I really have to agree with that. Apple has way to strong of a reputation to risk it over something like not acknowledging a technical issue. They've always taken care of any problems they've caused, in my opinion. Everyone makes mistakes and no one is perfect, and it's been a little over a week and they've now made a statement and are obviously working on an actual fix.
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Owners of Late 2013 Retina MacBook Pros Reporting Keyboard and Trackpad Freezes, Boot Camp Install Issues
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I really have to agree with that. Apple has way to strong of a reputation to risk it over something like not acknowledging a technical issue. They've always taken care of any problems they've caused, in my opinion. Everyone makes mistakes and no one is perfect, and it's been a little over a week and they've now made a statement and are obviously working on an actual fix.
This affects other machines as well on Mavericks
This affects other machines as well. I have a Macbook Pro 2009 2.26ghz and it happened after I upgraded to Mavericks. I have reverted back early to 10.8.x. Latest build of 10.8.x still had issue. Earlier version is running fine.
rmbp 2012 master race.
Enjoy your freeze 2013.
This affects other machines as well. I have a Macbook Pro 2009 2.26ghz and it happened after I upgraded to Mavericks. I have reverted back early to 10.8.x. Latest build of 10.8.x still had issue. Earlier version is running fine.
I to had freezes on old 2009 Macbook Pro and have SSD SanForce in OWC Electra when installing Mavericks. Had to revert to Early Mountain Lion to get it stable.
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Auto save feature should have your work saved pop up on restart.
Got it to work Win 7 64-bit but no lightup keyboard or right click trackpad.
I have successfully installed Win 7 64-Bit (but it took some doing) and I've done it tons of times on previous models so it wasn't me, there's DEFINITELY a software issue that needs updated, but my keyboard won't light-up and my track pad won't right-click, pinch, zoom etc. in Win 7 64-bit. I have downloaded the correct version of Boot Camp and it won't install (From Boot Camp Setup itself) so I had to manually install the drivers FROM the Boot Camp drivers folder once I unzipped it. My 13" i5 4GB/128SSD DOES have the latest Intel IRIS control panel and it's fully adjustable etc but even installing the 64-bit apple keyboard and driver for track pad doesn't change anything. There is NO Boot Camp controls at all in the task bar either (the one that normally installs by the clock to allow you to reboot into Mac OS for instance) so there definitely needs to be a Boot Camp update I believe. I installed the latest boot camp drivers from the Oct 3 2013 updates as one of the members supplied from a public DropBox link. Thank You "DaGr8Gatzby"
But still having issues. My 13" rMBP i5 2.4GHz never crashed in Mavericks ever but it took some doing to get it to install Boot Camp the first few times as it wasn't reading the usb ports so it couldn't access the Windows Support drivers that Boot Camp makes you download on first installation.
I hope Apple releases an update soon or someone here can assist further regarding my keyboard back lighting and track pad as well as the Boot Camp control panel and task bar issue.
Hope this helps someone and hopefully someone can help me fix these last couple issues.
Cheers
Faslane
I have successfully installed Win 7 64-Bit (but it took some doing) and I've done it tons of times on previous models so it wasn't me, there's DEFINITELY a software issue that needs updated, but my keyboard won't light-up and my track pad won't right-click, pinch, zoom etc. in Win 7 64-bit. I have downloaded the correct version of Boot Camp and it won't install (From Boot Camp Setup itself) so I had to manually install the drivers FROM the Boot Camp drivers folder once I unzipped it. My 13" i5 4GB/128SSD DOES have the latest Intel IRIS control panel and it's fully adjustable etc but even installing the 64-bit apple keyboard and driver for track pad doesn't change anything. There is NO Boot Camp controls at all in the task bar either (the one that normally installs by the clock to allow you to reboot into Mac OS for instance) so there definitely needs to be a Boot Camp update I believe. I installed the latest boot camp drivers from the Oct 3 2013 updates as one of the members supplied from a public DropBox link. Thank You "DaGr8Gatzby"
But still having issues. My 13" rMBP i5 2.4GHz never crashed in Mavericks ever but it took some doing to get it to install Boot Camp the first few times as it wasn't reading the usb ports so it couldn't access the Windows Support drivers that Boot Camp makes you download on first installation.
I hope Apple releases an update soon or someone here can assist further regarding my keyboard back lighting and track pad as well as the Boot Camp control panel and task bar issue.
Hope this helps someone and hopefully someone can help me fix these last couple issues.
Cheers
Faslane
Those aren't "presumptions." Those are examples of you trying to defend your ill-conceived claims.
No, I am not ignoring anything. But I am using my engineering expertise and knowledge to pick out the absurdities in your claims.
The only "point" you're making is that you have no concept of a total system cost. You pull out specs on individual components like the CPU clock speed and then you whine while ignoring everything else a MacBook Pro 15 buyer gets for their money:
- SSDD in the MacBook Pro (vs. conventional rotating drive in the Mac Mini)
- Intel Iris Pro Graphics 5200 (vs. low-end Intel HD Graphics 4000 in Mac Mini)
- Twice the RAM (8GB vs. 4GB)
- 720P HD camera
- 802.11ac WiFi (vs 802.11n in the Mac Mini)
- Two Thunderbolt 2 ports (vs. single Thunderbolt 1 port)
- Built-in 71.8-watt-hour lithium-polymer battery
- Battery management and charging system
- Trackpad
- Keyboard
Nice try at ignoring an important fact: The MacBook Pro 15 comes standard with 8GB of RAM and the Mac Mini comes with half of that. Yet you try to compare the prices of the two systems as if they were somehow equivalent when, in fact, they are wildly different products. If you need more than 8GB (and let's be totally honest, you have absolutely no need, whatsoever, for more RAM than that given your software synth dabbling), then buy it with 16GB.
