Want To Know About the New Apple MacBook Pro?

An anonymous reader writes to tell us about an extremely helpful user who is answering questions from all comers about the new MacBook Pro. "A few days ago, a user by the name 'bcavanau' posted on the macrumors.com forums that he had just picked up a new MacBook Pro. Forum members started asking him about features, specifications, and benchmarks. He was happy to oblige, posting responses to everyone's questions. Eventually the forum thread got out of hand, and he set up a website devoted to answering the questions. If you have a question that hasn't already been answered, email him at the address on the site. He is responding daily and sometimes within minutes. This guy is dedicated. Thanks 'bcavanau', you get two thumbs up." The link to the site is cached via the Coral Content Distribution Network.

Comments

Heat/Noise?

[MBCook]

Can anyone get through to find out about heat/noise? Even the cache is down for me. I've got a Powerbook G4 (when they just added the sudden motion sensor) and while I like the laptop I would LOVE to be able to play recent games (as well as have the second core) but I'm a bit worried about the heat and noise of the new MacBook Pros. One of my favorite things about my G4 is that it stays relativly cool unless I'm really pushing it, and unless I have it's about dead silent. Even when the fans are on full (like during a 3D game) it's still rather quiet compared to the leaf-blowers that many laptops turn into.

So how is the situation with the Core 2 Duo MacBook Pros? Is it the same as the Core Duos, or is it better/worse?

I intend to upgrade, it would take quite a bit to stop me. That said, my laptop still works so I plan on holding out until Leopard comes out. I'm hoping there is another revision by then (just for the speed bump or price drop), but if not I'll still get Leopard free (since it will come preinstalled).

Re:Heat/Noise?

[ThousandStars]

Long story short is that the guy says the noise isn't a problem -- it sounds nearly silent -- and he doesn't have any comparisons heat-wise.

Re:Heat/Noise?

[flight_master]

Hi,

I have one of the new Macbook Pros. They are silent, and generally stay pretty cool. I've had it get a bit 'warm' to the touch, but that's about it, and only after playing BzFlag for about an hour, with it on a soft surface...

Re:Heat/Noise?

[jellomizer]

If you want to know more about the Mac Book Pros I would suggest that you wait until people the Apple Stores have them stocked and Crazy people who bought them Tuesday (Like me) get them in. Expect mid November. For data to come out with different configurations.

Re:Heat/Noise?

[grammar fascist]

I've had it get a bit 'warm' to the touch, but that's about it, and only after playing BzFlag for about an hour, with it on a soft surface...

The big question is, after it got "warm" on that "soft surface," are you still fertile?

Re:Heat/Noise?

[Ethan Allison]

CPU 51C/124F. Hard disk 38C/100F.

Re:Heat/Noise?

[Magic5Ball]

Heat and noise are only problems if you actually use the MBP to its full capabilities ( >50% CPU usage on each core). Doing anything meaningful in CS2 or Parallels will turn the fans up to full speed in approximately 30 seconds, at which point they become noticable. Although the fans have become better tuned (willing to go up to 3,000 rpm more easily) in recent iterations, smcFanControl is still your friend if you actually want to use the MBP on your lap.

Re:Heat/Noise?

[BeeBeard]

He would have more control over the noise and heat levels than he realizes. The motherboard in that laptop is probably not all that esoteric and you can download software that will control the speed of the fan to give you more noise & less heat or less noise & more heat, depending on your needs.

Re:Heat/Noise?

[Bing Tsher E]

Our newest kitten is completely white, male, and stone deaf. Not an uncommon thing in male white cats.

A noisy MacBook wouldn't be a problem for him, either.

Re:Heat/Noise?

[flight_master]

By soft surface, I meant my dormroom bed ;)

As an attorney...

[Anonymous Coward]

for one of the aggrieved parties, let me just say that Corel Cache is nothing short of the Denial of Service attack. I hope they are taken down. When is /. going to learn that you can't flood sites, steal music, or copy DVDs without repercussion?

Re:As an attorney...

[koreth]

Wow, I'm glad my attorney isn't such a moron. The point of the Coral Cache (you know, with an "a" in the first word -- maybe you should learn its name if you're involved in litigation over it) is to avoid flooding sites with requests. By, you know, caching their contents. Just like the name says.

WUXGA

[crazyjeremy]

Can the 15.4 inch version have a WUXGA screen?

Re:WUXGA

[p0tat03]

Short answer: No. Only the 17" model has WUXGA resolution.

Re:WUXGA

[MioTheGreat]

It's really a shame. WUXGA is beautiful on a 15.4" screen. (I have a HP nw8440 with a 15.4" screen and WUXGA.)

Re:WUXGA

[Anonymous Coward]

no, apple knows what resolution you want better than you do, and you don't want WUXGA on a 15"

Re:WUXGA

[jellomizer]

It is not that. It is an issue of balancing usefulness and price. Apple never gives their customers to many options with perhaps the exception on the MacPros. First and primarily is because they can control their inventory and prices better with out a entire line of people making custom Systems. Thats Dells way not Apples. Now that Apple has this limitation they make the best of it by trying to balance what their customers want and need and afford. For Screens apple likes to stay in a range for DPI so things are not Huge on one computer or Tiny on an other computer. Putting WUXGA on a 15" Powerbook err umm.MacBook Pro can be to small for bulk of their users, As well make it to expensive. It is not about assuming that the people are dumb it is about making a product that appeals to the greatest possible population. The lower non-bleading edge display could save on cost of the system to avoid the MacBook Pros going into the $6000 range (Like the Maxed out Dells), as well there is the R&D time and release. Apple has never really been at the bleeding edge in technology they tend to use Leading edge technology that has proven itself. And if they use Bleading Edge stuff they tend not to advertise it much. Like the 802.11n which hasn't been standardized yet. While Dell Posts it like a badge of honor. Apples quality lies in supporting and using trusted technology. If you want the newest and best get a Dell. But if you want Newish and Tested put together right then go with apple.

Re:WUXGA

[Anonymous Coward]

My 2GB Dell D820 with WUXGA was under $1800 with Dock and MS Office. Its not maxed out, but its pretty potent. Where did you get $6,000 from?

Re:WUXGA

[Gentlewhisper]

My 2GB Dell D820 with WUXGA was under $1800 with Dock and MS Office. Its not maxed out, but its pretty potent. Where did you get $6,000 from?

The 200% "Apple tax"

Re:WUXGA

[swimmar132]

Agreed. 1680x1050 is great on a 15.4" screen.

The next OS X is supposed to be resolution independent. Perhaps they'll upgrade the resolution on their laptops then.

Ubuntu on a Dell E1505 is a great combination, btw.

Re:WUXGA

[MioTheGreat]

WUXGA is 1920x1200. ;) Trust me, It sounds like everything would be impossible to read, but after half an hour of using it, you think every monitor in existence without such a high density absolutely blows.

Re:WUXGA

[shmlco]

I expect most of your screen rationalization logic will be invalidated once Leopard ships with resolution-independent interface elements, at which point higher DPI screens will allow for crisper graphics and more readable fonts.

Re:WUXGA

[p0tat03]

I thought OSX is already resolution independent? My coworker runs OSX on a gorgeous 24" Dell LCD.

Re:WUXGA

[iljitschvanbeijnum]

"Resolution independent" means that the absolute size of stuff on the screen, such as text, GUI elelements and so on, is independent of the resolution of the screen. So if you have a CRT, and you change the screen mode from, say, 1280x960 to 1600x1200, everything looks the same except that (especially) text is now sharper. The same size letter is now drawn using a larger number of smaller pixels, just like printing at 600 DPI vs 300 DPI. RI allows two very useful things: you can increase display resolution without automatically shrinking everything that's on the screen, and you can make everything look larger on screen without artificially lowering your screen resolution, so that text and other stuff stays sharp. It is of course also possible to zoom out so that everything gets smaller and you can fit more stuff on the same screen. Apple has said they are going to support RI in the upcoming Leopard OS release, but it's unclear how they are going to expose this functionality to the user. Ideally, it will be possible to adjust the zoom factor on a per-application basis so that it's finally possible to compensate for the strange preference for ridiculously small text that is so prevalent among web designers without breaking the intended layour of websites, as the text zoom available in current browsers does.

Re:WUXGA

[jellomizer]

Well there is still Cost issue. But yes IF that feature is in the Next OS then having higher resolution will always be better. But that is not expected until Spring of 2007.

Re:WUXGA

[jellomizer]

Does your system Match all the Specs? Is is 1" thick, does it have wireless, does it use a Core 2 Duo processor... I am not saying all the things in the Apple Specs are important to you but they are part of the price. The $6000 is the Maxed out system. With 4 GB RAM, the Max of everything internal in the system. (Not adding in junk like external speaker, external hubs, Software, Warrantee etc...)

I am sure anyone can find a system that cost less then an apple especially if there are one 1 or 2 features that you need. Need RAM but not CPU you save a ton by getting a crappy Celeron. Or if Raw CPU speed is important then you can get slower or less memory.

Re:WUXGA

[Bing Tsher E]

So you're saying that with a 'Resolution Independent' display, that wide shiney brushed aluminum frame when I play a quicktime video will hog the same amount of screen no matter what resolution my display is set to?

Viva la Apple UI Wizards!

Re:WUXGA

[ArbitraryConstant]

I dunno, I think I might be willing to part with the camera that is banned on several customer's sites.

Also, I don't care if it's 1" thick, particularly if it's going to cause problems with cooling. That is something I can do without.

Re:WUXGA

[Anonymous Coward]

Take your stupid fucking initialism and stick up your well explored arse.

Re:WUXGA

[shmlco]

"But yes IF that feature is in the Next OS then having higher resolution will always be better."

It's been confirmed/a>.

Re:WUXGA

[virtual_mps]

Am I the only one who wishes vendors would just use unambiguous numbers instead of obfuscating their specs with weird acronyms? I'd much rather compare a 1440×900 to a 1600×1024 than a WSXGA to a WSXGA (yes, the vendors aren't so helpful as to use consistent nomenclature). Quick, which is better: QUXGA or WSXGA+? I can't even read video display ads anymore without a secret decoder ring handy.

Re:WUXGA

[dfghjk]

No, neither of the MBP screens is WUXGA. WUXGA is 1920x1200 and Apple doesn't offer that.

Re:WUXGA

[dfghjk]

The cost difference to the end customer between a Dell 15.4" with the lowest resolution (lower than the MBP) and Dell's WUXGA is $149 so your entire argument about cost is bullshit. You've offered no justifcations for your claims about what customers want and R&D time, and most would disagree with your assertion that "Apple has never really been at the bleeding edge in technology they tend to use Leading edge technology that has proven itself." Most would say that more about Dell that Apple. Pitiful really.

http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx ?c=us&cs=04&kc=6W300&l=en&oc=d820sapp&s=bsd

Fact is that Apple has consistently missed the boat on notebook screen resolutions. They want everything to be the same physical size on any display they offer even though that concept is misguided.

Can someone help me?

[Salvance]

I'm not a regular Mac user, so I don't really understand the significance of this news story. Is publishing a few specs really news? I'd expect this on a Computer site like Tom's Hardware, but not on slashdot, so I'm wondering if there is some unstated greater significance.

From what I can find, this C2D is a laptop that Apple Stores started selling over the past couple days. If it's already out, what will it provide me that other Mac's won't?

Thanks!

Re:Can someone help me?

[MBCook]

While they were put up for order on Tuesday, they haven't hit the street yet (as far as I know). You can't go buy them in stores right now (unless someone knows otherwise). So basically this person got their hands on the laptop early.

So why all the fuss? First, this is a Core 2 Duo so it is supposed to have better performance than the Core Duo models that were replaces (and it is supposed to run circles around my little Powerbook G4). But more importantly while the MacBook Pros were nice computers, there were quite a few complaints about the amount of heat they generate, noises (from the speaker/screen/who-knows). A lot of people (myself included) want to know if the laptops run as hot as the MacBook Pros did.

To the Mac community this is a bit like someone getting their hands on a Zune and answering people's questions when there is no information about the Zune but specs out there (which I realize is not quite the case, but it's an example).

Re:Can someone help me?

[Tibor the Hun]

Sure,
It's nice to know that they still use the firmware heavily restricted optical drives. (For those of us who are regular Mac users, and still want to regularly watch multiregion DVDs.)

Re:Can someone help me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't you understand? This is Apple! That makes it newsworthy. forget the fact that i'm already using a laptop with the same basic configuration in hardware... it has an HP logo on it and that makes all the difference in the world.

My god, you think by now you'd understand that this is fanboydot. they'll cover any little thing about linux or apple but anything outside of that is too mainstream and thus is for nothing but stuff suits and joe sixpack. we like the kool aid here, a lot.

get with it or be modded down "overrated" because most of those who still get mod points (ie. who've done the slashdot goose step) use this convenient little loophole in the moderators system even though CmdrDildo claims that he's working on getting this coded out... for the last three years.

It's the land of crap and hypocrisy.

Re:Can someone help me?

[Rascasse]

I was just at one of the Apple Stores in Toronto and they had all 15" Core 2 Duo models in stock ready to sell. Only the 17" model was out-of-stock. They did not have the new models on display though.

Re:Can someone help me?

[jellomizer]

I think the significance is that this version of the MacBook Pro could be considered the Gen 2 (Or Gen 1.2) MacBook Pro and people want to know if enough has changed to make it considered a Gen 2 or 1.2 or just a 1.1. Apple likes to brag and use best case results while real world is normally a bit different. So the site was mostly seeing if apple fixed the old problems.

Re:Can someone help me?

[slashddot]

Not so. They were available in the San Francisco Stonestown store as early as Thursday but ran out quickly. I picked mine up in Burlingame on Friday, the same day that store got their first shipment.

Re:Can someone help me?

[thedbp]

Go to the Apple Stores. They are there, ready for purchase, and absolutely smokin'. You wouldn't believe what kind of performance GarageBand has on these things. Haven't tried Logic, as I'm not that advanced musically, but I must say this:

The new Mac laptops are the best thing to happen to musicians since Tascam released the PortaStudio. Period. What other laptop comes pre-installed w/ multitrack audio recording software with built in amp modeling, software instruments, a huge loop library, and optical audio in and out through either FireWire or TOSlink?

Mobile muscians especially should be creaming their jeans over this. Just make sure you get a rugged case. Remember folks, the laws of physics still apply, and metal does dent.

Re:Can someone help me?

[drsmithy]

It's nice to know that they still use the firmware heavily restricted optical drives. (For those of us who are regular Mac users, and still want to regularly watch multiregion DVDs.)

I've always wondered if, in countries where region-coding is considered anti-competitive (eg: Australia), you can use uo your 5 region changes and then legitimately return the laptop as "broken"...

Re:Can someone help me?

[Bob Hearn]

As others have remarked, many stores either have or have had them in. However, AFAIK, they are all the "standard" configurations with the 120GB hard drive -- to get the 160 or the 200, I believe you have to order online.

Does anyone know different?

Re:Can someone help me?

[Bing Tsher E]

I don't really understand the significance of this news story.

It's important to any of the, er, 'consumers' who pre-ordered one without seeing anything at all physical to show them what they would be getting. Apparently there are enough said 'consumers' here on Slashdot (or one or two editors, or Apple Banner Revenue to harvest) to evoke that level of interest.

I know that if *I* pre-ordered a piece of expensive hardware without much info at all what it was going to be when it arrived, I would be anxious, too. Unless I was a moonie and it was some cherished relic from Sun Myung Moon or something.... Then I'd KNOW I had made the right choice by ordering it blindly.

Re:Can someone help me?

[Bing Tsher E]

and absolutely smokin'.

It's my understanding that you have to wedge a toothpick into the fan grille to get that 'level of performance.' Plus you have to wait several minutes.

Re:Can someone help me?

[Bing Tsher E]

Sure, but Apple will 'exchange' your laptop for one they have 'reconditioned' that has some hip-hop artist's name etched in the cover. And you'll get five more region changes.

Re:Can someone help me?

[Anonymous Coward]

no, i believe that is correct. we picked one up in portland yesterday and were told that the only model available was the baseline 15", matte screen - which was precisely the one we wanted anyway (save for wishing to upgrade the ram). there was some confusion at the checkout, as they'd initially brought us out the "old" version - the core duo 15". the price on that is a lot lower ($1500 with educational discount). when we re-read the receipt and saw the unexpectedly low price, we were half tempted to cut-and-run, until we noticed it was the wrong damn computer. sigh.

Re:Can someone help me?

[LadyLucky]

In New Zealand, all DVD players are region free. Normally the importer will flick whatever firmware switch is required to make them region free. You can't sell them if they are region locked.

Re:Can someone help me?

[mythz]

Because it is a story on Apple and /. is a closet Apple cult!

Re:Can someone help me?

[ykiwi]

tell that to my region locked mbp.....

