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Power Hungry Blu-Ray Drives Delaying Apple Notebook Adoption?

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Apr 12, 2001
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With the discontinuation of HD-DVD player production, Blu-ray has decisively won as the standard for high-definition video. Despite some initial hopes that Blu-Ray would make its debut at Macworld San Francisco, Apple still has not yet committed to shipping Blu-Ray drives in their machines.

Blu-Ray is expected to first arrive in their Mac Pro models, but notebook owners may have to wait a little longer before they are adopted in MacBooks and MacBook Pros. Wired explores the battery drain a standard Blu-Ray drive imposes on a notebook and claims that some of the 1st generation Blu-Ray notebooks could only play a movie 1/2 way through before draining their notebook's battery.

The situation is no longer as grim, with the Blu-ray Disc Association claiming the situation has been resolved and some laptops now able to play 2 Blu-ray movies back-to-back on a single charge. Beyond the pure power draw of the Blu-ray drive itself, the addition processing to decode the Blu-Ray video was contributing to the additional battery drain. One of the solutions has been the ability to offload this decoding to modern video cards.

Article Link
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2008/02/29/power-hungry-blu-ray-drives-delaying-apple-notebook-adoption/
I'm a proud MacBook Pro owner and I guess for me Blu-ray will be useful not for movies (I have such a small screen and it doesn't support 1080p anyway), but for sheer storage. Portable users have to put up with small HD's and it will be very useful for me to be able to fit pretty well 1/2 my h/d on 1 disk.
 
TheSpecialist said:
I think this will take a very long time as they will also have to be slotloading = more expensive. Superdrive is already 99$.
Click to expand...

Exactly. Slot loading = Thin. I have a HP notebook with Blu-Ray, hopefully (I know they will) Apple will work out the kinks in it. The biggest thing is the HP has HDMI, Apple will probably never have this port on MB,MBP. The HDMI on the HP doesn't have audio out on it, just video, so another connecter for the audio. A real pain in the butt, plus it can't handle 1080p on a 46" Sony HDTV.
 
there is absolutely no way an Apple laptop is going to get a Blu-Ray drive before the Mac Pro does.

They could bring them out together however...
 
Well this is good news. I can see why Apple would of been reluctant to include such drives in their machines while the format war was still going on. I think the Mac Pros will see the drives first, then the MacBook Pros and the iMacs.

I doubt it will be an option for the Mac Mini, although I can see it being an add-on external USB drive for the Apple TV... maybe, if Apple wants to go that route. Of course that's if the little Apple TV box can handle it. ;) We do know that it can upscale to 1080p while displaying 720p video. Although I believe it was said that the hardware couldn't handle displaying full 1080p content.

Either way I think Blu-Ray drives will be coming to a Macs soon, slowly but surly. :D
 
An AppleTV with a built-in Blu-Ray drive would indeed be one excellent little unit! If they included a tuner option, you would have a full-fledged all-in-one HD PVR and Blu-Ray solution.
 
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jpsalvesen said:
An AppleTV with a built-in Blu-Ray drive would indeed be one excellent little unit! If they included a tuner option, you would have a full-fledged all-in-one HD PVR and Blu-Ray solution.
Click to expand...

That would be really cool but I don't see it happening. For some reason I don't get the feeling that Apple wants to go in that direction with the Apple TV right now. I don't know why that is, there seems like there would be a sizeable market for it.
 
javierbds said:
or a mini! (as the AppleTV does not seem to be taking that road ...) :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Minis are Apples entry to sub $1k desktop computers, putting Blu-Ray in them so early will make costs go way to high. An iMac would be better with BD-ROM as it already has a nice screen (24-incher being full 1080p HD). Mac Pros are obvious, they are the créme de la créme of Mac desktops and they will include BD-ROM soon. MacBook Pros and iMacs are the next ones in line for BD, MacBooks and Minis have no real reason, especially the MB with such a tiny screen. Just my 2c.

Victor
 
Remember the economics of scale! Until Blu-Ray is very widespread, Apple just cannot include it in a low-cost products such as Apple TV, Mac Mini or the MacBook. Cost-wise MBP would be a possibility *IF* some manufacturer had that slim and slot-loading on catalog. Until that happens, MacPro is the only candidate for Blu-Ray.

Early adopters can always buy external units, which IMO still cost too much (for me). I don't really know which comes first this time; whether the cost comes down or people begin buying in volume.

Blu-Ray sure would be nice, but it needs to be cheap enough. There's no way I would pay 500 euros for a standalone hifi player or standard pc component. I'm sure most people feel the same way.
 
