Full Laptop Refresh By Holidays?

[DesignDJ]

Just curious how many of those who can afford to wait only have G4/G3 systems?. Because that means you guys have serious willpower. I can understand G5 or even intel owners being able to wait. Me i'm reaching the snap point.

I'm running a 400mhz G3 tower at home, I've been waiting for the laptop upgrade forever. Luckily I am on a G5 tower at work, which is the only thing keeping me sane. At home all I can do is surf the web, check email and run photoshop (barely). I didn't buy the 1st intel macbook pro that came out due to a money issue. But now I am ready to buy! The wait will probably kill me, but I am determined.

 

[Multimedia]

Daneoni Wait For Eight 2.33GHz Core Mac Pro By January Worst Case

I have a Mac Pro in my basket now but someting keeps telling me to wait that much longer and that ill be glad i did. On the flip side another voice is like "Buy the desktop now, you won't even be impressed when the MBP is finally unveiled....all the wait would be a waste of time".

Don't press that button! Wait for Dual Clovertowns in December-January eight 2.33GHz cores for the same money as four 3GHz cores. $3,300 by January worst case. The processor ships in November.

 

[timmillwood]

i'm really hoping for the new MBP next week. I am tempted to buy one now but i am holding off because of the rumored new design, better heat, battery life and speed.

I have no need for a removable HDD or FW800 port i just want somthing better than the old one which did have a few glitches

 

[ThunderLounge]

I believe the biggest reason for Merom is the 64-bit capability. The other improvements are evolutionary and not a biggie. People overlook the fact that the current Core Duo cannot run 64-bit. Not a biggie now, but when 10.5 ships, we will want to be on the Core 2 Duo wagon.
(Unless I'm all wrong on the 64-bit thing!)

So, THAT is my only reason for waiting for the Merom update. All other factors are rather minor and not worth waiting for if you want/need a MBP sooner rather than later...

EDIT: OK, the Core Duo is a hidden 64-bit chip in 32-bit clothing, but it does not support EM64T like Core 2... How's that...

I don't see it being a problem with 10.5, or even a future "10.6".

Apple's been good about keeping backwards compatibility, and 10.5 will run on anything from a G3 to a merom, to a clovertown just fine. It most certainly will perform better on the more recent processors, but it will still be able to run on the PPC chips. The worst that could happen would be dropping G3 support, but I doubt that will be the case in 10.5. The version after, perhaps. But I doubt in the two versions after 10.5 that you will see PPC chip support end. Three versions, perhaps. All depending on the amount of time between versions, etc.

While the 64-bit support will be nice at some point, I don't see it as a "must have or else" option for a while yet.

 

[ergle2]

EDIT: OK, the Core Duo is a hidden 64-bit chip in 32-bit clothing, but it does not support EM64T like Core 2... How's that...

The rest of your post I understood fine but this edit has me curious -- what did you mean?

 

[ergle2]

While the 64-bit support will be nice at some point, I don't see it as a "must have or else" option for a while yet.

I always thought it was a little odd that Apple didn't wait for the 64bit chips to move to Intel, since that would have allowed a switch at any time, pretty much.

I guess given the fact we're now in October and still don't have a 64bit-capable notebook explains why tho'.

EM64T mode won't make huge differences to most apps but unlike most processor families, 64bit mode has often proven faster than 32bit mode due to the extra registers available to coders/compilers.

Some code will also benefit from 64bit wide registers but that's less common.

The downside is context switches take longer (more registers, wider registers) and code density suffers due to longer addresses.

From what I've seen (recompilation of existing code, benchmarks, etc.) it's generally a win or a wash on most x86 processors.

 

[DHagan4755]

Updates next week?

The MacBook Pro is now listed as out of stock with 7-10 day wait times at the online U.S. Apple Store for Education Institutions.

This same time delay happened a week or so before the iMac was updated on September 6th, and is up from yesterday's times of 1-3 days for the 15-inch.

Meanwhile the 17-inch ship times decreased from 5-7 days to 3-5 days, and the MacBooks are all at 5-7 days. Again, this is all at the online Apple store for education institutions. Speculate on that as you will... I personally take that as a good sign for pending updates.

 

[NewSc2]

Just curious how many of those who can afford to wait only have G4/G3 systems?. Because that means you guys have serious willpower. I can understand G5 or even intel owners being able to wait. Me i'm reaching the snap point.

I've met enough professionals in the audio/music industry that still work off of really old G4 powerbooks (1ghz) and G4 towers. I have a lot of respect for their work, and they're still producing hits just like they were 5 years ago when their equipment was new.

 

[NewSc2]

MWSF isn't that far away, and I'd like to see Apple make a splash with a new MBP there. I'm prepared to wait that long for something good.

Also, has anybody been reading reviews of the C2D mobile? Remember that it's not a big improvement over C1D...

 

[ffakr]

buy whatever you need when you need it.