Re:Can someone help me?

[2ms]

The unstated greater significance is that it is far and away the most lusted after laptop available period. The titanium and aluminum Apple notebooks have, for years, been the standard by which all other notebooks are compared in just about every category except performance. However, apparently, now that they have the fastest processor available on any laptop (Intel Merom C2D) and a bunch of other nice power items inside, in combination with the fact that they also run Windows these days, makes this possibly the most widely appealing Mac laptop yet.

Why?

[nat1192]

Apple needs to leave the software business at least where OSes are concerned. Now their hardware is a different story. Linux on a Mac is a nice and fun experience and now they have intels so it makes some things alot easier.

Re:Why?

[Simon Garlick]

Are you on crack? OS X is the best UNIX I've ever used.

Re:Why?

[nat1192]

No to your first question. Anyway I am a Linux evangelist so what do you expect from me? I'm only a carbon-based lifeform who hates Mac OS* and Windows(even though I am forced to use it). Oh crap: I'm going to be attacked by Mac OS and Windows fanatics. Please, don't hurt me!!! *Crys for an hour, dumps a gallon of Self-Esteem on himself, and goes to watch Doctor Phil*

Re:Why?

[p0tat03]

Agreed. Right now I'm listening to online radio with iTunes, fiddling with some build errors in XCode, toying around in the shell ftp'ing a file that a build script failed to fetch, sharing a file with my roommate (who runs Windows) across the LAN using HTTP (as opposed to SMB), and looking at my Monday appointments in iCal. All of this functionality out of the box - it is bar none the best 'nix I've ever used (and continue to use).

Re:Why?

[Ant P.]

I think you're full of shit, and for the record I use neither MacOS nor Windows.

Re:Why?

[SpacePirate20X6]

Clearly you've never used any of Apple's applications. The applications included in Mac OS X, iLife, and iWork are simply amazing, intuitive pieces of software... This MacBook Pro wouldn't be the same if I were just running Windows.

~ SP

Re:Why?

[nat1192]

No I'm not I just went to the bathroom 5 minutes ago.

Re:Why?

[thelost]

That's the most amusing comment I've seen on slashdot in a long time - someone please mod this guy up +1 funny. I think you are the only person who has ever said Apple should stop writing software not making hardware. Needless to say I wholeheartedly support Apple making more versions of Mac OS X which is a wonderful operating system.

Re:Why?

[Frumious Wombat]

Oh, but you're so close to the edge... Give in, feel the evangalism, follow the One True Path. In your heart of hearts, you know that Linux is only a transient state, a ripple in the pool of computing, before the Hurd blossoms forth in all its glory. It is time. Give up Evangalism, and become a Prophet of Hurd!

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Eh iDVD does make it easy, but the menu creation system is crap, or at least i think it is. Can't move menus from one branch to another, you basically have to remake the entire menu.

Re:Why?

[Overly Critical Guy]

...and in the last Apple article, there were people claiming Apple needed to leave the hardware business and stick to software. Poor Apple. I'm sure a tear falls from Steve Jobs' cheek over the fact he can't please both sides as he signs another record earnings statement.

Re:Why?

[Inoshiro]

"Are you on crack? OS X is the best UNIX I've ever used."

Yea, it's wicked, except for the MM performance, VFS performance, POSIX ommisions (RT scheduling requires MACH proprietary APIs!), and fact that on my Core Duo I can freeze the UI when doing an import in iPhoto from a USB card reader.

It's a dual-core CPU, why should the VFS lock up both CPUs?

If I could run the Linux kernel with the MacOS X userland, I'd be happy.

Re:Why?

[Cylix]

I can hear a WoW troll shouting -- "For The Hurd!"

Re:Why?

[ThousandStars]

OS X is the best UNIX I've ever used.

Best for what? If OS X is the best UNIX you've ever used for, say, database hosting, then it's probably the only UNIX you've ever used.

Re:Why?

[PygmySurfer]

Well, I hate Linux, so I'd much prefer Apple stay in the software AND hardware business... I just wish they'd hurry up and ship my goddamn Core 2 Duo Mac Pro :)

Re:Why?

[IntergalacticWalrus]

Agreed. Right now I'm listening to online radio with iTunes, fiddling with some build errors in XCode, toying around in the shell ftp'ing a file that a build script failed to fetch, sharing a file with my roommate (who runs Windows) across the LAN using HTTP (as opposed to SMB), and looking at my Monday appointments in iCal. All of this functionality out of the box - it is bar none the best 'nix I've ever used (and continue to use).

OK, I'm probably going to get modded "troll" or "flamebait" for this but this is a legitimate question... Is this supposed to be funny or something? All of this functionality is also available out of the box on basically any Linux distribution (with differently named applications of course). If OS X is "the best 'nix [you]'ve ever used" then please tell us why, I'm still waiting for real reasons.

Re:Why?

[toadlife]

"Best for what?"

Perhaps this?

Re:Why?

[pyite]

If OS X is "the best 'nix [you]'ve ever used" then please tell us why, I'm still waiting for real reasons.

Okay, I'll bite.

1. Application Support

   Unfortunately for me, I tend to prefer Microsoft Office over OpenOffice. There's no Microsoft Office in Linux, FreeBSD, etc. In reality, this is a shame, because I spend most of my time using LaTeX and it stinks that when I do need an "office app" I have to resort to Microsoft Office since I consider it a better application. Also, there's no Photoshop for Linux, etc. Please don't say GIMP. I actually learned on GIMP and would much prefer to use it over Photoshop, but there's no true color calibration system for Linux. Aperture is also on OS X and I don't really have a desire to use anything else to manage photos.

2. User Interface

   I loathed the OS X interface when I first started using it. In fact, the day I got my PowerBook G4 (my first Mac, about 3.5 years ago), I spent all of 10 minutes in OS X. And I spend that time while I was figuring out how to install Debian on it. I ran Debian on my PowerBook for a year or more. I decided to try out OS X and haven't looked back. Well, I did for a bit, because the UI was a bit different to me. Since getting used to the UI, I would never like to go back to traditional UNIX desktops.

3. It just works.

   When I come from home from work and need to do something on my computer, I don't want to have to worry about it. I don't want to worry, for instance, if the new kernel I apt-geted broke my VMWare installation and now requires a module recompile. I don't have the time, nor the energy, to care anymore. OS X is for the practical inside of me. OS X is for the artist inside of me. OS X is for the lazy inside of me.

Re:Why?

[Billly Gates]

OSX is a great desktop operating system but a poor workstation compared to Linux. I summarized this on a post here.

Basically many opensource projects conflict and do not integrate with the praoprietary macosx counterparts. Its a bitch to upgrade things like samba and lpad. Ubuntu linux is great to upgrade and so are most debian based distro's and the BSD's. IT seems Apple wants you to upgrade and pay $$$ for the next version of OSX than allow you to upgrade the sytem yourself.

Re:Why?

[shwouchk]

I believe your parent wrote a so called joke. you should read about it :)

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

> I can hear a WoW troll shouting -- "For The Hurd!"

That's a rather disrespectful way to refer to RMS, isn't it? :-)

Re:Why?

[keitosama]

You're an evangelist, and yet use Windows? I sense a contradiction.

Re:Why?

[dfn_deux]

I've run both Linux and OS X on my beige box P4 desktop machine and the Darwin kernel seems much less responsive the the Linux kernel for everyday tasks AND the driver and open software availability are just crap compared to any modern Linux distro (or even cygwin on windows). Once *bsd or Linux has a good enough ABI to run the OS X window manager minus the Darwin kernel THEN Apple will have something really nice (for the users) on their hands. In the mean time I don't understand the "mac tax" mentality where you pay more for hardware and software; and that isn't an exaggeration, a quality mac usb keyboard with mechanical key switches costs between 90-150USD while the equivalent for PC can be hand for practically nothing. The same can be said for other trivial peripheral like mice, web cams, tv capture hardware etc... It is possible that someone out there has some great isight which shoots down my arguments, so by all means if I'm full of shit please provide me some solutions.

Re:Why?

[pyite]

the driver and open software availability are just crap compared to any modern Linux distro (or even cygwin on windows).
Drivers are in issue possibly for some exotic hardware, but overall I haven't had a problem. As for open source availability? This really confuses me. There's Fink and there's DarwinPorts. Both have a large collection of ports to OS X.

a quality mac usb keyboard with mechanical key switches costs between 90-150USD while the equivalent for PC can be hand for practically nothing
Huh? If it's USB, it's USB and it will work on a mac. If you're saying that you can get an old PS/2 mechanical keyboard and use it on your PC, well, fine. I personally can't fault Apple for not supporting an ancient technology. The problem is that pretty soon there will be no PCs with PS/2 anymore. Mice are the same.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, I've got a screenshot of this now just to prove it existed. A score:5 informative posting about the number 1 reason to use Unix based OS on Apple hardware is a Microsoft program. Elvis has left the building...

Re:Why?

[nine-times]

It just works.
When I come from home from work and need to do something on my computer, I don't want to have to worry about it. I don't want to worry, for instance, if the new kernel I apt-geted broke my VMWare installation and now requires a module recompile. I don't have the time, nor the energy, to care anymore. OS X is for the practical inside of me. OS X is for the artist inside of me. OS X is for the lazy inside of me.

I wanted to second this. It's not that I don't like Linux, but I work with a Linux guy, much smarter than me, who laughs at me for using OSX. But then, we find ourselves someplace with WPA on the WiFi connection, and he spends 20 minutes trying to connect before giving up. For me on my Macbook, it takes 20 seconds while I click a couple places and type a password. At some point or another, we need to use VPN, and it takes him a couple hours to get it running on this Linux machine. I just open up "Internet Connect", enter a few settings, and bingo!, I'm in. Still, he makes fun of me for having a 1-button mouse.

I don't doubt that there are advantages to Linux. I run Linux in various places, like it a lot for how I use it, and my coworker's setup is a hell of a lot slicker than any of my Linux machines. Still, I've never had to recompile the kernel on OSX in order to get my 3D capabilities working on my graphics card.

Re:Why?

[nine-times]

I've run both Linux and OS X on my beige box P4 desktop machine and the Darwin kernel seems much less responsive the the Linux kernel for everyday tasks AND the driver and open software availability are just crap compared to any modern Linux distro (or even cygwin on windows).

I'm not sure of the level of unresponsiveness you're experiencing or what the precise cause is. OSX is plenty fast for me, however, from what I understand, the Darwin kernel is slower than the Linux kernel in some ways due to the fact that it's a microkernel. I'm no expert here, but I'm told that micro kernels have some advantages, including security, and monolithic kernels have other advantages, including speed. It's a design decision and there are tradeoffs, but it doesn't seem to me that thing are sufficiently slowed for desktop purposes to complain.

But did you install Darwin or OSX? Was it the kernel that was slow or the system in general, or perhaps some specific application?

Re:Why?

[Angostura]

Out of the box - imovie, idvd, garageband, iphoto, itunes, iweb. The were the reasons that I switched to Mac about 3 years ago, combined with the fact that I wanted to tinker with Unix, but didn't want to *have* to learn the internals if I didn't want to.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

You Loonix fags are hopeless. You use a hobby OS and expect to be taken seriously. All the while you and your greasy, non-vagina-seeing neckbeard toad friends sit about drinking hard cider and talking about what a hard migration it is to Eft.

Fuck off, you fat hopeless loser. LOTD is dead, and it always will be.

Re:Why?

[IntergalacticWalrus]

Go read any Apple promotional pamphlet (including the "Switch" section of their official site, and also one of their first "I'm a PC. I'm a Mac" ads): Microsoft Office is always one of the first things they mention.

A Microsoft product is the only thing Apple has to show the general public that OS X is not a toy. It's pretty sad... If Microsoft ever kills their OS X version, they're fucking screwed.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, darwin is really just for OSX development. The driver support is intentionally bad. Open source software support I'll have to argue with. If you can't build something on darwin, report it to the maintainers. If its a good project like Perl, GNUstep, Etoile, etc. they will be more than happy to fix it. If its an issue with a bad project like GNU config*, they will tell you that you don't use linux and therefore deserve no support. It all depends on the developers. Linux zealots who refuse to support other platforms hurt their own platform. Vendor lock-in does not work in the OSS community very well. Most people put up with the headaches to avoid vendor lock-in. OpenBSD hates binary blobs because they introduce vendor lock-in.

*I'm referring to the config.sub and config.guess files included for configure scripts. The "developer" refuses to add new operating systems to the file based on his personal opinion. He also removes operating systems so the file is small, however, it supports many embedded variants of linux. Go figure.

Re:Why?

[Bing Tsher E]

Which 'UNIX' have you used? You've used Linux and once loaded SFU on Windows NT??

Re:Why?

[Bing Tsher E]

Unfortunately for me, I tend to prefer Microsoft Office over OpenOffice.
Agreed. Unfortunately for you.

but there's no true color calibration system for Linux

Whoops! There goes the 2% of the Photoshop userbase for which that matters.

I would never like to go back to traditional UNIX desktops.

You've never 'resided' on a traditional UNIX desktop. That would be MWM, or CDE. You mentioned 'Debian' which didn't even exist in the 'traditional UNIX' era.

I don't have the time, nor the energy, to care anymore. OS X is for the practical inside of me. OS X is for the artist inside of me. OS X is for the lazy inside of me.

Sounds like you're parroting Apple Marketing slogans, now.

Re:Why?

[Bing Tsher E]

There's also all the Adobe stuff.

If you want a fifteen second delay before it displays your PDF file, you want to use an Adobe viewer. The rest of us use xpdf.

Re:Why?

[Bing Tsher E]

combined with the fact that I wanted to tinker with Unix,

You read that phrase on a marketing brochure somewhere, correct?

Re:Why?

[pyite]

You've never 'resided' on a traditional UNIX desktop. That would be MWM, or CDE. You mentioned 'Debian' which didn't even exist in the 'traditional UNIX' era.

How the *heck* could you know what I've ever used? And yes, I *have* used CDE. And I have used MWM and associated LessTif niceties. Please, spare me the pedantry in analyzing my word choice. I think it was clear from context that I was referring to the thought of using non-OS X GUIs that happen to run on top of UNIX-like underpinnings.

Re:Why?

[fotbr]

Whoops! There goes the 2% of the Photoshop userbase for which that matters.

And this is exactly why some people hate linux, and the linux zealots. The linux community in general is helpful, but there's always a few that are willing to say "screw them, they don't really matter anyway".

Re:Why?

[trudyscousin]

"OS X is for the practical inside of me. OS X is for the artist inside of me. OS X is for the lazy inside of me."

Never mind that you have three fewer orifices available; what is for you?

(Seriously, I do agree with everything you've said, but you really should have framed that last statement a bit better!)

Re:Why?

[Angostura]

Go on. Educate me, you know you want to.

Re:Why?

[WhiteWolf666]

So the Apple Pro video apps, and the Adobe apps, are all crap?

Pfft.

Re:Why?

[skingers6894]

"If OS X is "the best 'nix [you]'ve ever used" then please tell us why, I'm still waiting for real reasons."

I'm sure many will bite here but it's pretty much pointless. As the arbiter of what are "real reasons" you will easily be able to dismiss any reason that may be "real" to them.

Re:Why?

[Achromatic1978]

Whoops! There goes the 2% of the Photoshop userbase for which that matters.

Haha. That number might be accurate if you count the userbase as including those who downloaded a warez version to edit their webcam shots.

But of the people who fork out $1,000+ for a legitimate copy of it? I can assure you far more than 2% are interested in calibration and ability to work with different profiles.

Re:Why?

[Macka]

*I'm referring to the config.sub and config.guess files included for configure scripts. The "developer" refuses to add new operating systems to the file based on his personal opinion. He also removes operating systems so the file is small, however, it supports many embedded variants of linux. Go figure.

Fortunately its OSS, so if his intransigence becomes enough of a headache for people, that developer will find his project conveniently forked, as happened to XFree86.

Re:Why?

[funkcicle]

OS X is for the practical inside of me. OS X is for the artist inside of me. OS X is for the lazy inside of me.

OS X is for the gay inside of you.

Hardware DRM

[Anonymous Coward]

Is Apple still including hardware DRM (AKA treacherous computing) in all its new Macs? If so, why would any self-respecting technically aware user buy a machine that has been so hobbled?

Re:Hardware DRM

[Anonymous Coward]

Is Apple still including hardware DRM (AKA treacherous computing) in all its new Macs? If so, why would any self-respecting technically aware user buy a machine that has been so hobbled?
perhaps because their implementation does not place any restrictions on the owner of the hardware? dont like osx? fine, install freebsd on it. nobody is stopping you. troll

Re:Hardware DRM

[Overly Critical Guy]

Mac OS X requires no serial number or activation. It's really quite nice. Compared to Vista and its high prices, draconian EULA, separate purchase required for 64-bit support, and bloated system requirements, Leopard makes Vista look amateur.

