New MacBook

i think they're really bad. no real additions except gpu, but removal of adapters and the mousebutton (and higher price).

no innovations (except removals.. how innovative). i never liked the keyboard now it's on all their notebooks, i never liked the one-mouse-button now they have the zero-mouse-button. and never liked glossy now they only have glossy. oh, and i don't like the new glass over the full screen lid, like hp does, too, on the consumer notebooks.

over all, they're shiny and less useful than before. apple going more and more commercial.

the new ssd's in are nice, but they're not the only one having such (dell since a month or so has the same in some)..

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Original post by davepermen i think they're really bad. no real additions except gpu, but removal of adapters and the mousebutton (and higher price). no innovations (except removals.. how innovative). i never liked the keyboard now it's on all their notebooks, i never liked the one-mouse-button now they have the zero-mouse-button. and never liked glossy now they only have glossy. oh, and i don't like the new glass over the full screen lid, like hp does, too, on the consumer notebooks. over all, they're shiny and less useful than before. apple going more and more commercial. the new ssd's in are nice, but they're not the only one having such (dell since a month or so has the same in some)..

Yes, but it's made from a single piece of machined aluminum. Look at the pretty lights!

I like it. I think they're worthwhile upgrades, but I'm wondering how the 9400M/9600M switch on the Macbook Pro will affect application development. It seems that you can switch between cards in realtime, which I presume would make me have to go and detect the change, and then upload vertex buffers, textures, etc to the new GPU. I haven't seen a tech note covering it yet.

I'm gonna wait it out and see what happens before thinking about upgrading; I got somewhat burned on buying an original Week 26 Macbook Pro. A pity the Macbook only has integrated video, although the 9400M is leagues beyond the GMA X3100.

The easier hard-drive access in the Pro is also pretty nice. It's a bearcat to swap my internal drive at the moment.

so far you have to log off to switch (engaged.com) but even if not, it should be handled by the driver. opengl never looses resources, so it has to take care of it by itself (but the app should be aware of a sudden hard framedrop while switching).

anyways, I still see no reason for these. i've watched the talk right now, and it was really boring, spreading out those new features, countable on one hand, over half an hour or so. the only real addition is the gpu, but they're not first in this. the rest is about evolutionary step-ups, and feature removals.

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Original post by davepermen i think they're really bad. no real additions except gpu, but removal of adapters and the mousebutton (and higher price). no innovations (except removals.. how innovative). i never liked the keyboard now it's on all their notebooks, i never liked the one-mouse-button now they have the zero-mouse-button. and never liked glossy now they only have glossy. oh, and i don't like the new glass over the full screen lid, like hp does, too, on the consumer notebooks. over all, they're shiny and less useful than before. apple going more and more commercial. the new ssd's in are nice, but they're not the only one having such (dell since a month or so has the same in some)..

Having a laptop that looks nice and feels nice is just as important to me as having nice hardware inside. In fact, very few people buy laptops for their blazing performance, so I'd imagine that for many (probably most) consumers the look and feel will actually be a bigger factor than hardware.

Let me put it this way. If I had $1500 to spend on a laptop and had a choice of getting either an ugly, weak-feeling laptop with faster hardware or a pretty laptop that feels nice and is a pleasure to actually take around but has less powerful hardware, by all means I'd spend the money on the latter.

Now, just to be clear, I've never used one of the new Macbooks or even seen one except for images, so you shouldn't take what I just said as an advocacy of the new Macbooks specifically. As always, I will reserve judgment on the new Macbook until I actually get a chance to try one out. I was simply pointing out that Apple's focus on the design of the laptop itself and not on technological innovation makes perfect sense from a business standpoint. People like industrial design.

I might get one now. I've been waiting for the macbook to get backlit keys and dedicated GPU. I basically wanted a 13" Macbook Pro.

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Original post by tstrimp I might get one now. I've been waiting for the macbook to get backlit keys and dedicated GPU. I basically wanted a 13" Macbook Pro.

I want that as well, but the Macbook still doesn't have backlit keys or a dedicated GPU (the 9400M, while nice, is still integrated).

If Apple had brought out a worthwhile successor to my 12" Powerbook I'd be first in line for this revision.

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Original post by davepermen so far you have to log off to switch (engaged.com) but even if not, it should be handled by the driver. opengl never looses resources, so it has to take care of it by itself (but the app should be aware of a sudden hard framedrop while switching).

Good to know; saves me a bunch of work, so thanks.

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Original post by nilkn Let me put it this way. If I had $1500 to spend on a laptop and had a choice of getting either an ugly, weak-feeling laptop with faster hardware or a pretty laptop that feels nice and is a pleasure to actually take around but has less powerful hardware, by all means I'd spend the money on the latter.

Whats wrong with you?!
Maybe its just me, but i'd rather have a fast laptop than a pretty looking laptop that cost twice as much for twice as less hardware...

