Okay, I REALLY am hoping for blu-ray, I dont want to have to buy another computer in a year and half when they start going mainstream or an external at that. SETTING ASIDE whether you think that DVD's will be around still for years to come, how possible do you think a blu-ray option for the new macbooks are, in your opinion.
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Blu-ray
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Do they even make drives thin enough to fit in a MacBook or MacBook Pro?
If Apple were to implement Blu-Ray into their computers, you'd see it in their Mac Pros or iMacs before it hits the MacBooks.
If Apple were to implement Blu-Ray into their computers, you'd see it in their Mac Pros or iMacs before it hits the MacBooks.
Yeah they do make one. Just 1 and it only fits the 17" MBP. It also costs as much as the MB.
what about the ps3? that's a slot loading drive. Maybe it's bigger thank I think though.
here's one: link
it's not slot load though. I think we might see slot load drives soon enough though.
Exactly. Not sure about the expenses or the size of the Blu-ray drive, but MB is bottom of the line. It will see things like this last, if at all. Many argue that it will never see things like this because we're moving on digital data and will give up discs altogether. I disagree and think we won't give up discs for several decades, but they do have a point...
If you really want blu-ray, you better be hoping on the MacBook Pro end.
well it is pretty much worthless to put blu ray on a laptop with a lower resolution than blu ray supports. That new sony laptop has blu ray, but only a 1366 x 768 screen (blu ray is 1920 x 1080). so unless you're outputting to a high def display, it's not worth it.
(oh also, keep in mind all sony laptops are ridiculously expensive anyway, so the cost of the drive itself isn't the reason. I think blu ray drives for laptops are around 500-600 dollars.)
Blu-ray laptops are add ons that range from 150-500. The Sony Z has a bluray read/write add on for 500, and the Sony FW has a blu-ray read only 150 add on, or I think a 300 read/write add on (not sure about the price on that one going off of memory). Those are tray loading and I'm all but certain that the huge price difference is due to the size of the drive. The Sony Z is 13.1" laptop and the
I believe Dell has a slot load blu-ray drive for 400, but as far as size goes, I don't know.
Currently the rumor is that the new macbooks are going to be all about the "brick". People are speculating that the power supply will include the power supply (duh), and an optical drive and maybe a few other things like an ethernet port or usb ports. If we have an external drive then I don't see why it wouldn't be possible that the next generation of macbooks could include external blu-ray drives and that 10.5.6 wouldn't come with the new macbooks along with hdcp. The fact that its external could simply mean it can easily be added as an add on.
oh yeah, i forgot that there's some read only drives and some that write as well. But it's not useful having blu ray in small laptops without screens that can support it. I think 15.4" is pretty much the minimum size laptop I would want a blu ray drive, and then I would only want WUXGA resolution to go with it. I frankly can't see a need to write 50 GB of data to a disc, hard drives are far better for the task, and for movies, a dedicated player or PS3 will be cheaper and better.
A blu ray drive for the Macbook? probably not for a long time, maybe the Macbook pro when 9.5 mm slot load drives are available. But, the Mac Pro should have had Blu ray, i think it's logical that we'll see that one be the first and then the imac, then the MBP, then the MB.
HP's are only $199, and on select models are only $99 dollars to add, I have been customizing them myself.
that's pretty good actually, but they're read only. Also, they're tray loading and 12.7 mm thick, which won't work with a MB or MBP. (I had the Dell m1530 in mind when i wrote that, now that I checked it's about 400 dollars for the upgrade over DVD. It's slot loading and read/ write, but 12.7 mm.)
True that, but I honestly would never be needing to burn 50gb to a disk, PLUS arn't those beasts (BD-R) like 10-12 bucks a pop?
iMac/MBP & BluRay
It is kinda amazing how other vendors (HP, Sony, dell) can develop and ship new products with more features (BluRay, TV tuners, Fingerprint readers..etc) on a regular basis than the company that is perceived as an innovator in the market. How come it takes so long for new product models to ship from Apple?
I wanted my next purchase to include BluRay since it is the heir apparent (at this time). I guess I could buy today and go the external BR route..but I was kinda hoping to avoid that.
Providing that there is no technical obstacles, Apple should make the options available (custom build) and let users decide if they want to pay the price for those options.
It is kinda amazing how other vendors (HP, Sony, dell) can develop and ship new products with more features (BluRay, TV tuners, Fingerprint readers..etc) on a regular basis than the company that is perceived as an innovator in the market. How come it takes so long for new product models to ship from Apple?
I wanted my next purchase to include BluRay since it is the heir apparent (at this time). I guess I could buy today and go the external BR route..but I was kinda hoping to avoid that.
Providing that there is no technical obstacles, Apple should make the options available (custom build) and let users decide if they want to pay the price for those options.
Apple doesn't need to innovate, its fanbase keeps it afloat (and vista's self destruction). There's a reason the low end macbook is still DVD/ CD writer, Apple doesn't need to change this because people are still buying their products regardless of what they do or don't do. So, I would expect Apple to still take a long time to update their products, they simply don't need to.
I'd say less than a 1% chance of seeing Blu-Ray anytime soon on a MacBook. Mac Pro first, then MacBook Pro, then (possibly, though still unlikely, in my mind) everything else. If you're waiting for a Blu-Ray MacBook, you'll probably be waiting years (and possibly forever).
While other companies offer BR drives (ROM and RW) for laptops, they are not selling many with them with the drives because they are still so expensive. They will come for Macs, but until then your best options are to (1) buy a $300 dedicated Blu-Ray player or (2) buy a BR-ROM drive, Windows XP or Vista, and AnyDVD HD for $400 and rip and watch on your Macs using Plex. It's unlikely that any of the Macs have HDCP-compliant displays. This will have to be fixed (and vid chips) before you'll see Blu-Ray player software for OS X.
I've seen a video of someone playing blu-ray movies on their macbook pro with an external drive. If a drive isn't hdcp complient does that mean that you can play the movie but you only get 720p? Then again, macbook pro's hardware is hdcp complient, but the software portion is missing but available if you boot into windows right?
Anyways, when you say "rip" and then play back with plex, do you mean encode the movie? Or can you use anydvd to remove the encryption, save it to the drive as an iso, use an iso loader, and then some software to play it back?