Apple Releases the MacBook Pro

[boombashi]

Good news, but I'm not a huge fan of the name. It lacks a certain je ne sais quoi that PowerBook has.

Yeah - I love the upgrade and I can see what they want to do with the names, but I can't help but keep calling it a PowerBook. Maybe it will grow on me, when the iPod came out everyone thought IT was from outer space.

 

[generik]

I was just over at Acer's website and I see they have introduced a new 4200 model with a 2.16Ghz Core Duo processor. Looks like Apple is going to have to get a speed bump into these things fast if they are going to compete in the Intel world. The race is on and now you don't want to be caught behind because people will wonder why yours is running slower then the same processor in a competitive laptop.

"Oh, because our pixie dust OS only boots off our proprietary OpenFirmware(tm) which will release its magic smoke if we run it at 2.16Ghz!"

The real reason is they want to have their margins, and be price competitive too. Welcome to the real world Apple

 

[berkleeboy210]

Placed my order, Shipping on or before February 15th... Also ordered an iMac, shipping on or before the 18th of January.

 

[Randall]

Gotta start somewhere - Apple was the first to ship without a floppy as well...and they are still in business They can't please everyone, but they try to please as many as possible while keeping their consumer products at a resonable price point. I had an iBook for 2 years and used the modem a total of zero times, granted everyone is different, that is why they have the add on. If you can rember they sold an add on floppy drive for the original iMac when it first came out.

Yeah you're right. But I still think they could have given us an extra USB slot and an extra FW400 slot to make up for it.

You charge your iPod on one USB slot, then you have your USB mouse in the other, now there is no room for your flash memory card.

The reason they got rid of FW800 is because intel doesn't have a chipset for it, and I guess it was easier to ditch it. I would expect it's triumphent return in future models, but who knows.

 

[maya]

I agree with you about the ports... 2 USBs and 1 Firewire hardly seems enough - especially considering that iPods these days charge from the USB (unless you've bought the external charger).

So, one USB for an external mouse, and another charging the iPod... there's none left for other peripherals.

Apple is moving towards wireless technology, with this they can make the MacBook lighter, thinner, affordable.

If you use dial-up you can either upgrade via broadband or access hotspots.
If you need an external keyboard and mouse, consider BlueTooth.

It will not be long before the iPod will acquire some form of wireless data transfer capabilities.

 

[MattG]

- Bill, thanks again for creating an OS with so many problems, you make it possible for me to afford nice Apple products!

Well put

 

[d.f]

this hasn't been said in this thread yet, so it's not a repeat....

can i just point out one thing that strikes me a very odd?

everyone on this site (the old and the new) has been waiting for this machine forever. even Steve made a joke in the keynote about the old powerbook lacking 'power'.

then introduces the solution to the biggest Apple problem for years..... the macbook - he said they're blazingly fast, etc, etc. then we saw ONE graph about speed (floating point and one other..)

if it was so 'special', 'blazingly fast', the one that we'd all been waiting for...

why on earth did he not demonstrate it..?

that said more about this laptop than anything. i smell a delay in shipping. no proof of power per watt...(the graph he showed means nothing... he could have easily said '5 hours bettery life', he knows that's what we care about).

it would have taken minutes to show us him using one..... rip a bleeding song in iTunes.... do some basic photoshop..... ANYTHING.

something doesn't feel right.

 

[generik]

Comparing an Acer to an Apple Mac is hardly relevant. Even if you compare Acer to other high-end PC makers, such as Sony, the price difference is huge. Computers are not only determined by their components, but also their build quality and general design. Acers are not known for good design, while Apple is definitely one of the leaders in design.

That I really got to see.

I'd say IBM is the true leader of design, I never owned a Thinkpad with major problems. 3 of my last 4 Apple purchases either were returned, or quickly gotten rid of on eBay.

I'll definitely wait this one out to see how the early adoptors (aka s**kers) will react to the quirks that may or may not crop out.

 

[macidiot]

Looks like they rushed this one out the door for stock-valuation and PR value. I think the "real thing" Intel-wise may still be 8 to 12 months away. My issues......

I agree that this looks like a stopgap. PR value yes, but not for stock valuation.

The stock went up today because Apple pre-announced a blowout quarter. 14 million iPods sold instead of the 11 million forecasted. 5.7 billion in revenue instead of the 4.9 forecasted. THAT IS WHY THE STOCK WENT UP.

Wall st. ran up Apple stock maybe 3points on rumors. If they hadn't announced the macbook, it would have dropped maybe 3 points. BFD. It still would have gone up 5 points on the earnings news.

I'm tired of hearing about Apple doing things for "stock price" reasons. They don't. Well except when they announce stock splits. Get over it. Apple is not run by Wall St. analysts and fund managers.

 

[maya]

That I really got to see.

I'd say IBM is the true leader of design, I never owned a Thinkpad with major problems. 3 of my last 4 Apple purchases either were returned, or quickly gotten rid of on eBay.