Don't press that button! Wait for Dual Clovertowns in December-January eight 2.33GHz cores for the same money as four 3GHz cores. $3,300 by January worst case. The processor ships in November.

That's silly for two reasons:

first: Waiting a week when something seems imminent is one thing but you'll never get a new machine if you are waiting for machines that are supposed to materialize in 2-3 months (or more).

second: I doubt the quad cores will make it into desktop Towers. The current machines are wicked fast and reasonably priced to boot. The first Gen of quad cores will return to the old P4 thermal envelope. They'll also cost quite a bit more AND it's just two dual-core chips on one piece of silicon AND they will clock lower than the dual cores so non-threaded performance will DECREASE.

bottom line, for most people, dual quad-core cpus won't be any faster. They'll certainly be HOTTER and the machine will run Louder and they'll most certainly cost more. I've set up a couple of the 2.66GHz Mac Pros and it's rather difficult to put a load on them. I ripped an hour long DVD to 640x480 deinterlaced H.264 video in half of playback time on one of those. That's a task that would run 2/3 of a day on a Powerbook G4.
Quad core chips will be neat but here's the reality...
- core speed will be down
- bandwidth constrained (look at the memory benchmarks)
- MUCH hotter
- more expensive
- Only really usefull to people who run massively parallel jobs (servers, rendering...)

If you run a server farm.. you'll love them. If you want a wicked fast desktop that doesn't sound like a Hoover, buy now. Also.. if you don't NEED the ultimate machine now or really soon.. the 2nd gen quad cores should be much nicer. The AMD solution will actually be done better but it's such a pain in the ass to have 4 RAM banks per processor socket.

 

[Mr.Gadget]

The rest of your post I understood fine but this edit has me curious -- what did you mean?

I read an article on Gizmodo that said Intel was hiding features on the Core Duo, namely the 64 bit support, but that the new Core 2 Duo will have this enabled...

 

[ct-scan]

The MacBook Pro is now listed as out of stock with 7-10 day wait times at the online U.S. Apple Store for Education Institutions.

This same time delay happened a week or so before the iMac was updated on September 6th, and is up from yesterday's times of 1-3 days for the 15-inch.

Meanwhile the 17-inch ship times decreased from 5-7 days to 3-5 days, and the MacBooks are all at 5-7 days. Again, this is all at the online Apple store for education institutions. Speculate on that as you will... I personally take that as a good sign for pending updates.

I'll take any sign
But it does seem like there needs to be a reason for this new delay...but I noticed that the Student store ship times are the same as the regular store, not like the institution store.

 

[ergle2]

They'll also cost quite a bit more AND it's just two dual-core chips on one piece of silicon AND they will clock lower than the dual cores so non-threaded performance will DECREASE.

2.33GHz clovertowns will cost the same as 3.0GHz woodcrests.

 

[erkus]

The thing is that it's not just about the CPU. A revised MBP probably means that they have worked on other things aswell, and that's more important to me. The main reason why i don't want to buy a MBP today is because I'm still sceptical to the whole heat issue and the whining problem. The other main thing that stops me is the price. With todays specs, the MBP is ridiculously overpriced.

Sure, 64-bit would be nice when running Matlab, but who knows what it will really mean when running leopard. The merom MBP will be my first mac so I'm quite eager to se it released. I have the money already and this waiting game really sucks. I have an extraterrestrial itch in my fingers from not letting myself press the order-button. If it isn't released next week i don't know what i'll do ...well actually I do. I'll keep waiting and there will be alot of swearing both over apple and at me for getting my hopes up ...again

 

[ffakr]

Ship times are up

Our campus store site also has ship times pushed up. This might be nothing but it is often an indicator that they are clearing channel. ..and I was just about to order one for myself.

I picked up a 15" powerbook for my employee around a week ago and published ship times were 1-2 days but it actually took something like 4 to ship. It arrived very quickly after it actually shipped though. It was a custom order however.

Right now there doesn't seem to be a difference between standard config and custom config ship times which is odd. I wouldn't put too much stock in this until the ship times slip up to 2 weeks.

 

[dkoralek]

The MacBook Pro is now listed as out of stock with 7-10 day wait times at the online U.S. Apple Store for Education Institutions.

This same time delay happened a week or so before the iMac was updated on September 6th, and is up from yesterday's times of 1-3 days for the 15-inch.

Meanwhile the 17-inch ship times decreased from 5-7 days to 3-5 days, and the MacBooks are all at 5-7 days. Again, this is all at the online Apple store for education institutions. Speculate on that as you will... I personally take that as a good sign for pending updates.

When I go to the store for Education, I get the same ship times as the regular store (24 hours unless you build to order and then it goes to 1-3 days).

cheers.

 

[ct-scan]

When I go to the store for Education, I get the same ship times as the regular store (24 hours unless you build to order and then it goes to 1-3 days).

cheers.

It's not the Student Education store, it's the Educational Institution store.

 

[generik]

MWSF isn't that far away, and I'd like to see Apple make a splash with a new MBP there. I'm prepared to wait that long for something good.