Yes, being an experienced engineer does mean something. It means that I have the expertise and experience to decide whether the claims of a lay person, like yourself, have merit.
I'm not trying to "dictate what system [you are] allowed to own." In fact, I don't care what system you own. Not even a little bit. My purpose in entering into this discussion is to throw in some engineering insight in response to your posts that are devoid of same.
I am making a clear point: Despite your huffing and puffing, the price of the Mac Mini has nothing to do, whatsoever with the price of any MacBook Pro. The Mac Mini doesn't have a display, keyboard, trackpad, li-poly battery, or webcam. The Mac Mini is not built to withstand the rigors of travel. It can run for exactly 0.00 hours when not plugged in. The graphics are slower, the WiFi is slower, and the rotating hard drive is massively slower than the SSDD in a MacBook Pro. End of comparison.
But you're buying a computer, not a CPU.
You don't seem to understand that I don't care what you want. Why isn't that sinking in?
I don't care about your budget, your hobby, your desire for a large dot-pitch display, or your disdain for high-quality screen elements. I'm an Apple shareholder with hundreds of shares of stock and I hope that Apple never builds the kind of system you want. Because, if they did, it would result in the stock price tumbling and massive quantities of unsold MacBook Pros. Face it: What you want is not appealing to most Mac consumers.
Apple killed off the 17" MacBook Pros because they sold poorly. They were too big to be practical on modern aircraft. Customers did not want to carry something that large and heavy. Apple is not going to make one for you and the small number of people who want them.
Apple does not employ pixel doubling for text on Retina displays. I don't know why it's so complicated for you to understand. Look:
Apple only employs pixel doubling for screen elements on older titles that have not yet been updated. The number of such titles is shrinking over time.
Retina displays show photos with greater resolution and clarity. If you take a photo with any modern digital camera, the number of pixels is far more than can be displayed one-for-one on any display. With a Retina display, far more pixels are displayed and the image is much sharper.
A 15 inch Retina display is the same size as a 15 inch non-Retina display. The only difference is the quality. You don't gain anything, other than a small cost savings, by going to a low-resolution, old-school panel.
Apple customers have spoken: They don't want to downgrade to the old-style displays to save, at best, a small sum of money. They want a premium experience, not some state-of-the-art CPU coupled with three year old display technology.
Your desires are 180 degrees out of phase with most who would have Apple build a cheaper MacBook Pro. There are many people who want a MacBook Pro just for email, web surfing, and word processing. The Retina display, that you so resent being standard, is the most important thing to them. They would be perfectly happy to get a Retina display on a MacBook Pro that has only 4GB of RAM, a Core 2 Duo CPU, and a 4200RPM notebook drive. There are a lot more of them than cash-strapped, software synthesizer hobbyists, so you should be thankful that Apple is offering a blindingly fast laptop with copious amounts of RAM, a very powerful CPU, and a solid-state hard drive for much less than they sold PowerBooks for a decade ago.
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Solution
Try uninstalling your Logitech Control Center software and drivers. I finally found a forum and tried this and works great now. I had to install the latest drivers first from Logitech's site since the older one was corrupt and then uninstall in the utilities folder. No more freezing for me.
I almost took my Mac into Apple to get serviced yesterday.
Try uninstalling your Logitech Control Center software and drivers. I finally found a forum and tried this and works great now. I had to install the latest drivers first from Logitech's site since the older one was corrupt and then uninstall in the utilities folder. No more freezing for me.
I almost took my Mac into Apple to get serviced yesterday.
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"layman like myself"?
You just invalidated any point you might have had because your arrogance is only matched by your ignorance and the size of your ego.
I SPECIFICALLY mentioned how irrelevant it is that the interface elements of the OS are retina when the majority of software is still going to be using pixel doubling and you seem to have ignored that fact and repeated the same point while adding "Apple software" as some meaningless clause as if any non-Apple software doesn't count because it's devastating to your argument.
I SPECIFICALLY pointed out the fact you CAN'T UPGRADE THE RAM LATER in the Macbook Pro makes the standard RAM very important to the cost of the system when a Mac Mini or the previous Macbook Pro can be upgraded later.
I SPECIFICALLY pointed out the specs of the 13" Macbook Pro are identical to the Mac Mini as far as the HD4000 GPU, SATA HDD and everything else. When they update the Mac Mini to Haswell, time will tell how invalid your argument will be when the Mac Mini is using the same GPU as at least the 15" without discreet graphics.
The mobile i7 is NOT state of the art. It's a standard part used in small desktops and laptops.
I specifically mentioned a higher retina resolution option would be good or did the bit about DPI go over your head? I thought you were a professional. I assumed it would be simple enough to understand.
