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MBA Powerful Enough For External HDTV?

J

Jezthomp

macrumors member
Original poster
Currently i plug my MBP into an external 40" HDTV, connect the power close the lid and watch HD films from iTunes, Plex etc.

Would a high spec MBA also be able to achieve this task, or is the graphics card not powerful enough?

Thanks for input... 🙂
 
Jezthomp said:
Currently i plug my MBP into an external 40" HDTV, connect the power close the lid and watch HD films from iTunes, Plex etc.

Would a high spec MBA also be able to achieve this task, or is the graphics card not powerful enough?

Thanks for input... 🙂
Click to expand...

My friend has a mba 11" late 2010 model and he powers his forty something inch tv with that little thing. The graphic cards seem to be only slightly different in terms of performance so yea I reckon you will do fine.
 
I had my MBA 13" running numerous episodes of The Big Bang Theory (720p) on a really big HDTV in a hotel room and it coped splendidly. 🙂
 
...

the TV size doesn't matter its the resolution that does. The air is more than powerful enough to output 1080P and it doesn't matter if its going to a 32" display or my projector on a 9 foot screen its the pixels that matter
 
Cheers guys.

Weighing up replacing my 08 MBP with a fully specked MBA.

Don't do any heavy video editing, just web development and watching films connected to a HDTV so hoping it will be ok....?
 
Jezthomp said:
Cheers guys.

Weighing up replacing my 08 MBP with a fully specked MBA.

Don't do any heavy video editing, just web development and watching films connected to a HDTV so hoping it will be ok....?
Click to expand...

It will be more than enough! 🙂
 
It's only the TV resolution that matters, not the fact that it's a TV or its physical size. HDTVs are usually 1366x768 or 1920x1080. I can play 1080p videos on my 1920x1200 monitor without slowdowns so yeah, it will work.

Also, a 2011 MBA will be faster than your 2008 MBP. My i7 MBA is noticeably faster than my mid-2009 15" MBP.
 
Thanks again guys.

My only worries were really the tv thing and perhaps VMware Fusion running smoothly with Win 7 on it.

Because thats the one thing that is slowing up on my MBP.

All the rest i use photoshop,illustratior, Dreamweaver etc run fine.

Start up Vmware Fusion and everything slows to a halt, might be because the windows copy is updating but i think its the age...

Thanks again 🙂
 
Jezthomp said:
Thanks again guys.

My only worries were really the tv thing and perhaps VMware Fusion running smoothly with Win 7 on it.

Because thats the one thing that is slowing up on my MBP.

All the rest i use photoshop,illustratior, Dreamweaver etc run fine.

Start up Vmware Fusion and everything slows to a halt, might be because the windows copy is updating but i think its the age...

Thanks again 🙂
Click to expand...

fusion and parallels both run smooth on my 2011 air. The cpu is much better than that in your pro which helps a lot. Would be better with 8gb of ram though
 
Thanks newdeal.

Just thought that the usual MBP i get 15inch 4GB one might actually be too much for what i use it for.

The MBA SSD etc make it a quick little machine from what i've read.

The money i save, could go towards a thunderbolt display to work along side the MBA.

Have Apple almost made the MBP a little redundant, apart from high end video and image work, surely the MBA can handle anything the MBP can?
 
Jezthomp said:
Thanks newdeal.

Just thought that the usual MBP i get 15inch 4GB one might actually be too much for what i use it for.

The MBA SSD etc make it a quick little machine from what i've read.

The money i save, could go towards a thunderbolt display to work along side the MBA.

Have Apple almost made the MBP a little redundant, apart from high end video and image work, surely the MBA can handle anything the MBP can?
Click to expand...

The MBA and MBP have never been as redundant as right now in the past. The MBA used to be much slower in comparison.

The MBP will be faster for gaming and professional multimedia applications such as sound/video editing. For most normal daily tasks though a MBA will be faster than a MBP with a hard drive because of its SSD.

If you have the money, I agree that MBA+Thunderbolt display is a sweet combo. While expensive, the TB display is far from being overpriced for what it is.
 
You don't even need a high end MBA to do this.

I have a base 13 and can play 1080p videos (streaming or hard drive) on my 56 inch Samsung WHILE playing another 1080p video on my macbook air's screen or playing Left 4 Dead 2 on my 13 inch screen simultaneously.

It's pretty amazing, I can load up a 1080p video for people to watch on the HDTV while doing my own thing on my macbook air without any hiccup.
 
The MBAs have been able to play Blu-ray movies since the 9400m so long as they don't have to deal with the HD audio.
 
Thanks guys.

I forgot to say I store all iTunes stuff on an external hd and is played from that via USB, ok now still be ok with an Air?
 
macneubie said:
will those thunderbolt (mini display port) to HDMI adapter on the current MBA output audio also?
Click to expand...

Yes it will. I don't have the Apple Brand adaptor and it does fine. Can't think of the brand right now, but got it at Best Buy.

Edit: it's the Rocketfish brand.
 
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