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Early 2008 MacBook Pro Whispers

Wolfpup said:
It might end up more than 10%, depending on the clock speeds they pick. Like if they go from 2.2 to 2.5Ghz would be at least 25% faster, and even better than that in some applications.

And if they throw in a better GPU on top of that...
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No, it wouldn't. Increasing the clock speed from 2.2 to 2.5 GHz isn't going to provide anything close to a 25% speed improvement for most apps.

freitas said:
My reason for wanting for the upgrade is the potential for better battery life. The penryn has already been shown to give you more mileage than the merom on the santa rosa chipset (http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3195). I am holding out for the better battery life and the 6M cache.
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According to Anandtech, it's just a few percent. Enough that I'd prefer it if I were buying a new machine, but not enough that I'd lose sleep over it - or spend all my time whining about the new ones not being available yet.
 
Reality?

Is anyone else getting nervous that we aren't going to see this update for a while? I was so sure that it would be this last tuesday or next, but I'm starting to get a bad feeling. I know other companies are releasing their mobile Penryn products...but isn't Apple always among the last to update the processors? I know no one wants to hear this pessimism, myself included, but what is the reality here? Other than the fact that its been 7 months since the last update, what are your guys' legitimate reasons that Apple owes us an update within a week or two?
 
bayol05 said:
Other than the fact that its been 7 months since the last update, what are your guys' legitimate reasons that Apple owes us an update within a week or two?
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I think the primary words here are 'owes us'. Do they owe us an update? In my opinion they ought to drop the prices in line with other similarly spec'd products or to keep their profit margins at a constant level at least.

Apart from that, I haven't seen many good reasons why the MBP needs an update and it appears most people want it to update just so they can buy something brand new. Each to their own and I can sort of understand that... however I don't expect an update for another month or so... we'll see.
 
bayol05 said:
Is anyone else getting nervous that we aren't going to see this update for a while? I was so sure that it would be this last tuesday or next, but I'm starting to get a bad feeling. I know other companies are releasing their mobile Penryn products...but isn't Apple always among the last to update the processors? I know no one wants to hear this pessimism, myself included, but what is the reality here? Other than the fact that its been 7 months since the last update, what are your guys' legitimate reasons that Apple owes us an update within a week or two?
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Seems like with the last real update, Intel announced Santa Rosa and roughly a month later the updated MBP came. Well... Weren't mobile Penryns announced at the beginning of January? Seems like the updated MBP should come any moment now :D

Damn Thinkpad was tempting me yesterday. They have Penryns available already :mad: Kept having to remind myself how large and heavy the 15" T61 really was....
 
jragosta said:
This is something that always amazes me about computer buyers. Unless you're into very heavy graphics rendering, you're not going to see any difference between the current generation MBP and one with slightly faster processors.

It just doesn't matter for most people any more. Whining endlessly because Apple hasn't yet released a computer with a 10% faster processor is silly. IMHO.
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I do very heavy graphics rendering. Pictures take over 5 days to render on my G5.
 
Early 2008 MacBook Pro Whispers

Okay, I am the newbie here that runs Safari on his Windows PC pretending it is a MBP! Now that is sad. From a marketing standpoint, why would Apple take a their innovation of the year - the MBA - and position it against the a new release of a MBP update? For the general public, most are unable to distinguish between the two as far as the nuances between the two systems. If the release of a MBP would come this early, it deserved some heightened marketing at MacWorld 2008! This is just my amateur shot at what I believe to be true -- and I hope I am wrong :D
 
I'm also onboard for a case redesign. I love how the current one looks, but could do without some of the plastic components and the "creaking".

It is still a good improvement over the G4 Powerbook I still own. This thing was held together mainly with glue. Literally. I have had to superglue parts of the case back together at least 10 times in 5 or so years. Once the hinge seized (still don't know how) and needed replacement. The screws on the LCD are just decoration. Its completely held together with glue. Took a hair dryer and prying to get the bezel off.

