Macbook Aluminum 13 vs MBP 13 (IMO)

[webjeff]

So,

Today I went the mac store and checked out the new MBP 13 model compared to the one I bought just a few months ago in mid march. To be honest, I saw no difference in the monitor compared to mine. People on here were raving about the screen being soo much better. Is it just me or how much better is the screen? I couldn't tell the difference. I didn't have them side by side, but I know mine and I saw the new ones today. So, I don't know.

Do others feel the same way I do or do you guys see a huge difference???

Thanks
Jeff

PS I am not talking about the white vs mbp 13

 

[NT1440]

Why would you ever be able to tell a difference with no side by side?

There are things that are definitely better like the contrast and viewing angles, was there anything in you "test" that would have looked at those?

 

[unagimiyagi]

Trust me, it is much, much, much better. It's hard to tell in the store b/c it's chaotic and you can't put your content on it as much, but when you watch dark scenes in videos and start to look at the screen from various angles, you will see the difference.

Closest approximation is to look at the macbook air screen and look at the old unibody macbook 13" screens. If you can't tell the difference, it doesn't matter, b/c if you buy a 13" mbp now, it's cheaper, better, so you should still get the new one anyway!

 

[fuzzielitlpanda]

what were you looking at and from what angle? if you look at the basic desktop on both models head-on, it'll look the same, but if you look at a dark movie from the side, i'm sure it would be different.

 

[UbuntuFu]

Remember Apple quietly updated the screens in the 13" macbook as recently as March.

Check to see what model your screen is.

 

[webjeff]

Uhmm.....

You asked "Have you watched a dark movie from an angle?"... my answer would be no, lol!!

I just want someone to say its not that much different really. Am I the only one that looked at it and said "Hey, this isn't much different, infact I can't really notice a difference" I'm sure if I had them side-by-side for hours I could tell a difference. However, that's not ever going to happen.

People on here seem like it's a huge difference, I see a huge difference between the white macbook and the alum 13 or mbp 13, but not between them themselves.

I dunno, am I crazy?
Jeff.

 

[Ruahrc]

If you know what to look for, it's pretty big IMO. I have a Dell 2209WA IPS LCD at home which is calibrated with a colorimeter. I use it for hobby photo editing. Anyways, the gamut on my PBG4 was clearly less than my LCD because if I looked at the same photo on both screens the laptop could not produce the intense reds like the LCD could.

I saw this same behavior at the apple store with the old 15" MBP they had connected to the 24" LED cinema display. The laptop screen lacked the intense reds (this was the most obvious color to me). The 17" MBP they had on display though with the new screen could match very closely the gamut of the 24" LED.

When I bought my 13" MBP and took it home and looked at it, I could also see how the screen could match the gamut of my 2209WA display at home. Just like the 17" MBP would be able to do.

I will qualify this by saying that none of the displays save the 2209WA were calibrated, but again if you know what you're looking for you can tell at least with an uncalibrated display that it has a bigger gamut. For me and my photography, the upgraded screen is a big deal and was what pushed me to finally upgrade my 5 y.o. laptop.

The screen still has the viewing angle issues inherent to TN panels, making the IPS desktop displays better still, but it is great for a laptop and if you have the correct viewing angle on the laptop display it's IMO good enough to do good color work on. My old 15" laptop was good enough to do color work on but the new one is better.

Ruahrc

 

[unagimiyagi]

Uhmm.....

You asked "Have you watched a dark movie from an angle?"... my answer would be no, lol!!

I just want someone to say its not that much different really. Am I the only one that looked at it and said "Hey, this isn't much different, infact I can't really notice a difference" I'm sure if I had them side-by-side for hours I could tell a difference. However, that's not ever going to happen.

People on here seem like it's a huge difference, I see a huge difference between the white macbook and the alum 13 or mbp 13, but not between them themselves.

I dunno, am I crazy?
Jeff.

It's not a sin not to notice the difference. If anything, you're probably a happier person and easier to please. That really is not a bad thing at all. In your case, get the cheapest last-gen 13"unibody that you can find unless you care about the extended battery life and sd card slot. Perhaps some might liken it to high-end audio where some people swear that certain speakers sound way way better than other similarly priced speakers, and speaker cables make all the difference. Some hear it , some don't. I don't. I personally think that speaker cable differences are a bunch of crock. But these differences in the screens on the new macbook pros are absolutely better to my eye--by a lot.