Wise Rhetoric

I’ve been a PC user and software developer for 20 years, first on DOS and then Windows. I’ve used UNIX and Linux a little bit and Mac OS even less. I’ve always disliked laptops but never owned one of my own until now, when the need to purchase one arose. I never would’ve considered a Mac if not for several things that swayed me: 1) At multiple Microsoft developer conferences, I was surprised to see numerous attendees using Macs. 2) I spent about 30 hours playing around with a very similar 13″ unibody MacBook a few months ago and was very impressed with both the hardware and OS X. 3) Apple switched to Intel CPUs, making it much more viable to run Windows on a Mac – whether it’s in a virtual machine or natively through Boot Camp. 4) Apple lowered their prices on the kind of machine I’m looking for: small enough to be good for travel, not aimed as a desktop replacement, but not as weak and cheap as a netbook.

Enough about me, let’s talk about the hardware. So far it’s lived up to my high expectations. Physically it feels very solid, looks great, and is just the right size. The display is clear, 1280×800 resolution is sufficient, viewing angle is ok, and reflections haven’t been a problem at all so far. I love how the screen appears to float with no discernible transition between it and the black border. The touchpad is amazing and was one of my main attractions to the machine – it’s big, you get pixel-perfect precision when scrolling with it using two fingers (this is NICE!), tap to click/drag works well, and right-clicking is easy. The keyboard feels good, though it’s a bit cumbersome to not have dedicated Insert/Delete/Home/End/PgUp/PgDown keys (a common laptop problem). The magnetic power connector with charge status LED is a nice touch. Gigabit Ethernet lets me transfer large files as fast as the hard drives can handle, while the wireless is convenient and reliable. Speaker quality is surprisingly good and loud (on OS X), and the audio was fine with no noise when plugging in a good pair of headphones. The 5400RPM hard drive can be a bit slow but OS X and Windows 7 make the most of it. I’ll upgrade it to an SSD later. Upgrading the RAM to 4GB was a piece of cake once I got my hands on a #00 Phillips-head screwdriver. The optical drive is loud and scary on disc insert/eject, but works fine. I’ve used the machine on battery a few times and the battery life seems incredible (6+ hours while using XP in a VM on OS X?) but I need to test this more to know for sure. I usually keep it plugged in.

The fan is silent at its default speed of 2000RPM, and the case stays cool at idle and during light use. Under load the case can get quite hot, but only near the screen/power connector. The system doesn’t seem to mind running hot, as it never seemed to raise the fan speeds on its own in my testing. So, I use Temperature Monitor and smcFanControl (third party apps for OS X) to cool it down a bit. At higher speeds the fan is not silent but is still pretty quiet and cools much better. I’m used to having to do this with PCs and graphics cards anyway.

Everything seems to work nicely so far on OS X, but I’m still new to it. Visually it’s pretty and stuff “just works” for the most part. Being able to use Terminal for certain things is nice. Running XP in a virtual machine using VirtualBox was VERY easy to set up and works well – just like running it on Windows. I have noticed a few problems using OS X so far: Keyboard shortcuts seem kind of inconsistent between apps. It wouldn’t remember one wireless network after having connected to another. The list of Windows machines on the network shows up in the Finder sidebar sometimes, but not other times (apparently a machine running XP has to be on the network?). These problems weren’t hard to overcome, though. I paid the $10 to get Snow Leopard and am looking forward to trying that soon.

I installed Windows 7 64-bit RC1 using Boot Camp and that went fairly smoothly. I had to download the NVIDIA 9400M drivers separately from NVIDIA’s web site. The biggest problems running Windows natively seem to be no manual fan control (have to do that in OS X and then reboot) and bad sound drivers. While sound appears to work fine at first, once you use the machine a bit more you realize that the drivers are broken. Apple switched to a new audio chipset (Cirrus CS4206A) and it works fine in OS X, but the Windows drivers (XP and Vista/Windows 7) have serious problems. The built-in mic works in Control Panel and Sound Recorder but not in any normal applications like Skype, the left/right speakers are too quiet and the left speaker is louder than the right one, and there’s red light coming out of the headphone jack. There are huge forum threads about this, no good workarounds, and apparently Apple needs to get it fixed. There are a few other minor annoyances in Windows compared to OS X: the trackpad scrolling works but isn’t as precise/smooth, and I can’t seem to fully turn off the keyboard backlight. Other than these things though, Windows 7 runs beautifully. It’s very fast, looks great with Aero Glass, idle temp is ok, sleep works perfectly, function keys work, wireless is rock solid. I could easily use it as the main OS and probably have a better overall experience than most Windows-based laptops out there.