I'd like my machine to be solid and made of the least amount of cheap plastic possible.

stevenfarrisohi said:
From a marketing standpoint, why would Apple take a their innovation of the year - the MBA - and position it against the a new release of a MBP update?
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I can agree with this up to a certain point, only that the MBA now has the spotlight on the website, so major updates to MBP would overshadow that. On the other hand, these two machines are so unbelievably different and targeted at different applications and users that I fail to see how one would affect the others sales. If I am looking for a POWER laptop, the very LAST thing I would ever consider is a MBA, especially when it has no cd drive and insanely few expansion ports.
 
stevenfarrisohi said:
Okay, I am the newbie here that runs Safari on his Windows PC pretending it is a MBP! Now that is sad. From a marketing standpoint, why would Apple take a their innovation of the year - the MBA - and position it against the a new release of a MBP update? For the general public, most are unable to distinguish between the two as far as the nuances between the two systems. If the release of a MBP would come this early, it deserved some heightened marketing at MacWorld 2008! This is just my amateur shot at what I believe to be true -- and I hope I am wrong :D
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Don't worry, you are.... slightly. Most people can distinguish between the MBA and the MBP. People aren't as computer stupid as they were a few years or even a few months ago.

The MBP won't come anytime soon because Apple is most likely working out all of the bugs in their new MBP design. They are testing the HDD hatch on the 15" to make sure that users can replace the HDD easily and efficiently. On the 17" they have even more to test. They have to see if BOTH HDD slots are easily user replaceable, they are testing the dual FW400 ports and the new eSATA port as well. They are waiting for the final shipments of Nvidia 512MB GFX cards, and Intel Dual 2.8 GHz chips.

And I am sure that the hold up is because they finally considered to remove that over-hyped MacBook keyboard and put the original one back on.
 
Digital Skunk said:
Don't worry, you are.... slightly. Most people can distinguish between the MBA and the MBP. People aren't as computer stupid as they were a few years or even a few months ago.

The MBP won't come anytime soon because Apple is most likely working out all of the bugs in their new MBP design. They are testing the HDD hatch on the 15" to make sure that users can replace the HDD easily and efficiently. On the 17" they have even more to test. They have to see if BOTH HDD slots are easily user replaceable, they are testing the dual FW400 ports and the new eSATA port as well. They are waiting for the final shipments of Nvidia 512MB GFX cards, and Intel Dual 2.8 GHz chips.

And I am sure that the hold up is because they finally considered to remove that over-hyped MacBook keyboard and put the original one back on.
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lol :)

But yeah.. a refreshed MBP will not get the same ad campaign that the MBA is getting. I can't watch an hour of prime time TV without seeing two or three MBA ads.. during ONE TV SHOW. Seriously. The American public buys what they see on TV. They will go to the Apple store or website looking for the MBA that they saw on TV, odds are good if they aren't Mac users they won't even know what the Pro line is. In addition the MBP is such a different machine, if anything an aluminum MB would be the sales cannibal, which is why you won't see one for at least a few months if ever.
 
Someone was asking why people are waiting when the current CPU isn't noticably slower than the new Penryn cpu's.

Maybe it isnt (it is, and with SSE4 it is significantly so), but that's one part of t he reason that waiting is worthwhile.

Maybe they'll ditch the crap latch and do a mag-latch for the new model. Maybe the screen's will be higher res. Maybe the base spec HDD's will be larger. Maybe the price will drop.

The reason it's worth waiting is that right now, the MBP's are both over-priced AND outdated. I'm prepared to swallow ONE of those for the pleasure of using OSX. Not both.

Doug
 
jragosta said:
No, it wouldn't. Increasing the clock speed from 2.2 to 2.5 GHz isn't going to provide anything close to a 25% speed improvement for most apps.
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You're forgetting to add in the general performance improvement you get with Penryn. 25% is pretty much a baseline MINIMUM improvement for the current 2.2Ghz Core 2 versus a 2.5Ghz Penryn version. In many programs it would be more like 30%, and down the road some programs could be 60% or more if they can take advantage of SSE4. But 25% is a pretty conservative estimate for general performance (although I suppose technically OS X could react a bit differently than Windows does).

Penryn's not something I'd worry about that much either, but it along with a speed bump could still represent a very noticeably more powerful system, which at this point is worth waiting for, since it could come in as little as 5 days.
 