I'll definitely wait this one out to see how the early adoptors (aka s**kers) will react to the quirks that may or may not crop out.

Come now, we do not call these people S*k3r5, we call them wealthy.

 

[tmyanks24]

How about us students who don't want to dish out $2000+ on a laptop? When will the iBook be updated and what does Apple have planned for people in our price bracket? Why no mention of lower-priced products today, just an upgraded, more expensive PowerBook?

 

[nxent]

Maybe the PowerMac will just be called, "Mac."

You have the Mac Mini as its cheaper option.

hmm. why didn't they call it the "probook" then they could have the "promac". maybe this will come later with a complete redesign of the form factor

 

[Crikey]

bummer

Here is why the single FireWire 400 port is a problem, for some users. If you want to use your Mac as a portable recording studio, you're going to need to do two things. One is connect to a pro-quality audio interface, which is typically a FireWire 400 connection. The other is to connect to a large fast external hard disk to avoid I/O contention on your internal boot drive. The best way to do this was to attach an external FireWire 800 disk and write your audio to that. With separate FireWire 400 and FireWire 800 buses, the digital audio streaming in from the audio interface had the whole 400Mbps bus to itself and didn't conflict with the disk I/O bandwidth being used on the FireWire 800 bus.

With only one FireWire 400 port, the MacBook Pro can't do that. Despite any likely performance boost from its dual-core Intel CPU, the MacBook Pro now has a pretty substantial disadvantage relative to the G4 PowerBook for those who work with audio on the Mac.

Deal-breaker? Maybe. Hopefully, Apple has some effective work-around for this.


Crikey

 

[BlueRevolution]

I was thinking maybe the "Power Mac" would be renamed to the "MacMac".

Deal-breaker? Maybe. Hopefully, Apple has some effective work-around for this.

maybe get a couple extra FW ports on a cardbus card or whatever it is the MacBook uses? not something you should have to do, granted, but it would work anyway.

 

[Val-kyrie]

Crippled Release

apple has gone back to crippling thier machines to benefit thier profits and the consumer looses out.

i wish they'd just give in, make the powerbook a bit thicker (only enough) so they can give it the full 2.+ghz Intel (like all their competitors have managed) and then the ibooks could get a 1.5 or so Core Duo. . . .

I don't think Apple limited the MB Pro to 1.67 and 1.83 GHz because of heat; rather, I'm betting they are still caught in the self-imposed need to distinguish their lines and they didn't want the PB to have the same specs. as the new Intel iMac. In fact, I think the MB Pro and Intel iMac only differ in speed of the DVD drive, one less FW port on MB Pro, adapters, and in the size of the screen. The differences are minimal, really. However, Apple's release still leaves egg on its face because (as was already covered here on MR) Acer has announced a new Core Duo laptop called the TravelMate 8200 with the following specs:

- Core Duo 2.0GHz (Yonah)
- 2GB RAM, 15.4" Screen, SATA HD, ATI Radeon X1600 512MB
- 6.6 lbs
- 6 hours of battery life
- Carbon Fiber finish lid

 

[thes]

That I really got to see.

I'd say IBM is the true leader of design, I never owned a Thinkpad with major problems.

Exactly my point. ThinkPads, Sony's, etc are comparable to Apple in terms of quality. Have you looked at the prices of the Dual Core Thinkpads? You'll realise a ThinkPad will similar specifications would cost only a little less than the Apple.

 

[mandis]

bye bye FireWire 800... We'll miss you dearly

I doubt I’m going to purchase a macbook pro anytime soon, as I don't find it to be a pro computer at all. The lack of a decent communication port for external Hard drives such as FW800 or external SATA shows that in fact this product is not intended for professionals.
In the Architecture firm I work for we're exchanging hundreds of gigabytes of photos, renders, Maya and Archicad files every single day. We also make regular backups on a day-to-day basis, which stack up, to even higher amounts of information and of course higher speed demands. So far my rev.c powerbook G4 has been able to cope by utilizing it's FW800 port and a collection of 3 Lacie 1TB BigDisks which I have nicely arranged on my desk and which I connect to the main server every 2-3 days (we need to make double copies of everything we make). Now apple has decided to take away this feature on their latest and greatest, state of the art laptops, how dare they call this progress? It almost seems as if all the Apple engineers did was to put a generic intel motherboard inside a powerbook case and add a pretty useless isight camera of top of the screen for the sake of innovation.
I would suspect that most people in the design/photography/video editing business must have noticed this problem so I would appreciate some advice or any suggestions you may have.

Share your thoughts people...

 

[ImAlwaysRight]

oh and that whole 4X faster thing is nice too.

Ah, nothing like a little marketing.

Look at the app performance http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/intelcoreduo.html

Modo (Rendering) 4.1x [WTH is Modo?]