Given the top end Retina Macbook with 2.6Ghz i7 and a PCIe SSD is nipping at the performance of the entry level 2013 Mac Pro in both a boot drive and CPU sense. If it wasn't form-over function and over-priced, you might have "almost" a point to make about the price. If I could, I'd get the 15" Retina without the discreet GPU, up the RAM to 16Gb and the CPU to a 2.6Ghz then use it as a full desktop replacement.
As for CPU performance vs cost. Here you go. You're welcome to search for them on Geekbench to confirm for yourself.
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I don't know who you think you're quoting, because that phrase does not appear in my previous posts.
I did call you a layman because you fit the dictionary definition: "a person without professional or specialized knowledge in a particular subject."
My points stand on their own and your ability to argue against them without resorting to insults speaks volumes about the weakness of your position.
I did not use the phrase "Apple software" anywhere in my post. You don't get to make up things and attribute them to me by putting double quotes around them.
You need to get up-to-date. As PC Magazine wrote in their review of the MacBook Pro: "Many more apps are updated to take advantage of the Retina display than last year, so you'll only run into blocky looking UI elements if you use a really old version of a program."
Yes, you wrote that and I agree. It's important to decide if you 8GB is enough or if you should buy it with 16GB.
I wish you'd decide which MacBook Pro you're arguing against. When you're complaining about the price, it's the MacBook Pro 15 with Retina display and when you're trying to pretend that the Mac Mini and MacBook are really the same system, it's the MacBook Pro 13 w/o Retina display.
I don't care if the Mac Mini performs identically and costs 1/10th the price. It's totally irrelevant. The Mac Mini has nothing to do with this discussion. It's not a notebook computer.
So, if the Core i7 family is not state of the art for mobile CPUs, what do you think is?
Nothing you know about computers is "over [my] head." Your comments about DPI were in the rambling paragraph where you wrote "on a retina display, I gain NOTHING in the way of extra screen area because it's increasing the DPI of all the interface elements." I totally agree with that statement. The purpose of a Retina display is not to give you more screen real-estate via pixel count. As Apple's own website states:
Apple's Web Site said:
It doesn't say anything about fitting more icons or characters onto the screen. Your comments about DPI were all based on the incorrect belief that the purpose of the Retina display was to fit more onto a given screen.
I get that it's out of your price range and you want to be able to upgrade the RAM (I'm assuming that's what you meant by your "form-over-function" comment). But the market ultimately determines whether it's overpriced. So far, the market isn't agreeing with you on that.
Neither is the technical press. PC Magazine wrote:
PCMag.com said:
I don't doubt those numbers at all. Nor do I see a problem with them. Desktop systems almost always offer far greater performance per dollar than do notebook computers.
What does a MacBook Pro cost with no display, no keyboard, no battery, no battery charge control circuitry, no touchpad, no 720P webcam, a conventional drive rather than SSDD, and a case that's not designed for thinness, lightness, or withstanding the rigors of travel?
The Mac Mini (which I find to be far more compelling than the iMac line) exists primarily to get PC people moved into the Mac ecosphere at a low price point. "Bring your own display, keyboard, and mouse. Use what you’ve got." says Apple's web site. If Apple didn't see those Mac Mini customers becoming MacBook Pro, iMac, and Mac Pro customers, the Mac Mini would cease to exist.
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100% evidence of your observable arrogance and a direct quote proving both points. If you want to split hairs over "lay person" vs "layman" refer back to the arrogance observation but I'm simply someone who previously had the option of a 15" Macbook Pro with a discreet GPU and a 2.3Ghz Quad i7 for £1,499. Now I have to pay £1,799 for no more usable screen area because Retina uses 4 for every 1 pixel of a standard display and for the extra money I lose an unnecessary optical drive but gain 2 x Thunderbolt 2 ports, a 256Gb PCIe SSD and a CPU and GPU that perform equally or better. I fully intend to wait for 2013 15" Macbook Pros to appear on the refurb store based on that.
You purposefully mentioned in an earlier reply:
as for:
Why do you explain exactly the point I've made multiple times already and then accuse ME of not understanding it?
I KNOW it uses 4 for every 1 pixel.
I KNOW that means I gain no more desktop area on a 15" Retina than a 15" with a 1440 x 900 1:1 pixel ratio NON-Retina. Why is this so hard to understand when I mention it, yet so easy for you to put into words as an attempt to be patronising over something you're clearly misunderstanding when I make exactly the same point? I'd call than stubborn arrogance myself.
I KNOW I have no "incorrect belief that the purpose of the Retina display was to fit more onto a given screen" because I'm talking about USABLE DESKTOP AREA which you keep managing, then failing to understand for some unknown reason just to be argumentative.
For the last time, I just suggested the option of a 15" display that has a higher usable resolution than 2880x1800 (with a 4 for 1 pixel ratio RETINA display) given that there's no longer the option of a NON-Retina 15" Macbook with comparable specs to the BTO option on the 2012 version giving a 1680x1050 desktop area. The Retina Macbook can do a scaled resolution of 1920x1200 and although the scaling quality of the screenshots I've seen are very impressive, I'd sooner at least have the option of a higher resolution screen like the Retina equivalent of 1680x1050 (3360x2100). Please don't keep insisting I want a 1:1 pixel ratio display with the native resolution. It should now be obvious that's not what I've suggested at all at any point.
Given your utter failure to comprehend my screen area/DPI point, I'm actually shocked that point was understood because I didn't state it any differently.
