Full Laptop Refresh By Holidays?

[UmaThurman]

"Speed bumped macs coming" + Apple Insider = "Well, we were talking to this farmer who has a brother, and his girlfriend's husband's ex wife's mother says that she knows a guy who likes apple pie. Oh and she likes macs too"

LoL.

Either way, i'm one of those people that will faithfully remain waiting for those C2D mb/mbps. This will be my switch from pc to mac. I'll wait however long though, as I'll need it to carry me through the rest of college. Aren't y'all so proud of me? It'll be here soon enough, y'all just hold on a bit longer.

 

[SteveJoobs]

This thread is becoming surreal.

3600+ posts of fretful conjecture.

OUCH!

 

[shadowlander]

"Speed bumped macs coming" + Apple Insider = "Well, we were talking to this farmer who has a brother, and his girlfriend's husband's ex wife's mother says that she knows a guy who likes apple pie. Oh and she likes macs too"

LOL. Gotcha.

 

[Butthead]

Many of the larger Apple stores carry alternative configurations of systems, not just the base configs. As for upgrades, especially on a Mac Pro, do them yourself. RAM and HD swaps are super-simple, take only a few minutes, and you can usually save quite a bit. If you're getting a MB, I would recommend the white 2GHz model. No reason to pay a $150 premium for black.

No reason? see barefeats.com for thoughs on this and differences btw MBP & MB, claiming the 5.4k drive MB didn't make for much of a slowdown in certain tests compared to a 7.2k drive in a MBP

http://www.barefeats.com/mbcd3.html

"I'm not fond of the plastic case design used for the MacBook 13". It smudges and scratches too easily compared to the aluminum cased MacBook Pros. The black model is even worse than the white one in showing my oily fingerprints.

But the black model does look very cool. I find the glossy screen is easier to see in the sunlight than the MacBook Pro's "dull finish" screen."

MBPs are more difficult to upgrade as can been seen by the tutorials on this site, this for the MB:
http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/Mac/MacBook/

See user reports on www.xlyr8yourmac.com for thoughts on drive upgrades/searchable database.

Personally, I like the white color better than black, black absorbs rather than reflects sunlight, and my fingers a grease too . But other than cost, the MBP are far better as far as what they have, Express Card capability (since Apple has given up on going any faster with FW, too bad; FW1600 or FW3200 would have been great).

 

[Westside guy]

There is no shortage. It's a hallucination induced by drinking too much (product)Red KoolAid. Every major computer vendor, including Dell and Apple are all shipping Merom (yes, even the 2.33GHz version) within their standard build times.

Actually, given Dell's past practices and the fact that C2D is going in their lower end laptops, not their high-end ones - I suspect what they've done is put the Conroe desktop C2D in there, unless you know specifically otherwise.

 

[Butthead]

LoL.

Either way, i'm one of those people that will faithfully remain waiting for those C2D mb/mbps. This will be my switch from pc to mac. I'll wait however long though, as I'll need it to carry me through the rest of college. Aren't y'all so proud of me? It'll be here soon enough, y'all just hold on a bit longer.

LOL, as soon as the fully upgraded MBP sittiing on the Santa Rosa platform with 800Mhz DDR2 RAM, possible slot load Blu-Ray burner, for sure hybrid NAND flash drives with near instance boot times, 80nm higher performance for same amount of power consumption GPU's, more advanced power saving features of the Santa Rosa chipset/platform are made known when systems start shipping as soon as March 2007 (when Santa Rosa is supposedly still on schedule to be released); you'll go father on to the Mac Zealot 'darkside'...you must update every year to the latest and greatest from Steve-o's reality distortion field.

Yeah, that speed bumped to C2D MBP of now, will look like an underperformer come next spring. And then we have late 2007/early 2008 when the 45nm Intel chips start shipping, and like wise smaller process GPU's, and then hopefully by then 'affordable' optional 128GB flash mem. drives to replace HD's altogther in laptops (currently way too expensive-$1700 in 64GB capacity)...yey!

