Hey, well my newish lappy, Dell D620 from September, has recently died so i was considering getting a 15" 2.16GHz Macbook Pro or a white 2GHz MacBook. I'll be mostly doing graphic design, web development n coding under WinXP using Parallels. I will be also upgrading to 2GB of RAM too. So my questions that i would like to ask are:

Is the MacBook Pro's proformance really worth the extra money?
Is the MacBook Pro portable enough for 9-5 college days?
How good is the Pro's battery life?
Should i wait for the new version to be released? (if so any dates?)

Any other info will be very helpfull

Thanks inadvanced =]

You dont really need the Pro's graphic card unless you are doing something with 3D a normal MacBook will do.
The MacBook Pro's battery life if you you is extensively is about 2 hours.
For parallels I recommend you to buy the Pro and also for your graphic design. Its faster and its screen is bigger (I also have the Pro and Iam very satisfied). If you want to use Parallels at reasonable speed the Pro is also the best option.
Btw its hard to say when there will be a new version. My guess would be in June with the WWDC or after Leopard is released (octobre) If you need it NOW buy the Pro if you can wait. Wait for the new version.

Yea, if you can afford it go for the Macbook Pro. It has bigger screen which is good for the Graphic design you will be doing. But the downside is the portability, it is very dent-prone and not as sturdy as the plastic use in Macbooks. And it's a bit bigger for my tase on the portability side. I carry it with me almost everyday to school and it is ok i guess. The battery life for me is good, i just suggest you get the Applecare for your laptop becuase it covers the battery life on it so when it goes down they will give you another fresh battery. I would wait if i were you but im not even sure when they are expected to come out with a new model.....
oh yea and ram at newegg is like $58 dollars for another Gigabyte.Newegg

You dont need applecare for your battery. After battery update they added this to their site:

"The warranty on the batteries of MacBook and MacBook Pro systems with Core 2 Duo processors has been extended to 2 years from the date of purchase."

Thanks for the info =] me thinks i shall wait till WWDC then and see what happens =]

i still recommend you ge the applecare warranty for your macbook either way, things go wrong even though its a mac

^defintely, my friend's powerbook died 2 weeks before applecare was up, and he got a mbp from apple 4 free!