I wasn't "pretending" anything, I was simply stating the specs of the i5 Macbook Pro and i5 Mac Mini are close to identical apart from the obvious differences for portability/desktop form factor. You even agree with me on that which isn't surprising given that they are:
http://store.apple.com/uk/buy-mac/macbook-pro?product=MD101B/A&step=config
http://store.apple.com/uk/buy-mac/mac-mini?product=MD387B/A&step=config
Common features:-
i5 CPU: 2.5Ghz vs 2.4Ghz
HD4000 GPU
500Gb 5400rpm HDD
Thunderbolt
As for a Quad i7-based Macbook Pro, we now pay a £300 premium because it has a Retina display, PCIe SSD, Thunderbolt 2 and integrated graphics that are close to or even better than the discreet GPU in the 15" 2012 model. When you look at it from a cost point of view, you get so much for the price increase, its obvious Apple have made the decision to only offer a quad core i7 in their top 2 models but the fact remains, a quad i7 Macbook now starts at £1799, it used to start at £1,499. I imagine more people bought Retina models than the entry level 15" so they dropped it and offered a 13" non-Retina based on the older CPU family/chipset so there's still a basic 13" Macbook available for people who don't want the Air for a £999 price point.
The Core i7 isn't the state of the art feature of the Macbook Pro, Apple's design skills, the Retina display and the PCIe SSD are. Mobile Core i7 CPUs are the same used in compact desktops. It's everything apart from the CPU that make up most of the cost of a Macbook Pro over a desktop system based on the same CPU. (Please try and comprehend the fact I mean compact desktops using mobile CPUs, such as the Mac Mini, before you decide to "correct" me that desktop CPUs are different).
I'm was simply suggesting they offer a Macbook Pro with a larger than 13" screen without it starting at £1,799.
In the case of the i5-based 13" model with a 500Gb HDD and HD4000 GPU, £499 vs £999. See Applestore links above.
The benchmarks that have started showing up on geekbench make the Macbook Pro a more viable option than the Mac Pro for me. In either case, due to internal expansion, all I'd need to do is put my SSD in a USB 3.0/Firewire 800 enclosure and keep my current media library on the external drive it's already on and I have a system 5 x faster than I have now that fully portable while my existing system goes through my 1080p TV as a media centre. This was my plan all along. Get the Mac Mini as a tie over, wait and see what comes out.
I couldn't agree more both on the more appealing than a glued together all-in-one point of view and designed as an entry level Mac for Windows switchers or budget conscious Mac owners. One thing it does offer though is LOTS of CPU power that's at least comparable with the top end Macbook Pro and barely a whisker slower than the entry level 2013 Mac Pro for CPU-bound tasks. I don't see them dropping the Mac Mini at all. It's not just switcher-bait, it's a very powerful little system and there's loads of third party systems from Sonnet and other companies that makes a 2.6Ghz Mac Mini a more viable option than a Mac Pro unless you have £3,299+ to spend.
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about ghosting image:
Have you guys noticed any ghosting/image retension on your screen? Previous Retina models with LG panels had this issue and I'm wondering if they have fixed it. Of course, for some people it took months to show but some had problems within a few days. Anyone noticed anything? Do you have 13" or 15" models?
I want know if I wait a little more to buy the new macbook pro until this problems are fixed or buy right now
Have you guys noticed any ghosting/image retension on your screen? Previous Retina models with LG panels had this issue and I'm wondering if they have fixed it. Of course, for some people it took months to show but some had problems within a few days. Anyone noticed anything? Do you have 13" or 15" models?
I want know if I wait a little more to buy the new macbook pro until this problems are fixed or buy right now
I am going to try, very hard, to be polite and professional here so as to wind down what has verged on a flame war for too many days now. I hope that my efforts will not be in vain.
I'm not splitting hairs over that. You put quotes around a phrase that I didn't write. Quotes mean something. They mean that the person wrote (or said) exactly what is in the quotes unless the person doing the quoting uses square brackets to denote text changed (e.g. [my] in place of your) for clarity.
Because, you seemed to not know that some of the apps I cited were not by Apple. Apple didn't write Microsoft Office, Chrome, or Firefox, yet all of them have Retina-optimized (no pixel doubling) graphics. So do most other modern apps and basically all will soon.
Apple isn't duplicating pixels on anything but old legacy apps that have not been updated. They are never doubling them on fonts (to the best of my knowledge).
It must be our differences in the use of English due the being on different continents. I often found it difficult to discern what points you believed you were making, especially with your requests to include a 17" model. Again, I'm trying to be polite here.
Retina means that the eye cannot pick out individual pixels. A display with 6000dpi will look no better than one with 300dpi. That's the principle behind it; the resolution of the human eye at the reading distance.
The Core i7 is state of the art as far as mobile processors are concerned.
I understood that all along. And I understood it when I said that desktop computers, including the Mac Mini, iMac, and others that use mobile CPUs, typically offer much higher performance per dollar than their notebook counterparts with the same CPUs. Notebooks cost a lot more for the reasons I clearly explained.
Fine. You suggestion is noted.
The links you provided were not for two '13" model' notebooks. One was a Mac Mini and its price has nothing to do with the price of a notebook computer using the exact same CPU and chipset. It would cost you more than £500 to turn the Mac Mini into a 13" notebook computer. So, end of story.
