Jason Snell of Macworld has posted his first impressions of the newly redesigned Macbook & Macbook Pro which are quite comprehensive for impressions (link) .
Very cool that you can use iPhone headset with the notebook but am slightly annoyed that switch between using graphics cards in Pro model is not handled automatically when attached or not attached to the power adapter. You have to logout for the switch to take effect ( a little annoying Apple ) so hopefully some type of fix can be implemented by Cupertino in a future software/firmware update.
Still, won’t stop me from purchasing one in next 3 weeks.
No Comments »
I have read a number of possible notebook predictions on the web today about Tuesday’s media event in Cupertino & figured I may as well add my tuppenny/cents worth also. Both Justin and I were discussing over the weekend what we believe will come out of the event tommorrow & I would like put down my predictions in this post. Maybe Justin (good buddy) will put out his prediction in a post also after this, but anyway here I go:
Major revision to Macbook & Macbook Pro: This is obvious I know as the media event is about notebooks, but judging by the number of images that have been posted over the weekend from the Chinese blog macx.cn which were reposted by a number of other blogs including this 9to5 mac article, these images show that the redesign of both Macbook/MB Pro bring them closer in looks to the Macbook Air. It looks according to these images that the MB Pro is gaining a new port on left hand side where all the other ports (USB, Firewire etc) are being moved also for this redesign. This new port is at the same level as the Macbook Air sized trackpad but it is unknown what the function of this port is. I first figured that it might be there to house a HDMI port but it is too big & not the right shape, but read another 9to5 mac article which suggests that it may be there to house a DisplayPort socket which could be correct as the unknown cutout shape on port would match this type of socket. That could also make it related to the patent that Apple filed & which I read about in Engadget via PC Joint relating to an iMac shaped docking station (link) for Apple notebooks. In relation to the redesigned Macbook images that the Firewire port has been dropped completely in favour of USB 2.0 only, I believe that this is to make a clear distinction between the consumer focused Macbook & prosumer/professional focused MB Pro. Firewire (pioneered by Apple) I have found to be an excellent connection & transport port for data (use it for my external HD) so I’m surprised that Apple may be dropping it from the Macbook. Apple will also be using an Nvidia chipset in both sets of notebooks with the Macbook dropping the integrated Intel chipset for the Nvidia MCP chip instead as reported by other various blogs. The DisplayPort which is a competitor to HDMI which also offers content protection will lead to the introduction of Blu-Ray drives for the Pro notebooks which was mentioned by Kevin Rose which would be enabled in the release of OSX 10.5.6 also. Would figure myself that they will only be introduced on the top-end 15″ & 17″ (the displays could be in 16:9 ratio which would slightly increase screen sizes) & as a build to order option online for lower specced MB Pro model.
Upgraded Macbook Air: This notebook will receive upgrades of it’s processor, memory, graphic chipset & storage capacity-no casing redesign (Nothing wrong with that in my book). The graphic chip will be upgraded to the Nvidia MCP integrated one that will appear in the new Macbook which will give it more graphical oomph. The existing specially designed Core2Duo chip provided by Intel will be replaced by a new 45nm low voltage Core2Duo chip with increased clock speeds to cover the two models in this line. I believe that solid state drives could become standard across the line with Intel possibly providing the new drives in an 80gb & 128gb capacity with substantially improved access times & even faster boot times.
iLife 09: It’s been over a year since the introduction of iLife 08 & since iLife is bundled with the sale of all Macs I believe that this event would be a perfect time to introduce the latest version. If the Blu-Ray rumour holds true, the only substantial change I would expect would be an iDVD Blu-Ray authoring facility being added to bring iDVD to parity with Roxio’s Toast which has this feature. There will also be minor changes made to the other iLife components with further integration with MobileMe possible.
The above are the products I believe will be introduced at the event tommorrow.