Hey I know we all want our updated MBP...I mean I am lamenting with the rest of you. I can only hope the hold up is because Apple wants to get this right. I hope we have put enough pressure on them that they are going to deliver us a stellar, no flaws or bugs, update that is worthy of the long, long, seemingly endless wait. They know they pushed aside the pro's for the MBA deadline so they had better deliver. Even if it is pushed back to March we can only hope they have made the wait worthwhile. And they better not come out with some new flashy design upgrade, with all the works, including Blu ray(which I don't think will happen with this next upgrade) in the fall after we have all bought this upcomingMBP . Not that I could do anything about it but they better not Damnit!:mad:
 
voyagerd said:
I do very heavy graphics rendering. Pictures take over 5 days to render on my G5.
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Then I guess you're one who should be using an 8 core Mac Pro, not a laptop.

And even in the event that you need a laptop, the number of people who NEED to render stuff on their laptop that takes days is far too small for Apple to worry about.

Wolfpup said:
You're forgetting to add in the general performance improvement you get with Penryn. 25% is pretty much a baseline MINIMUM improvement for the current 2.2Ghz Core 2 versus a 2.5Ghz Penryn version. In many programs it would be more like 30%, and down the road some programs could be 60% or more if they can take advantage of SSE4. But 25% is a pretty conservative estimate for general performance (although I suppose technically OS X could react a bit differently than Windows does).
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Sounds like wishful thinking.

According to Ars Technica, the difference is about 11% on average for non-SSE4 tasks. When SSE4 apps come out, that number will be better, but '25% is a pretty conservative estimate' is just plain wrong.

To make matters worse, many of the things they're testing are CPU intensive. If you look at the apps that most people do on a day to day basis (particularly on a laptop) like word processing, web browsing, calculating spreadsheets, and so on, the difference will be even less-and most of those things are so fast that it doesn't matter, anyway.
 
2egb24l.jpg


I don't know about the MacBook keyboard on the MBPs... but it would appear Apple wants the design on all their models, the MBP is the only one currently without. Think they'd do black illuminated keys a la Air? Or keep the silver (pardon the two minute Photoshop job)?
 
jragosta said:
Then I guess you're one who should be using an 8 core Mac Pro, not a laptop.

And even in the event that you need a laptop, the number of people who NEED to render stuff on their laptop that takes days is far too small for Apple to worry about.
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Yes, indeed. Not to mention, that it is propable that if he used a somewhat newer computer he could get that rendering time down by at least two days – thus being far more productive.

Makes you wonder if he really is making a living from that G5 of his or is simply trying to "brag" about it.
 
jragosta said:
Sounds like wishful thinking.

According to Ars Technica, the difference is about 11% on average for non-SSE4 tasks. When SSE4 apps come out, that number will be better, but '25% is a pretty conservative estimate' is just plain wrong.
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Ars Technica and Anandtech are exactly what I'm basing my figures on. Again, you're forgetting to add the clock speed increase and minimum of 10% performance boost together.

25% is a solid across the board MINIMUM speed increase you'd expect from an update like that, with many programs benefiting much more, and future stuff potentially getting 60%+ gains.

To make matters worse, many of the things they're testing are CPU intensive. If you look at the apps that most people do on a day to day basis (particularly on a laptop) like word processing, web browsing, calculating spreadsheets, and so on, the difference will be even less-and most of those things are so fast that it doesn't matter, anyway.
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Right, but most of those things could be done on a fast Pentium 3 technically. That's no reason not to wait for a 25% performance boost, even if many people won't really use it (yet-gives the system more longevity even for those people).
 
jnc said:
2egb24l.jpg


Apple wants the design on all their models, the MBP is the only one currently without. Think they'd do black illuminated keys a la Air? ?
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Speaking of black keyboards (which I, for one, hope the new MBP will have, as I preffered the white lettering on the black keyboard of the TiBook), I wonder if Apple is planning on releasing a black BT keyboard?

http://store.apple.com/Apple/WebObj...o=8B21AA37&node=home/shop_mac/mac_accessories

(scroll down a bit).

Notice how it states it is "white"? That has to mean we might get another colour, right?
 
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