For now I’ll run OS X as my main OS on this machine as much as possible, to get to know it and to get the best use of the hardware. But it’s great that it runs Windows so well too. I bought this machine in order to get high quality hardware plus the ability to run both OS X and Windows, and Apple seems to have delivered.

First of all, I want to say this is not a Mac vs. PC review. People can get a little crazy about their reviews and preferences, and I want to state that this is just that – a review. My decision to buy a Mac was a preference – there is not just one computer out there that is right for everyone. I also want to note that I upgraded to 4 GB of RAM and a 250 GB hard drive.

Pros:
Absolutely amazing battery life (when I was trying to kill it for calibration, it lasted 5.5 hours – and it wasn’t calibrated yet!)
Very fast – takes less than a minute to turn on fully
Great size and weight – I don’t even notice the difference in the screen from my 15″ Acer, but I do notice the drastic weight difference!
Very, very well-made – when I first picked it up, it felt a tad heavier than I thought it would be for its size, but that’s just because it’s so solidly built. My old laptop had more flex.
Trackpad is great and easy to use
It does not get hot, unlike my old computer, which could melt chocolate and burn my legs. If I put it on a blanket, it gets a tiny bit warm (but not uncomfortable at all); if I put a magazine under it on my lap, then it stays as cool as if it weren’t running.
Super quiet – I can’t even tell it’s running half the time.
The speakers are great, especially considering there are no speakers visible on the computer! I think the sound might come up out of the keyboard.

“Cons”:
The trackpad does take some getting used to. Not because of the “lack” of a button (the trackpad is the buttong) or the multitouch gestures, but because it’s so BIG I keep accidently resting my palm on the side of it, which prevents the pointer from moving! However, I appreciate the big size and am quickly getting used to it.
No hibernate. However, you can get a widget from the Apple website for the dashboard called Deep Sleep that enables hibernate – I love it!
Can’t close the lid without putting the computer to sleep – however, this is probably a good thing to protect the computer from owners like me who would endanger their computer by moving it while the hard disk is spinning.

As you can see, all my cons are not really cons – just little differences that are easily fixed or adjusted to.

A lot of people are mad about the glossy screen, but I haven’t had a problem with it. Yes, there’s a bit of a glare, but it’s the same amount as on my TV. I can easily ignore it while watching video. I prefer it to my Acer’s old traditional, matte, screen, because this one I can easily clean. It’s just glass. It even comes with a cleaning cloth.
It also comes with a really cool charger. The magnetic connector is nice – I once tripped on the cord of my old computer and it went crashing to the floor! That won’t happen now. People have said the cord is too short, but the power brick comes with two attachments: a plug so you can plug the brick itself into the wall, and a cord that makes the adaptor reach farther. I like the choice, and with the extra cord, it’s the exact same length as my former adaptor.
Others have complained about the edge of the computer hurting their wrists; I have had no problem with this. Granted, I have yet to use it at a desk, which might create a different angle, but the edge hasn’t bothered me (and doesn’t even feel sharp). I do have small hands and wrists, so that might be why I’m not bothered.

Initial start-up takes but a few minutes, and after that, it takes less than a minute for the machine to be up and running. It is NOT hard to get used to a different operating system – if you just fiddle around for a few minutes, you can find out everything you need to know. If that is the only thing keeping you from buying a Mac, no worries. You can do it.

If you think you want this computer, you will not be sorry! I did not choose it for its looks but it is pretty – I’m almost afraid to use it, it’s so nice! If you are willing to sacrifice some battery life or size for price, then you can get a PC for less that will fit your needs. I was just not willing. Besides, with the recent drop in price, the student discount, the free iPod that I sold to defray the cost, and the free printer, this computer only ended up being about $100 more than the other PCs I was considering that only had 4 of the 5 things I wanted in a computer(13- or 14-inch display, under 5 pounds, fast processor, great battery life, well-made and durable).

