My mom is after an Apple macbook of some description.

Can you guys who are familiar with Apple point me in the right direction of which 1 is best for her as ive never had any dealings with thier laptop products!

Shes only after the basics, mainly internet, email, browsing through her photos, photo editing. Will also need a DVD/cd writer.

It will also have to suit me as after 6 months when shes board of it il have it off her

Cheers guys

Stew

If it's just for those apps then go for the lowest spec m8. Although I just looked and they have dropped the MacBook range http://store.apple.com/uk/browse/home/specialdeals/mac thats a good deal for a Mac

does she really need an laptop?
the cheapest imac is the same price as the cheapest macbook... I don't know how good here eyesight is but the cheapest macbook only has an 13.3 inch screen. The imac has a massive 21.5inch screen...

Well, your choices are limited. Apple used to have a plain Jane Macbook, but now have only the Macbook Air and Macbook Pro - in the States at least. The Macbook Air doesn't have a CD/DVD drive. You'd have to buy an external drive. The Mac Superdrive is $80 US. And for what its worth, the Macbook Air just seems too flimsy to me.

I currently have a 15" Macbook Pro. My first Mac was a Macbook. A client of mine bought it for me as he was sick and tired of hearing me bitch about my Dell. Shortly after he gave it to me, I switched my whole office to Macs and bought a 13" Macbook Pro for my wife. The oldest is about 5 years old and they are all going strong. I sold the my original Macbook to a friend and its still going strong. Every other computer I've owned has crapped out within 2-3 years.

The only complaint I have is that the new OS-X Lion operating system sucks. I never had any crashes until I installed that POS, now all my computers will freeze for no good reason. Until Lion came along, I was huge Apple-phile.

The bottom line, if I were looking for a new laptop, price be damned, it would be another 15" Macbook Pro. From the aluminium case to the components, its is a top notch piece of kit. Its the simple things like the keys not falling out and the peripherals working flawlessly that ALMOST make it worth the extra $$. The fact that it USED to connect, and stay connected, to the internet and other external devices without need for a computer science degree to make it work, was the other value point for me. But, alas, Lion sucks. It was an "upgrade" without a reason - except to sell more product and shit can Mobile Me in favor of the less powerful Cloud POS. However, if I were looking for a laptop to do the things your mom wants to do, I'd keep it simple and buy her a reasonably priced, HP, Sony, Toshiba, Compaq or whatever. I say that because until Apple gets Lion sorted out, its no better than Windows - so the value of not pulling your hair out just isn't there to justify the added cost. You could probably buy two of the above mentioned brands for the price of an Apple. That's just not worth it for a home application to me. YMMV.

Edit: Wow, you guys are quick.

Get the Macbook Air. Incredibly light, powerful enough and a joy to own.

If that is all she wants it for get her a 300 quid laptop and draw a fricken apple on it.

I got a Acer Aspire 5742 for less than 400 quid recently, the kids have started wrecking it already and I can watch just as much porn as Klincky does on his grand's worth of dirty mac book

I want to add that the Macbook Pro has a backlite keyboard as the reg macbooks do not...So if you want to use it in the dark your all set with the pro version..
If you dish out the money for the pro it will outlast a PC hands down..Right out of the box it's ready to go...Easy to set up step by step instructions so simple..
Just link her email with the "Mail" on the desktop and email is 1 click away. And no worries about viruses, not like a PC needs to worry.

If you want it to yourself later on, then go for an Air with Intel i5 processor (current model). Screen resolution is better than Pro, backlit keyboard, works like charm (compared to my wife i5 Pro with hard disc it IS really better) and I suppose you will not miss DVD writing much (who is missing audio/videocasettes these days? no one even remembers them...). If possible - always go for the best and enjoy, life is short for regrets

I never use DVD/CD anymore, its a slow dying media. Downloads and streaming are the future.

I've had my Macbook for 6 years, it's been dropped, trodden on and it went around the Med in a motorbike pannier and then decided it didn't like the KTM Aventure's meaty vibration, however..it recovered and is still going strong, love mine..

I've had MacBooks in the past and they are great. I do have to agree that you can abuse them and they are tough to break. I've since moved on to an iPad and it's really all I need. You can get one pretty cheap nowadays and if she is after a physical keyboard you can always but a folio with a fold out case. You can get an iPad 2 starting at £ 220ish.

For what it's worth, I work in the I.T. Industry and have been a PC guys for many years. I recently (6 months ago) started using a MacBook Air and have to agree with previous comments that it is a fantastic device. Very light weight and quick. It does have a backlit keyboard and, not that I ever use it but, you can get an external SuperDrive for it. At this point, I really can't see myself going with anything else. The build quality is second to none and the battery life is incredible to boot. Good luck.

Its funny. The day after I posted this, an automatic update happened that seems to have cured the connectivity issues I was having. Plus it got rid of that fooking box you had to un-click to make sure every program you opened during the previous session did not automatically open during boot up. That was an idiotic idea. In any event, it seems to be working better now. Cloud still sucks though.

No doubt Apple is the best no virus crap like pc. I have a HP lap top 17" screen Blu ray player and dvd burner.I have had my share of virus problems.
I am waiting till the I pad become the new lap top.I have a I phone4s and an Ipod touch.
I am so tired of the apple droid wars.
I had a HTC EVO great phone .But my I tunes has so much stuff and I can't get it on my HTC.
Now with my 4s I put everything on it and don't have to fight with trying to get stuff to work.

It's so crazy Apple is such a cash cow .You can't buy insurance for your phone.So if you lose it or it its stolen your fooked.
Apple and the Droid just spend all there time sueing each other in court.

So as soon the I pad gets the stuff I need I am getting it.I give up to Apple Plus I do like my new phone.
PC's makes me crazy But it will do for now.

LOL yeah I'm totally gonna give my mom a Linux computer

That's some seriously nerd-tastic thinking.

Do people really buy a laptop that they think will make them look cool?! Seriously?! Who the fook does that? A motorbike I understand but a fooking laptop? I think some people spend way too much time over thinking such things.