This is meant as genuinely helpful, friendly advice: Don't consider a Firewire 800 enclosure for an SSD. It would choke the throughput to a crawl. USB 3.0 is much better, but Thunderbolt is the way I would go if I wanted to really see the performance benefits of the SSD in an external enclosure. I believe it to be less CPU-intensive than USB 3.0, which was really designed for the bargain-basement PC marketplace.
My wife uses a Mac Mini that I chose for her. It replaced her last Mac Mini. I am thinking of getting a used one as a server for my domain. It's really a fantastic system, but I still believe that Apple's interest in it is still to attract switchers. I don't believe that it has nearly the profit margin, and certainly not the gross profit, of their integrated systems (iMac and MacBooks). I'd say buy one, throw away the hard drive, and install an SSD in it's place.
I'm not splitting hairs over that. You put quotes around a phrase that I didn't write. Quotes mean something. They mean that the person wrote (or said) exactly what is in the quotes unless the person doing the quoting uses square brackets to denote text changed (e.g. [my] in place of your) for clarity.
Because, you seemed to not know that some of the apps I cited were not by Apple. Apple didn't write Microsoft Office, Chrome, or Firefox, yet all of them have Retina-optimized (no pixel doubling) graphics. So do most other modern apps and basically all will soon.
Apple isn't duplicating pixels on anything but old legacy apps that have not been updated. They are never doubling them on fonts (to the best of my knowledge).
It must be our differences in the use of English due the being on different continents. I often found it difficult to discern what points you believed you were making, especially with your requests to include a 17" model. Again, I'm trying to be polite here.
Retina means that the eye cannot pick out individual pixels. A display with 6000dpi will look no better than one with 300dpi. That's the principle behind it; the resolution of the human eye at the reading distance.
The Core i7 is state of the art as far as mobile processors are concerned.
I understood that all along. And I understood it when I said that desktop computers, including the Mac Mini, iMac, and others that use mobile CPUs, typically offer much higher performance per dollar than their notebook counterparts with the same CPUs. Notebooks cost a lot more for the reasons I clearly explained.
Fine. You suggestion is noted.
The links you provided were not for two '13" model' notebooks. One was a Mac Mini and its price has nothing to do with the price of a notebook computer using the exact same CPU and chipset. It would cost you more than £500 to turn the Mac Mini into a 13" notebook computer. So, end of story.
This is meant as genuinely helpful, friendly advice: Don't consider a Firewire 800 enclosure for an SSD. It would choke the throughput to a crawl. USB 3.0 is much better, but Thunderbolt is the way I would go if I wanted to really see the performance benefits of the SSD in an external enclosure. I believe it to be less CPU-intensive than USB 3.0, which was really designed for the bargain-basement PC marketplace.
My wife uses a Mac Mini that I chose for her. It replaced her last Mac Mini. I am thinking of getting a used one as a server for my domain. It's really a fantastic system, but I still believe that Apple's interest in it is still to attract switchers. I don't believe that it has nearly the profit margin, and certainly not the gross profit, of their integrated systems (iMac and MacBooks). I'd say buy one, throw away the hard drive, and install an SSD in it's place.
My point is still valid. You called me a "lay person", I referred to it as "lay man". Same thing. The quotation marks don't invalidate the point I was making.
The point I was making is that it's irrelevant if Apple apps or company X, Y or Z have made Retina optimised apps. There's still no real benefit to the screen area of not going with a higher overall resolution, therefore larger desktop area no matter what DPI the Retina display happens to have.
The desktop Core i7s are too. The combination of Turbo Boost and Hyperthreading mean the minimum performance of any current Quad laptop or desktop based on the i7 at least matches or beats the quad-core Xeon systems of only a couple of years ago for a fraction of the power/heat.
I was just demonstrating that Apple tend to base the Mac Mini spec on the Macbook Pro model it releases before it and the only differences are the parts in addition to the CPU and Chipset. 1 has parts suitable for a desktop, the other a laptop. The laptop obvious costs more but they share the same basic architecture.
I simply intend re-using the SSD I currently boot from as an external drive when I get my next system so it's not wasted as the boot drive in a Mac Mini-based media centre. The drive cost £90 new and the reasons for using Firewire 800/USB 3.0 case are 4 fold too:
1) With an SSD I get much faster read/write speed of small block sizes. This means (at present), I get faster application loading, boot times, searching through software synth patch libraries as well as faster loading of patches. If I use the drive in a USB 3.0/Firewire case I gain all those advantages over using a conventional 7200rpm drive. The small block size speed of an SSD is night and day. 100s of Mb/s vs under 1 or 2Mb//s with a HDD.
2) It has no moving parts so as a portable drive, it would be more robust than a HDD no matter how it's stored.
3) Firewire 800 would offer a reasonable throughput that far exceeds the needs of multitrack recording whether I was using an SSD or not and USB 3.0 would increase that throughput even further and obviously offer the best of both worlds: - Compatibility with my existing system if need be and compatibility with any current Mac whether it has Firewire or not without resorting to adapters.
There's a youTube video from Sweetwater showing a full Pro Tools HD rig running off a Macbook Pro via a Thunderbolt PCIe expansion system and it seems USB 3.0 enclosures are as stable and reliable as internal drives.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYybe7QpAaQ
4) I get to re-use the drive. That's the main thing.