Re:Hardware DRM

[TFer_Atvar]

Bigger targets require more invasive security. It's why your average missile silo has better defenses than the police station down the street. There's a bigger "reward" for breaching the security, so although both do their jobs well, one simply requires more defenses because of its nature and its "importance." The same arguments can be made for Firefox/IE7 security. (Relative) anonymity is perhaps the most important layer of security.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Overly Critical Guy]

Actually, I suspect it's more to do with the fact that Apple makes most of its money on the hardware, so it can be more lax when it comes to OS X copyright protection because you've already paid them for the computer. OS X has at least 15% worldwide install base with 18 million users according to IDC, and Macs are highly prevalent in academic institutions (half of the machines sold at both Princeton and Harvard are Macs according to their campus stores), so it's not like there's no juicy target.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Zantetsuken]

wouldn't that "no activation, etc" be because of the hardware drm (tpm if I remember right?) that keeps you from running OS-X on non-apple hardware. thus if you are running OS-X it's because you had to pay for the hardware, with which the os is bundled.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Anonymous Coward]

And that's why all Hondas ship with a super high-tech security system called a "key."

Re:Hardware DRM

[javacowboy]

"Hobbled"? It's obvious you're talking out of your ass.

Do you have any evidence that Apple is using TPM to restrict your rights on new Intel Macs? No, of course you don't.

I own an Intel Mac and it doesn't prevent me from doing any of the things I was doing before.

Maybe, just maybe, Apple adopted the TPM module because they want to prevent people from running OS X on commodity hardware. That was the override and exclusive motivation behind the move. Unless you have strong evidence to the contrary, I'll continue to believe that's the true nature of Apple's motivation.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Sancho]

The machine doesn't seem to be hobbled. The OS won't run on non-Mac hardware, but you can run just about any modern x86 OS on the Macs.

Besides, TPM itself isn't evil; it's only a tool. It can be used for good or evil, just like a hammer, debugger, or decss.

Re:Hardware DRM

[IntergalacticWalrus]

Besides, TPM itself isn't evil; it's only a tool. It can be used for good or evil, just like a hammer, debugger, or decss.

But unlike a hammer, a debugger, or DeCSS, TPM cannot be used for good. At all. So yes, it really is evil.

Re:Hardware DRM

[TFer_Atvar]

I won't argue that they're prevalent in academic environments... I'm here at Virginia Tech, home of the big Apple supercomputer, and they're pretty ubiquitous here as well. But you're talking almost two orders of magnitude different in terms of numbers.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Sancho]

Simply untrue.

TPM can be used as a way to sign binaries from the bootloader all the way through the OS and its libraries. You can, in theory, guarantee that your OS has not been compromised. This can even be done with Linux, though it would make replacing binaries a little more difficult. The tradeoff in security may be worth it to some people.

So yes, TPM can be used for good. You're just assuming that only closed-source vendors would ever possibly use it. Google for Bruce Potter and TPM--he opened my eyes at Defcon on this particular subject.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Anonymous Coward]

Compared to Vista and its high prices, draconian EULA, separate purchase required for 64-bit support...

Why do Mac fanbois keep spreading this Vista FUD about "seperate purchase required for 64-bit support." It's been said again and again that 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Vista will be in the same box, no seperate purchase required. 32-bit or 64-bit will be an installation option, not a purchase option. Get it?

If you think this would be so bad, why don't you mention the fact that the new MacBook Pro has a 32-bit version of OS X installed and a seperate version (Leapord) needs to be bought to have 64-bit OS X?

Re:Hardware DRM

[drsmithy]

Mac OS X requires no serial number or activation.

That's because you need a hardware dongle from Apple to run it.

It's really quite nice. Compared to Vista and its high prices, draconian EULA, separate purchase required for 64-bit support, and bloated system requirements, Leopard makes Vista look amateur.

FUD.

Re:Hardware DRM

[drsmithy]

Maybe, just maybe, Apple adopted the TPM module because they want to prevent people from running OS X on commodity hardware. That was the override and exclusive motivation behind the move.

Many would argue that *is* restricting their rights.

For example, I have an unused copy of OS X for Intel here. Why shouldn't I be allowed to (try) and run it on any computer I want ?

Re:Hardware DRM

[jcr]

For example, I have an unused copy of OS X for Intel here. Why shouldn't I be allowed to (try) and run it on any computer I want ?

Because it wasn't sold to you on those terms, troll.

-jcr

Re:Hardware DRM

[Rix]

By reading this comment, you agree to send me $5 every week.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Anonymous Coward]

Besides, TPM itself isn't evil; it's only a tool.

The TPM in an Apple is designed to work in secret. It is designed to work AGAINST the owner of the machine -- you know, the person who paid for it. Throw out all the spurious examples (hammers, screwdrivers, toothpicks) you like... but it doesn't change the fact that Apple includes hardware that is designed to enforce ITS view of what your computer should be able to do... and force the user to trust only Apple, and anyone that Apple says is trustworthy (with no choice about breaking that trust).

Apple sold you a jail cell... put you in it, and kept the key. What's more, with a simple software update (automatically, since you have no choice about these things thanks to the TPM) they can change the rules any time they like.

But hey, Apple fans are self-selected as a bunch of submisives.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Richard_at_work]

I can use TPM to protect my own data. Hows that not a good use, or are you suggesting that the entire world be allowed to copy and distribute my data?

As the GP said, its a tool that in itself is neither good nor evil, anyone who tries to label it as such has a political aim. Its as evil as the GPL.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Ash-Fox]

Do you have any evidence that Apple is using TPM to restrict your rights on new Intel Macs?

Yes. I noticed they did some lovely design with TPM to try to make sure their OS only runs on their new Intel Macs. I see that as a restriction of rights imposed on the new Intel Macs.

Re:Hardware DRM

[argent]

I can use TPM to protect my own data.

TPM doesn't protect your own data any better than any other equally strong cryptographic technique... except from yourself.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Richard_at_work]

It does however give me the option of stopping it going elsewhere, and TPM has thus far never kept me from my information.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Bing Tsher E]

Sun is 'mainly a hardware manufacturer' who offer their Solaris operating system for free download. They even make it relatively easy to install Solaris on any machine you own that is capable. And there are a LOT of clone boxes capable of running Solaris.

So what gives? Apple is cheaper and more tightfisted than Sun?

Re:Hardware DRM

[Bing Tsher E]

Kids buy them while they're in school and get the heavy educational discount.

Then they graduate, start paying their student loans, and 'sidegrade' (not upgrade or downgrade) to a Dell.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Overly Critical Guy]

What's FUD about it? It's all true. Vista costs more ($400!) and has draconian EULA restrictions, WGA, bloated system requirements, no universal binary 32-bit/64-bit support, and more.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Overly Critical Guy]

Why do Mac fanbois keep spreading this Vista FUD about "seperate purchase required for 64-bit support."

Because Microsoft's engineers lack the talent to implement the 32-bit/64-bit universal binary technology that Apple employs that makes it so you don't have to purchase separate 32-bit and 64-bit versions of an application. 32-bit apps and device drivers run 100% natively (unlike Vista's slower 64-bit translation layer), and 64-bit binaries are provided in the same bundle.

If you think this would be so bad, why don't you mention the fact that the new MacBook Pro has a 32-bit version of OS X installed and a seperate version (Leapord) needs to be bought to have 64-bit OS X?

Because it doesn't have anything to do with this discussion. Again, Apple's superior engineering skills have provided us with universal binaries, so transitioning to 64-bit is a completely seamless process that you won't even have to deal with. On Windows, you have to deal with broken drivers and slow application compatibility, which means most people will be running the 32-bit Vista even though they have 64-bit processors.

Apple will make Microsoft's 64-bit support look like amateur hour. Since Vista already looks like a toy, it's one more reason Vista will be a sales flop.

Re:Hardware DRM

[Anonymous Coward]

They're also more profitable than Sun, and less likely to go bankrupt than Sun. (Despite 15 years of 'Apple is dying!' punditry.)

Re:Hardware DRM

[jcr]

15 years? Nope, a lot longer than that. I was hearing this crap about Apple going away since the days of the Apple II.

Apple computer: on the brink of oblivion since 1975!

-jcr

MagSafe?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are plenty of 3rd-party support for the old Powerbook power plug. How are people dealing with the Magsafe connector when it won't plug into external batteries and various other things like the iGo? I have found places that will butcher the power cord and stick in a Thinkpad male-female combination to make it compatible with stuff, but it seems rather drastic that the first thing I'll have to do to a new MBP is cut the cord and start soldering stuff.

How about FreeDOS?

[Anonymous Coward]

I need a machine to run FreeDOS. Does the new MacBook Pro support FreeDOS?

Re:How about FreeDOS?

[jellomizer]

I am pretty sure it could. Boot Camp may do the job. If not then some virtuaization software may do it. I know you were trying for a Funny mod but I decided to play the straight man. I am not sure though if freedos will be handle all the features. Like accessing the full drive size, all the memory, The native screen resolution. But that would the be the same problem you will get with any modern PC using a Core 2 Duo Processor.

Temperatures

[Rugikiki]

For those asking that can't make it to the site, at idle both CPU cores are at 123.8 F, and the hard drive is at 100.4 F.

Re:Temperatures

[fontkick]

For those asking that can't make it to the site, at idle both CPU cores are at 123.8 F, and the hard drive is at 100.4 F.

Nice to finally see a laptop with a built-in coffee warmer. Those Apple engineers are fucking geniuses.

Re:Temperatures

[reaktor]

Yeah that's pretty hot for a laptop. But I guess it packs a punch.

Re:Temperatures

[Billly Gates]

What a shame. I think if my notebook died I would go with an AMD chip. I care about heat and power usage and lifetime warranties. It seems Intel and macbooks are waaayyy too hot for lap usage and more heat means poorer battery life and lifetime. This is why I bought an older PentiumM centrino notebook. They are cool and power efficient.

Re:Temperatures

[GotenXiao]

For those living in countries that DON'T use Fahrenheit:

at idle both CPU cores are at 51C, and the hard drive is at 38C

Re:Temperatures

[Bing Tsher E]

I am queueing up in my mind all the 'warm your coffee on your pentium' jokes presented by Macnuts a decade ago. Which reminds me of all the bluster that 'RISC is the future' and 'the Pentium is a joke' etc. etc.

Enjoy your Pixar cartoons, kiddies!

It's a shame

[drsmithy]

That the MBP doesn't have:

* An option for a 7200rpm hard disk (except the "aircraft carrier" model
* A option for a faster video card
* Higher screen resolution
* A docking station
* A 12"-ish variant

Personally I consider these significant omissions for a machine touted as being a top-of-the-line "Professional" laptop.

On the flipside, it's *great* to see Apple throwing in 2G RAM standard, except in the bottom-end model.

On the wishlist, I'd _love_ to see a laptop that can drive two external screens.

(I'll probably still get work to buy me one, though, then I can get my OS X fix on someone else's tab.)

Re:It's a shame

[dal20402]

Don't worry too much about the 7200rpm drive for now. I have one in my first generation MBP, and wouldn't get it if I were buying today.

The density of the 160GB 5400rpm model, which wasn't available in quantity when the first generation MBP came out, is high enough that performance is really, really close to the 100GB 7200rpm models. My MBP averages about 44MB/s write flat-out... the Seagate 5400.3, according to this, will do over 41. Read speeds are similarly close. If you're really pushing the disk subsystem so hard that you'll notice that difference, do yourself a favor and use the new FW800 port.

When Seagate finally ships its 160GB 7200.2 results may be different. I'm buying one of those for my existing MBP as soon as they ship.

I second the request for 1680x1050. (1920x1200 would just be too much on 15.4".) The faster video cards would probably cause heat issues; all the laptops available with them are thicker and heavier.

For the 12" the MacBook, unlike what we're used to with iBooks, is a legitimate performer unless you need 3D graphics. I'd like an even smaller model, and the option for discrete graphics in the black MB.

What I really want can't be provided by Apple... a fast 320GB notebook drive. That would change my life.

Re:It's a shame

[v1]

* An option for a 7200rpm hard disk (except the "aircraft carrier" model

Heh, I like that. Though I usually refer to them as "TV dinner trays".

Re:It's a shame

[drsmithy]

The density of the 160GB 5400rpm model, which wasn't available in quantity when the first generation MBP came out, is high enough that performance is really, really close to the 100GB 7200rpm models. My MBP averages about 44MB/s write flat-out... the Seagate 5400.3, according to this, will do over 41. Read speeds are similarly close. If you're really pushing the disk subsystem so hard that you'll notice that difference, do yourself a favor and use the new FW800 port.

It's the latency benefit I'm more interested in that transfer rates.

I second the request for 1680x1050. (1920x1200 would just be too much on 15.4".) The faster video cards would probably cause heat issues; all the laptops available with them are thicker and heavier.

The heat issues from faster video cards could be easily handled (IMHO) with dynamic clock adjustment.

For the 12" the MacBook, unlike what we're used to with iBooks, is a legitimate performer unless you need 3D graphics. I'd like an even smaller model, and the option for discrete graphics in the black MB.

Unfortunately the Black MB does _not_ have a discrete video card. Why Apple didn't do that, with the perfect opportunity for distinction via the colour and otherwise inexplicable higher price - especially when they must have known there would be no 12" PB replacement - is a bit of a mystery.

What I really want can't be provided by Apple... a fast 320GB notebook drive. That would change my life.

I must admit I've never seen the point of huge amounts of local storage in a laptop (or any standalone PC, for that matter). If you want lots of space, you're far better off putting it into a separate machine.

Re:It's a shame

[dal20402]

I must admit I've never seen the point of huge amounts of local storage in a laptop (or any standalone PC, for that matter). If you want lots of space, you're far better off putting it into a separate machine.

My life for the foreseeable future requires lots of longish trips and some boring time in hotel rooms. I'd be totally happy if I could 1) load Logic Pro and my several GB of associated stuff; 2) have a few spare GB for a Windows partition; 3) bring my whole music/video collection along without either just choosing "greatest hits" or having to explain for the 2000th time to the TSA that no, my external hard drive is NOT a bomb (as well as tote the extra few pounds and cables around).

Re:It's a shame

[jericho4.0]

1920x1200 would just be too much on 15.4""

Way overkill. That's why I want a MBP with EGA graphics and 8-bit sound.

Re:It's a shame

[dal20402]

Just add one </i>... the preview button is our friend.

Re:It's a shame

[diamondsw]

The hard drive is indeed a shame, as my older MacBook Pro has a 7200rpm drive. That alone helps me avoid too much envy of the newer models.

Re:It's a shame

[Sancho]

I use 1920x1200 on a 15.4" screen (Dell Precision M70.) I have no problems with it. Font sizes are adjustable, so if I'm having problems reading something, I can just crank it up. I'd rather have the option for better resolution than not. Unfortunately, that'e never been an area where Apple excelled--they tend to cater strictly to the median user.

I'd buy a MBB today if they suddenly released one with 1920x1200, and going to 1680xwhatever on the 15" would really make me consider one.

Re:It's a shame

[PygmySurfer]

* An option for a 7200rpm hard disk (except the "aircraft carrier" model

Apparently, the 160gb (5400 rpm) and 200gb (4200 rpm) drives use PMR. Someone on the forums over at macrumors linked to a benchmark, apparently the 5400 rpm PMR drives are faster than traditional 7200 rpm drives.

* A option for a faster video card

I think the form factor has a lot to do with this. I don't know that they could squeeze an X1700/X1800 or GeForce Go 7800/7900 in the current form factor, and I don't think enough customers would want them to justify the increased size. Really, I don't see such cards being useful for anyone but gamers (is it really going to make that big a different in Final Cut Pro, Motion, or Aperture?), and gamers really should look elsewhere. Really don't know why anyone would want to do serious gaming on a laptop anyway, but that's just me.

* Higher screen resolution

Would definitely like to see this. Leopard is apparently going to support a resolution-independent UI, so you can make the widgets as big or as small as you want. That's just begging for an ultra-high resolution display.

* A docking station

BookEndz makes some port replicators, but they're really not that impressive. I think thats probably the one feature I'd like to see Apple add to the MacBook lines.

* A 12"-ish variant

The MacBook is so close. Discreet graphics are all it needs (though an ExpressCard slot would probably be nice, too). Maybe when Intel's Santa Rosa platform comes out next year.

All that said, I ordered mine, and I can't wait to receive it :)

Re:It's a shame

[drsmithy]

BookEndz makes some port replicators, but they're really not that impressive.

Particularly considering the price. That's some serious money for a device that could only described as "barely adequate".

Re:It's a shame

[PygmySurfer]

Agreed. The MacBook (non-Pro) port replicators they have don't seem too bad (though seriously lacking in the aesthetics department), but the MacBook Pro port models are huge. And as you said, the price is outrageous.

