Fix my old one or buy a new one?

Question

Hi there, I'm hoping you can give me some advice, as I'm about as non-technical as people come!
I bought my macbook in 2006 - it's 13 inch and pretty much the most basic option that was ever on the go. It has been amazing over nearly 5 years, but has been chipping away bit by bit and now it's completely done.
I was really excited about buying my new mac until I went into the store yesterday and realised...I wouldn't be purchasing the cheapest version, because the cheapest version (the air) is 11 inches (?!) and has no disc drive. So really, I would be looking at dropping £999 which I honestly wasn't prepared for, even using my friend's student discount, I wonder if it's time for me to retire from living the mac dream and now opt for something like a (gasp) Dell?
At a push, I can afford to spend this, it just means spending ALL of my money on it, at once. And I haven't even factored after care etc into it?
So my friend suggested I just get my old one fixed up. I'll go through what's wrong with it, because to me it's beyond repair, but to experts...I don't know -
1) It makes a strange internal noise - like a clink or a chink - when it gets moved quickly, followed immediately by a complete power-off. This is no longer restricted to when it gets moved, it will now do this when it is still, without any warning.
2) You can't move it at all without it completely abruptly powering off.
3) It's mac OS 10.4 which NOTHING is compatible with anymore, seriously nothing.
4) The z key is missing, the computer thinks the trackpad is constantly being held down and it's super sensitive.
5) The red light is always shining out of the headphones jack and for a couple of years now I have been only able to hear sound when headphones are plugged in.
6)  The battery is falling away from the laptop, seems to have lost its stick/magnet.
7) aesthetic issues like the white external peeling away
8) obviously has the littlest amount of battery power imaginable
9) the other day the charger actually broke off inside the laptop i.e. the charger tip sort of fell into pieces, and putting them back together hasn't worked.
- So do these things tally up to a cheap repair, or not so much? Thoughts?
Is also worth mentioning I will be using the laptop for work - but I am at the moment, out of work. I don't need masses of memory or amazing graphics or really anything that out of the ordinary!
Thanks in advance

Answer 1

First off there is nothing wrong with Dell. Second there is no more upkeep on a PC from a good make, and if you buy a good model (not the cheapest) then there is on a Mac, please just read this and other forums on this site and others site. Macs have problems also. With hardware and software (in fact Macs use the same exact hardware as PCs). The only real difference between the 2 is PCs use a BIOS (Basic Input Output System) and Macs use a EFI (Extensible Firmware Interface) to control and identify the hardware that is in the system (lately there have been a few EFI updates coming from Apple just like there are BIOS updates coming from makers of PCs).
It all depends on how you use the computer, what websites you go to and what software you install. Yes there is a bunch more CRAP software for PCs then there is for a Mac (that is to be expected seeing as PCs still hold a 90+% market share). But there is still Crapware for the Mac OS (and in my opinion some of the crapware is written by Apple).
Are Macs easier to use, that is totally subjective. On either system you open a program, load a file you want to work on, you save that file once you are done working on it to a specific place, folder, on your hard drive and close the program (but on a Mac the program doesn't really close when you close a document window. You have to take one more action to actually close programs). Nothing different there.
Are Macs more configurable? In my opinion no. I own and work on both systems and in my experience Windows is easier to configure to your liking. Maybe that is because I started with MSDOS and Windows a long time before buying a Mac. But it seems to me Windows has more GUI (Graphical User Interface) configuration windows for many more settings then OS X has. In OS X I find myself going to Terminal (The command line) to make some setting changes more then I do in Windows (maybe that's just me).
Now on to your question.
If you could fix up your old Mac it would more then like cost you about the same as a new Mac and then what you would have. An older Mac that worked as it did when it was new, no better or faster, and you would still have to use older programs. Which isn't a bad thing if those old program still do everything you needed them to do (I still run MS Office 2000 on all my PCs. Because Office 2000 still works and does everythiing I need that program to do). On my Mac I run Office 2011 Mac because I can't install the Office 2004 on Lion.
So I suggest you look at getting a new MacbookPro or a PC notebook. I personally don't see the Macbook Air as someones only computer. I see the Macbook Air's more as a second, or third, computer. But again that's just me, maybe.
As to second hand Macs from Apple, they are called refurbished.
There is a reason they are refurbished! There was something wrong with them to begin with. I personally won't go there. I have actually looked at a few and they are not that much cheaper then a brand new one of the same model.
Good luck and it's OK to spend all your money, if you want to. That's why they keep printing it and you keep earning it.