That would be my plan if I got a Mac Mini instead of a Macbook Pro. There's a complete kit including the tools and flex cable on Amazon for under £20 so adding an SSD in addition to the 1TB drive it comes with would be an option too.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Applicabili...TF8&colid=11EEGOKOKZ46R&coliid=I37C9NC55YLO7U
If I went that route myself I'd add 16Gb (£120) and using the flex-cable kit, 2 x 128Gb SSDs in a RAID 0 config, put my old SSD in the Firewire 800/USB 3.0 case as previous and then use the HDD it comes with as a bootable backup drive externally.
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We are arguing different points. You can't just paraphrase someone and then throw what you concocted into quotes.
Yes, I did call you a layman because you fit the dictionary definition: "a person without professional or specialized knowledge in a particular subject." You are a hobbyist with a good general knowledge about computers, not a professional engineer with a specialized knowledge about computers. It's not an insult. It's a statement of fact. I'm a layman when it comes to astronomy. I have telescopes, have built some of them, and enjoy using them. But I'm not a professional astronomer or optics engineer.
I really can't parse that sentence. I don't know whether you're arguing in favor of physically larger screens (like a 17 inch) or 15" Retina displays with more pixels, or smaller fonts, icons, and display elements.
State of the art in desktop CPUs is still the current generation of Xeon CPU, though I will grant that the quad-core Core i7 is a very impressive CPU.
I can basically agree with that, with the additional stipulation that the physical chassis of the MacBook Pro is substantially more expensive to manufacture.
As you said, the Mac Mini is a fine performing system already, so you may not replace it for quite a while. By the time you do, the existing SSD may not be worth a lot.
I'd add a 240-256GB SSD internally as a second drive. I would configure that with the rotating drive to create a Fusion Drive. In my Mac Pro, I have a 240GB SSD and a 4TB Hitachi 7200 RPM drive operating as a Fusion Drive.
That would pretty much match the MacBook Pro for a fraction of the cost. And you can use larger monitors -- I have a pair of 23" Samsungs on my Mac Pro and would be miserable with a laptop screen now.
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You're still claiming your engineering background makes you the only person qualified to say whether a mobile i7 is for everyone or just people like them depending on if it's used in a desktop or laptop. That's the point I've being making all along and "lay man/lay person" doesn't mean anything.
As for the obvious confusion over the screensize/resolution. The option of it remaining as a 15" but with a higher overall resolution, retina or otherwise is what I've been suggesting all along. I've attached an image demonstrating what I mean.
I currently have the Mac Mini in my signature, hence the fact I didn't want to end up making no use of the SSD once the system is retired as a media centre. If I was to get a 2012 (or Haswell equivalent in 2013) Mac Mini, I'd never use a fusion drive because you get better throughput with 2 x SSDs in a RAID 0 config and using the 1Tb HDD for backup only would make good use of the drive it comes with. This vid shows someone doing just that and the throughput is over 900Mb/s!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4l5dI0zLn-Y
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Dang, geek rage is so entertaining. Thanks guys
But Bruce Wayne really could beat up Ironman in a fist fight. It's just when they use their technology where Batman would lose. Star Wars is superior to Lord of the Rings in every single way despite Peter Jackson's technical achievements because in either book or film form, it's tediously dull and the 1960s Captain Kirk could totally beat 90s era Pickard in a fight. No question
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Freezing issues on 25 min old laptop
Well So I went to the Apple store in Manchester and picked up a mid range 13inch Macbook Pro. Get it home and set it up with iCloud etc.
Brezzing through BBC with Safari open and iTunes playing from the iMac in the over room using sharing. What happens?
"FREEZE"
Only option was a hard reset. I've had lots of Apple products but will be taking this one back to the stop.
Any idea what they think this is?
Well So I went to the Apple store in Manchester and picked up a mid range 13inch Macbook Pro. Get it home and set it up with iCloud etc.
Brezzing through BBC with Safari open and iTunes playing from the iMac in the over room using sharing. What happens?
"FREEZE"
Only option was a hard reset. I've had lots of Apple products but will be taking this one back to the stop.
Any idea what they think this is?
I never said I was "the only person qualified" to say anything. There are plenty of people with my level of expertise and greater -- many of whom work at Apple and, with the help of marketing, decide what components and features should be included in each of their offerings.
Apple doesn't build custom computers for niche markets. They build balanced, premium systems to appeal to the mass market. If you want a MacBook Pro 15, you're going to pay for a quad-core Core i7 CPU, an HDMI port, an SDHC slot, two USB 3.0 ports, two Thunderbolt 2 ports, dual microphones, a 720P webcam, S/PDIF optical audio out, a headphone jack, and a Retina display -- regardless of whether you feel that you need or want each of those features. You don't get to omit or downgrade the features.
Apple's business model, and success, is built on having a limited number of models and options. They don't want to present consumers with 28 different versions of the MacBook Pro 15. So they have two basic models on which you can upgrade RAM quantity, drive size, CPU speed, and select the appropriate keyboard for your language. Given their phenomenal success and the glowing reviews of their MacBook Pro line, I don't see a need to deviate from that formula to make lesser, bargain systems with downgraded or omitted features.
