down to a Dell Adamo or one of the aluminum Macbook Pro models. The Adamo’s reported low battery life was a real buzz kill, but it was ultimately the price that was the deciding factor. The Adamo hovered at around $2000 before taxes with the power of something like the Macbook Air, whereas the 13″ Macbook Pro started at around $1300 with a student discount and came with an 8GB iPod Touch as long as I bought it before September. Once I saw the MBP design in person I was sold and I forwarded Apple large chunks of money in exchange for their product.

This might all just be a mid-year crisis that sometimes hits tech geeks. I’m caught part of the way between Q1 and Q2 launch cycles, and so I go and buy a “sexy” laptop instead of buying a more powerful and affordable one from HP or Toshiba. But I think it’s more than that. There’s something about the clicking of the Chiclet keyboard, the laser precision of the unibody aluminum design, and the pulsing white of the sleep light that makes using this computer far more fun than it should be.

Related posts:

1. Apple Refurb Deals – MacBook Pros at a Nice Price
2. Now That Didn’t Take Long… Remote Disk Access Coming To All Macs Running Leopard
3. MacBook Pro – Great Rant at MobileCrunch
4. MacBook Air and A Nation Divided
5. Anticipation…Anticipation… It’s Making Me Wait… FedEx + MacBook Air = :)