Re:It's a shame

[Anonymous Coward]

Higher screen resolution

Now that it's official that Leopard will support resolution-independence, you'll undoubtedly get this in post-Leopard models.

Re:It's a shame

[Jeff DeMaagd]

What I really want can't be provided by Apple... a fast 320GB notebook drive. That would change my life.

There is something for that:
http://www.mcetech.com/optibay/

What it does is move the optical drive to be an external drive and put another notebook hard drive inside. So if you have 2x 160GB drives, you have 320GB right there. I think kicking out the optical drive is a good compromise. The number of occasions that I use one is dwindling quite a bit. Even for movies, I can use an external at home to import it and it's on the hard drive for later use.

Re:It's a shame

[toddestan]

The hard drive is indeed a shame, as my older MacBook Pro has a 7200rpm drive. That alone helps me avoid too much envy of the newer models.

Atleast you can always buy a 7200RPM drive and install it if you are so inclined. Not much you can do about the other omissions.

Re:It's a shame

[anagama]

Elitist. CGA rocks! And who needs more than "beeeep"?

Re:It's a shame

[Xyde]

I second the request for 1680x1050. (1920x1200 would just be too much on 15.4".) The faster video cards would probably cause heat issues; all the laptops available with them are thicker and heavier.

I have a feeling we'll be seeing 1680x1050 and probably higher the moment resolution independance is ready in Leopard and shipping on new machines.

Re:It's a shame

[Onnimikki]

What happens if you have to reinstall the OS? Can you install the OS from the external drive?

Re:It's a shame

[Lars512]

For those wanting higher res screens, my bet is that they'll be released at the same time as Leopard. Why? Because Leopard is likely to support resolution scaling to avoid the problem of text/icons becoming small at high-dpi's. From memory, there aren't settings in OS X for upping font size of things like the menus (for example), making it a problem at the moment, although there is supposed to be developer support for it already. Vista also supports some form of high-dpi display: when you up the DPI, new style apps should scale themselves appropriately, and old-style apps (e.g. currenfirefox) get scaled too to increase their size, making them larger but a little fuzzy or softened.

That said, I completely disagree that 1920x1200 is too much. I'm on a 15.4" Dell latitude d820, and the screen is beautiful! I'm dual-booting ubuntu and Vista, and neither have any problems with this dpi. The text is rendered super-crisply and at a readable size. That said, my dell has had chronic keyboard issues (broken on arrival, keyboard replaced twice, motherboard replaced twice) and I'm getting a refund for it. With the money, I'll buy the better of the 15" Macbook Pros. But I will still miss this screen =)

Re:It's a shame

[shmlco]

What we really need to do is to convince Belkin to make this product work on a Mac.

Re:It's a shame

[countach]

>It's the latency benefit I'm more interested in that transfer rates.

Fine. Buy the 160GB and make a 100GB partition. Use the 60GB only for archival. Now you've got the same latency as the 100GB and can stop trolling here.

Re:It's a shame

[amorsen]

Fine. Buy the 160GB and make a 100GB partition. Use the 60GB only for archival. Now you've got the same latency as the 100GB and can stop trolling here.

Err, no. At 7200RPM, average rotational latency (half a rotation) is 4.2ms. At 5400RPM, it's 5.6ms. Most of the people being called trolls in the comments to this article aren't actually trolling.

Re:It's a shame

[WoLpH]

Get a thinkpad, IBM also has high-resolution screens, I have a 15" thinkpad with 1600x1200 on it and there are also widescreen versions available with 1920x1200. If apple would have a screen like that _and_ a trackpoint then it might be able to replace a thinkpad for me, until that time, it's IBM for me :)

Re:It's a shame

[nine-times]

I second the request for 1680x1050. (1920x1200 would just be too much on 15.4".)

Not if they're offering a completely scaling UI. Supposedly, when Leopard comes out, it will be resolution independent.

Re:It's a shame

[iljitschvanbeijnum]

At 7200 RPM it only takes 8.33 milliseconds for the platters to make a revolution, while at 5400 RPM this takes 11.11 ms, so the average time you have to wait before the data is under the head (half a revolution) is 1.4 ms longer. But that's not the only aspect of the access time: the heads also need to move to the right track. The smaller the distance the heads have to travel, the faster your access time. By only using 63% of a 149 GB drive you cut down on the average distance the heads have to travel, increasing your average access time. This way, a 93 GB partition on a 149 GB 5400 RPM drive can have the same average access time as a 93 GB 7200 RPM drive and you have an additional 56 GB that you can use to dump data that isn't accessed often, and you'll save yourself some power.

Re:It's a shame

[amorsen]

The smaller the distance the heads have to travel, the faster your access time. By only using 63% of a 149 GB drive you cut down on the average distance the heads have to travel, increasing your average access time.

Seek time is by far not linear with seek distance on modern disks. Cutting the seek distance in half doesn't cut the seek time in half.

Re:It's a shame

[Bing Tsher E]

Anybody who says anything negative in a apple.slashdot.org thread is automatically a troll. And the phenomena is spreading, as Apple Product hype slowly melds out into offtopic areas of the site like hardware.slashdot.org.

Re:It's a shame

[Bing Tsher E]

Me, I want an $2800 24-bit graphics card that can do 800x600. And it has to be NuBus!

Re:It's a shame

[dal20402]

Interesting. I'm not totally sure this would work for me but it's got me thinking hard. Thanks for the tip.

I'm curious if anyone has used this in an MBP, which has a stock SATA hard drive, and tried a RAID 0 across the SATA primary drive and the ATA/100 secondary drive. I have no idea whether performance from such a setup would be reasonable.

Re:It's a shame

[dfghjk]

"1920x1200 would just be too much on 15.4"

No, it's not. It's glorious. If configurations had to be limited, 1680x1050 would be OK if they offered full WUXGA on the 17". I find WUXGA on the the 15.4" to be just fine.

Re:It's a shame

[dfghjk]

I personally wouldn't want the extra resolution to be thrown away by increasing the screen dpi setting. It would make a nice option but it would be regrettable if you couldn't control it.

I use a 200dpi screen at home and find that 128dpi is a better setting than 200dpi. I prefer the extra resolution to be used for increasing content on the screen. I sit closer to compensate. Hopefully Apple will see fit to offer that level of control. I doubt it.

Re:It's a shame

[nine-times]

Yeah, well if the UI is resolution independent and they give you the controls to scale the UI, you can do whatever you want. My point is that 1920x1200 is not to much for a 15" screen if you can scale everything.

Re:It's a shame

[dfghjk]

"...and they give you the controls to scale the UI..."

But who says they will? If you consider how Apple locks down virtually every aspect of their UI, the same bet would be to assume they won't. Apple clearly won't deviate much from 100dpi today so I personally believe they won't until they have resolution independence AND they control screen dpi automatically. I hope they offer the control but I'm not optimistic.

I feel that 1920x1200 is great for a 15.4" display on a notebook regardless. You sit closer to a notebook display anyway. I find the Apple 100dpi displays very disappointing, particularly the 30" model. They need to run the 30" up to 3840x2400. That would be 150dpi or about the same as a 15.4" WUXGA display. I would buy that monitor but not the current 30" (which I bought but eBay'ed because it was too grainy).

Re:It's a shame

[nine-times]

But who says they will?

Apple does. From Apple's web site:

The old assumption that displays are 72dpi has been rendered obsolete by advances in display technology. Macs now ship with displays that sport native resolutions of 100dpi or better. Furthermore, the number of pixels per inch will continue to increase dramatically over the next few years. This will make displays crisper and smoother, but it also means that interfaces that are pixel-based will shrink to the point of being unusable. The solution is to remove the 72dpi assumption that has been the norm. In Leopard, the system, including the Carbon and Cocoa frameworks, will be able to draw user interface elements using a scale factor. This will let the user interface maintain the same physical size while gaining resolution and crispness from high dpi displays.

Their new OS, coming in a couple months, will be resolution-independant, and allow scaling the entire UI to account for high-resolution displays.

Re:It's a shame

[dfghjk]

That quote is somewhat laughable when you consider that screen dpi's well in excess of 100 have been shipping in non-Apple machines for the better part of a decade now. Nevertheless, that quote says nothing about Apple allowing the user to control screen scaling. In fact it supports my position.

"This will let the user interface maintain the same physical size while gaining resolution and crispness from high dpi displays."

I don't want the interface to maintain the same physical size! I want it to be smaller. Finally, get my question right:

"

"...and they give you the controls to scale the UI..."

But who says they will?

"

As in "who says they will give you the controls to scale the UI?" Apple doesn't. All Apple is saying is that Leopard will offer a scalable UI.

Re:It's a shame

[nine-times]

So your position is that even though they're going through all the trouble to make their OS resolution independent, they'll lock people out from the ability to control their scaling? What makes you think that? Give me a quote that even implies that, rather than offering this feature as a tool for users and developers, they're going to use it to lock people at 100dpi.

I claimed Apple was going to offer resolution independence that would keep high resolutions from being unreasonable on small monitors, you asked, "who said?", and I pointed you to a quote which said they were already implementing this feature. Grow up and quit nit-picking.

Re:It's a shame

[dfghjk]

"Give me a quote that even implies that, rather than offering this feature as a tool for users and developers, they're going to use it to lock people at 100dpi."

No, you are failing to understand. I'm not saying they will lock users into 100 dpi (they've been doing that already), I'm saying that I worry they will lock users into a common physical screen size for UI objects. I've already provided a quote for that right out of yours:

"This will let the user interface maintain the same physical size while gaining resolution and crispness from high dpi displays."

The reason Apple has never offered screen dpi's in excess of 100 dpi is that they want to lock in physical UI sizes and they have not offered scaling. With scaling coming in Leopard, Apple is not saying they will offer users control over scaling and their past history suggests that they won't be inclined to. Apple can read screen dpi out of displays and I believe scaling will be automatic. For me, that would be regrettable. I don't want Apple denying me the ability to use screen resolution as I see fit.

"I claimed Apple was going to offer resolution independence that would keep high resolutions from being unreasonable on small monitors..."

You said nothing of the sort. Here is what you said:

"Yeah, well if the UI is resolution independent and they give you the controls to scale the UI, you can do whatever you want."

You claimed nothing, but you suggested that control would be given to the user. Apple has never suggested that they would give such control to the user and they have a long history of denying users such control. The fact is that you will not be able to "do whatever you want" without that control and you've provided no reason to believe that such control is coming. I called you on that and I quoted you specifically and correctly. You may have misunderstood but that's your problem, not mine.

Re:It's a shame

[nine-times]

Follow the damn thread, I responded to a statement that it wouldn't be good to have high-resolutions on laptops because things would be too small, and I was saying that would be a non-issue with the next release of OSX.

What you're saying now is half-true. The reason for scaling is, of course, so they can offer higher resolution displays without shrinking the UI to an absurd degree. Yes, the reason Apple isn't offering high-resolution displays right now is specifically because they can't scale their UI easily enough, and super-tiny text and controls are a pain. Hell, a lot of Apple users complain already about the MacBook Pros for everything being too tiny.

Will Apple offer a slider in "system preferences" for the user to scale the UI directly? Maybe, maybe not. Will they "lock users out" from this functionality? It'd be stupid to do that, and you have no reason to think they will. If nothing else, it would help their accessibility options to allow people to grow it a bit. If nothing else, they're opening some control to developers, which means that at a bare minimum, you should be able to tweak the setting somewhere.

But what, this whole inane discussion is for you to brag that you like tiny UI controls, running a 17" display at 1600x1200? Great, pat yourself on the back for being a 733t h4x0r. I'm out.

Re:It's a shame

[dfghjk]

"Follow the damn thread"

What makes you think I didn't? You were the one with the comprehension problem. I fully understood your post and called attention to the fact that Apple has never stated they would provide the control you suggested.

"Hell, a lot of Apple users complain already about the MacBook Pros for everything being too tiny."

I don't believe that for a second. MBP screens are only 100 dpi and everything is big. It is the single worst problem with the MBP IMO.

"Will they "lock users out" from this functionality? It'd be stupid to do that, and you have no reason to think they will."

I have every reason to think they will and, unlike you, I've expressed those reasons specifically. Good to see you've finally caught on to the discussion that you, yourself, started.

"If nothing else, they're opening some control to developers, which means that at a bare minimum, you should be able to tweak the setting somewhere."

Really? That doesn't follow either. The bare minimum is no control at all. You started out assuming we'd get the control. Now you're claiming that the control is available to developers and they could expose it if they wished. Again, I ask you for a reference to back up your claim.

"But what, this whole inane discussion is for you to brag that you like tiny UI controls, running a 17" display at 1600x1200?"

No, that's bullshit as well as being incorrect. 100 dpi is totally uncompetitive and the PC world hasn't been tied to it for many years now. Apple needs to get with the program and not only allow better displays but also let it's users choose how to use them. That's the point.

"Great, pat yourself on the back for being a 733t h4x0r. I'm out."

Odd that you would describe me, a man in my mid 40's, using such juvenile language. Perhaps it's the one you comprehend the best since you clearly are incapable of understanding anything I say. Go run and hide now.

Re:It's a shame

[iljitschvanbeijnum]

Hell, a lot of Apple users complain already about the MacBook Pros for everything being too tiny.

I can do better than that: lots of stuff is uncomfortably small on my 1280x854 Powerbook screen. Especially the web seems to be made for people with hawk-like vision, I can't believe how tiny the letters on many pages are.

I'm not too worried about Apple not exposing zoom control to users: there will be utilities that allow users to adjust their zoom settings the same day that Leopard comes out in that case.

I am a bit worried about what someone said about there only being a small number of fixed zoom factors: 1.25, 1.5, 2 and 3. I can see how having a limited number of zoom factors can make some stuff a bit easier, but the short time gain is probably not worth it in the long run, and steps of at least 25% are just not good enough. I would love being able to zoom to the equivalent of 1172 pixels wide on my 15" screen, but that's only a factor 1.09. 1.25 would be 1024 pixels wide, which is way too much. So a granularity of at least 1/8th rather than 1/4th would be much better.

But I would take a 1920x1200 screen with a 1.5 rather than a 1.625 zoom factor without complaining too much, especially if such a MacBook Pro comes with the new Santa Rosa chipset that pushes real-world battery operation past the 4 hour mark. I wonder how many l33t h4x0rs will use a 0.75 zoom factor on such a rig, though...

Re:It's a shame

[iljitschvanbeijnum]

"Hell, a lot of Apple users complain already about the MacBook Pros for everything being too tiny."

I don't believe that for a second. MBP screens are only 100 dpi and everything is big. It is the single worst problem with the MBP IMO.

sqrt(1440^2+900^2) / 15.4 = 110

As I said, I have a Powerbook which does actually have 100 DPI, which makes certain things smaller than I'd like them to be. Maybe another 10% smaller would be workable for someone who has a 10% shorter eyes-to-lap distance than me, but I'll stick with my Powerbook until resolution independence is here.

Re:It's a shame

[dfghjk]

How far from your notebook screen do you sit and how far from your desktop screen do you sit? Is it the same? Notebooks are typically closer yet Apple thinks they should have the same dpi. Stupid.

10% or 15% sure isn't enough difference for me to worry about in this context but to each his own. I still don't accept that "a lot of Apple users" are complaining about the screen having too much resolution. Frankly I think it's ridiculous.

The resolving power of the eye at 24" is about 150 dpi for good vision. That means your Powerbook could be 36" away and the MBP only 32". Chances are you use it closer than that so, unless you have poor vision, you don't really have a problem with the MBP at 110 dpi. I use a 204 dpi desktop monitor at 20" and it's a bit too small. 150 dpi is perfect for laptop distances and that's what a 15.4" WUXGA display is. Perhaps all these complaining MBP owners just need glasses.

On a related topic, I've read comments that the Zune is inferior to the iPod because its screen is larger but has no greater resolution. Curiously, iPod screens are 160dpi yet I don't hear anyone complaining about too much resolution there. Perhaps Apple should offer 100 dpi iPod versions for you guys that are complaining that everything is too small.

Re:It's a shame

[iljitschvanbeijnum]

The resolving power of the eye at 24" is about 150 dpi for good vision. That means your Powerbook could be 36" away and the MBP only 32". Chances are you use it closer than that so, unless you have poor vision, you don't really have a problem with the MBP at 110 dpi

It's not a question of being able to distinguish the individual pixels, but rather, what is a comfortable letter size for reading. Most people read the paper nearly at arm's length, I hold it much closer. It's not that I can't read it at arm's length, it's just much more comfortable a bit closer. When I'm using my laptop interactively, I sit relatively close because my hands are on the keyboard. But when I'm reading stuff on the web, I'd rather lean back against the couch. This makes the letter size used on /. too small to read for me. So either I have to lean in or I have to zoom the text.