Besides we all know Uma babe is a stylin' freak, she's gotta have the newest Apple fashion accessory to tote about, lol.

 

[Butthead]

notice how they say MACBOOK and not just MACBOOK PRO? both laptops will get the refresh!?

Exactly, but who is to say they will be updated at the same time? Could be weeks or months (MWSF for the MB, if supplies of the top end C2D are limited due to yield as MM has picked up on in his post about the AI rumor).

I have to admit I did not read thoroughly through the last 1k-2k posts on this thread, lol. A logical speculation from the start would have been Apple made a decision, based on how many of the higher speed C2D's (looking a head to a possible Mar-April 2007 Santa Rosa roll out) Intel expected to be able to supply them with, based on existing hierarchy of orders from other (read, more important/senior accts ) laptop makers.

I have not been able to find actual numbers of Intel iMac's sold so far, on quarterly basis, or historically compared to numbers of MB or MBP (or equivalent PG). I could be that Apple forecasted that they would sell more iMacs at this time of year, if they got the C2D earliest. But that in doing so, Intel could not supply Apple with enough chips for updating either the MBP or MB lines. So there would a lag time, where other accounts would have the piece of the pie as far as these higher speed/low yield C2D chips. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. They could have been told by Intel there would have only been a few weeks delay to ramp up production, and that Intel missed the mark by a few weeks or so, sending more of the higher speed chips to other accts. while Apple had to be content with supply for the iMacs.

So Intel has finally shipped enough C2D's for the excruciatingly long wait for Apple zealots, to do a simple speed bump to C2D chips, based on the existing MB & MBP models/features. It is possible there would be some minor changes other than C2D, but I don't have high hopes. I going to get resigned to the fact the MBP 17in won't get a 2k res screen until the Santa Rosa revision. Then again, the speed bumped Al PB's got a screen res boost on the last round, didn't they, you never know?

Current speed bumped C2D MBP's will disappoint, I am sure; people will go crazy over the Santa Rosa platform version (2.5Mhz CPU w/800Mhz FSB), and it will sell like hot cakes. By April we may also have a Winblows v. Mac OS new 64bit OS battle going on...when that happens, more switchers I predict

 

[Butthead]

what do you know, theres hope afterall.... given all this AI rumors, and with the macbook stocks dropping... this is clear clear clear indication that this thread will reach 5000 posts

maybe 10,000 posts if apple just doesn't release macbook pros until mwsf. just being curious but what is the longest thread ever?(not just macrumors, but the whole internet.)

Only have to look at other forums for fanatics that spend all their waking lives on the net . I suspect an update soon, so this thread will die before hitting 5k posts.

Hmm, a site like this one, IIRC, has a number of Li-Poly battery threads that went well over 100 pages long. They already have over 6M posts, 100k members!

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/index.php?

Before it went down due to Canadian MJ politikin, overgrow.com had more than a few 100+ pg threads (stoners you know ).

Hometheatre forums have more online users/members than MR, I think, should be some really long threads there. currently 2,440 active usrs.

http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htf/index.php

*edit* Oops, I meant this other site http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/, 3,100 currently active, 8.5M posts, almost 300k members (but it's been around since 1995).

Some really long threads on reefcentral.com

They don't show stats on the home page, but a quick glance and one can estimate they have at least 3M posts too.

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/

Maybe, is there a forums for Scientology members, hehe?... probably threads that go on forever on that site, lol.

 

[Detektiv-Pinky]

Chances for a Speed-Drop?

Do you think there is any chance that Apple would LOWER the specs for an updated Macbook?

I would rather have a 1.6 Ghz cool & quiet C2D prozessor in my Macbook to lasts 8 hours on a battery charge, than the 'Latest & Geatest' that scorches my legs and drains the charge in no time.

And they could sell it even cheaper!