Again, there's a dictionary definition of the term. As I said, I'm a layman when it comes to astronomy and optical design of telescopes. I have fun with it and know a good bit about it, but would not presume to tell a professional in that field that I know better than he does.
So you would prefer that the screen elements be scaled to a smaller size -- larger than half size (in inches, not pixel count) but smaller than full size. Okay. I think I understand. The vendor can choose whatever size screen elements that they want. Apple doesn't restrict that. They could even make the scale user-controllable.
If you don't have much data to store, then, sure, you can stripe a pair of SSDs. Most people have a lot more data than that. I have a 4.24TB Fusion Drive and have 1.65TB free.
I'm sorry that you would never use a Fusion Drive, because you are depriving yourself of the best balance between speed and capacity that has ever been realized in the personal computer market. It takes the enterprise-level feature of data tiering and moves it from the file level to the sector level. So if you have a large database and only access certain portions of it frequently, the sectors containing those portions are automatically moved to the SSD while those seldom-used sectors remain on the rotating media.
I realize that people often believe that they can manually tier their own data onto drives of differing speeds, but they are never as successful as data tiering algorithms. Ever.
You continue to assume that dictionary definition applies to you because you believe an engineering background is considered more professional than what you "assume" my background is, which is infact a DTP background, one which has meant I've been using the Mac platform in that field since 1993 and that means I could play the same "Professional" card as you and it would still have as little merit as it does when you do it. Neither of us have the right to tell the other which model of mac is in "their" range of possible systems or not.
I'm obviously stating that Apple themselves used to consider the need for a 15" non-Retina system with a quad i7 and features more in common with the current entry level 13" till they brought the new range of 15" Retina Macbook Pros out.
As for offering their customers "downgrade" options, the very first Mac Pro offered a BTO option of using slower 2Ghz Xeons so it could be bought for £1,400 instead of £1,700 so it's not uncommon at all for them to allow customers to remove features to lower the cost. This would of course be impossible/inpractical with a Macbook Pro. Hence the fact I mentioned their previous, non-Retina 15" used to be a model in it's own right, complete with BTO options offering higher overall screen resolution/larger DISPLAY-NATIVE desktop area.
I can't believe even with screenshots clearly labelled with equivalent non-Retina and Retina-native resolutions just to clarify, that you're still not understanding the simple point I was making. Another equally simple analogy would be comparing 2 different 27" monitors. One offers a 1920 x 1200 resolution, the other offers a 2880 x 1800 resolution. Which one is higher, doesn't use any form of scaling and yet is the same screensize?
Interface scaling is meaningless to the point I was making because I was simply and "obviously" (with screenshots to illustrate) stating that a 15" display with a 3360x2100 resolution would offer a NATIVE RESOLUTION and HIGHER DPI more in line with the previous non-Retina 15" BTO option of a 15" 1680x1050 screen than a Retina resolution that can only scale in 2:1 pixel ratio to 1440x900 and as the NATIVE RESOLUTION remains at 2880 x 1800, anything else would be flaky GPU scaling like the Retina does with 1920x1200 etc... at present.
You're missing 3 glaring points there:-
1) The Mac Mini can only accept 2.5"/9.5mm height drives. The largest of which is a 1.5Tb model with a 5400rpm mechanism. A false economy when I have plenty of eternal HDD storage already containing a large media library.
2) There's zero benefit to the files I store on conventional HDDs in using a Fusion configuration because they're only my iTunes library, photos and other low bandwidth files that are fine on a USB/Firewire external.
3) I'm missing out on nothing apart from a 900Mb/s boot drive vs a 550Mb/s boot drive and forfeiting the advantage of external 3.5" HDD storage for a compromise of a 1.5Tb Fusion drive. I know people have created fusion drives using external enclosures but for the reasons I've mentioned, it would be a complete waste of money and technology to do that.
You still seem to be laboring under the mistaken belief that I care what kind of Mac you buy or if you buy one. I don't. I am simply addressing your claim that Apple should expand its line to include a MacBook Pro 15 with a non-retina display.
Now that Apple can sell a MacBook Pro 15 with a Retina display for under $2000 US, they no longer need to produce one with a downgraded display in order to reach that price point. In 2010 a MacBook Pro 15 with a non-Retina display and a Core 2 Duo CPU cost $1999 US, the same price as a 2013 MacBook Pro 15 with Retina display and a Core I7 CPU.
You cannot say that it was "clearly labelled" when it didn't even include labels to indicate the screen size. There was a big picture and a smaller one inside, each with resolution numbers. There was nothing to indicate whether they were trying to show the advantage of higher DPI on the same size monitor, say two 15" monitors, or whether they were in support of a 17" monitor with the same DPI as a 15" monitor.
Neither. Monitors don't scale anything at their native resolution. The icons, fonts, screen elements will all be about 33% smaller on the higher DPI monitor that you describe above. Then I won't be able to read the fonts or operate the controls because they will be too small. I don't see that as being a complex concept.
I was paid to review books in the Time-Life Books Understanding Computers series, providing corrections and clarifications to the editors -- partially because of my superb reading comprehension and communications ability on technical matters. I have also been paid to write articles for computer and electronics magazines. You did not make your point simply or obviously, despite your claims to the contrary.
Now, finally, you have written something that clarifies what you meant. See how you provided display size, resolution, and your allegation that the GPU scaling is "flaky"? That's what we could have used days ago.