In many applications, there are ways to increase the text size, but this depends on the application and can have undesired side effects. For instance, using text zoom in a browser zooms the text but breaks the intended layout because all the non-text stuff is nearly always defined in pixels. The MacOS UI as a whole doesn't have an option for setting the text size. All of this makes resolution independence something I really look forward to.

Re:It's a shame

[dfghjk]

I'm not advocating that anyone sit further away. In fact, I feel the opposite but I was pointing out what the maximum viewable distance is at a given dpi and how much further away that is than common usage. For a notebook 150 dpi is perfectly reasonable and only mac people (who don't have the option) argue that it isn't. Arguing with them is meaningless since the only thing that will change their mind is Apple introducing it (sure PCs did it first but Apple made it easy to use!).

Curious that your computer usage specifically creates a problem that can't be solved without a user-controllable global scaling option which (a) doesn't exist and (b) there is no promise that it will exist in the future, then you use that problem of your own creation to argue against the value of display resolutions greater than 100 dpi. Perhaps what you need is a more ergonomic setup for computer usage, as once you learn how to use a computer well you will realize that screens with greater than 100 dpi are indeed valuable.

There is no need for screens to have crappy resolution just so you can continue to read them from a meter away using an OS that provides absolutely no control over viewing sizes. Even Windows does better than that.

Re:It's a shame

[iljitschvanbeijnum]

For a notebook 150 dpi is perfectly reasonable and only mac people (who don't have the option) argue that it isn't.

Without any context, a DPI number is meaningless. My printer prints at 600 DPI which is great. If I set my CRT to its highest resolution (1600x1200) I get 130 DPI. Many things are just fine at this resolution, for instance the MacOS menu bar is easy to read. But for other stuff, it doesn't work so well. For instance, using Safari as my web browser without any zooming the letter o on /. is about 1 millimeter high on the screen. In a newspaper, it's about 2 mm, in a book a little less but closer to 2 than to 1.5. If you consider that newspapers in the past have had typefaces created for very purpose of cramming as much text on a page as possible, and they've been doing this for a few centuries, I'm pretty sure that around 2 mm is a much better size than 1 mm, and it's not Steve Job's reality distortion field that makes me feel that with this combination of web design and screen resolution, I have to strain to read text.

Curious that your computer usage specifically creates a problem that can't be solved without a user-controllable global scaling option which (a) doesn't exist and (b) there is no promise that it will exist in the future, then you use that problem of your own creation to argue against the value of display resolutions greater than 100 dpi.

I don't; go back and read my posts. I'm all in favor of high resolution screens in general. When I have to read a lot of stuff behind my CRT I'll increase the resolution to the aforementioned 1600x1200 and the letters look much better, this is great.

Apple had a page up talking about how 100 DPI is the ideal resolution (can't find the page right now, I think they took it down). I'm not buying that: it's a limitation of their software that everything running on a Mac thinks the whole universe is 72 DPI and you can't even change the system font size (even my first Amiga that I had half a lifetime ago could do this). But given that situation, I agree with their decision to stay away from really high resolutions.

Even Windows does better than that.

Sad but true, although changing the default in Windows XP isn't entirely problem free. Hopefully this type of discussion will be history after the introduction of Leopard and a slew of ultra-high resolution Apple laptops. In the mean time, I suggest that you consider the possibility that just like computers, people have widely different hard- and software attributes so what works for you doesn't necessarily work for everyone else.

Re:It's a shame

[dfghjk]

"Without any context, a DPI number is meaningless."

Yes, but I've given thorough context. It is indisputable that screen dpis higher than 100 are usable at viewing distances that computer users typically have. Instead, you offer complaints that ultimately arise from the total lack of control Mac OS gives you over scaling in the UI. No other GUI is so sorely lacking in that capability.

"...I'm pretty sure that around 2 mm is a much better size than 1 mm..."

See, you're the one lacking context. Without knowing viewing distance, no physical size can be considered "much better". That is the inherent problem with OS X that mac users are oblivious to due the that "reality distortion field" you claim to be uneffected by.

"I don't; go back and read my posts."

I did the first time. For someone so in favor of high screen resolutions I find this comment interesting:

"Maybe another 10% smaller would be workable for someone who has a 10% shorter eyes-to-lap distance than me, but I'll stick with my Powerbook until resolution independence is here."

Later you justified it by describing you typical usage pattern as having wildly varying distances. I believe I totally nailed your argument.

"Apple had a page up talking about how 100 DPI is the ideal resolution"

Yes, and I agree that it's a lame apology for their lack of fundamental tech. At typical monitor distances 150 is completely usable. All platforms suck with regard to scaling but OS X sucks the worst and Apple lies about it.

"Sad but true, although changing the default in Windows XP isn't entirely problem free."

No, in fact Windows is terrible. The dpi setting is broken and scaling font sizes is cumbersome and not effective.

"Hopefully this type of discussion will be history after the introduction of Leopard and a slew of ultra-high resolution Apple laptops."

I sure hope so. This disussion isn't about scaling which we all know Apple is promising. The discussion is about allowing user control over scaling. I would find that feature compelling but I doubt Apple will offer it. That was my entire point and the one I took exception to the original poster for claiming.

"I suggest that you consider the possibility that just like computers, people have widely different hard- and software attributes so what works for you doesn't necessarily work for everyone else."

I do; it's mac people who don't get that. Because of the RDF, mac lovers are convinced that 100 dpi really is the magic number and there's no greater proponent of that than you in your original post. I own a MBP and I use it despite its low resolution screen. Fixing that would make the MBP even better and allowing people with varying eyesight the ability to control scaling just makes sense. It is Apple that demonstrates time and again that they have no respect for people's widely varying attributes as you say. If they did there would be more configurability to the UI.

Re:It's a shame

[iljitschvanbeijnum]

Because of the RDF, mac lovers are convinced that 100 dpi really is the magic number and there's no greater proponent of that than you in your original post. I own a MBP and I use it despite its low resolution screen. Fixing that would make the MBP even better and allowing people with varying eyesight the ability to control scaling just makes sense.

I really don't get why you are arguing against me. :-)

I run my 17" CRT (= 15.5" viewable area) at 1172 pixels wide, and I'd love to have that as the native resolution for my Powerbook as well, making for 90 DPI.

We are pretty much saying the exact same thing, except that you want it in order to make stuff on the screen smaller, while I want it to make stuff on the screen bigger. We both don't like the hardcoded-for-100-DPI way that things work today.

I'm not quite as negative about Apple as you, though: it looks like they're getting their act together. It would have been better if they'd done that one or two releases ago, but I'm in the market for a new laptop between now and six months from now so it all works out.

Re:It's a shame

[dfghjk]

I feel that having user controllable scaling would be a very compelling feature but it would be only half complete without higher dpi screens. For a HTPC, the scaling feature would be a tremendous asset in compensating for varying viewing distances. I'm just pessimistic that Apple will allow that considering their history. Perhaps I will be pleasantly surprised or, as the other poster said, maybe at the very least a 3rd party could expose the control. Nevertheless, my argument was that Apple never stated an intention to provide such control as was previously claimed. We all agree that it would be useful.

I believe that making things larger is just as valuable as making things smaller BTW. What I want is more screen space along with more options on how to use it. I'd also want Apple to fix support for the IBM T221. It was supported at one time but it no longer works. A 9MP, 200 dpi desktop monitor would be a beautiful thing with an OS that can actually scale. That monitor, and Photoshop, are the only reasons that Windows still owns my desktop.

Extending the battery life with C2d Macbookpro?

[Leontes]

Which is the better 15" macbookpro for battery life?

I'm deciding in purchasing between the faster and slower macbookpro's: Does the faster one drain the battery noticibly faster, or is there better power management with the more expensive computer? If I know I'll be using the computer without access to a wall socket for longer periods: is it smarter to go with the slower computer?

Re:Extending the battery life with C2d Macbookpro?

[dal20402]

Don't know about the C2D models, but my 2.16 CD MBP gets slightly worse life than a friend's 1.83 version. SpeedStep apparently won't slow down the processor quite as far.

The difference is very small though... with the faster processor and my 7200rpm drive it's about 15 minutes. They are claiming slightly improved life for the C2D version, but all CD MBP's get pretty terrible battery life. MacBooks are better, if you can live without a graphics card and with a smaller screen.

Re:Extending the battery life with C2d Macbookpro?

[v1]

My solution to this is get a 2nd battery and a 2nd power adapter. I keep the one adapter in my bag and the other at my desk. This way I am not always dorking around with the power pack anytime I move my computer. (is it really worth it to crawl under there again and unplug it, will I really need it today at work? - inevetably the day you don't take it is the day you need it) The second battery gives me anywhere from 4-7 hrs of total battery time depending on what I'm doing, and I full cyclone and swap batteries monthly to keep them both charged and conditioned.

I've done this with the last three laptops I've owned and I've never regretted it.

There are also free CPU tools you can buy that will, among other things, turn one of the two cores off, on the fly. That, together with enabling processor cycling in energysaver, will probably double your battery life if you really need it to last. No need to get a whole new computer to get decent battery life.

Re:Extending the battery life with C2d Macbookpro?

[sokoban]

There are utilities to underclock and undervolt MBPs. I don't know if there is a Core 2 Duo one available yet, but http://www.coolbook.se/CoolBook.html has one.

Re:Extending the battery life with C2d Macbookpro?

[shmlco]

Apple rated the old version at 4.5 hours max. The new one is rated for 5, while the 17" version is 5.5.

Re:Extending the battery life with C2d Macbookpro?

[cthulhu11]

Can you swap the battery without disrupting operation? Dual-bay Dells that I've had could do that, but unless the MBP has some sort of internal buffer battery, the need to shut down to swap the battery would seem to severely limit the utility of carrying a [no doubt very expensive] spare.

Re:Extending the battery life with C2d Macbookpro?

[v1]

That depends on the laptop. iBooks could not be without battery and power for any time at all under any circumstance or they would shut down. Powerbooks had a backup battery in them that was supposedly good for 3 minutes with no power while ASLEEP. So to swap batteries in a powerbook or tibook you would sleep it, swap batteries (quickly) and wake it back up. The computer would not wake if it had no power. Take too long to swap batteries and it would shut off and you'd have to reboot when powered up again. The backup battery also functioned as a PRAM battery if the computer was without power for a long time it would usually hold the clock.

The macbooks and macbook pros take a different approach. When you sleep them, it takes upwards of 30 seconds to sleep them, depending on memory installed. At that time it is preparing to "hibernate". This means it stores processor state AND memory on the hard drive. If you remove the battery after it has gone to sleep, it does indeed shut off. But when you put the battery back in, it is still off. Press power, and it will reanimate. This process takes about 15-20 seconds, again depending on memory. Durig this time, the screen that was up when it sleeped is displayed, but in a washed out way. A progress indicator marches across the screen, it looks a bit like the volume adjust indicator. During this time it is restoring memory from the hard drive. When that gets all the way to the right, the screen returns to normal intensity and it's awake. So the macbooks have no backup battery and there is no limit to how long it takes you to change batteries. Best of both worlds I suppose.

Also, if the computer is critically low on battery and is awake, it automatically puts itself to sleep and hibernates. So the only way you are going to force it to need to reboot would be to pull the battery either while it's awake or while it's in the process of hibernating. (so if you need to change batteries, be sure you wait until the sleep light is pulsing before pulling the battery)

Since everything is on the hard drive while hibernating, there should be no theoretical limit to how long it can hibernate without power. I assume it will lose the clock at some point though. I have taken a few macbooks apart and I seem to recall seeing a small watch battery on the board... that being the case, that's probably the pram battery and is there to keep the clock and possibly to keep hibernation status. In that case it should keep the clock even if left unpowered for days.

Re:Extending the battery life with C2d Macbookpro?

[cthulhu11]

For my usual purposes, breaking TCP connections is disruptive :-/

How about Debunking...

[ericdano]

How about Debunking that tool, Rob Enderle and his "article". Or articles. Hell, just debunk the fool. I seriously question how this guy makes a living with his totally inaccurate stories.

Why reinvent the wheel?

[Rytr23]

I beleive Apple.com has info on the laptop... and it can handle the slashdot\digg effect...

Re:Why reinvent the wheel?

[niteice]

It doesn't have real-world performance data.

Re:Why reinvent the wheel?

[TheRaven64]

There are some numbers on MacBook Pro performance here. The bottom line is that the they're 10% faster than the last versions at the same clock speed for 32-bit tasks and about 20% faster for 64-bit things (than the old model was for 32-bit ones, since the Core 1 couldn't do 64-bit).

Problem with link?

[xanthines-R-yummy]

Is anyone else having a problem with the links in the story? I typed this in, which seems to work:

http://www.lartren.com/mac/

I also think they ment to post the following Coral link as well:

http://www.lartren.com.nyud.net:8080/

Want To Know About the New Apple MacBook Pro?

[CCFreak2K]

Want To Know About the New Apple MacBook Pro?

No.

(Disclaimer: I did not put the "no" tag on.)

Re: Want To Know About the New Apple MacBook Pro?

[Bing Tsher E]

I wouldn't mind so much that this article was posted if it was on apple.slashdot.com where it belongs.

Bias, I cry!

[Anonymous Coward]

Why didn't Slashdot link to my extensive review, with pictures and benchmarks, of the brand-new 12-inch Dell Inspiron e690 with the free Dell DJ Ditty mp3 player and Genuine(tm) Microsoft(tm) Windows(tm) XP(tm) Home Edition(tm)?

Fake (?)

[donaldGuy]

Am I the only one who sees quite obvious signs of image manipulation ("photoshop"ing) on the "About this Mac" Dialog around the Processor part..?

I was apt to believe it from the large amount of info, but that sets up a major read flag.

Re:Fake (?)

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you're just seeing artifacts from the image compression.

Re:Fake (?)

[whogben]

Those are obvious signs of image compression, not photoshopping :p

Re:Fake (?)

[mabinogi]

What "Obvious signs"?

I think that if you look hard enough at any digital image, you can find "obvious signs" of manipulation. In fact, you could probably find "obvious signs" of digital manipulation in a purely analogue film print ;)

Because they're tools?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sucking the cock of a corporation is really the lowest circle of whore hell.

fucK!?

[Anonymous Coward]

leaving the play *BSD hAs lost more

Slashdot really going down hill...

[William_Lee]

It's a pretty sad day when this type of "news" makes the front page of /. How is this story worthy of the front page, even for Mac fans?! I have to believe the editors can do better than this...

Re:Slashdot really going down hill...

[jellomizer]

What is more interesting I was trying to search Slashdot archives for the release of the Powerbook G4 Titanium Back in 2001. To no avail. It seemed back that the Powerbook wasn't nerdy enough news. And now any product blip by Apple get a lot of attention. I guess it is the sign of the times.

Re:Slashdot really going down hill...

[Zhe Mappel]

Agreed. This is amateur hour stuff. Someone bought a MBP? And he's answering questions? omigod!

Considering the very serious string of problems associated with the Macbook (check out the vernerable macfixit.com or the comprehensive macdefects.com), you'd think Slashdot might be inspired to actually look carefully at the issue.

Slashdot look carefully at the issue? Either I'm drinking too much tonight, or not enough.

Re:Slashdot really going down hill...

[lintux]

It's an experiment. This guy opened a website where you can mail him questions and he'll answer them by e-mail and on the site. Now it's on Slashdot and every geek in the world will know about the site. Expected result: Not just a Slashdotted webserver, but also a Slashdotted guy and a Slashdotted mailserver.

Let's see what happens. ;-)

Re:Slashdot really going down hill...

[William_Lee]

Nice to see this modded offtopic, even though it directly addresses the topic...Guess it's nothing but Mac fanbois on the mod squad today...

Information the manufacturer should provide?

[LoudMusic]

A lot of this is stuff the manufacturer already provides, but in addition to that I think this is specifically a service the manufacturer could provide. Imagine being able to drop a message on a Dell website asking a specific question about how one of their computers runs a specific program and them giving you detailed results within 24 hours. That'd be pretty cool.

Q: Dell, I'd like to run Microsoft Flight Sim on an XPS 700 with three 30" displays. Can you give me the frame rate on that?

New tag

[Anonymous Coward]

This entire truly deserved the tag "AppleSpam"

god bless this man!!!!

[musikit]

thank you!!! to the person who posted this article and to the person who owns the website!!! i just bought a mac book pro and was driving myself nuts trying to get the wlan to work. very much appreciated.

Why isn't it smaller?

[weave]

I have a 667 Mhz 12" G4 Powerbook that I adore and have been using for four years now. It goes with me everywhere, I can open it (barely) on a tray table in a coach seat on a plane, it works well on a bus, train, etc. It goes everywhere with me -- cause it is a decent size and works well. I don't need/want 15" and the 13.3" macbooks are still too big for what I want. :(

I was just at a "Sony Style" Store today and their smaller Vaio notebooks look real sweet. Just increase the DPI of the resolution and it cram into a smaller form factor please. Not all of us are blind.

