MacBook and MacBook Pro: Penryn, Battery Life, Updates Sooner than Later?

[Lanbrown]

Originally Posted by Darkroom

could one also speculate that, consequently, the new iMac revision is next week?

Don't forget the Mac Mini.

[flopticalcube]

Mini could use leftovers from the MacBook. Maybe a 2.0/2.2 X3100 mini. iMacs will be next, no doubt.

[rols]

Originally Posted by PenrynMBP

Someone tell me why its only 3MB L2 Cache? I waited so long and paid this much for a lower cache than the previous MBP? You got to be kidding me, I am very close to canceling my order. Someone tell me if its a big difference with 3MB to 4MB.

because that's how Intel makes the chips

[diamond.g]

Originally Posted by d_and_n5000

The only thing I have to say is I hope that Apple makes it very well known that they are using a new formula for their battery tests. I'd imagine that Joe Consumer who did a decent amount of research will take one look at the new MacBook battery test, say "WTF! Battery life dropped an hour and a half! What's Apple doing? They need to beef it up, I'm not getting this for that that much less battery life!" Lost sale. Not good.

They have Wireless Productivity under the numbers. Just like they do for the Macbook Air. Shouldn't be too difficult to figure out.

[arn]

Originally Posted by PenrynMBP

Someone tell me why its only 3MB L2 Cache? I waited so long and paid this much for a lower cache than the previous MBP? You got to be kidding me, I am very close to canceling my order. Someone tell me if its a big difference with 3MB to 4MB.

Based on this benchmark
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=442272

The 2.4GHz Penryn MacBook Pro (3MB L2 Cache) scored the same as a 2.4GHz Merom MacBookPro (4MB L2 Cache).

These are benchmarks, not real world... even so the difference is probably negligable.

arn

[kornyboy]

Wirelessly posted (iPhone: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/4A102 Safari/419.3)

I like this with intel. Maybe we will see revisions closer to when new processors are announced.

[lukechip]

Originally Posted by amac4me

I think you're correct about an iMac update in the near future.

Agree this is likely. Wonder if the GPU in the iMac will get upgraded as well, or at least a CTO upgrade option added.

Has ATI launched anything arrived in the market since August last year which would suit the iMac ? Would they move the iMac back to nVidia again ? Will they have a bet each way ?

[ChrisA]

Originally Posted by PenrynMBP

Someone tell me why its only 3MB L2 Cache? I waited so long and paid this much for a lower cache than the previous MBP? You got to be kidding me, I am very close to canceling my order. Someone tell me if its a big difference with 3MB to 4MB.

What you should care about is the speed of the total SYSTEM. In a multi-level memory system you can estimate the access speed by multiplyingthe cache hit ration by the cache sspeed and adding that to one minus the hit ratio times the RAM speed. So to know if the system speed is better or worse you need to know more than just the size of the cache. Although we assume the hit ratio is influanced by the cache size.

[diamond.g]

Originally Posted by lukechip

Agree this is likely. Wonder if the GPU in the iMac will get upgraded as well, or at least a CTO upgrade option added.

Has ATI launched anything arrived in the market since August last year which would suit the iMac ? Would they move the iMac back to nVidia again ? Will they have a bet each way ?

HD3870 is a good candidate (as is the 9600GT).

[asdavis10]

Originally Posted by Muzzway

Good job, Intel. Apple could use some pushing.

Intel pushing Apple to use the Penryn chip isn't a good thing. Yes the MBP was due for an update, by Apple product standards, but it was still comparably better than anything else in its class. Instead of getting a major revision in specs and design, Apple was forced to introduce a marginal upgrade. Yes multi-touch was something everyone wanted in the new MB ad MBP, but even that is minor.

[nikiski]

I don't know if anyone noticed, but if I am correct I can only see 2 wires coming out of the airport card on the left of the board (instead of 3 on previous model). Can anyone confirm my findings?

I wonder how the wireless reception is on the new MacBook Pro's...

[flopticalcube]

Originally Posted by diamond.g

HD3870 is a good candidate (as is the 9600GT).

The 3870 is coming in March, just in time!

[Beric]

Originally Posted by whidbeyben

The MBA and MBP refreshes show progress, but the market for a 12" MBP has got to be at least as large as the MBA target audience. Add 0.25 inches to the thickness of the MBA to fit in an express card slot, or 3G modem, Firewire for DV capture, and a real hard drive capacity (80GB max is a joke- you couldn't really even rip DVD's onto an MBA for an overseas flight because there'd be no room on the 64GB SSD after installing Leopard, Vista, Office and a moderate sized iLife collection), and you might have a candidate. It's no surprise that the market for used 12" Powerbook G4's is still quite hot on eBay. The 4.5 pound laptop is still a sweet spot. I'm still hoping Apple will come out with a 12 or 13" MBP with the next major MBP revision.

I agree with this. I would never buy a 15 or 17-inch MBP, because of both the price and the size, but I would make a 12-inch MBP my next computer purchase if it existed. I basically want a small-footprint computer that has a good graphics card and a good-sized HD, and processor specs equivalent to a MB. That's pretty much it.