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Original post by Ravuya Quote: Original post by tstrimp I might get one now. I've been waiting for the macbook to get backlit keys and dedicated GPU. I basically wanted a 13" Macbook Pro. I want that as well, but the Macbook still doesn't have backlit keys or a dedicated GPU (the 9400M, while nice, is still integrated).

Actually the new $1600 MacBooks do have backlit keys. For some reason, the lower-end one doesn't include that (as if those little lights cost that much). But you are correct about the GPU.

In regards to the no mouse button, I was initially upset as well. But if you watch their full video they show someone clicking the pad. The entire pad actually is a button. It's not tap-to-click (like you can do on most laptop trackpads) but rather then entire pad seems to depress slightly when you want to use it like a button. I think it's really nice.

I'm also glad they moved all the ports and disc drive on the MacBook Pro. Nothing annoyed me more about my laptop than the fact that my disc drive is on the front. Then I have ports on both sides of the laptop. The new MacBook Pros have the disc drive on the right and all the ports on the left.

I also think it was a real good move to make the hard drive easily accessible (on both MacBooks and MacBook Pros) so people can more easily swap them out (in case of defective hard drives like one of my old PowerBooks or just for more size).

If I had more money, I would probably be getting the $1600 MacBook to replace my MacBook Pro. I don't really need the dedicated graphics and the smaller form factor (and likely less heat) would be greatly welcomed. Too bad I just bought this MBP a year ago and I don't have the money to justify buying a new laptop already.

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i think they're really bad. no real additions except gpu, but removal of adapters and the mousebutton (and higher price). no innovations (except removals.. how innovative). i never liked the keyboard now it's on all their notebooks, i never liked the one-mouse-button now they have the zero-mouse-button. and never liked glossy now they only have glossy. oh, and i don't like the new glass over the full screen lid, like hp does, too, on the consumer notebooks. over all, they're shiny and less useful than before. apple going more and more commercial. the new ssd's in are nice, but they're not the only one having such (dell since a month or so has the same in some) anyways, I still see no reason for these. i've watched the talk right now, and it was really boring, spreading out those new features, countable on one hand, over half an hour or so. the only real addition is the gpu, but they're not first in this. the rest is about evolutionary step-ups, and feature removals.

Well, you're just a ray of sunshine! :)

Seriously, I was pretty impressed. I'm not going to run out and buy one necessarily, but would be very interested to check out one of the models in the store. Anyway, I'm saving up for a Mac Pro for my studio.

Sorry, duplicate post.

[Edited by - nsmadsen on October 15, 2008 7:18:26 PM]

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Original post by Jarrod1937 Quote: Original post by nilkn Let me put it this way. If I had $1500 to spend on a laptop and had a choice of getting either an ugly, weak-feeling laptop with faster hardware or a pretty laptop that feels nice and is a pleasure to actually take around but has less powerful hardware, by all means I'd spend the money on the latter. Whats wrong with you?! Maybe its just me, but i'd rather have a fast laptop than a pretty looking laptop that cost twice as much for twice as less hardware...

I certainly understand what you mean, but at some point more powerful hardware becomes superfluous with respect to the task you actually are buying it for. I wouldn't buy a laptop for gaming or advanced graphics development because I wouldn't use a laptop for either of those features (unless it's a rare circumstance where a larger, less portable desktop computer is not an option).

So spending money on those features would be a waste. The hardware in the new Macbooks is more than sufficient for everything I'd ordinarily use a laptop for. If I was already going to spend some extra money on the laptop, I'd rather spend it on something that will increase the quality of my experience using the laptop rather than on extra-powered hardware that I don't need.

Now, in reality I probably wouldn't have extra money to spend on a laptop either way, so this would be a non-issue. [smile]

If we were talking about desktops, then the situation would be completely reversed. If I had extra money to spend, I'd spend it on better hardware at the cost of an uglier case or lower quality peripherals, for example.

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Original post by Ravuya I want that as well, but the Macbook still doesn't have backlit keys or a dedicated GPU (the 9400M, while nice, is still integrated).

You're right about the GPU, it's still a far cry from the integrated video cards on laptops I've had to deal with in the past. Intel GMA anyone? That's a pretty slick move to remove the backlit keyboard from the lower end model. I would have completely missed that and been quite disappointed.

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Original post by nsmadsen Well, you're just a ray of sunshine! :) Seriously, I was pretty impressed. I'm not going to run out and buy one necessarily, but would be very interested to check out one of the models in the store. Anyway, I'm saving up for a Mac Pro for my studio.

heh:) *sunshine*. well, what are you impressed with, desprite look?

and the mac pro (not the notebook) was always a great desktop, great to work with (great to open and work with the hardware, too. something apple often forgets in mobile devices (no battery access on iphone, no ram access on the new macbooks)).

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Original post by nilkn Let me put it this way. If I had $1500 to spend on a laptop and had a choice of getting either an ugly, weak-feeling laptop with faster hardware or a pretty laptop that feels nice and is a pleasure to actually take around but has less powerful hardware, by all means I'd spend the money on the latter.

there are a lot of great looking notebooks from other vendors, with great hardware. take my hp 2710p, it's gorgeous (to quote steve jobs).

the point I try to make, is, they only fixed their work on the design this time, but they actually failed that. the black bordered screen with the glass in front is a huge design failure imho. having seen that on the new hp consumer notebooks in real live, i can say it looks ugly in reality, and the shiny screens are terrible to use.