I hate Apple's new laptop attitude that "pro" means huge.

Re:Why isn't it smaller?

[Anonymous Coward]

HEAR HEAR! Apple, PLEASE make a 12" Pro version to replace our 12" Powerbooks!!

still waiting to buy,
Los Angeles

Re:Why isn't it smaller?

[Pink Tinkletini]

I third that motion. The smallest MBP is still too big, and the regular MB's keyboard sucks. While we're at it, please bring back the PowerBook name.

Re:Why isn't it smaller?

[Jeff DeMaagd]

Just increase the DPI of the resolution and it cram into a smaller form factor please. Not all of us are blind.

For monitors, it is ppi - for pixels per inch. dpi is for print, each dot is its own discrete, unmixed color. Otherwise, each color within a pixel counts as a point.

I think the higher ppi will simply increase the chances that the user will become blind as a result. My vision is good, I can use the 150 screens but it's pretty uncomfortable for long term use.

Re:Why isn't it smaller?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a 667 Mhz 12" G4 Powerbook

no you don't. the 12" g4 debuted at 867MHz.

Re:Why isn't it smaller?

[Anonymous Coward]

'I was just at a "Sony Style" Store today and their smaller Vaio notebooks look real sweet. Just increase the DPI of the resolution and it cram into a smaller form factor please. Not all of us are blind.'

Dude. The tiny Vaios are small enough for you already? WTF??!?! Are you a primordial dwarf? Holy shiat.

I mean, wow. Just, wow.

Re:Why isn't it smaller?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, he's saying he'd like to see a Mac laptop that small.

Re:Why isn't it smaller?

[ivan256]

I think the higher ppi will simply increase the chances that the user will become blind as a result.

That's an enormous load of crap. Turning up the resolution doesn't mean you can't keep everything on the screen exactly the same size.

This is retarded

[Asrynachs]

What kind of retard cares that much about the specs of a computer?!

I tell you I'm starting to agree with Macleans.

Re:This is retarded

[TrekCycling]

It is kind of funny. There's one and only one thing I care about with regards to the Mac laptops. When are they going to make one with a larger keyboard? I saw one of these new Macbooks the other day in the Mac store. Great looking machine. Only problem is there is like 3 inches of wasted space on each side of the keyboard that they could have used to make the keyboard more comfortable. Instead they chose to make the keys smaller. Good going, Apple! That fixes it.

Sorry, but it can run 100% cooler, be twice as fast and all I care about is that the ergonomics suck on it for me. I really want to buy one badly. I have $1500+ with Apple's name on it if they'd just produce a keyboard that was the size of many Windows-based laptop keyboards. My current notebook that I use for my writing and writing workshops is a Compaq Presario. Not the greatest laptop in the world. Heavy, unweildy, definitely not a Mac. But it cost $600 and I don't get hand cramps when my larger than normal hands touch the keyboard. Fix the keyboard, Apple and you could throw a freaking sub 1Ghz processor in there for all I care.

Re:This is retarded

[wish bot]

errr...all the Powerbooks (and the MacBook Pro's) have full sized keys. Even the old 12" G4. What they don't have is a numeric keypad, but the other keys...they're all full sized.

Re:This is retarded

[hey!]

What kind of retard cares that much about the specs of a computer?!

Well, it isn't so much that this guy cares about the specs of a computer, as he cares enough about the people who are considering using that computer. Even though he's never met these people, he derives pleasure from knowing that he's helped them. I realize that in the US since 1980, this qualifies him as a "retard". Before that we used to call a person like that a mensch, not a retard.

Re:This is retarded

[Asrynachs]

lordy lordy. I spose it's to my disadvantage that I didn't scrutinise over the L1 cache on my case fans, and the serial number on my battery case only has one 0 on it. These are things people need to seriously consider when buying a computer for word processing and HTML programming. Otherwise you won't be able to brag to like minded idiots about stupid crap nobody cares about.

Re:This is retarded

[TrekCycling]

Not sure what you mean by normal, but it's a small keyboard compared to what I'm used to.

Yay!

[Anonymous Coward]

Short answer: No. Only the 17" model has WUXGA resolution.

So that means I NEED the 17 inch model then!

Performance (Xbench) and Apple's claim of 7x speed

[parkerpress]

I've heard that Apple is claiming that the new Core2 Duo is 7 times faster than the old "top of the line" 1.67Ghz PowerBook. But comparing the XBench output that was posted earlier to an XBench run that I just ran (see below my signature) shows only a 2x increase in almost every single category (there was one or two that were about 2.5 times higher).

But nowhere near 7 times.

How can they make such a claim? I could understand missing by a few percentage points, but their claim is WAY off reality.

And, yes, I have the same amount of memory and the same OS that was used on the new tests.... The only difference was physical hardware.

Steve

Results 51.32
System Info
Xbench Version 1.3
System Version 10.4.8 (8L127)
Physical RAM 2048 MB
Model PowerBook5,6
Processor PowerPC G4 @ 1.67 GHz
L1 Cache 32K (instruction), 32K (data)
L2 Cache 512K @ 1.67 GHz
Bus Frequency 167 MHz
Video Card ATY,RV360M11
Drive Type Hitachi HTS541010G9AT00
CPU Test 70.93
GCD Loop 139.85 7.37 Mops/sec
Floating Point Basic 48.47 1.15 Gflop/sec
AltiVec Basic 288.78 11.51 Gflop/sec
vecLib FFT 51.03 1.68 Gflop/sec
Floating Point Library 50.90 8.86 Mops/sec
Thread Test 71.85
Computation 68.48 1.39 Mops/sec, 4 threads
Lock Contention 75.57 3.25 Mlocks/sec, 4 threads
Memory Test 39.47
System 35.49
Allocate 131.05 481.25 Kalloc/sec
Fill 35.04 1703.52 MB/sec
Copy 20.67 427.03 MB/sec
Stream 44.46
Copy 49.15 1015.26 MB/sec [altivec]
Scale 50.02 1033.46 MB/sec [altivec]
Add 42.70 909.66 MB/sec [altivec]
Triad 38.14 815.87 MB/sec [altivec]
Quartz Graphics Test 69.74
Line 60.56 4.03 Klines/sec [50% alpha]
Rectangle 69.55 20.77 Krects/sec [50% alpha]
Circle 71.08 5.79 Kcircles/sec [50% alpha]
Bezier 78.81 1.99 Kbeziers/sec [50% alpha]
Text 71.21 4.45 Kchars/sec
OpenGL Graphics Test 85.41
Spinning Squares 85.41 108.35 frames/sec
User Interface Test 42.00
Elements 42.00 192.75 refresh/sec
Disk Test 30.13
Sequential 46.59
Uncached Write 46.44 28.52 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 45.47 25.73 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 45.28 13.25 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 49.40 24.83 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Random 22.26
Uncached Write 7.66 0.81 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 53.00 16.97 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 59.94 0.42 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 73.81 13.70 MB/sec [256K blocks]

hooplah

[SuperBanana]

I'm a bit worried about the heat and noise of the new MacBook Pros.

I'm typing on a MBP "v1.0" and the only noise I hear is the hard drive- a quiet "whoosh". The fans at minimum speed (1000RPM) are completely inaudible. They are more progressive than the G4's which were pretty much an on/off switch.

As for heat? Every year I read whining about "how hot" the newest Powerbook is. It's all a bunch of shit (with the exception of the 12" Al Powerbook. That thing WAS an oven.) Component specs don't change- people just assume "oh, it's a gazillion times faster, it MUST run hotter!" Funny, but if you compare the new intel Minis to the old Minis- they use a few watts LESS power.

Right now it's sitting on my legs, I'm wearing jeans, and it isn't uncomfortable- smcfancontrol says it's 138 degrees F on the CPU die. When it's running too hot for comfort, I fire up smccontrol and bump the fans up to 1500rpm, where you can just barely hear them- and it cools things down by about ten degrees.

Re:hooplah

[Jeff DeMaagd]

I personally had no experience with Powerbooks (and really didn't give a damn about them) but I was shocked at how uncomfortably hot that the MacBook Pro got, even when it was just idling. I really objected to the idea that I simply had to put up with it. Even some twat suggested that I use some sort of shelf like iLap, which to me was a contradiction to said twat's claim that the MBP was a laptop. My Compaq never got nearly that warm. It wasn't hard to get the MBP core temperature up to 85 C / 185F. I never did get the surface temperature, but it got too hot for me to comfortably use in fifteen minutes from startup.

Now that smcFanControl exists, I permanently set the minimum to 2000RPM and it's only slightly warm. Even at 3000 RPM, it's not very loud. It really doesn't seem to move much more air, but I've noticed temperatures that were 20 C lower than when I changed the fan speed. Before that program was released, I regarded the MBP simply as a desktop replacement because it got way too warm to be used on a lap.

Re:hooplah

[CrackedButter]

I'm surprised no 12"PB owners have chirped up. I have a 12"PB and there is no heat issues, "it's all a bunch of shit" :)

Re:hooplah

[binary paladin]

I own a 12" Al PowerBook and I use it, in bed, as a LAPtop. The only time it's particularly hot is when I have it charging while I work. When it's running off the battery alone it is just fine. I really don't know who these people are they freak out about the "heat." It's just not that bad.

64 Bit Support?

[tji]

I sent Brian a question (shortly before he got "Slashdotted") about whether the new MacBook Pros supported 64 bit mode. He was kind enough to compile and run the little 'sizeof' program I sent him and respond about the output..

The announcements and marketing information about the new MBP's was conspicuously absent of any mention of the 64 bit support of the new Merom / Core 2 Duo processor. This is strange because both the Mac Pro and the iMac specifically mention their 64 bit support.

There is a lot of contradictory information floating around about the state of 64 bit support on the Intel Macs. So, I asked him to compile an app to show the sizeof a long int and pointer. The output showed 4 Bytes / 32 bits.

So, this is curious... Does x86 Tiger not support 64 bit mode? But, people have done tests on 32 bit vs. 64 bit on intel Macs ( http://www.geekpatrol.ca/blog/150/ ). So, why is the MBP different than the iMac, which uses the same processor and chipset?

Anyone have more definitive information on 64 bit support for this new MacBook Pro? Or for x86 Tiger, the new iMacs and Mac Pro's?

Also, before all the "64 bit support is pointless" replies; yes, I know it can only handle 3GB of RAM. I know the benefits of 64 bit will not be dramatic (I already have two Linux boxes running Athlon64's in 64 bit mode). I'm just curious whether all the features of the processor can be used. I also want the performance benefit of doubling the number of general purpose processors and 64 bit math. And, since Leopard is supposed to have much better 64 bit support, I want to see where this MacBook Pro will stand.

Re:64 Bit Support?

[Anubis350]

AFAIK on 10.4 only the PPC version is 64-bit. We'll have to wait till 10.5 for 64bit mode on x86, right now it runs in 32-bit.

Re:64 Bit Support?

[Anonymous Coward]

Try adding "-arch ppc64" to your compiler flags.

Re:64 Bit Support?

[Anonymous Coward]

Tiger has a 64 bit kernel, whereas Leopard will have a 64 bit userspace as well.

Re:64 Bit Support?

[Sancho]

64-bit is only supported if the app is compiled against a few specific libraries (I forget which ones). Any other apps will behave as 32-bit. I'm not sure if the next OS X release will change this.

Re:64 Bit Support?

[PygmySurfer]

The geekpatrol blog you referenced in your post did some MacBook Pro Core 2 Duo benchmarking, and they tested in both 32-bit and 64-bit mode. So it seems to me that they support it.

Re:64 Bit Support?

[TheRaven64]

The default ABI is 32-bit. Try adding -m64 to your compiler flags.

Re:64 Bit Support?

[gsnedders]

Tiger supports 64-bit CLI applications (although 32-bit is still the default when compiling), and Leopard will support full 64-bit GUIs.

Re:64 Bit Support?

[tji]

Thanks for the tip.. Brian read this thread and tried out that flag. With that flag, it outputs "8" for pointer and long int.

So, it seems that the kernel on the new MBP's are indeed 64 bit.

Re:64 Bit Support?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Mac OS X10.4 (Tiger) kernel is always 32bit, but supports 64bit (LP64) user-space proceses on PPC64 and x86-64 processors.

The kernel remains 32bit mostly because it doesn't has to be 64bit and it greatly simplifies the driver compatibility story.

I believe the story remains the same for Leopard. My guess would be that this will only change when support for 32bit-only processors gets dropped, probably around 3 to 5 years after Apple sells its last 32-bit only Macintosh.

Re:64 Bit Support?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, this is wrong for x86_64. PPC64 may be more versatile, but in x86_64 you put the processor in 32 or 64 bit mode on startup. If you put it in 32 bit mode, it has no access to any 64 bit features, math, registers, etc. In 64 bit mode, it can do all the 64 bit functions, as well as 32 bit.

So, the Tiger kernel must be 64 bit mode. But, since it includes all the 32 bit libraries, it has no problem running standard 32 bit code.

Hats o' gold, thanks to your friends at /.

[mactari]

Eventually the forum thread got out of hand, and he set up a website devoted to answering the questions. If you have a question that hasn't already been answered, email him at the address on the site. He is responding daily and sometimes within minutes. This guy is dedicated.

And thanks to slashdot, maybe those Google Ads he's added to his answers will bring him a few bucks he wouldn't have made on the "out of hand" macrumors forum.

Not that there's anything necessarily wrong with cashing in -- macrumors' forum isn't exactly ad-free either -- but I'm not real sure how making your own website to answer questions makes slashdot. If he'd taken it apart, upgraded the processor, or found out that there's something inside we hadn't heard of, well, telling us about that is possibly post worthy. Right now, this story is just hardware.slashdot.org-as-billboard.

One of the incredible bits of insight from the site:
Q: What can you tell me about the battery?
A: Not a whole lot. Made in China (what isn't), Model # A1175, Li-ion.

Wow.

Save yourself some time, and skip directly to pictures of Sudan or Christian Wife Pictures. Not joking.

Re:Hats o' gold, thanks to your friends at /.

[TomHandy]

Well, to me at least, the information he's been providing has been useful.... in particular the determination of the clockspeed of the X1600, which shows it to be clocked much closer to stock speeds than the old MBP's. A lot of this is not information that can be easily gleaned elsewhere, and what is notable as far as I'm concerned is that he was one of the first people to get his C2D MBP and actually run all these tests and answer all these questions people asked of him. He's put a lot of time into it, and I see no problem with him putting some google ads up as well.

Re:Hats o' gold, thanks to your friends at /.

[Anonymous Coward]

Let me get this straight: answering questions regarding an unreleased, unanounced apple product truthfully with that product in hand is somehow not interesting to you?

OK, so you don't like Macs. Or you don't care about the new models. Either way, please buzz off.

Re:Hats o' gold, thanks to your friends at /.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep, so the critique isn't that he's got ads, but that /. decided to give him another, an ad for his ads, so to speak.

If "the determination of the clockspeed of the X1600" is particularly important, put that fact in the OP with context, or also point to a site (the macrumors forums?) where the importance of that is contextualized. Or wait for the site to be of obvious enough interest that it's worth posting here. Battery trivia and Christian Wife Pictures don't do it for me.

Re:Hats o' gold, thanks to your friends at /.

[The Ego]

answering questions regarding an unreleased, unanounced apple product

You mean this secret, unreleases, unannounced Apple product?

Re:Hats o' gold, thanks to your friends at /.

[Anonymous Coward]

OK, so you don't like Macs. Or you don't care about the new models. Either way, please buzz off.

Ha. If you call writing for xlr8yourmac, Inside Mac Games, contributing the tiniest bit to the Mac Bible a few years back, releasing shareware Mac-first, and posting now from an iBook G4 (with over a gig of RAM, no less) not liking Macs, well, I won't argue with you.

And I'm very interested in the new models. Tell me something new about them, or don't post to /.

Re:Hats o' gold, thanks to your friends at /.

[cthulhu11]

Li ion? Doesn't Apple claim Li polymer?

Re:Performance (Xbench) and Apple's claim of 7x sp

[PygmySurfer]

Because Apple cherry picks the test results they publish on their web site. It seems the 7 times performance improvement claim strictly relates to SPEC benchmarks.

