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MacBook Pro Gets Santa Rosa Chipset, LED Screen

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the well-isn't-that-special dept.

frdmfghtr writes "TechNewsWorld is reporting that Apple has updated the MacBook Pro line with the Santa Rosa chipset from Intel. In addition, Apple is also introducing mercury-free displays with some models. 'When Apple presented new editions of its MacBook line last month, the company excluded the latest Intel Centrino chips, dubbed "Santa Rosa," which had been released just days prior. The chips have found their way into Apple's new high-end MacBook Pro notebooks, which the company revealed Tuesday. Certain models use mercury-free displays, falling in line with the company's recent ecological promises.'"

10 of 452 comments (clear)

  1. How about... by daveschroeder · · Score: 5, Informative

    ...a link to the actual MacBook Pro web page and specifications, since that's what people here probably care about, as opposed to a "TechNewsWorld" article being the only thing linked in the summary?

    Also, while Apple folks and other tech-savvy folks may know the Intel-based Macs run Windows, why does the news article not even mention that? For many people even considering buying a Mac, the fact that a laptop like this can easily run Windows natively or seamlessly alongside Mac OS X with packages like Parallels Desktop at least bears repeating.

    1. Re:How about... by alxbtk · · Score: 5, Informative

      Yeah it can run windows, and it's also the first Mac to get a DirectX10 compatible GPU (Nvida 8600 here) which could be a good thing for gamers.

    2. Re:How about... by freedumb2000 · · Score: 5, Informative

      Serioulsy, does anyone even really miss it these day? Tapping on the touchpad with two fingers for a right-click really does not make me miss a second button.

    3. Re:How about... by jellomizer · · Score: 4, Informative

      And many, many people still don't fully understand that, yes, it really, really can run Windows. And yes, your Windows app will really, really work. Yes, even that one. Yes, really.

      That is very true. People don't understand Virtualization and Confuse it with Emulation. Emulators tend to have a lot of problems with compatibiliy because anything that the programmer didn't think of will not work. Virtualization is having the program run nativly and only emulating a few Low Level calls (Memory Containment, Video, Hardware). So if it request some strange opt-code from the processor the processor will nativly handle it, as well the other OS is running so unlike Wine which translate system calls to the host OS. Virtualization handles the OS's System Calls. But historically before Mac Going Intel Everything needed to be Emulated so some stuff didn't work or work well.

      As for boot camp people don't understand where the Hardware code stops and the OS begins. Some people think boot camp is Windows Running on Top of OS X (Like a single user virutalization) Leaving resources reserved for OS X to keep it alive. All boot camp does is work as a boot loader for Windows and once windows is loaded Windows has full control of your system.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
  2. updated features by swissfondue · · Score: 3, Informative

    30-40 minutes estimated additional real battery life for the 15". Although apple isn't saying if most of the additional power saving is coming from the LED-backlit screen.

    --
    Rubies and Pearls are not what you think.
    1. Re:updated features by RMH101 · · Score: 4, Informative

      it's not just from the screen. santa rosa can slow down the whole bus, not just the CPU, making more power saving.

    2. Re:updated features by dave420 · · Score: 4, Informative

      Not to mention its new wireless adaptor and the ability to turn off the second core if needed... and the PCIE, the graphics adaptor, etc. Intel made power savings across the board - Apple don't state where the power savings come from, because Apple doesn't know.

  3. Re:How about color quality? by TheBig1 · · Score: 4, Informative

    I am very interested in this as well, and have been looking around various photo forums for the past few weeks (in expectation of this announcement). The general consensus seems to be that the color gamut is superior on LED displays than traditional ones; whether this first generation one will work this way we'll have to wait and see...

    However, from what I understand, the iPod screens have been LED based for some time; while I don't have one myself, from what I've seen the colors are very nice on them.

    Take that as you will 8-)

    Cheers

  4. Re:How does the chipset help? by k_187 · · Score: 4, Informative

    The big thing is that it will let the macbook pro address a full 4gb of RAM. In the previous revisions only 3GB could be addressed. I'd imagine there are also other power/performance improvements.

    --
    11 was a racehorse
    12 was 12
    1111 Race
    12112
  5. Re:How about color quality? by jddj · · Score: 5, Informative

    The LEDs do just provide the backlight.

    The color spectrum that a given LED provides will necessarily be different than the spectrum that CCF backlights generate, and different from the spectra that the various CRT monitor phosphors generate.

    If a given portion of the spectrum is not present in the "white light" (using that term very loosely here) backlight, no amount of filtering by the LCD screen overlay can put it back. If this is not intuitive, imagine trying to create blue using only a pure-red LED backlight. (You can't do it - the backlight must have at least some blue).

    So if, for example, the LED backlight has more green and red light available in its "white light" spectrum than a CCF backlight has, the LCD overlay so-illuminated can produce yellow tones (since red and green are the constituent primaries that make yellow) that a LCD illuminated with a CCF cannot. That gives the LED-illuminated LCD a wider gamut.

    However, if both the LED-illuminated and the CCF-illuminated LCD overlays only filter light at a resolution of 8 bits per channel, they will both be able to display the same amount of information about color, but because the gamut of one is different from the gamut of the other, in many cases they will not be able to display the same colors.

    The "6-bit" comment in my earlier post refers to the fact that Apple has been shipping 6-bit displays on its Powerbooks and MacBook pros for a while. I believe there has been a /. post on this situation.

    If a manufacturer provides more bit depth (more than 8 bits per channel, f.e.) the LCD overlay will be able to filter the available light more finely than 8- or 6-bit displays can do. In general, an 8-bit display should in fact have a larger (but not necessarily wider) gamut than a 6-bit. A 10-, 12-, or (allow me to dream here) 16-bit-per-channel display would have still larger (but again, not necessarily wider).

    In an LCD display the spectrum of the backlight will determine how wide the gamut can be at its absolute maximum - if a color is not present in that spectrum, it cannot be filtered into existance by the LCD overlay. By the same token, the bit-depth-per-channel of the LCD overlay will determine how many individual color tones are in that gamut.

    In reality, it's a lot more complicated than this, but this is the gist of it.