[Muzzway]

Originally Posted by asdavis10

Intel pushing Apple to use the Penryn chip isn't a good thing. Yes the MBP was due for an update, by Apple product standards, but it was still comparably better than anything else in its class. Instead of getting a major revision in specs and design, Apple was forced to introduce a marginal upgrade. Yes multi-touch was something everyone wanted in the new MB ad MBP, but even that is minor.

True, but a minor update is better than no update. Those waiting for a redesign will certainly get it eventually, and this refresh may be thought of as acting sort of like a stepping stone before getting to the next overhaul, whenever it may be ready.

[mrcrapperson]

Originally Posted by TheSpecialist

Interesting that Apple is changing so much, even more appealing to me is that they did at least 1 thing every tuesday...!!!

Also, the new MBP doesn't have the Apple logo on the command key anymore, it now says command or cmd.

hm.. about time

I'll miss the old apple key, but it was kind of a pain to have to describe it when doing phone support.

[InkMaster]

Originally Posted by nikiski

I don't know if anyone noticed, but if I am correct I can only see 2 wires coming out of the airport card on the left of the board (instead of 3 on previous model). Can anyone confirm my findings?

I wonder how the wireless reception is on the new MacBook Pro's...

Looks like the old ones have 2 wires also... unless I'm blind :/

http://blog.petralli.net/photos/v/ta...geViewsIndex=1

[kevinbal]

Originally Posted by amac4me

I think you're correct about an iMac update in the near future.

I think you're super correct about iMac updates next week with the "Special Limited Time Only Pricing" on the refurbished iMacs at the Apple Store. Smells like "clearing out stock at this price point while we still can" to me.

[asdavis10]

Originally Posted by Muzzway

True, but a minor update is better than no update. Those waiting for a redesign will certainly get it eventually, and this refresh may be thought of as acting like sort of a stepping stone before getting to the next overhaul, whenever it may be ready.

The only problem with this is that consumers are getting a 4% (on average) CPU increase. That is not, by any stretch of the imagination, noticeable at all. You can't do anything with 4%. Hopefully the next upgrade will see the Nehalem, six core, processors. Minor revisions bring up the issue of consumers having buyers remorse. If Nehalem ships in Q4 of this year as reported, people will be crying to high heavens about Apple doing them wrong. Multi-touch is ok but give me a 10% CPU increase, more L2 cache (which thankfully Penryn has), and a logic board that can use 4GB RAM sticks (though I know I'm dreaming right now) and that is a true upgrade. Not to mention it would be nice to see a magnetic latch on the MBP as well as other design changes. But if Apple was forced to do this because of Intel then they really didn't have much choice so I will give them a pass.

[nikiski]

Originally Posted by InkMaster

Looks like the old ones have 2 wires also... unless I'm blind :/

http://blog.petralli.net/photos/v/ta...geViewsIndex=1

Thanks, but that picture looks like a 17-inch'er to me.

I checked with my friend whom has taken his 2.4GHz MacBook Pro 15" (Mid-2007) apart and has confirmed that it has 3 wires. A different card may be?

[Phrasikleia]

Originally Posted by onicon

chances are you'll be profiting more from the increase in processor speed than suffering from the decrease of the cache size. plus when there are programs that use the new sse4 instruction set, the old meroms definitely bite the dust in any comparison.

Which types of programs will use the new sse4 instruction set? Will Photoshop users benefit?

[LostPacket]

Originally Posted by shoulin333

wonder if this means the MBA will be upgraded soon also... i hope not bah

Probably not. It's using the new die that Intel is just starting to market to other manufacturers. That chip is just starting it's life cycle.

The biggest news I can see is the lack of new multi touch in the MBs. It really differentiates it from the MBPs. With the MBP controller, new gestures are just a software update away. Not so with the MBs. Maybe they did this to make up for the jump in MB processor power?

[steinah6]

Originally Posted by mdntcallr

Also, NEED BLU-RAY on the MBP!!

At least as an option!

Wait, when was a slim-profile, slot-loading Blu-Ray drive announced/introduced? I was not aware there were any in production (Apple does not manufacture these parts...)

Edit: I shoulda googled it.

http://store.fastmac.com/product_inf...roducts_id=195

$899 for the option, probably close to $1200 in the MBP if Apple built it in. I suppose you would like an 128GB SSD with that? $5k MBP?

[EagerDragon]

So if Apple was forced to upgrade the MB and MBP, then the iMac will follow since it uses the same chip and chip set.

[Phrasikleia]

Originally Posted by steinah6

Wait, when was a slim-profile, slot-loading Blu-Ray drive announced/introduced? I was not aware there were any in production (Apple does not manufacture these parts...)

These Sony Vaio notebooks have Blu-Ray: http://tinyurl.com/2nxvou

[steinah6]

Originally Posted by Phrasikleia

These Sony Vaio notebooks have Blu-Ray: http://tinyurl.com/2nxvou

Those aren't slot-loading.