I’m a long time PC user and had been in the market for a notebook the last few months. I wanted something light and powerful that I could take along with my dSLR and photography gear and to do some light post processing in the field.

When at home, I planned on hooking it up to an external display for more critical post processing work, so a 13-14″ notebook was perfect for my needs.

I seriously looked at the Macbooks because of the thin and light form factor, build quality, and I wanted to take a serious look at OSX Leopard after having so much fun with my iPhone 3G. Plus I could run Windows apps (I’ve got Adobe Design Standard CS4 for Windows) with virtualization software.

These refreshed Macbooks finally make the lineup truly worth considering for those looking at a Mac over a PC. Spec wise, these new macbooks are much more comparable to their PC competition (eg. Dell Studio XPS 13).

I picked up the 2.53GHz model because with the education discount and free iPod Touch promotion (through Apple), making the jump up to the higher end 13″ was a no brainer. According to early Macworld speed tests, the performance differences between the two new 13″ MBP models is more than just 2GB RAM.

Pros:
- Rock solid build quality. My wife’s Dell Inspiron 15 feels like a plasticky toy in comparison.
- Thin and Light (not quite MacBook Air, but you’re not making the same compromises either)
- OSX Leopard (and all that entails)
- **NEW** Display. Vastly improved over the previous unibody MacBook. Now on par with 15″ models. I do find myself adjusting the angle of the display to minimize reflections, but it’s not as distracting as people are saying. It’s all a matter of personal preference though. The glass is what enhances the display, so there’s the compromise.
- SD Card slot. People are complaining about the 15″ MBP losing the express card slot, but since the 13″ unibody MB never had one, this is an additional port.
- Battery. With the right settings, the battery feels like it can go on forever. I’ve pushed the battery life meter to 8 hours…though 6-6.5 hours is more achievable.

Cons:
- Heat. Under heavy load, the aluminum acts like a radiator and it heats up near the left hinge.
- Aluminum susceptible to scratching. I barely had my MBP for a weekend and there’s already a little scratch on the lid. I’m going to consider a Speck SeeThru Satin to protect it.
- Having to figure out how to get the Mac to get access to my PC’s printer and external storage…not a real con, but there’s an obvious learning curve.

I purchased the Unibody MacBook in October, and I sold it just to get the new MacBook Pro. I have to agree that the new 13″ MacBook Pro deserves the name “Pro” in it now. It has much better features, and this should have been the computer that the Unibody MacBook was back in October. Ever since Apple introduced the Unibody MacBook, many people complained about the loss of FireWire and the terrible screen quality. Fortunately, Apple responded to those complaints with the new 13″ MacBook Pro. The return of FireWire has made a lot of people happy, and the surprising addition of the SD Card slot made it even better. The quality of the screen is also a lot better. The screen displays much better colors, and it still carries the revolutionary LED backlit.

The pricing of the MacBook Pro line has also dropped significantly. The original 15″ Pro was starting at the price of $1999, but they dropped it by $300 making it $1699. The Unibody MacBook was asking for $1299, but they are now asking for $1199 with the addition of the new features. I am very pleased that they dropped the price, as it is very rare to hear Apple drop their prices. The new features make it much more affordable. The computer still looks identical to the previous October notebook revision. It still carries the sexy Unibody design, and the backlit keyboard is now standard on all models. I actually find the backlit keyboard very useful, even as a touch typist. The gorgeous glass multi-touch trackpad still pleases me with the features and the size.

After the rebranding of the Unibody MacBook, and the addition of the new features. Apple has really stepped up to the plate. They successfully tightened up the competition, as the new MacBook Pro line is now much more affordable and is priced very well. The new 13″ MacBook Pro does feel like a “Pro” computer, where the performance is hard to feel unsatisfied. The graphics are incredible. Even if you feel that the MacBook Pro line is still too much, Apple is also offering the classic MacBook line for a low price of $999. If you purchase this laptop now, you’ll be able to upgrade to Snow Leopard for only $10. With the gorgeous Unibody design, LED backlit display, and trackpad, $1199 is a price that cannot be beaten. Great job Apple!