MacRumors said:
the addition(sic.) processing to decode the Blu-Ray video was contributing to the additional battery drain. One of the solutions has been the ability to offload this decoding to modern video cards.
Click to expand...

What are these modern video cards powered by? Hamsters? Duracell Bunnies? nuclear fusion? :eek:
 
javierbds said:
or a mini! (as the AppleTV does not seem to be taking that road ...) :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

yeah i'd be up for a Opt Extra of a BluRay in a MacNano, that way i can run it into a projector and have a bluetooth keyboard and mouse ultimate lounging, suilt me better so i can browse and email etc to above a ridged :apple:TV

not plug in messy drive just a build in. i wouldn't mind if was play only even.
 
Well if the trend follows (Mac Pro, Macbook Pro, iMac.... wait a bit, then MacBook) - that may mean the MacBook will have a halfway decent graphics card in it in about two years time! I'm so annoyed with the X3100. It's not so great. (although pretty good for video, no good for 3D)
 
elppa said:
What are these modern video cards powered by? Hamsters? Duracell Bunnies? nuclear fusion? :eek:
Click to expand...
Electricity. However, the algorithms are implemented in hardware or on highly specialized hardware, so there is no overhead in decoding. That's why you get a graphics system with a good GPU when you want to do gaming - the GPU is highly specialized for its domain rather than the very generalized CPU.
 
JFreak said:
Cost-wise MBP would be a possibility *IF* some manufacturer had that slim and slot-loading on catalog. Until that happens, MacPro is the only candidate for Blu-Ray..
Click to expand...

There are already a couple of manufacturers that make slot loading BD ROM and recordable drives: AMEX BDR-220 and Panasonic (Matshita) UJ-225B
 
jpsalvesen said:
Electricity. However, the algorithms are implemented in hardware or on highly specialized hardware, so there is no overhead in decoding. That's why you get a graphics system with a good GPU when you want to do gaming - the GPU is highly specialized for its domain rather than the very generalized CPU.
Click to expand...

The point being, having this same GPU in the drive would yield the same energy savings, without using the GPU for a secondary purpose.

This is a cost-saving, not energy-saving, measure. Still good (and I'm unlikely to be using the GPU for anything else while a movie is playing), but it should be stated for what it is.
 
with the war over, one could assume the next major refreshes of all the lines would contain some sort of bluray player
 
Blu ray in a notebook makes no sense to me. Most laptop screens don't support the 1080p resolution or 1920x1080 so you would not get the benefit.

Unless they start shipping laptops with HDMI outputs and one would use them plugged into a flat screen, I can't see the demand.
 
720p offers over double the resolution over standard DVDs. Once you've seen "Planet Earth" on a laptop in 720p, you'll revise your opinion.
 
TheSpecialist said:
I think this will take a very long time as they will also have to be slotloading = more expensive. Superdrive is already 99$.
Click to expand...

Doesn't necessarily mean it costs $99 to manufacture.

kornyboy said:
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That would be really cool but I don't see it happening. For some reason I don't get the feeling that Apple wants to go in that direction with the Apple TV right now. I don't know why that is, there seems like there would be a sizeable market for it.
Click to expand...

You're right on, Apple TV's killer app is it's internet connection, Youtube, and Podcasts, and it allows people to buy/rent Movies directly on the TV. It's supposed to be more like a replacement for discs, not as a trojan for getting more Blu-ray drives out there, but it's still not impossible I guess.

riversky said:
Blu ray in a notebook makes no sense to me. Most laptop screens don't support the 1080p resolution or 1920x1080 so you would not get the benefit.

Unless they start shipping laptops with HDMI outputs and one would use them plugged into a flat screen, I can't see the demand.
Click to expand...

The 17" MBP has a 1920x1080 screen, and 720p (that is still HD you know) is 1280x720, my Macbook has 1280x800.

Sebastian
 
MacRumors said:
The situation is no longer as grim, with the Blu-ray Disc Association claiming the situation has been resolved and some laptops now able to play 2 Blu-ray movies back-to-back on a single charge. Beyond the pure power draw of the Blu-ray drive itself, the addition processing to decode the Blu-Ray video was contributing to the additional battery drain. One of the solutions has been the ability to offload this decoding to modern video cards.

Article Link
Click to expand...

The Graphics card in the MBP does exactly that, and I think the X3100 can do hardware decoding of H.264 as well, the ATI cards can handle both VC-1 and H.264 though.

Sebastian
 
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