1. Testing conducted by Apple in October 2006 using preproduction MacBook Pro units with Core 2 Duo; MacBook Pro with Core Duo and PowerBook G4 systems were shipping units. *On a 2.33GHz Core 2 Duo-based MacBook Pro, Logic Pro showed a 45% performance improvement, playing 240 reverb plug-ins, compared to 165 reverb plug-ins played on a 2.16GHz Core Duo MacBook Pro. MacBook Pro continuously monitors system thermal and power conditions, and may adjust processor speed as needed to maintain optimal system operation.
      2. Estimated SPECint_rate_base2000 score: 6.6 for 1.67GHz PowerBook G4, 48.4 for 2.33GHz Core 2 Duo system and 34.8 for 2.16GHz Core Duo system. Estimated SPECfp_rate_base2000 score: 4.9 for 1.67GHz PowerBook G4, 37.1 for 2.33GHz Core 2 Duo system and 27.6 for 2.16GHz Core Duo system. SPEC®, SPECfp, and SPECint are registered trademarks of the Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation (SPEC); see www.spec.org for more information.

Calm down kids, it's just a computer.

[fuego451]

Go ahead and mod me troll or flamebate but all this gush, gush, squirt, squirt over a f**king laptop just seems so bizarre. Perhaps it is because I had way too much French white wine tonight, a rare treat for me, with my wonderful fish dinner and things appear closer than they really are but doesn't this bcavanau character seem a bit contrived? He is able to answer hundreds of questions almost instantaneously and all of a sudden he has his own web site, with ads no less. All due to his new macbookpro, I suppose.

Re:Calm down kids, it's just a computer.

[TomHandy]

Of course it isn't contrived. There was a forum thread on MacRumors, and he was one of the first people to pick up his MBP from an Apple Store. People started asking him questions, and he went ahead and set up a separate website where he could post answers, screenshots, 3DMark scores, etc. based on the various tests people asked of him. He isn't answering "hundreds of questions almost instantaneously"; he asked people to send him things they wanted to find out (i.e. temperatures, clockspeed of the X1600, etc.) and went ahead and put them up.

Re:Calm down kids, it's just a computer.

[fuego451]

Well, I got hammered for my remarks, as I felt I would, and I'm sure that makes someone feel better. I did read the article before posting and I knew that most of the questions being asked of this guy were answered on the Apple spec page. I'm sure that some folks need to know the clock-speed of the X1600, also answered on the Apple site, but I believe many more buy high-end mac's on reputation alone, I would. It just seemed like this whole thing was a marketing gimmick.

Re:Calm down kids, it's just a computer.

[thesandtiger]

You call 1 response to your comment - someone pointing out your errors in a fairly pleasant manner - and overall neutral moderation "hammered"?

I do not think that word means what you think it means.

Re:Calm down kids, it's just a computer.

[fuego451]

No, I was refering to the -1 Troll I received for my original remarks. I had no problem at all with TomHandy's comment and I understand the points he made.

Re:Calm down kids, it's just a computer.

[TomHandy]

Where on Apple's site does it tell you the clock-speed of the X1600 in the new MBP's (or even the old ones for that matter)?

Re:Calm down kids, it's just a computer.

[thesandtiger]

Right - my point being that it was one person modding you down. That's hardly hammered here. Try posting something that REALLY goes against the /. zeitgeist and you'll see the hammers fall. Angels would weep to see how much abuse you'd take then. Babies and kittens would spontaneously catch fire. Television's Ray Romano would call you at home to taunt you.

Re:Calm down kids, it's just a computer.

[fuego451]

Hmmm, you are correct Tom. I skimmed the spec page last night and thought I saw something clock-speed related under 'Video and graphics support'.

Re:Calm down kids, it's just a computer.

[fuego451]

I have seen it happen and have no desire to harm innocent animals, not even a Sand Tiger, or cause distress to an angel and I certainly don't want tv people calling me.

'Sand Tiger' does tingle the 'fight or flight' switch in my lizard brain, along with 'Bull Shark' and 'Great White'. As a young beach-rat/surfer in the mid '50's, I never really thought much about shark attacks but that changed along with increasing popularity of the sport and attacks.

Want To Know About the New Apple MacBook Pro?

[justsomebody]

No, not really.

simply couldn't resist making this comment:)

Re:Performance (Xbench) and Apple's claim of 7x sp

[toddestan]

How can they make such a claim? I could understand missing by a few percentage points, but their claim is WAY off reality.

Apple's been doing this for years, it's nothing new - it was actually quite funny to watch them do a complete 180 in regards to Intel vs. PPC a while back. Basically, don't pay any attention to any benchmarks performed by the same company that sells the hardware.

aren't you even disagreeing with parent?

[ArbitraryConstant]

It sounds like you're giving a very lengthy explanation of why one should agree with Apple's lineup decisions, which doesn't really contradict the post you replied to, which said something very similar with a much more negative spin.

But, you've also said stuff that's not true. Most importantly, it's not a matter of not wanting to risk bleeding edge stuff. That's crap, and if it were true they would not, for example, have jumped on the Core Duo bandwagon so early. Also, the resolutions we're talking about now have been economical for several years, the lower resolution of Apple laptops has been a persistent problem for several years now.

I also don't think it has anything to do with keeping the order page simple. They've got selectable memory, hard drives, optical drives, various addons, etc. Would it really complicate things that much to give a few different options on a major component?

The only arguments that hold water are that it makes Apple's inventory easier, and that it's a good DPI to use for some applications.

However, I don't care that it makes Apple's inventory easier. That's not my problem. My problem is getting a computer that meets my needs.

Nor do I care that it's a good DPI for someone that's not me. I need high resolution to fit lots of code, documentation, and terminal windows on the screen. Many Apple fans assume that choosing the best compromise is the right answer, but that's wrong. Allowing the user to choose their favorite is the answer.

Re:aren't you even disagreeing with parent?

[jellomizer]

I am not disagreeing that WUXGA screens are worse then apple. I am disagreeing with that the reason why Apple put it in is because they think they know best. I am pointing out they are putting in what is best for them. And reasons why it is best for them. There is a lot of Bleading Edge technology that works well from their release, but Apple doesn't like taking that risk.

Bleeding edge vs. Leading edge The Core 2 Duo have been out for months a full month for Laptops. There was time for the processors to be checked out and proven. If it was bleading edge when Intel release the Chip the next day Apple will be shipping with them. (Like dell). Well I searched many of the major laptop manufactures about these displays when the C2D MBP was released and its resolution was normal with other high systems not the highest and not the lowest.
(I am not a display expert) As well I would like to know how much battery life if any you save by using the lower res, as well difference in brightness, and aspect angle.

So Apple doesn't feet your needs, then don't get it. If you really need something that customized then get a PC. PCs have always been more customizable then Apples anyways. I myself personally have gone threw a complete customizable phase, where I just build a PC to do what I want. But with the direction of my professional work, as well my personal interests I am no longer as concerned about making all the choices. I am willing to put a little blind trust to a company (that has earned my trust) that they will give me a well balanced system. So I don't have to pine thew toms hardware on all the spec for every part. And doing all the engineering and choice making that apple spends good money to figure out. It is not about me not knowing what the stuff is or what it does. But it is things like if you ware willing to loose 100 pixels in one direction to save enough for faster ram, or knowing the OS doesn't depend much on this component and more on that. Unless you want to spend a Ton of money on the best of everything. Anything before that and the more you want to go down in price requires more and more decisions on what to trade off. A maxed out Dell Laptop Costs over $6500 that is about 33% faster then a $3000 Apple Laptop. So is it worth it? It is up to you.

If you want an apple with the higest possible resolution then get a MacPro with a 30" display, or whatever display. I am sure you can also pop out the one that comes with the laptop and put in a better one. And sell the origional one on ebay.

I code a lot too. To get the extra text in, I do a Crazy thing like making the font smaller. Or I hook up to an external Display. and I get my Screen with an additional high res screen, OS X makes this easy an convenient for its users. It is not saying a higher res display wouldn't be nicer but loosing an inch in 2 directions in pixels isn't much a loss. Especially the way apple makes workaround for these limitation much easier and convient to manage then Windows or LInux.

Re:aren't you even disagreeing with parent?

[ArbitraryConstant]

"Bleeding edge vs. Leading edge The Core 2 Duo have been out for months a full month for Laptops. There was time for the processors to be checked out and proven. If it was bleading edge when Intel release the Chip the next day Apple will be shipping with them. (Like dell)."

I wasn't talking about C2D, I was talking about Core Duos, which Apple shipped in January, right after they were launched. Apple didn't give them much time to vet themselves.

Therefore, I think this is just a rationalization, not the real reason. It's false too much for it to be the real motivation.

"So Apple doesn't feet your needs, then don't get it. If you really need something that customized then get a PC. PCs have always been more customizable then Apples anyways. I myself personally have gone threw a complete customizable phase, where I just build a PC to do what I want. But with the direction of my professional work, as well my personal interests I am no longer as concerned about making all the choices. I am willing to put a little blind trust to a company (that has earned my trust) that they will give me a well balanced system."

That's funny 'cause Apple has lost my trust. They had it at one time, but I wasn't able to keep that up given the needs I have that they don't even attempt to me, and the total lack of balance that's evident in so many of their systems.

For example, I recently got a workstation. Yet, I only needed one dual-core CPU, so getting a dual-Xeon system would be a huge waste of money. Where are Apple's well-balanced systems in this case? I see only extremes in two directions. I don't want a maxed out Dell, but I don't want a gimped pseudo-laptop like an iMac or a massively overkilled machine like a Mac Pro either. I want well balanced, and Apple doesn't have it.

"A maxed out Dell Laptop Costs over $6500 that is about 33% faster then a $3000 Apple Laptop. So is it worth it? It is up to you."

If that's what I was talking about, it wouldn't be worth it. Since that's not what I'm talking about, I clearly have to explain further.

I don't want a completely maxed out machine. I want one that has money allocated to things I care about, and away from things I don't care about. This is much more difficult with Apple. The Dell I'd get might cost the same, but have a better screen instead of a higher clock speed on the CPU that I don't need but Apple won't give me a choice.

"I code a lot too. To get the extra text in, I do a Crazy thing like making the font smaller. Or I hook up to an external Display. and I get my Screen with an additional high res screen, OS X makes this easy an convenient for its users. It is not saying a higher res display wouldn't be nicer but loosing an inch in 2 directions in pixels isn't much a loss. Especially the way apple makes workaround for these limitation much easier and convient to manage then Windows or LInux."

When coding, the first thing I do is make the font smaller, but with Apple's DPI, the pixels are too big and the letters become illegible sooner. With a higher resolution screen, I can take this further, and fit more onto a laptop screen when I can't have dual displays like I do at home.

Re:aren't you even disagreeing with parent?

[Achromatic1978]

Well I searched many of the major laptop manufactures about these displays when the C2D MBP was released and its resolution was normal with other high systems not the highest and not the lowest.

A maxed out Dell Laptop Costs over $6500 that is about 33% faster then a $3000 Apple Laptop.

So why make the comparison, then? Because there's quite a bit more to it than speed. There's a higher resolution display, for one. For another, the T7600 is faster than the MBPs (though you did notice that - you can also get a 7600G which officially supports overclocking). But to get the computer (XPS M1710) upto that $6500, you had to choose 4GB of 667MHz RAM. Even at 533MHz, that twice the amount of memory is in itself $1200 cheaper. That's before trying to compare an ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 256mb to a 512MB NVIDIA GeForce Go 7950 GTX. So the reality is that the "comparable" tricked out (I'm deliberately trying to avoid the "It uses BIOS, not EFI, so it's not the same!!!!11!1!one!" arguments) is $3727, even with the far superior video card.

Newsflash:

[thedbp]

The people that have the knowledge and time to upgrade their kernels and individual system compoents, will. And they will run Linux.

The other 99.9 percent just want something that works that they don't have to fiddle with and is also rock-solid stable and comes w/ incredible media creation apps built in and integrated into every major part of the OS.

Re:Newsflash:

[Ash-Fox]

The people that have the knowledge and time to upgrade their kernels and individual system compoents

How much bloody knowledge do you need to click the 'there are new updates' taskbar icon (Kubuntu)?

The other 99.9 percent just want something that works that they don't have to fiddle with and is also rock-solid stable and comes

I agree with this.

w/ incredible media creation apps

No... Can't really think of many people who even want to mess with those (even though they have it available to them).

built in and integrated into every major part of the OS.

... Like what? Video recording button in a word processor file open dialog?

Re:Newsflash:

[thedbp]

How much bloody knowledge do you need to click the 'there are new updates' taskbar icon (Kubuntu)?
Not much. Installing MythTV (which many people may want to do), however, is another matter entirely.

No... Can't really think of many people who even want to mess with those (even though they have it available to them).
You're right. We shouldn't give people the ability to learn how to edit movies, record music, author DVDs, etc. Personal expression is overrated. We should take the content we're given and like it. ... Like what? Video recording button in a word processor file open dialog?
Now, that's just retarded. There is however an audio recording function built into the Mac version of Word so you can record the lecture as you take notes ...

Seriously, do you think before you respond?

Re:Newsflash:

[Ash-Fox]

Not much. Installing MythTV (which many people may want to do), however, is another matter entirely.

Never heard of it honestly. I did look it up, looks like a interesting project. The installation instructions looked a bit messy for Ubuntu based distros, however the dedicated distributions to the task didn't seem messy upon first glance

The closest thing I can think of that exists that I can compare against in the world that is similar is Sky's Sky+ package and TiVo. I'm not aware of other solutions (hey, I just heard of mythtv -- although I'm not really interested in anything like that). Although by comparison, Sky+ and TiVo come with a operating system setup and preconfigured for the hardware they come on. So it seems more like apples and oranges to me.

I'm pretty sure the installation can be improved, but then again, this software hasn't reached version one yet. So you can't expect it to be ready yet.

You're right. We shouldn't give people the ability to learn how to edit movies, record music, author DVDs, etc.

Don't put words into my mouth. I was only disputing your claims of what most people 'just want'.

There is however an audio recording function built into the Mac version of Word so you can record the lecture as you take notes ...

I fail to see how that's integrated into 'every major part of the OS'. Sounds just like a Word feature to me.

Re:Performance (Xbench) and Apple's claim of 7x sp

[TomHandy]

It's not necessarily a complete 180 though. A lot of those PPC vs. Intel debates were back when Intel was making the Pentium IV, and before they had gone down the path of the Pentium M, which led to Core Duo, and now Core 2 Duo. The old Pentium IV stuff was a dead-end, and the criticism of them was spot on. And the proof is in the fact that Intel did change their direction on processors.

You _can_ get 320GB in a laptop

[real gumby]

What I really want can't be provided by Apple... a fast 320GB notebook drive. That would change my life.

Well, Apple won't sell it to you but you can buy it: there's a company that offers to replace your DVD drive with a hard disk. If you can function OK on the road without a CD/DVD drive (and use an external at home) then this will give you what you asked for. Hmm, just found 'em: http://www.mcetech.com/optibay/. They apparently consider it a self-install procedure! I'm not sure most people should Try It At Home but whatever.

Well, you see...

[Anonymous Coward]

...this is Apple, so it's different. It looks like you need to be reprogrammed!

whining about heat

[Gary W. Longsine]

I've seen a few laptops that had batteries in the recent replacement ranges where the new battery ran so much cooler that the laptop operating temperature dropped 15 to 20 degrees. I suspect much of the whining for the past year and a half was due to bad batteries.

Re:whining about heat

[binary paladin]

You know... I just posted about how my 12" Al PowerBook wasn't a problem and then I read your post. I purchased the machine off of eBay and got a replacement battery along with it because Apple was recalling it. I've never used it with the original battery but I wonder how much of an issue that may have been. I'm writing this purely to clarify (if anyone read my other post) that I do indeed have a newer battery.

Re:Performance (Xbench) and Apple's claim of 7x sp

[gnasher719]

'' I've heard that Apple is claiming that the new Core2 Duo is 7 times faster than the old "top of the line" 1.67Ghz PowerBook. But comparing the XBench output that was posted earlier to an XBench run that I just ran (see below my signature) shows only a 2x increase in almost every single category (there was one or two that were about 2.5 times higher). ''

I thought people would know by now that XBench is about the most useless "benchmark" around.

There is the fact that they measure the speed of the user interface by changing the title of a single button as fast as possible - unfortunately, the OS very sensibly limits this to 60 frames per second or whatever the display rate is, so this code will _never_ get faster, no matter how fast the hardware is.

Then the benchmark is single threaded. Guess what effect two or four processors have on this benchmark: None. In the real world, they double or quadruple the speed of speed critical code. The floating-point code uses a single precision FFT implementation that was written to highlight the capabilities of Altivec but never used by anyone in the real world. Let's say it wasn't high on the priority list when rewriting it for x86.

64 bit is only a big deal on AMD

[argent]

Unless you're running code that's pushing hard against the limits of 4GB of RAM (well, 2GB on Windows), in which case you already know it and you're almost certainly not using OS X or Windows anyway (unless you're some kind of masochist, or you're Oracle), the only reason to run 64 bit is to take advantage of the larger register file on an AMD 64-bit processors. AMD pulled a very clever trick here, and used 64-bit processing as an excuse to introduce an ABI that exposed a larger register file to the compiler, which gave them a performance edge over Intel. Intel doesn't seem to have really taken advantage of this on their new rev of the old P6 core... they're just depending on their better process to make up for the overhead.

