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I hate apple for not having an express card slot on 15"
- Thread starter jrlcopy
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Title is all... I was one of those "single digit" users that used it.
Sorry, I know this post is a waste of space and bandwidth, but wanted to rant.
To be honest, I wouldn't mind having it too on the 15 inch. I suppose I won't be able to use an UAD card with it
I think Apple could careless. Apple knows that people will buy their products regardless, if the individual needs the cardslot then they'll upgrade, which will in turn lead to more money. I personally don't believe they really "care" too much for what their customers suggestions/needs. The specs other companies offer are great compared to Apple's if one is paying a few thousand for the product, but durability doesn't "last". It seems like Apple is really riding their Aluminum Unibody design. Anything, but Windows I guess :S
I still use mine, and I'm not upgrading my MBP until something faster than USB2 or Firewire is available.
I don't like the slot mechanically, though. It is too easy to accidentally eject a card when I try to plug in an eSATA cable, and cards are always a bit loose side-to-side. I prefer the PCMCIA type slots with an eject button.
On the next MBP I want:
-Optional CD drive
-Option for SSD+hard drive or 2 hard drives
-Expresscard
-Lightpeak
-High res matte screen
If they could fit all that in a 13", along with a better GPU, that would be even better. Make the 13" MBP a true Pro machine, and sell the Macbook to people who don't want to pay whatever it costs to get the computer I described, since 95% of them won't use those features. They could even make the Macbook aluminum, so it's "just as good" as the MBPs, and that would eliminate the MB's awkward position in Apple's lineup.
I don't like the slot mechanically, though. It is too easy to accidentally eject a card when I try to plug in an eSATA cable, and cards are always a bit loose side-to-side. I prefer the PCMCIA type slots with an eject button.
On the next MBP I want:
-Optional CD drive
-Option for SSD+hard drive or 2 hard drives
-Expresscard
-Lightpeak
-High res matte screen
If they could fit all that in a 13", along with a better GPU, that would be even better. Make the 13" MBP a true Pro machine, and sell the Macbook to people who don't want to pay whatever it costs to get the computer I described, since 95% of them won't use those features. They could even make the Macbook aluminum, so it's "just as good" as the MBPs, and that would eliminate the MB's awkward position in Apple's lineup.
They wont. Expresscard is neglected by vendors on the OS X side so we get drivers that crash and burn our systems. The high end solutions that are actually worth a damn cost hundreds of dollars.
Granted I too use the expresscard and I don't mind paying a premium, but most of the "consumers" I knew using the macbook "pro" (college kids, non techies) didn't know what an expresscard was. Many thought it was a remote holder.
A freaking remote holder.
While most have rightly focused on the "pro" uses of the slot, it also future-proofs your machine. I was able to keep my 2003 tibook running (w/ firewire 800 and usb 2) until last year thanks to its trusty cardbus slot.
btw, I'm posting this on my 15" 2.9g 2009 MBP with its 3 g expresscard ...
btw, I'm posting this on my 15" 2.9g 2009 MBP with its 3 g expresscard ...
Expresscard pipes directly into your computer's fast pci bus. For video capture, it allows you to capture into a completely different bus than other peripherals, greatly eliminating the chance of capture problems. 4 g broadband, I've read (somewhere in this forum), will also exceed the speed of usb 2 -- so an expresscard is needed to take advantage of quickly coming 4g.
That's inherently impossible since 4G is limited to 100Mb/s, which is less than the technical maximum of USB 2.0
FW800, eSATA, UDMA CF reader, just to name a few.
FW and eSATA are different interface types, of course USB can't do that. That's like saying "i can't put this square block into this circle", well duh, it inherently won't work. If you really want them to work get an adapter, I found ones during 10 seconds of googleing. Same for UDMA CF reader http://www.amazon.com/Lexar-Dual-Slot-Memory-Reader-RW035-001/dp/B0013TRZI2
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I can't really fault Apple for dumping the ExpressCard. It just never really caught on and for most people was nothing more then an empty slot in their MacBook. On the other hand I can't say I'm happy with the decision to replace it with an SD card reader either. I'd have been much happier with another FW800 port or even another USB port. As far as I'm concerned they simply went from one external interface I probably never would have used to another external interface I'll probably never use. The SD would have gained some usefulness if they had included an SD port on the iPad or if they throw one into the next gen iPhone ( Oh the ways Steve finds to keep us tied to iTunes).
What's with the "duh"? You explicitly asked what ExpressCard could do over USB, then responded "duh" when alphaod pointed out an example!
USB is slow. You can get 35MB/sec max out of USB, but Expresscard is capable of up to ~250MB/sec. File transfers to my eSATA hard drive are 3-4 times faster on eSATA than USB, and significantly faster than even FW800. You can't get full UDMA speed out of that CF reader, so there's no point.
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Well USB takes a real-world hit in through-put speed, sometimes only 1/3 of the rated speed, depending on other devices on the bus, and mystery mojo. I'd still rather have the overhead protection of expresscard. I guess we'll know how well 4 g dongles act on a usb 2 bus as they're deployed ...
I looked around for a thread on this but no joy. Here's something old at tom's:
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/174836-32-sata-transfer-rate