Thanks Apple, for the three year old Graphics Chip...

[drjsway]

And the Audi A5 is $37k car with about the same horsepower as a $22k Honda Civic Si so what's the point of this thread? Nobody goes to the Audi forums complaining about price and speed.

If you want to buy a Civic, nobody's stopping you.

 

[cathyy]

everyone seems to be leaving out a vital portion of GPU specs, # of processors

8600m GT 9600M 330M

Stream Processors 32 32 48
Core Clock (MHz) 475 500 575
Memory Clock (MHz) 700 900 1066
Maximum Memory 512MB 512MB 1024MB
Memory Interface 128-bit 128-bit 128-bit


as others have said, for 8600GT users, expect double the graphics performance.

for 9600GT users (like myself) don't expect as much.

Why do you say that the 330M significantly better than the 8600M GT, but relatively on par with the 9600M GT?

It's quite the opposite actually. The 8600M GT and 9600M GT are both quite near each other since they both have 32 stream processors, and the 330M will be significantly better.

But not that much better anyway, and certainly nowhere near 2x. Probably around 50%. However a mere 50% boost is pretty sad seeing how it's been 3 years already.

And the Audi A5 is $37k car with about the same horsepower as a $22k Honda Civic Si so what's the point of this thread? Nobody goes to the Audi forums complaining about price and speed.

If you want to buy a Civic, nobody's stopping you.

The Civic has more horsepower and is more fuel-efficient. (ATI 5650 vs Nvidia 330M)

 

[puma1552]

The biggest slap in the face is that people who bought computers last week got two NVIDIA cards, and people who bought them in the last 24 hours are getting stuck with Intel's garbage integrated graphics.

 

[drjsway]

The Civic has more horsepower and is more fuel-efficient. (ATI 5650 vs Nvidia 330M)

So get the Civic. My point is that Apple charges a premium for brand, style, user experience, and build quality, same as Audi. People are happy to pay that premium for an Audi (even though a 200hp 4-cylinder engine is really slow for a luxury sports coupe) and people are happy to pay that premium for a mac.

 

[AdamA9]

After years of seeing people almost exclusively switch to Mac from PC, only now, when it becoming so obvious that Apple will incomprehensibly fail in this aspect of their computers time after time after time worse than ever before in their god damn history, you see people on these boards regularly switching the other way.

Yeah, we can't complain, it's not an obligation for Apple to put out balanced specced computers, but it really does suck, I find myself unable to upgrade my notebook at all because you'll certainly never see me with a piece of crap peecee.

Apple is going for the consumer market, it's clear that they are with their mass marketing, and their 'switch from PC' advertising on their sites, however, they will always get away with the pricing because those who use Apple have this 'you'll certainly never see me with a piece of crap peecee' attitude which means they have you between a rock and a hard place. Apple users will always upgrade to Apple because they have this materialistic view of computer hardware that they're not cool if they're seen with PC rather than Mac. If a PC performs the same basic functions as a Mac, but does it at half the cost, then aesthetics and materialism come into it.

Only a handfull of users are graphic designers and what-not. Most people are everyday users, but Apple followers.

People need to realise that the Win7 is not all that bad, and if they changed the UI to something more like a Mac, you'd hardly notice the difference. The only way to stop Apple getting away with the sub-average spec bumps and price increases is to stop buying the products, but no one wants to stop byying the products, and try something new because of the image, and that is why Apple get away with it, and always will.

I've owned PC for over 10 years before switching to Mac this year. I've never had to return a PC, I've never had one fail badly and lose all my data. Each one was easy for ME to upgrade, and easy for me to enhance for a small sum to keep it up to date, rather than being forced to upgrade the machine every couple of years. If I wanted better graphics, I would buy a new card and install it myself, new RAM, no problem.

Unfortunately, after much excitement when making the switch, which was mainly generated after reading how much people love Apple, I'm slowly wondering if I've made a mistake. I have had graphics problems, screen issues, constant occurances where the beachball just spins and spins. MobileMe issues with sync, internet wireless problems. Maybe I'm just having bad luck, and I wont lie, the Apple customer service was great, but I was kind of hoping after making the switch I wouldn't need it.

