I just got my first MacBook to replace my old broken Dell laptop. I noticed it came with this nifty program called GarageBand. I would like to try recording some of my guitar music with it. I would have liked to plug my guitar straight into the laptop, or else plug a microphone into it and put the mic in front of my amps like I did on my old laptop, but this laptop doesn't seem to have any jacks or ports for that sort of thing. There is the magnetic thing for the power cord, USB ports, thunderbolt ports, a headphone jack, HDMI port, and some slit that I have no idea what it is.

Are there any adapters out there that would allow me to plug my guitar or microphone into the laptop through one of these jacks/ports?

Also I'm looking for free tab/playback software that can open Guitar Pro ver 4 files.

You're gonna want to get an audio interface. While there are adapters that can get you from A to B pretty cheap, they'll also sound like shit, and you'll eventually find yourself getting an interface anyway. Here's a cheap and very solid one:

http://www.guitarcenter.com/Focusrite-S ... 3847819.gc

As far as tab software that can open GP files, Tuxguitar is your best bet.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/tuxguitar/

EDIT: Fixed the interface link to the one I was actually looking for.

Yeah, guitars and real mics aren't meant to go into computers dude. You need a pre-amp.

Thanks for the help, guys!

1. Buy an interface (Presonus, Focusrite, etc. and be sure to check that it has a hi-z input!)
2. Buy reaper it is only 60 USD if I remember right. (Don't buy logic or any other daw. People often get horny because of the vsti and the amount of plugins and so on when buying software. You will never use them anyway!)
3. Download free guitar plugins. (lepou, tse, etc)

One of the advantages of using reaper is that you can use both AU and VST. The other advantage is that it is a cross-platform software which means that you can save a project in osx and another person can open it in a win pc (works great for inline collaboration!)

Not to hijack the thread, but I'm about to get a MacBook too and wondered about Garageband. I currently have an Alesis SR-16 for drums, does GarageBand have the ability to write drumtracks in it, thus making my Alesis unnecessary?

Yes, but they don't sound as good as addictive drums or ezdrummer.