Tech specs and configurations

The 17-in. MBP C2D comes with a stock 160GB hard drive that uses perpendicular recording technology, spins at 5,400 rpm and seems to offer a little speed boost of its own. (My first MBP has the optional 7,200-rpm 100GB drive.) Don't care as much about speed as storage? Apple now offers an optional 200GB hard drive that spins at 4,200 rpm. For 40GB more storage, you pay $100. Or you can lose some disk space, snag the 7,200GB hard drive and save $100. The 160GB drive seems to hit the sweet spot, offering a good amount of storage with relatively little speed penalty.

The other main option is additional RAM. Although the MBP has two RAM slots that will take 2GB chips, only 3GB of that RAM can be used by the laptop because of the way the Intel architecture works. "We don't know of any Core 2 Duo computer that can address the (full) 4GB (of RAM)," Nishimura said. "The limitation is due to the Intel chipset. We feel like it's less confusing to customers" to advertise the 3GB RAM maximum.

In other words, you can put 4GB in, but you're only going to effectively get 3GB, so why spend money you don't have to? And to get that 3GB, you will spend money. Apple charges $575 for a 2GB stick of RAM -- surprisingly beating the third-party RAM supplier I usually buy from by $30. So if you're working with large files, use Photoshop Final Cut Pro or just want bragging rights, go ahead and buy the RAM from Apple.

Having said that, 2GB is plenty for now, and if six or 12 months down the road you want to boost the RAM, prices will almost certainly be better.