If you're comparing apples-to-apples (ha!) Macbooks really aren't all that much more expensive than their competition. Ever since Apple moved to unibody constru

If you're comparing apples-to-apples (ha!) Macbooks really aren't all that much more expensive than their competition. Ever since Apple moved to unibody construction, their laptops have a build-quality that most laptops don't even come close to. The ones that do cost just as much, if not more. That's not the main reason I'd recommend a Mac though. I've been using Linux in some form or another for just about as long as I've been using a computer. However, my Linux skills didn't really take off until I bought a Mac. OS X is Unix (literally, it's certified as a Unix OS). I found that when I was dual-booting Windows (this was before desktop virtualization), my primary cognitive investment was in learning to solve problems in the environment where I "lived". I used Windows most of the time, and Linux for things like Apache and an ftp server that I used to share files with friends. The problem was, I only learned Linux while I was using Linux. When I switched to OS X, my environment became more consistent. OS X isn't Linux, but it shares a lot of similarities. If you buy a Mac, you'll have a bash shell in both of your environments. You'll use similar tools like package managers and command line utilities like grep, sed, and awk. You'll solve little day-to-day problems with bash scripts, and generally become more comfortable with the terminal. This will translate to skills that you can use when working with Linux servers. The other thing I would recommend is that you use virtualization rather than dual boot. Dual booting has a high switching cost. You have to shut everything down and reboot the computer in order to switch environments. Given the power of laptop computers today, virtualization is a great option. Free virtualization software like VirtualBox gives you everything you need to spin up Linux virtual machines, which you can experiment with, and even trash, without consequence.