 

[AppliedVisual]

No reason? see barefeats.com for thoughs on this and differences btw MBP & MB, claiming the 5.4k drive MB didn't make for much of a slowdown in certain tests compared to a 7.2k drive in a MBP

Comparing base configs of the MB, yeah... The blackbook is going to have the faster HDD. But if you price them out (white and black) with the same HDD and RAM, they're identical except the color. You're paying that extra $150 premium to have a black one. ...Sadly though, if I were buying one I'd probably go against my own advice and go for black. If he's going to the Apple Store, they should stock white MB systems with the 80GB and 100GB HDD options as well as 1GB RAM options. Bot the stores near me do. They have 3 or 4 configs of both the white and black Macbook that they usually try to stock.

And I would personally spend the money anyway and go for the MBP unless the MB more than does it for you. The other poster was saying he had decided on MB rather than MBP, so I didn't factor the performance advantages of a MBP into this...

Personally, I like the white color better than black, black absorbs rather than reflects sunlight, and my fingers a grease too . But other than cost, the MBP are far better as far as what they have, Express Card capability (since Apple has given up on going any faster with FW, too bad; FW1600 or FW3200 would have been great).

Has Apple (or any of the IEEE Firewire consortium members) even investigated faster FW options? I know in the official IEEE1394 spec the last time looked at it topped out at FW800. There were some different connector options and implementations for bonded or multiplexed FW streams briefly outlined and various things targeted at more industrial applications, but that was about it... Faster FW would definitely be welcome or maybe even a couple independent FW800 channels. I'd love to have eSata on the MBP someday, but SATA can't run everything...

 

[cecildk9999]

I intend to replace the RAM and HDD of any Apple laptop I buy with third party components (since it'll be far cheaper than upgrading through Apple). In my case the extra RAM and HDD space in the MBP is entirely moot, though I suppose I could put them in my old laptop...

I totally agree with you here; you can take a MacBook and give it some much nicer specs at a reasonable price compared to what Apple will charge. I was just saying that Apple can 'justify' (but not really now) the higher price points since your baseline high-end MBP starts with a few nicer pieces of hardware than the high-end MB.

I'm still going to reserve judgment on whether Apple's pricing points are 'fair' until I see the full line-up of new models that should come with the holidays. If the new MBPs are really just portable iMacs with an extra premium tacked on to them for the 'Pro' denominator, then I may rethink my decision to go for a pro laptop in the future, but I can't see Apple doing that to their 'flagship' laptop. It would be nice to have a few more customization options, but it seems that battle is usually lost with Apple.

 

[Multimedia]

1.83GH MacBook for $949 Refurb Is The Way To Go

Many of the larger Apple stores carry alternative configurations of systems, not just the base configs. As for upgrades, especially on a Mac Pro, do them yourself. RAM and HD swaps are super-simple, take only a few minutes, and you can usually save quite a bit. If you're getting a MB, I would recommend the white 2GHz model. No reason to pay a $150 premium for black.

Buy a refurb instead and save enough for your third party RAM and even bigger 160GB HD. I recommend the 1.83GHz MacBook if you don't need to burn DVDs.

 

[Multimedia]

Less Than 2GHz C2D Is Missing 4MB Shared L2 Cache

Do you think there is any chance that Apple would LOWER the specs for an updated Macbook?

I would rather have a 1.6 Ghz cool & quiet C2D prozessor in my Macbook to lasts 8 hours on a battery charge, than the 'Latest & Geatest' that scorches my legs and drains the charge in no time.

And they could sell it even cheaper!

You won't want less than 2GHz because it's got a 4MB shared L2 cache. That's one of the #1 reasons to wait for C2D.

 

[Multimedia]

Speed Bumped Means 2.33GHz With New Ventilation System & HD Bay

I am interested in an opinion from some of you guys who have been around here longer than me on the following quote from AppleInsider:

"Meanwhile, several of Apple's retail partners waiting on new shipments of the company's MacBook notebook lines were recently told that shipments of "speed bumped" models are currently tracking for the first week of Nov."