Re:64 bit is only a big deal on AMD

[Anonymous Coward]

Intel doesn't seem to have really taken advantage of this

Wrong.

NO WIRELESS??

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't believe that in this day and age Apple is selling notebook computers WITHOUT wireless by default. Not only that, you really have to dig around to even find the option to add an airport card to a Macbook pro. What the hell?

Re:NO WIRELESS??

[Anonymous Coward]

It actually has an 802.11 pre-n chip, and with a driver/firmware upgrade can be updated to 802.11n when the spec is ratified.

Limitations of DRM

[argent]

You can, in theory, guarantee that your OS has not been compromised.

You can guarantee that it has not been modified through direct manipulation of the executable files. You can not guarantee that it hasn't been compromised by (for example) a buffer overflow attack in the current session. Unless you remove all interpreters from the system or require that all interpreted code (including configuration files!) be signed, it's not much harder to run arbitrary code even on a TPM-protected system than to devise an exploit in the first place.

You can't even guarantee that it's clean at boot, since a secondary exploit could be hidden in a data file, database, or configuration file to be re-run at boot.

And by making it impossible to replace the binaries without devising a similar exploit yourself you prevent people from fixing the problem... you have to wait for the manufacturer to do it. We can see how well that has worked for Microsoft.

Re:WUXGA a question

[bblfish]

Sorry for the ignorant question. If WUXGA is 1920x1200 and the max supported resolution on the 17" is 1680x1050 then how come it is still WUXGA. Now I did do a little research on Wikipedia WUXGA right before, but that does not tell all the story. For example it says that North American HDTV uses 1920×1080 pictures, so it would seem that those would not quite fit on the 17" laptop, no?

What am I missing?

Re:laptop drive dual screens

[Anonymous Coward]

Check out Matrox... They claim to have an external box that will do just that:

http://www.matrox.com/graphics/en/gxm/products/dh2 go/home.php

Note: I haven't actually used one yet, just want one!

Pitting?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have had the same Powerbook for three years until it decided to fry a few months ago. It was a fantastic machine, except that the metal pitted deeply where I rested my palm. And I men deep. I took it to the Apple store many times for an explanation, with no result, or replacement. I was fine with this, figuring that the case was not anodized properly or something.

I got a Macbook Pro in September. Different Apple store, different resident expert. I took my old powerbook along to show the pitting, and asked if the newer Macbook was improved in this regard. I was informed that it was, and that I should not get pitting in this machine. It is now October, and it looks like a small pin has stabbed my machine a thousand times in the area of the palm rests.

What the hell is wrong with the case of my laptop? Does anyone our here know what I should call it? And does Applecare cover this and the Apple store just doesn't know?

Re:Pitting?

[Jerry Rivers]

Geez man, change our diet, your sweat is toxic.

Re:Pitting?

[easter1916]

Try cutting back on the amount of acid in your diet. And turn on the A/C, you sweaty bastard.

Wait a bit

[Anonymous Coward]

As a checkin assistant at a certified Mac repair shop, I can't say I'd recommend the MacBook line at the moment. I've seen more MacBooks (Pro and regular-type) coming in for repair over the past month than any other type of Mac - mostly with powering and booting issues, but we've also seen bad LCDs and really weird battery problems. Of course, the systems are all just out of return policy and the customers are pissed. I've also noticed a trend of people bringing in MacBooks with "RTN" written across their proofs of purchase...apparently a lot of them are DOA too. Not the happiest time to be an Apple repair shop.

Re:WUXGA a question

[wolrahnaes]

1080i/p HDTV would be letterboxed, so it fits fine just has some leftover space at the top and bottom.

Don't ask me why, but for some reason even though HDTVs are 16:9, those building widescreen computer monitors decided 16:10 was better.

deaf cat

[falconwolf]

Our newest kitten is completely white, male, and stone deaf. Not an uncommon thing in male white cats.

Does your cat have blue eyes? Deafness is uncommon in cats, even white cats, unless their eyes are blue, it's a recessed genetic trait and doesn't matter what sex the cat is. Years ago I had a female cat like this.

Falcon

Re:deaf cat

[Bing Tsher E]

His eyes are green. We think he is a genetically white cat, not just a 'spotted cat with one big white spot.' But we know nothing about his genetic history.

Re:WUXGA a question

[bblfish]

Well ok, HDTV pictures would fit on the 17" PowerBook's laptop screen, as they could fit on any laptop screen if resized correctly. The question I was raising, not very clearly though, is whether if the pictures of HTDV are 1920×1080 pixels, viewing them on a 1680x1050 pixel screen would entail some loss of quality? It would seems so doing simple maths: 220 pixels in the length and 30 pixels in the height.

But according to wikipedia both 1920x1080 and 1680x1050 are considered WUXGA. So are we missing out a lot on these new 17" PowerBook Pro's?

tough books

[falconwolf]

Just make sure you get a rugged case. Remember folks, the laws of physics still apply, and metal does dent.

I've been wondering how tough the cases for the MacBook Pro are, I've heard their pretty hardy but I wonder if they can take a lot of beating. I'd like to be able to take mine with me when I go hiking. Then when I get a dsrl camera I could easily tranfer my photos to the laptop and do preliminary editing.

Falcon

large hds

[falconwolf]

I must admit I've never seen the point of huge amounts of local storage in a laptop (or any standalone PC, for that matter). If you want lots of space, you're far better off putting it into a separate machine.

Maybe you don't see the need for large storage capacity but many do. My old desktop, er tower, PC has two hds, the original is 40GB and the second is 120GB. Between the two I have maybe 10GB freespace. Though I don't have one now I'll easily fillup 160GB when I get a DSRL camera. Why should I get a second machine just for storage? I may get a NAS but I doubt it.

Falcon

docking station

[falconwolf]

* A docking station

BookEndz [bookendzdocks.com] makes some port replicators, but they're really not that impressive. I think thats probably the one feature I'd like to see Apple add to the MacBook lines.

Same here, I'd really like to get, have, a docking station for the MacBook Pro. When I have a PC laptop I used it almost as much away from home as I did at home and having a dock was so much easier and quicker than plugging and unplugging all the cables, I went through this daily sometimes two or three tymes a day.

Falcon

MS Office

[falconwolf]

A Microsoft product is the only thing Apple has to show the general public that OS X is not a toy. It's pretty sad... If Microsoft ever kills their OS X version, they're fucking screwed.

I heard, er read, some tyme back that MS was going to discontinue Office for Macs once their obligation is fulfilled. This is why Apple did Keynotes, or some such. However if MS does kill Office for Macs then they loose a leg with the monopoly charge hanging over them. Keeping Office for Macs going is a "cheap" way to say they aren't a monopoly and it earns them a little money. Now what I'm really looking forward to in Leopard are the Windows APIs in it so Windows apps can run in Leopard without using virtualization.

Falcon

Re:MS Office

[IntergalacticWalrus]

Now what I'm really looking forward to in Leopard are the Windows APIs in it so Windows apps can run in Leopard without using virtualization.

What?? Where the hell did you get that from?

Re:MS Office

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft's contractual obligation to develop Office for the Macintosh expired in 2002.

apple educational discounts

[falconwolf]

Kids buy them while they're in school and get the heavy educational discount.

Then they graduate, start paying their student loans, and 'sidegrade' (not upgrade or downgrade) to a Dell.

The last tyme I checked, about 3 or 4 months ago, the educational discounts Apple has weren't even %10. I recall when they were %50, back then it was half the price.

Falcon

Re:Performance (Xbench) and Apple's claim of 7x sp

[matherman]

Yea here is my Xbench results and I see nothing that is 7x faster. I have the last generation 1.67 15" powerbook. with the optional 7200rpm 100gb drive(which is at 90% capacity). Also i only have 1.5gb mem.

Results 44.90
System Info
Xbench Version 1.3
System Version 10.4.8 (8L127)
Physical RAM 1536 MB
Model PowerBook5,8
Processor PowerPC G4 @ 1.67 GHz
L1 Cache 32K (instruction), 32K (data)
L2 Cache 512K @ 1.67 GHz
Bus Frequency 167 MHz
Video Card ATY,RV360M11
Drive Type Hitachi HTS721010G9AT00
CPU Test 68.41
GCD Loop 100.07 5.27 Mops/sec
Floating Point Basic 43.09 1.02 Gflop/sec
AltiVec Basic 250.02 9.96 Gflop/sec
vecLib FFT 77.43 2.55 Gflop/sec
Floating Point Library 43.53 7.58 Mops/sec
Thread Test 66.58
Computation 62.63 1.27 Mops/sec, 4 threads
Lock Contention 71.06 3.06 Mlocks/sec, 4 threads
Memory Test 28.58
System 24.63
Allocate 140.09 514.47 Kalloc/sec
Fill 29.59 1438.94 MB/sec
Copy 12.36 255.37 MB/sec
Stream 34.04
Copy 33.48 691.42 MB/sec [altivec]
Scale 38.75 800.54 MB/sec [altivec]
Add 32.74 697.46 MB/sec [altivec]
Triad 31.96 683.74 MB/sec [altivec]
Quartz Graphics Test 57.07
Line 52.75 3.51 Klines/sec [50% alpha]
Rectangle 60.75 18.14 Krects/sec [50% alpha]
Circle 60.27 4.91 Kcircles/sec [50% alpha]
Bezier 63.29 1.60 Kbeziers/sec [50% alpha]
Text 50.50 3.16 Kchars/sec
OpenGL Graphics Test 72.88
Spinning Squares 72.88 92.45 frames/sec
User Interface Test 34.71

Re:WUXGA a question

[wolrahnaes]

Wikipedia's wrong then. All I've ever heard used to refer to 1680x1050 is WSXGA+

My claims of no quality loss were based on WUXGA (1920x1200) which can display 1080p pixel for pixel. On a WSXGA+ display, there will be a loss of information, though a good decoder will make this unnoticable and it will still look better than 720p content on the same display.

I have a Dell 2005FPW WSXGA+ display and I run my Xbox 360 at 720p through it with excellent results, but it can't compare to playing 1080i movies or some of the very little 1080p content out there. Side by side the difference is obvious.

Windows APIs in Leopard

[falconwolf]

What?? Where the hell did you get that from?

One place I heard it is here. I've read a number of posts on slashdot that have said Windows APIs might be in Leopard, er I thought I did but I just searched and didn't get any results. So I googled and found some info:

1. Leopard To Run Windows Apps Via API Just Like OS/2 Did
2. 9 Mac OS X Leopard rumors
3. Apple implementing Windows API directly in Mac OS X Leopard? (Windows apps on Mac without Windows)

I found others along the same lines: OS X leopard windows api. As for how factual they all are I don't know but I'm really hoping to see it come true, I'm using an HP PC typing this but within a couple of weeks I plan on getting a MacBook Pro and I want to be able to run at least one Windows app on it without using either bootcamp or a vm to run Windows. I'll probably get CrossOver Mac but I'd prefer Windows APIs in Leopard.

Falcon

Re:Windows APIs in Leopard

[IntergalacticWalrus]

Uh? All three articles mention Cringely making shit up.

Besides that's completely unrealistic.

DOES IT RUN LINUX on a BEOWULF CLUSTER??

[Anonymous Coward]

...and does it run hot enough to heat my grits to Natalie Portman levels of hotness???

Re:Performance (Xbench) and Apple's claim of 7x sp

[toddestan]

Well, take how much faster Apple claimed the PPC chips were than the P4's, then multiply that by how much faster Apple claims the Core chips are than the PPC chips, and you will have how much faster the Core chips are compared to the P4 according to Apple. There is no question that the Pentium 4 was a dead end, but there is no way the Core chips are 25-35x faster as Apple math would imply.

Re:WUXGA a question

[dfghjk]

"1080i/p HDTV would be letterboxed, so it fits fine just has some leftover space at the top and bottom."

Nonsense.

"Don't ask me why, but for some reason even though HDTVs are 16:9, those building widescreen computer monitors decided 16:10 was better."

Sony introduced the first widescreen monitor for PCs long before HDTV existed and its native resolution was WUXGA. The 16:10 format has carried on since then. On PCs it does allow viewing a 16:9 with a little vertical room for controls or a menu bar, for example, but I doubt that was a deliberate decision at the time.

Re:WUXGA a question

[wolrahnaes]

The earliest evidence of 16:10 PC monitors that I've seen is the Sony GDM-W900 in early 2000. 16:9 had been part of the HDTV standard for years before then, plus DVDs (typically 16:9 or even wider) were beginning to catch on.

16:10 seems to be another confusing and reasonless LCD quirk, just like the 5:4 1280x1024 resolution. That said, I like my widescreens and don't really want things to change.

You don't even know what to be angry about

[SuperKendall]

Not this idiotic complaint again - TPM is used only to make sure OS X will run on computers that contain the right signature. All other OS'es, including Windows and Linux, will run just fine on any Mac.

You see, what people are up in arms about in relation to TPM is that it will either (a) not let you run any OS but the single one that hardware vendor approves, or (b) not let you run ay applications that the OS maker does not approve. Neither is the case with any Mac hardware or software.

So basically you don't even know why you are upset, you just hear the words "TPM" and like the backwoods hillbilly hearing "bitfoot" stomping through the underbrush you start of firing without knowin' what yer shooting et.

Your post makes one itch for the ability to genetically maniupulate offspring to remove resseive genes. Brave New World, bring it on - at least I won't have to read drivel like your post.

Re:WUXGA a question

[Achromatic1978]

I always assumed 16:10 was so 16:9 content, be it games or movies - can be used with additional space for controls and UI.

Re:Performance (Xbench) and Apple's claim of 7x sp

[NCG_Mike]

The claim of a seven times speed increase is likely due to a favorable test for Intel CPUs and the Intel compiler itself versus IBMs XLC.

I can tell you that, in real world terms, the MacBook Pro is a mutiple factor faster than my dual 2Ghz G5 system... with *some* things. Same OS build, same amount of RAM and the same GCC.

I worked on an app that does a lot of floating point calculations (Gamut modelling to be specific) and the MacBook Pro did a particular calculation about three times faster than the dual G5 I was developing on. It was such a dramatic change that our QA department thought something was wrong.

The app was compiled as a universal binary with GCC 4.0.1 turning on some optimizations for Intel that I couldn't do for the PowerPC range of CPUs as I had to support G3 class processors.

FWIW, I had set the following specifically for Intel builds:

-march=pentium-m -mtune=prescott -msse3 -ftree-vectorize -ftree-vectorizer-verbose=5

On the PowerPC builds I use:

-mtune=G5 -mcpu=G3

Common optimizations are:

-Os -fobjc-direct-dispatch -funroll-loops -DNDEBUG

The NDEBUG is to turn assert() off, of course.

Of note is the lack of SIMD for my PPC builds because of the G3 requirement. Also, I'm pretty sure the codegen for Intel CPUs is more optimized than for PPC builds because of the work the Linux community has done over the years. I've looked at PPC codegen before and GCC often does a bad job of loop processing and creates pipeline stalls frequently due to incorrect branch choices it makes to break the loop, according to Shark.app. Re-writing the C++ loop has been the way I've tricked it into doing what I want.

Re:Performance (Xbench) and Apple's claim of 7x sp

[Anonymous Coward]

They're faster at different things, though. If I run 3x faster than Bob, and Bob carves 4x faster Fred, that doesn't mean I run (or carve) 12x faster than Fred. In case you've never noticed, Apple always uses the 'up to' qualifier on their benchmarketing, because they're at least honest enough to admit (even during keynote speeches) that not every component in the computer has gotten faster at the same rate as the CPU.

Re:WUXGA a question

[dfghjk]

The W900 was the monitor I was referring to. Sony had at least two versions of the monitor, and the earliest reference I found in a quick search was 1997. I had one long before 2000.

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb197/is _199706/ai_hibm1G119360432

While HDTV standards existed in 1997, how many HDTV sets were being sold then? Widescreen DVDs were, and are, typically published in the format they were originally produced and no movie format was ever 16:9. 16:9 was a format dreamed up specifically for HDTV and movie producers weren't fond of it. There is nothing magic about 16:9 and no reason why monitor makes need to avoid 16:10.

16:10 has nothing to do with LCD. It was established as the widescreen monitor format before LCDs were made in that format.

Re:Performance (Xbench) and Apple's claim of 7x sp

[toddestan]

Yes, they always find the one little thing that their computer does do a whole lot faster on some benchmark, then apply that thing to the whole machine by making claims like "up to 7x faster". Sure, they are technically correct, but they are also being very misleading when they do this.