If I were you I wouldn't spend all that money on a shiny new laptop. And unlike others are suggesting, I would definitely not spend even more on a shiny new Mac

If I were you I wouldn't spend all that money on a shiny new laptop. And unlike others are suggesting, I would definitely not spend even more on a shiny new Macbook, because it's not a one-time cost. You will pay more in repairs later on. Especially since you're interested in Linux, I'd go to ebay and buy an old Thinkpad. You can get some good cheap ones. If you do want a Macbook, you can also get some cheap ones on ebay. I'm typing this on a 2008 Macbook that I bought last year for $500. It's serving me perfectly well as a web developer. I have also done some iOS development on it. Before you settle on a Linux distro, try a few in VMs and see which one you like best. Then you can install that to the hard disk. One thing to make sure is you don't buy a computer with a low max RAM. Even if it's a relatively old model, as long as you can have 4-6GB RAM, it'll work great. If you make more money freelancing, you can sell the old computer and buy a better one. It will also teach you something about buying and selling computers, if you're interested in that kind of thing.