Also, has anybody been reading reviews of the C2D mobile? Remember that it's not a big improvement over C1D...

Yes, because Intel will ship Apple with some super top secret unreleased chips...

What do you expect Apple to unveil at MWSF? Meroms? Pfft, been there done that... LAST QUARTER. Oh, and we all know PC users pay attention to Apple media events like MWSF too...

 

[ergle2]

I read an article on Gizmodo that said Intel was hiding features on the Core Duo, namely the 64 bit support, but that the new Core 2 Duo will have this enabled...

Ahh... I remember reading that way back -- it's incorrect.

Sossaman is only 32bit too.

I think the mixup came over Sossaman being the LV Xeon when the NetBurst Xeons were gaining the EM64T extensions, but I forget the details.

 

[daneoni]

Don't press that button! Wait for Dual Clovertowns in December-January eight 2.33GHz cores for the same money as four 3GHz cores. $3,300 by January worst case. The processor ships in November.

Sounds nice and all but fact is i'll never use 8 cores....at least for the next 3 years easy, i barely use 2!. I also get the feeling the 8 Core macs will be slightly more expensive and having 8 cores isn't really all that, especially when it will be choked by a 1333MHz FSB and FB DIMMS which are supposedly slightly slower than pure DDR2 RAM.

The current MacPros are an amazing price for what you get and they have potential for 16GB RAM, 3.0GHz current Xeons or even drop-in dual Quadro chip upgrades. Also Blu-Ray/HD-DVD is possible. Its also probably cheaper than the imminent MBPs and would be easier to sell should i need to. I know people will still buy current Mac Pros at respectable prices even after the 8 Core versions are released.

So whats not to like?

 

[ffakr]

2.33GHz clovertowns will cost the same as 3.0GHz woodcrests.

Yes, and 2.66GHz woodcrests cost nearly half of what a 3.0GHz woodcrest costs. What's your point? You're comparing a mid-range non-shipping quad core part to a top of the line shipping dual core part.

For most people, as I said, the dual core parts with a higher clock will perform better and they'll put out much less heat. I consider myself a poweruser. I'm really debating a dual-dual for home vs. a 24" iMac. The new iMacs are really fast too but I want the 1900xt video card.
Given the choice, I'd have to take a dual-dual woodcrest over a slower clocked dual-quad clovertown. For pretty much everything I'd ever do, today's system would perform better. It would also be cooler and quieter. The new Towers are remakable.. they're nearly silent. In a typical private office you might think it was off or entirely passively cooled. That won't be the case if you stuff two chips in that max at 120-130W each.. even if you have a 120mm fan in there.

Check the benchmarks. I belive Tom's hardware has some up (I think thats the long review I read). The Clovertowns get creamed in memory benchmarks (too many cores per bus). The Clovertowns do kill in synthetic computation benchmarks and in a few well threaded examples but they tie or loose to Core2 Duo chips in many if not most of the real world benchmarks. In particular, games just don't take advantage of 4, let alone 8 cpu cores. In woodcrest systems, they occasionally bench faster with one processor on instead of both enabled. In the 2 v. 4 core Game benchmarks.. any synthetic performance advantages also evaporated. In a lot of those benchmarks, the Core2 systems beat the 4 core systems convincingly (lower memory latency also in those machines).

I'm just saying.. 4 core chips WILL be cool but Ferrari's are cool too. They also don't make the best ride for most average people.. not even for most people that really enjoy driving [around the city]. Quad core systems will certainly have their markets but telling people to wait 2-3 months just because Apple might ship a machine that might be less suited is just bad advice.

 

[meepm00pmeep]

well, i have until some time next week before i get my MBP, so i'll hold off from opening it, in case there is an update, that way i can return it for the updated one... so, i just hope an update occurs from now until the end of next week, if not, i'm still a happy camper

 

[ergle2]

Yes, and 2.66GHz woodcrests cost nearly half of what a 3.0GHz woodcrest costs. What's your point? You're comparing a mid-range non-shipping quad core part to a top of the line shipping dual core part.

It was a statement of fact about cost. They're the price Multi said in his original post.

Having said that, for a lot of the work Xeons are used for, these mid-range quads will beat the top of the line dual.

I deleted the rest of what you wrote, as I pretty much agree with it.

 

[timmillwood]

I hope for a MBP with a 2.33Ghz Core 2 Duo, 1Gb ram, 120Gb 5400rpm HDD, 15.4" Glossy screen, 256mb Graphics all for £1699 -HE Discount

New 0% Credit Card coming in the next 14 days so no rush yet apple but as soon after 14 days as you can would be great... because 0% only until September 2007

 

[Soundburst]

Hello,

I'm going to be buying one as well shortly, and ideally I would love a resolution upgrade, and the optional choice of adding 256mb graphics onto the base MBP. Doubt they'll give us the graphics choice though. Not too fussed on the rest of the stuff though.