GarageBand (Software tracks playback) 2.1x

Final Cut Pro (HDV 1080i60 render) 2.1x

Pages (Common Application Tasks) 1.7x

These are probably the four fastest application tasks Apple could find. I'd like to see a chart of application tasks that were SLOWER under the new MacBook.

Refresh the Powerbook G4 with faster memory, better graphics, etc, and then compare the Powerbook 1.67 to the Macbook 1.67 (not 1.87).

Looking forward to seeing real-world results.

I was set to buy but passed as I was hoping for a low end iBook in the $799-999 range. $1999 for the lowest intelbook is just disappointing. I guess ThinkSecret is a couple months ahead of the game.

 

[swingerofbirch]

Probably Power Mac will become MacPro

I have to admit that I did not read all 15 pages of posts (I'll save them for a rainy day ) , so this may have been said. But I think the reason for dropping Power from the name of the PowerBook is that Power may have been a reference to the PowerPC.

So, Powerbook became MacBook Pro

However, the iMac retained its name. Therefore, I hypothesize that the iBook will retain its name as well. However, since Power Mac refers to a PowerPC product, I hypothesize it will become MacPro or Mac Pro.

So, an "i" in front will refer to a consumer product, and a "pro" in the rear will refer to a professional product.

I agree I am not in love with the name at the moment, just trying to rationalize it

 

[boombashi]

Here is why the single FireWire 400 port is a problem, for some users. If you want to use your Mac as a portable recording studio, you're going to need to do two things. One is connect to a pro-quality audio interface, which is typically a FireWire 400 connection. The other is to connect to a large fast external hard disk to avoid I/O contention on your internal boot drive. The best way to do this was to attach an external FireWire 800 disk and write your audio to that. With separate FireWire 400 and FireWire 800 buses, the digital audio streaming in from the audio interface had the whole 400Mbps bus to itself and didn't conflict with the disk I/O bandwidth being used on the FireWire 800 bus.

With only one FireWire 400 port, the MacBook Pro can't do that. Despite any likely performance boost from its dual-core Intel CPU, the MacBook Pro now has a pretty substantial disadvantage relative to the G4 PowerBook for those who work with audio on the Mac.

Deal-breaker? Maybe. Hopefully, Apple has some effective work-around for this.


Crikey

use firewire and USB - it's audio, no problem. I've been doing multitrack and audio/video work for years without the need for FireWire 800. I never got a chance to use it, and I'm sure it's nice, but not needed until drives write at even 200mbps

 

[maya]

hmm. why didn't they call it the "probook" then they could have the "promac". maybe this will come later with a complete redesign of the form factor

Its a marketing thing, where Apple wants the name "Mac" on everyones mind and be recognized with the images of creative hardware and software. Just as the iPod has done for music.

The word "Power" was getting old, and the PowerBook G4 was not even powerful when compared to others, so the Power was worthless in the name. Adding Pro at the end, just means that there is going to be another student/consumer line that will replace the iBook. Something along the line of:

Mac Mini
Mac Book
Mac Book Pro
iMac (this might see a name change to Mac, but I doubt it)
Mac Pro (aka PowerMac)

iPod Shuffle
iPod Nano
iPod

Seem the direction Apple is taking on the name front.

The "i" is going to be saved for the iApps consumer line, though GarageBand does not fit in there for some reason.

 

[Xtremehkr]

Wow, it's like Christmas time for Apple users.

I guess we got the final word on the new Powerbooks, there never will be any new Powerbooks.

It will take time before I get used to MacBook, but at least it has been updated.

 

[kretzy]

I think this would have to be the fastest growing thread ever on MR!

My initial reaction to the MBP was "I WANT ONE". However, after a bit of rational thinking I don't think I'll buy a new laptop this year. Along with being a Rev A, there are the many things which people have pointed that detract from this computer.

Loss of FW 800 doesn't bother me, loss of DL does. I don't really like the iSight, I think it's more of an iSore. If I wanted one I would be it as an accessory.

I think if I wait until 2007 the full range will be out and I can then make a more practical decision.

I think an iMac for the rest of the family is in order though.

 

[d.f]

I have to admit that I did not read all 15 pages of posts (I'll save them for a rainy day ) , so this may have been said. But I think the reason for dropping Power from the name of the PowerBook is that Power may have been a reference to the PowerPC.

So, Powerbook became MacBook Pro

However, the iMac retained its name. Therefore, I hypothesize that the iBook will retain its name as well. However, since Power Mac refers to a PowerPC product, I hypothesize it will become MacPro or Mac Pro.

So, an "i" in front will refer to a consumer product, and a "pro" in the rear will refer to a professional product.

I agree I am not in love with the name at the moment, just trying to rationalize it

steve said during the keynote the reason for the name change (powerbook to macbook pro) was they wanted the word 'mac' in the name. i guess iBook will become just macbook....

 

[SuperThread]

Does anybody else find the iSight ugly as sin?