I am not as familiar with AppleInsider as some of you and am interested in how you "decrypt" this statement. Do you take it that they are implying a speed-bump-only upgrade? Or is it simply an ambiguous statement not meant to be understood?

No. Speed Bumped Means 2.33GHz With New Ventilation System & HD Bay. Anyone who thinks it's only going to be a speed bump is unfamiliar with the heat problems in the existing line.

"Speed bumped macs coming" + Apple Insider = "Well, we were talking to this farmer who has a brother, and his girlfriend's husband's ex wife's mother says that she knows a guy who likes apple pie. Oh and she likes macs too"

Oh and what he said.

LoL.

Either way, i'm one of those people that will faithfully remain waiting for those C2D mb/mbps. This will be my switch from pc to mac. I'll wait however long though, as I'll need it to carry me through the rest of college. Aren't y'all so proud of me? It'll be here soon enough, y'all just hold on a bit longer.

I am super duper proud of you Uma. And I love your movies too.

 

[DHagan4755]

Suspect since the "MacBook Pro" moniker was announced in January, Apple, in my opinion, was signaling that it was moving toward a two-tiered structure to their portables — a consumer and professional version of each display size.

A piece of that puzzle became more clear in April when Apple released the MacBook in black. Yeah, part of this was in reaction to the black iPod. I think Apple was testing the waters. Steve Jobs was said to be pretty enamored with black when they were developing the original PowerBook G4, but could not come up with an efficient and inexpensive way at the time to paint titanium black.

To further put a spin on black, all of Apple's professional applications and products are wrapped in black from web design to packaging. If you follow Apple's apparent wisdom with the black MacBook, we would have had a black iMac by now. The new iPod nano (soon to ship) has a high-end 8GB model in...black.

As you look across the landscape to see what Apple's competition is doing in the notebook space, they are offering some pretty amazing price points for 15-inch widescreen notebooks. It makes me wonder why Apple is not competing in this space? There's quite a gap from the grossly overpriced black MacBook to the MacBook Pro.

Now whether this means anything or not is only privy to those in the know™.

I think Apple is about to embark on that two-tiered strategy, adding a consumer 15.4-inch widescreen notebook.

The MacBook has a nifty removable hard drive bay and a magnetic latch. Geez, those are things the pro model should have! This makes me think that Apple is going to unify the enclosure of the MacBook and MacBook Pro at some point. The "white model" will be the one with the integrated graphics. The "black model" will be the pro model will be the one with the dedicated graphics. There will be a 13-inch, 15-inch, and 17-inch model in white and in black.

Just think: How many professionals would have scooped up that black MacBook had it had an ATi Radeon X1600?

Something to keep in mind...

 

[DHagan4755]

Speed Bumped Means 2.33GHz With New Ventilation System & HD Bay.

You're right. Apple needs to tackle the heat issue. This makes your theory of redesign more plausible, although I just don't see it happening without Apple holding a special event.

I know, I know...Apple didn't hold a special event to announce the MacBook, but the consumer portable in Apple's product matrix has never gotten much of a billing outside of its initial release in 2001. (Only when Apple has made major cosmetic changes have they held press events. Think May 1, 2001 when they ditched the clamshell iBook design for the white "chicklet" design that is still used today.)

The point I am making is that Apple needs to do a lot of other engineering to their MacBook Pro, and if this indeed happening, I just don't think this will be silently announced. For starters, of course, is the heat and the missing features found in the less expensive models — namely the removable hard drive bay.

More glaring to me (no punn intended) is the very limited maximum angle the screen can be opened. This is a real design flaw, and shows of the weakness in that hinge design. OK, ports: A lot of customers in the pro space would like these out of sight, out of mind...in the back of the notebook where they once were. Since the hinge design consumes the entire back plane of the notebook, the ports have all been moved off to the side. This has created problems for the 15-inch model because there is no room on the logic board to fit a FireWire 800 port. I would say this has also created a problem in that Apple was not able to fit a dual-layer SuperDrive in there either. As for the display itself, they are unevenly lit and have a limited viewing angle. Yeah, they are brighter, but viewing angle needs to be addressed too.

