Hi,
I know we just had a refresh, but I hear that we can see another refresh with Sandy Bridge in the Fall of this year or by the end of the 2010. Is it a reasonable expectation? If it is, what are the new features can we expect to see?
Thanks.
I expect Sandy Bridge to appear in MacBook Pros in the first quarter of 2011.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1001_3-20002374-92.html?tag=mncol;mlt_related
http://www.infoworld.com/d/hardware...-chips-year-end-448?source=rss_infoworld_news
Considering sandy bridge isn't due out til early 2011 at the earliest (assuming no delays etc), with mass production not scheduled until Q3 2011; your expectations are quite unrealistic.
Mind providing some sources for your assertion? The two links I provided state production by the end of 2010. The second link suggests appearance in desktops and laptops in early 2011. Here's a third link and a quote from it: Intel will ship the successor to its "Nehalem" processor, "Sandy Bridge," in volume production by the end of 2010, Otellini said. Otellini, btw, is Intel's CEO.
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2362601,00.asp
depends on what you call worth the wait; course they'll be faster than what we have now - but it'll be at least a year 'til we see them in MBPs.
One year
at most.
They'll be the first generation of an all-new architecture; so bugs and unforeseen issues will be par for the course. Will they be faster? Yes, more battery life and less heat? Doubtful in my opinion, probably about the same as what we have now. If you plan on waiting for technology, you'll be waiting forever.
Um, the Core i7 and i5 in use now are the first generation of an all-new architecture for MacBook Pros. So if you don't mind "bugs and unforeseen issues" now, you shouldn't mind it for Sandy Bridge. The Arrandale refresh that will come between now and Sandy Bridge will provide better battery life and less heat so it's safe to say Sandy Bridge should too over the current i7 and i5. People didn't mind waiting for Arrandale and it proved to have a 20% performance improvement over the Penryns. Sandy Bridge is claimed (by Intel) to have a 20% improvement too if you compare the top Arrandale of today with the top Sandy Bridge to come.
It will be an Arrandale refresh i think cooler chips with lower TDPs and higher clockspeeds
Maybe a GPU refresh although i'm not holding my breadth
Sandy Bridge isn't even feasible till mid 012 at the very least
Feasible? In what sense? And isn't mid '12 quite extreme since Intel expects production by end of '10? By mid '12 we'll have Ivy Bridge.
You have to bear in mind that the first SB chips will be desktop chips, most likely "extreme" versions, and will be completely unusable in any laptop, much less an MBP. So that adds quite a bit of waiting time on. Then you have to factor in the additional time it takes for Apple to decide exactly what mobile chips it wants, testing them, making sure they don't sacrifice battery life, etc etc. It could be a very long wait. Plus, if the MBP refresh cycle coincides with intel's production like it did with Arrandale, then it'll be another few months while the technology is available/mass produced, but Apple is still working out bugs or trying to get stock.
Nope. Intel has already demonstrated Sandy Bridge in a laptop:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-20002617-64.html
And: The initial versions of the chips will be for desktop and laptop computers, not servers, said David Perlmutter, head of Intel's chip architecture group, in an interview at the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) in Beijing on Tuesday. From:
http://www.infoworld.com/d/hardware...-chips-year-end-448?source=rss_infoworld_news
Gee, most of you guys who seem pessimistic about how early we'll see Sandy Bridge MacBook Pros also own Arrandale MacBook Pros. I hope that's not the obsolescence fear creeping in.
Advice: Buy now, sell it before update.
You'll lose a few bucks, but at least you had something to keep you busy
Good advice. Something the guys I quoted especially could do too.
I'm hoping for USB3 in the minor update cycle. I'd give it a 50:50 chance.
More likely is a lower power processor option.
cheers
JohnG
I'd like USB3 too but I'd say a 10% chance. Intel isn't even including it in chipsets for Sandy Bridge so Apple would need to pay for a third-party USB3 chip which they're unlikely to do to keep their margins as high as possible. That and Apple seems to be developing Light Peak with Intel and so wouldn't want any competing connection technologies to compete with it.