I'll try to check out the new mac ones as soon as possible in reallive to see if they're better in those respects (but i doubt it from what i've seen. even in the ads the screen looks terrible mirroring).

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Original post by nilkn So spending money on those features would be a waste. The hardware in the new Macbooks is more than sufficient for everything I'd ordinarily use a laptop for.

they are not sufficient for me. performance is great, but features are not. espencially connectors lack. I don't want to take a lot of extra-cable-adaptors with me just to connect some ordinary non-apple device. this is a HUGE minus. if you pay more, you want more. so my base is a cheap good ordinary notebook, and then go upwards. if you take an ordinary notebook, then the macbooks are downward in connectors, and features (like all my hp notebooks allow for two batteries at the same time, for portability up to 24h in one of their newest ones).

oh, and if you want to spend money on a new notebook right now, better get a very fast ssd to put in. it's cheaper than a new notebook, and your notebook will be faster than any new notebook (except one with the same ssd, but it'll be much more expensive than just the ssd :)). so, instead of buying a new notebook, get the intel ssd. you'll love your old "ugly" notebook then :)

i'm currently booting vista in 40seconds compared to up to 5 minutes before. and that's an "ordinary" ssd. my notebook beats my quadcore at home in most use cases.

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Original post by davepermen the black bordered screen with the glass in front is a huge design failure imho. having seen that on the new hp consumer notebooks in real live, i can say it looks ugly in reality, and the shiny screens are terrible to use.

That's subjective. I have owned 3 laptops. My first was an Asus G1 with a gorgeous glossy screen and it looked amazing. Then I got a toshiba convertible that had a matte screen. It looked absolutely terrible and wasn't any more usable compared to the Asus. I now have a Sony Vaio SZ780 which also has a beautiful glossy screen. They are much more vibrant then the matte screens and I have never had a problem with glare.

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i'm currently booting vista in 40seconds compared to up to 5 minutes before. and that's an "ordinary" ssd. my notebook beats my quadcore at home in most use cases.

What the hell were you using that took five minutes to boot? No modern laptop hard drive will take anything close to that long. I can boot my Vaio in under a minute and it is a 5400 RPM drive.

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Original post by davepermen there are a lot of great looking notebooks from other vendors, with great hardware. take my hp 2710p, it's gorgeous (to quote steve jobs).

Like I said, I wasn't actually arguing for the new Macbooks. I'll refrain from a judgment until I see one in person. I was just making the point that I think Apple's investment in the aesthetics of their Macbook line as opposed to hardware innovation is a worthwhile pursuit.

I'd like to mention that Vista's boot times are not really going to be improved by faster drives. Vista's startup routines and precaching (superfetch) are the main bulk of the startup time. I have a raid 10 made up of 4 10,000 rpm Raptor X's and i still get a boot time of 34-40 seconds or so (haven't actually timed it with a watch ;-)

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Original post by davepermen espencially connectors lack. I don't want to take a lot of extra-cable-adaptors with me just to connect some ordinary non-apple device.

Are you referring to the new display port or do you mean like USB peripherals? It has two USB 2 ports on it (along with the Firewire 800).

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if you take an ordinary notebook, then the macbooks are downward in connectors, and features (like all my hp notebooks allow for two batteries at the same time, for portability up to 24h in one of their newest ones).

While that is a good feature for some, I'd guess most people don't want multiple batteries. Most laptop users probably would prefer the lighter weight of a single battery knowing that electrical outlets aren't a rare commodity. You have them at work, at home, in hotels, in coffee shops, and you can even buy converter boxes to put in your car that feed on the power outlets there to charge your laptop.

It's all opinion, of course, and you're entitled to want multiple batteries. I'm just saying that just because it works for some people and some companies, doesn't mean it's an objectively superior feature. I only have a laptop (no desktop at all) and I would never get a second battery. So I do prefer the lighter, thinner style Apple can get by only supporting a single battery.

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Original post by tstrimp That's subjective. I have owned 3 laptops. My first was an Asus G1 with a gorgeous glossy screen and it looked amazing. Then I got a toshiba convertible that had a matte screen. It looked absolutely terrible and wasn't any more usable compared to the Asus. I now have a Sony Vaio SZ780 which also has a beautiful glossy screen. They are much more vibrant then the matte screens and I have never had a problem with glare.

I tend to agree that it's a thing of getting used to. I used to have notebooks with matte screens for years, and preemptively hated all glossy screens. Now I recently got an Asus G71V, which came with a glossy screen. I first hated it. A few days later, I hated it not that passionately anymore. After a week or so, I didn't even notice it anymore.

However glare can be a problem if you work in places with lots of high contrast light all around (airports are notorious). And finger prints are really visible on glossy screens...