We should remember that Steve is well known for the “one more thing” surprise, so we might get something extra possibly not quite related to notebooks directly (Touch Tablet = wishful thinking on my part).
However, I’m looking forward to tommorrows event with anticipation which will definitely take my mind away from the expected harsh budget our government is delivering earlier tommorrow also.
No Comments »
Well having had gotten a few solo shows under my belt I decided last night to get down to doing a test recording with my co-host on the MacCraic Podcast Dave. I wanted to wait until I had a better microphone than just the built in one on the MacBook Pro which I had been using before. This week my lovely Plantronics Audio 650 USB arrived. So last night we sat down and fired up Skype and Wiretap Studio (from Ambrosia Software) and went about recording our conversation.
Well the first mistake was that I let the recording go on for over 30 minutes before I decided to check it. Boy oh boy was Dave coming in hot. The audio was flatting out everywhere. Now Dave has a good booming voice so I should have expected it. I knew there was a way to correct this and get us both sounding good. What was that piece of software called again? Oh yes the Levelator (love that name). I threw the recording at the Levelator (not really expecting miracles) but it only made minor changes. The difference between our two recordings was too great to fix.
I went back into my sound preferences and played around with a few sliders and had Dave do the same. We tried another couple of minutes. No I am still getting that flat spot at the top of the audio. Back in and tried another few sliders but to no avail.
I knew it could be fixed so I told Dave that we would abandon testing for the night and I would go back and listen to Allison Sheridan’s wonderful series Podcasting on Podcasting in which she describes how to do what we were trying to do. (You can find Allison at podfeet.com)
Sure enough the solution I had been looking for was right there in front of me and I hadn’t noticed it. I had done everything except this. On the call window in Skype is a volume slider which allows you to reduce the volume of the caller. No let me say I had noticed this but in my infinite wisdom concluded that that could not be the solution. How wrong was I?
In addition I had my microphone turned down too low so you can imagine the contrast when I listened back to the audio. The content was good however, even if I do humbly say so. 
So it’s back into testing tonight hoping to get some better audio. Thanks ever so much to the wonderful work of Allison over at podfeet.com. I would encourage you to go and check out her site and subscribe to the NosillaCast.
No Comments »
Both 9 to 5 mac (who broke this rumour first) & Fortune’s Apple 2.0 blog have published their belief that “the Brick” does not relate to a new Apple product but rather a new state of the art production process for laptops. This process would involve the use of lasers & water jets to carve a “brick” (hence the codename) of aluminium into a hollowed out laptop shape into which the circuit boards & LCD display would be installed.
The process is believed to involve no screws in the produced product which in turn would lead to virtually no manufacturing defects during production, exceptional product quality & resilience. It should be noted that when Steve Jobs set up Next Computers a considerable sum of money went into the creation of a state of the art facility in Freemont, California which opened in 1990, so it should not be surprising that this route would be explored by Apple under Steve Jobs again. Basically, it would give Apple full control over the manufacturing of their own products with no reliance on their contract manufacturers which could lead to further innovative products coming out of Cupertino & would probably cut down on hardware design pics coming out ( a la the possible casing leak for the new MBP a while back ).
Again this is a rumour, but 9 to 5 mac have gotten their rumours (Macbook Air for e.g) right before & this would be a biggie for them if true.
Oct 14th can’t come around quickly enough (if Kevin Rose John Gruber was right).
Personal Update: Have had a further thought about this rumour of the new manufacturing process for notebooks by Apple. The start up costs would be quite high although the learning curve would lead to lower production costs in the long term ( hence last month’s lower margin declaration over the next few quarters given at analysts conference call by Peter Oppenheimer which may be related). However, how would you get to the battery if you need to put in a spare if it’s a seamless casing ? Not a lot of consumers would be willing to slide out the innards of this notebook just to change the battery & to create separate battery section would lead to loss of seamless design.
Here’s hoping Apple find an innovative way around any potential stumbling blocks.
No Comments »
Entries (RSS)