The lame graphics card definetely is the dealbreaker for me. If the update had included a powerful gfx-card and an IPS-panel, steve would have converted another pc-user. my money would have been his profit.

well, he ****ed it up. now i will stay a pc-user and HP, lenovo, maybe sony will get my money.

i guess i won't be the only one. let's hope this poor update-policy will be reflected in sales numbers. dear, apple-lemmings, please get reasonable and teach steve the only lesson he understands: non-consumption

i'll explain it to you in a way that will be easy to understand:

apple is looking to make big profits. by putting cheap hardware into the system, they have to spend less money on building the system while charging the same amount of money as usual (because there's no one in direct competition with them). today they spat in the face of their dedicated fans by rolling out more pathetic upgrades, and hiking prices. they did the same thing with the current imacs, and i suspect that they'll do the same thing with the mac pro and macbook air in the very near future.

people keep praising steve like he invented fire, but in reality he's just doing it for himself (if you sit down and think about it for a minute, you'll realize that the company is selfish, and does the whole user experience, and being environmental friendly gimmick to make money), and selling the false apple cult idea to mindless sheep.

+1

 

[barefeats]

"Mid Range" is a good description of the 330M

The GT 330M is adequate for most users. But there are some of us who would gladly pay extra for an "enthusiast" level GTX 285M whether using FCP's Motion, Photoshop's 3D features, Cinema 4D, or various 3D Games.

3D Mark Vantage (a serious 3D benchmark):
9600M GT = 1472
GT 330M = 2496
GTX 285M = 6468

Crysis GPU Benchmark (high quality):
9600M GT = 14 fps
GT 330M = 23 fps
GTX 285M = 50 fps

CoD Modern Warfare 2 (high quality)
9600M GT = n/a
GT 330M = 27 fps
GTX 285M = 61 fps


(Numbers above are from NoteBookCheck.net.)

 

[AdamA9]

And the Audi A5 is $37k car with about the same horsepower as a $22k Honda Civic Si so what's the point of this thread? Nobody goes to the Audi forums complaining about price and speed.

If you want to buy a Civic, nobody's stopping you.

A slight difference here, since a PC is only a few hundred cheaper than an Apple. Rather than 1000's with Audi and Honda, but I will go with the analogy.

Apple users are too materialistic to give up their beloved logo and swap for something just as capable with their every day needs. Same with the Audi vs. Honda analogy. An Audi badge looks better than Honda, and your friends are more impressed to see the badge, despite the HEFTY price tag, repair bills and service costs. You'll also get poor upgrades in future models on the Audi, just look at the new A4 compared to the last, with their driving position etc.

Yes they will bring out something cool in the future and claim to be the best Audi Q7/5 (who hasn't done a 4x4 before) and Apple iPhone (not the first smart phone), but the point is, if you're seen sitting with someone on a train, and the person next to you pulls out their Sony laptop, and you get out your (lesser spec) MBP, you still feel better than the other person.

 

[Jarcrew]

A slight difference here, since a PC is only a few hundred cheaper than an Apple. Rather than 1000's with Audi and Honda, but I will go with the analogy.

Apple users are too materialistic to give up their beloved logo and swap for something just as capable with their every day needs. Same with the Audi vs. Honda analogy. An Audi badge looks better than Honda, and your friends are more impressed to see the badge, despite the HEFTY price tag, repair bills and service costs. You'll also get poor upgrades in future models on the Audi, just look at the new A4 compared to the last, with their driving position etc.

Yes they will bring out something cool in the future and claim to be the best Audi Q7/5 (who hasn't done a 4x4 before) and Apple iPhone (not the first smart phone), but the point is, if you're seen sitting with someone on a train, and the person next to you pulls out their Sony laptop, and you get out your (lesser spec) MBP, you still feel better than the other person.

Cool generalisation, bro.

 

[AdamA9]

Cool generalisation, bro.