The MBP 15 was offered with 1440 x 900 and an optional 1680 x 1050. The latter didn't sell as well with many people arguing that the screen elements and fonts were too small. So the MPB 15 Retina display is a two-to-one multiple of the more popular resolution of 1440 x 900. That has the added benefit of being much less costly to manufacture and get good yields from.
No, they aren't "glaring points." The first is your incorrect assertion about the maximum size of a Mac Mini hard drive. Samsung's Spinpoint M9T series has a 2.5" 2TB drive that will fit in a Mac Mini. The second two are just details about how you arrange your storage.
You're missing the really important one: Your money would be better spent on to cover the additional cost of the Retina display than on running 128GB SSDs in a RAID 0. As the Tom's Hardware article "One SSD Vs. Two In RAID: Which Is Better?" summarized, "RAID 0: Great For Benchmarks, Not So Much In The Real World". In the real-world testing they wrote "Our third real-world benchmark provides us with pretty much the same results as the first two. Theres practically no difference between the SSD-based setups, whether you're looking at a single drive or two in RAID 0."
Below are quotes and the dates of every post I've made on the subject clariftying the fact I was suggesting a higher resolution 15" display:
On 28th October I wrote:
3 hours later on 28th October I wrote:
4 hours after that on the 28th October I wrote:
on 29th October I wrote:
on 3rd November I wrote:
On 4th November I wrote:
On 5th November I wrote (WITH SCREENSHOT TO ILLUSTRATE THE VERY SIMPLE POINT):
But some people would be comfortable with a 3160 x 2100 15" Retina display. The text and interface elements would be much sharper and easier to make out due to the high DPI.
And yet you repeatedly presume rather than read, then jump to conclusions.
But with the Retina display, they would be much easier to read due to the DPI. I can read minute text on my iPhone5 that I couldn't on my 23" LCD from a comparable distance or the iPhone3GS I used to have.
You forget one vital point. I already have an external media library based around high capacity, low cost 3.5" drives. It's a false economy to spend money on a still restrictively small 2.5" 2TB 9.5mm drive when I already have all the storage I need externally and the price of a 2Tb 2.5" drive is higher than a 3Tb 3.5" one. Hence the use of one or more SSDs internally for either 900Mb/s or 550Mb/s. You even mentioned you have 4Tb+ of storage yourself in an earlier post. I'm sure that isn't based around 2.5" drives for exactly that reason.
Also according to http://www.tomshardware.com/news/seagate-samsung-hdd-spinpoint-m9t,24997.html
So a 2Tb 9.5mm 2.5" drive is a non-starter to begin with even if they were in the £60-70 price range of 3.5" drives of that capacity.
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I do not know why you think you were "clarifying" anything, especially when taken in light of your original posting in which you said that you couldn't even afford the existing Retina MacBook Pro; and now you're recommending that the Retina display be given an even higher resolution.
You write like Yoda (from Star Wars) talks. Stop telling me what you don't want it to scale to. Write clearly: 'I want a 15" Retina display with a resolution of 3360x2100 so that, when scaled at 2:1, it gives an effective resolution of 1680x1050...'
The screen area of a 15.4" Retina display is the same as the screen area of a 15.4" non-Retina display: about 104 square inches (13" x 8"). The screen area has nothing to do with the DPI.
If you want to fit more onto a 15" screen, then tell to the maker of your software synthesizer. He's got 220DPI to play with and he can size the controls and fonts to whatever he wants.
No, it didn't go over my head. I decided that we will argue the original assertion you made: That Apple should offer a non-Retina display 15" MacBook Pro. I will not permit you to change the argument mid-stream to say that the Retina display, which you already said you can't afford, should be higher resolution and, therefore, more costly.
That's like claiming that your audio would sound better if it had sample sizes of 64 bits instead of 24 bits. Your eyes, like your ears, have limits of resolving power.
Finally! You admit that the Retina display technology would benefit you, providing you with the ability to use smaller fonts, and presumably smaller screen elements, with less eyestrain. It's taken a while, but I'm glad that you finally recognized that.
You twisted everything I've said to fit your egotystical inability to ever be wrong. Congratulations.
Is immediately contradicted by:
This table explains EXACTLY why you STILL can't comprehend a simple point even now:
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I didn't twist anything. I quoted what you wrote.
You started this entire thing by claiming that the Retina display has no value for you at all and that it makes the MacBook Pro too pricey. Now you've meandered all of the way to claiming that you need even more resolution than a Retina display.
Nope. There was no contradiction at all. Human vision, like human hearing, has limits of resolution. Which is why 2880x1800 is more than enough resolution for a 15.4" display.
I fully understand what you want. You want a MacBook Pro with a 3360x2100 15.4" display that can scale, via pixel doubling, to 1680x1050. And you want it to cost less than the current MacBook Pro 15 with Retina display because that's out of your price range. Would you like it delivered by a Unicorn while you're at it?
What I can't understand is why you would want to take a 30x30 pixel screen element and double it to a blurry 60x60 on your imaginary Retina display rather than tell the effing software developer to make a native Retina version sized appropriately for the real Retina display.
Or you could just get a big enough display for the work you do and stop trying to come up with ways to squeeze more dinky fonts, controls, buttons, and sliders onto a little notebook-sized 15.4" screen.