 

[rand0m3r]

You won't want less than 2GHz because it's got a 4MB shared L2 cache. That's one of the #1 reasons to wait for C2D.

can you explain exactly how much diff 4MB shared L2 cache means to the non-hardware-savvy

if it isn't such a big deal i'll prolly go for the low-end one since i prolly won't need the low-quality dvd burner. i'll just use my nano to transfer files to my PC to burn.

 

[sblasl]

I can't imagine a radical redesign of the laptops as a "silent" upgrade and I definitely can not imagine them being released without Steve Jobs jumping into the limelight to make the announcement.

So where & how will they be introduced?

 

[Konfabulation]

The MacBook has a nifty removable hard drive bay and a magnetic latch. Geez, those are things the pro model should have! This makes me think that Apple is going to unify the enclosure of the MacBook and MacBook Pro at some point. The "white model" will be the one with the integrated graphics. The "black model" will be the pro model will be the one with the dedicated graphics. There will be a 13-inch, 15-inch, and 17-inch model in white and in black.

Just think: How many professionals would have scooped up that black MacBook had it had an ATi Radeon X1600?

Something to keep in mind...

I seriously doubt that Apple would trash the anodized aluminum design anytime soon. It is seriously cool. If anything, they will have MBP's with a black anodized finish.

 

[myke323]

"What it didn't say was how many of those Core 2 Duo processors were of the Merom mobile variant as opposed to the Conroe desktop variant."

Sooo, are the C2D processors in the Imac Merom or Conroe? And what exactly makes them different?

 

[EAH22]

Hey guys i was wondering does anyone know the date of the update to c2d?



























kidding

but seriously, the macbook was my first mac and I love it, I upgraded the ram to 2 gigs, and my wife and I use it all the time, and our PC desktop is collecting dust, but as soon the macbook pros come out with c2d I want one. I think its justified

 

[JackSYi]

This may be a better interpretation to the quantity comment in that report... Perhaps it's not a shortage of actual CPUs that is the concern, but rather systems themselves. Apple could be anticipating a huge demand for the C2D update combined with holiday timing. Perhaps they have been stockpiling to be sure there are enough stock config systems to supply retail locations as well as to fill the CTO orders right from the start and to carry on through the end of the year.

Finally an optimistic opinion.

 

[YunusEmre]

Enough already

I have suffered in the hands of Microsoft enough already. My "add/remove programs" list is full of security updates with numbers as names. Every other day I get a pop up saying more security updates are ready for download (and a reboot of course). My winnt folder is full of sub-folders with names like these:

$NtUninstallKB329115$
$NtUpdateRollupPackUninstall$
$SQLUninstallMDAC25SP3-KB911562-x86-ENU$

More of these are added everytime I allow a security update. Windows is a product that should be put out of it's misery and terminated for good. Bring out a product that will wipe out this disease called windows. And I am sick of waiting for the next generation of Macbook pros. Come on already, announce it so I can kick this piece of crap out of my house.

Disclosure: This rant was made necessary by and typed on a Windows PC.

 

[JackSYi]

Appleinsider

About Appleinsider in their accuracy:

On Aug 24th, they reported that Mac Mini supplies were drying up without any shipments.
On Sept 6th, Apple quitely updated its Mac Mini lines.

On Sept 4th, AI reported that the new iPod Nano ramp was underway.
On Sept 12th, Apple announced the new iPod Nanos.

On Oct 6th, and 13th, AI reported that Apple was preparing for the new C2D MBPs.

Next tuesday is highly likely. If not next week, the week after for sure. AI has a tendency to report 7-14 days in advance and they hardly ever just screw up.

BTW: Does anyone have the link to AI's report on MBPs at Photokina? I can't seem to find it in their archives.

 

[SteveJoobs]

JackSYi,

Excellent post! Your AppleInsider reasoning makes a lot of sense.

Crossing fingers & toes here ...