Thanks! I feel super cool with my Apple

 

[Passenger88]

I have been waiting 4/5 months for this update to finally buy my first MCB, but this topic gave me alot of doubts. I mean for the prices that you pay for a MCB, you can get an other laptop with better specs for even cheaper.
And I am also disappointed about the videocard. I didn't expect blueray or HDMI, but I don't understand either why this update gets this price jump. They cannot justify this price jump with the integrated videocard.

 

[JaZzMaN251]

Steve:

We chose killer graphics plus 10 hour battery life over a very small CPU speed increase. Users will see far more performance boost from the speedy graphics.

Apple website:

The new Intel Core i5 and Core i7 processors boost performance up to 50 percent over the previous generation.

Anyway, the GPU could be better, but still, it's better than the previous ones.
And it sure will be better than my GeForce FX Go5200 (64MB!!!)

I wonder if Apple made the GPU decision with Steam in mind... I can't believe Steam wouldn't know what GPU the new MBP's were having before they started on the OSX version of their applications.

 

[anthorumor]

I have been waiting 4/5 months for this update to finally buy my first MCB, but this topic gave me alot of doubts. I mean for the prices that you pay for a MCB, you can get an other laptop with better specs for even cheaper.
And I am also disappointed about the videocard. I didn't expect blueray or HDMI, but I don't understand either why this update gets this price jump. They cannot justify this price jump with the integrated videocard.

This argument is made a billion times already. In the end the consumer wins, because they can jump ship with Windows to get all the fantastic stuff you mentioned, OR be forced into Apple's ecosystem. But either way there is still CHOICE (even if Apple's choices arn't exactly commendable)

 

[asphyxiafeeling]

The biggest slap in the face is that people who bought computers last week got two NVIDIA cards, and people who bought them in the last 24 hours are getting stuck with Intel's garbage integrated graphics.

how is this a slap in the face? It's actually a bit of an upgrade if you factor in that you no longer need to log out / change settings to switch between integrated & dedicated performance!

Apple didn't really have much of a choice anyway, because Intel has forced Nvidia out of the chipset business! There are no more integrated nvidia cards in production, unless I'm mistaken. .

 

[JaZzMaN251]

how is this a slap in the face? It's actually a bit of an upgrade if you factor in that you no longer need to log out / change settings to switch between integrated & dedicated performance!

Apple didn't really have much of a choice anyway, because Intel has forced Nvidia out of the chipset business! There are no more integrated nvidia cards in production, unless I'm mistaken. .

Plus, everytime you need the NVidia card, you will actually save about a minute in time that you previously needed to switch graphics. There is no processor, RAM, ... that will recover that amount of time.

(Ok, this is maybe a very optimistic look, but I can imagin lots of people enjoying this feature against the previous method)

 

[stefan15]

330M is a good fit for the MBP. Like other posters have mentioned, you can move up in GPUs, but you will need to sacrifice battery life and thickness. The laptop would arguably need to be thicker to accommodate, say, a 285's cooling needs.

Besides, the 330M isn't THAT bad. It'll play Starcraft 2! Personally I game on Xbox 360, are there really that many hardcore graphics intensive games for OS X? I mean, unless you're trying to play Crysis ;P

Don't forget Optimus. It's a really good feature to have.. seeing as that (hopefully since you bought an Apple) you will be working more than gaming, it makes sense to be operating in non-discrete mode as much as possible. The seamless GPU switch is gravy.

 

[gadgetfreaky]

330M is a good fit for the MBP. Like other posters have mentioned, you can move up in GPUs, but you will need to sacrifice battery life and thickness. The laptop would arguably need to be thicker to accommodate, say, a 285's cooling needs.

Besides, the 330M isn't THAT bad. It'll play Starcraft 2! Personally I game on Xbox 360, are there really that many hardcore graphics intensive games for OS X? I mean, unless you're trying to play Crysis ;P

Don't forget Optimus. It's a really good feature to have.. seeing as that (hopefully since you bought an Apple) you will be working more than gaming, it makes sense to be operating in non-discrete mode as much as possible. The seamless GPU switch is gravy.

Mac doesn't use Optimus. Apple wrote the software for the graphics switching. The 5830 has much better power /performance and they should have written the graphics switching for ATI instead of Nvidia.

 

[panzer06]

Mac doesn't use Optimus. Apple wrote the software for the graphics switching. The 5830 has much better power /performance and they should have written the graphics switching for ATI instead of Nvidia.

+1 ATI FTW

 

[Pressure]

Mac doesn't use Optimus. Apple wrote the software for the graphics switching. The 5830 has much better power /performance and they should have written the graphics switching for ATI instead of Nvidia.

The Apple graphic switching works with any graphic card.

The Geforce GT 330M has a Thermal Design Power of 23 Watt and the Radeon Mobility HD 4830 has a Thermal Design Power of 24 to 30 Watt depending on configuration.

However, the Radeon Mobility HD 5650 is only 14 to 19 Watt.

The Geforce GT 330M must have been dirt cheap for Apple.

 

[jgassens]

How is a machine that sports the latest CPU technology along with killer industrial design and great battery life "Lower end"? Just because the GPU isn't the most powerful on the market?

Lower end in the sense that you can purchase an equally spec'd machine for about $500-$1000 less. Granted, you don't get the sweet design or the really nice display (and you may have a ridiculous Alien head on the cover), but you can get a significantly faster machine both in in the form of GPU and CPU.

If you contrast this with the last MBP update, where we got super-duper long battery life, multitouch track pads, all in one aluminum enclosures, Core 2 Duos upward of 3.06GHz... things that, quite frankly, were ahead of their time, this is update is a disappointment.

Unless you purchased the last generation MBP and you don't want your friends to have a much better laptop then you from Apple... in that case, this refresh is a Godsend.

 

[acurafan]

i'll explain it to you in a way that will be easy to understand:

apple is looking to make big profits. by putting cheap hardware into the system, they have to spend less money on building the system while charging the same amount of money as usual (because there's no one in direct competition with them). today they spat in the face of their dedicated fans by rolling out more pathetic upgrades, and hiking prices. they did the same thing with the current imacs, and i suspect that they'll do the same thing with the mac pro and macbook air in the very near future.

people keep praising steve like he invented fire, but in reality he's just doing it for himself (if you sit down and think about it for a minute, you'll realize that the company is selfish, and does the whole user experience, and being environmental friendly gimmick to make money), and selling the false apple cult idea to mindless sheep.

+2 buy their stock, then dump it when apple F's up or steve croaks/leaves/whatever, let the fanboys provide for your capital gains.

 

[Eidorian]

The Apple graphic switching works with any graphic card.

The Geforce GT 330M has a Thermal Design Power of 23 Watt and the Radeon Mobility HD 4830 has a Thermal Design Power of 24 to 30 Watt depending on configuration.

However, the Radeon Mobility HD 5650 is only 14 to 19 Watt.

The Geforce GT 330M must have been dirt cheap for Apple.

Fire sale at nVidia and it isn't Fermi.

 

[Jarcrew]

Lower end in the sense that you can purchase an equally spec'd machine for about $500-$1000 less. Granted, you don't get the sweet design or the really nice display (and you may have a ridiculous Alien head on the cover), but you can get a significantly faster machine both in in the form of GPU and CPU.

...So it's not equal spec, is it? If it doesn't have the same display or battery life (and it won't), it can't be considered equal. And that's saying nothing of the enclosure - last I checked, custom-machined metal is more expensive than moulded plastic.

Displays, batteries, enclosures, these things are all integral to your experience with a computer. It's no good brushing them off like they're incidental; they're clearly the MacBook Pro's strong points and represent a large portion of the price tag.

 

[doguhan]

Jajajajajajajaja oh wow. You all are clueless on the works of a GPU

enlighten us

 

[samwise]

GT 240M as default GPU on the Alienware M15x, with a $200 option of a GT 260 M.

That still leaves the M15x about $200 under the price of a similarly-equipped MBP 15 i5, though.

 

[Jaro65]

Apple's always been like this. In fact there profit margins now are lower than any time in the past god knows how long.

Please cite your source.