Tagged Products - 2gb+256mb+15in

Apple MacBook Pro with 15.4" Display

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This is not confirmed, but there is substantial discussion online suggesting this is the case. The 9600M is essentially a 32 processor computer (running at 120 gigaflops). So, a MacBook Pro will actually gain in speed over time. The MacBook does not have a separate graphics card that can work this way.

3. MacBook Pro graphics are twice as fast as MacBook graphics, so if you do anything visual with your computer (digital photography, video, games, etc.) then everything will run much more quickly and smoothly. Some games that are just barely playable on the MacBook become fun and seemless on the MacBook Pro.

4. The MacBook Pro has a firewire port (omitted from the new MacBook).

5. The MacBook Pro has an expansion card slot (really handy for adding a memory card reader or 3G roaming internet).

So, for the extra $400 (MacBook 2.4 GHz vs. MacBook Pro 2.4 GHz) you get a lot of extras that you will notice and use. And you will avoid the poor LCD on the MacBook. You are still stuck with the highly-reflective glass screen (if my eyeglasses can get anti-reflective coating, then why not this computer screen?), however, so it's only four stars until they solve that problem.

Apple MacBook Pro with 15.4" Display

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the silver case. If you ask me, the old MBP had too much silver. EVERYTHING on the machine was silver aluminum. Don't get me wrong, i loved the old MBP, but this is just one step up. The Keyboard is also backlit so when you are in a darker environment, the keys light up, helping you see anything and everything on the keyboard. The Keyboard is absolutely beautiful on the machine and adds a nice touch overall to the look.





TRACKPAD
I find it weird that i can put an entire section on a review about a laptops trackpad, but this is undoubtedly necessary. The new trackpad is ALL glass and there is no button---per say. In reality the entire trackpad is the button. They took off the button on the bottom and extended the trackpad down to give you more real estate. Apple spent months designing this trackpad and i have to give them major credit for that. recently me and my friend were looking at laptops at Circuit City, and one thing we did was go through every single laptop and look at it's trackpad. It is absolutely amazing how much time and effort company's DON'T put into designing their trackpad, when in my book, it is a HUGE factor. The coefficient of friction on this trackpad is exactly what it needs to be. not too rough, not too smooth, just right. I absolutely love the MBP trackpad and think it is something apple needs to be commended for.




GRAPHICS
Apple and NVIDIA joined up and came up with a new video card for this MBP. The MBP actually has 2 graphics cards in it. One that is integrated, and one that is dedicated. The integrated graphics is NVIDIA instead of the old intel, so it is immensely better. The dedicated card (which can be easily switched on) is a powerhouse and almost puts a MBP in line with other gaming machines, almost. Needless to say, this notebook will do just about whatever you want it to do graphics wise, gaming, video editing, photo editing, you name it, it will do it pretty easily. no worries here.


OVERALL
overall this laptop is at the top of it's class and you might be wondering why i gave it 4 stars and not 5.....first and foremost, money. I have to say that this is still overpriced. You are paying for a collection of things like the operating system, graphics card, high end components and things like that, but come on apple, 2000 dollars is a lot to drop on any laptop, no matter what it is. Is it worth it? without a doubt yes, and that is why apple can jack up their prices, but at the same time, it seems like they are kind of taking advantage of us, especially in the economic slum we're in right now. Maybe i am just cheap (which i don't think most people would classify me as that) but that seems a little high to me. And another thing. what is up with the new display port? i have a 46 inch samsung tv and i will be hooking it up to my MBP but the cable is 100 dollars!!!! and that is just to dual link dvi----i still have to buy a dual link dvi to HDMI adapter after that. Ugh. apple (along with other company's...cough cough monster cables) is completely ripping us off on their cables and that makes a difference in my outlook on the big picture.



CONCLUSION
The new MBP is absolutely stunning in every aspect of its design. Apple continues to wow us, and they will also continue to prosper and grow. I will be enjoying my new Macbook pro and i hope this review helped you in any questions you might have had. It is an investment that will live for a long time and will be greatly enjoyed every day. good job apple.

APPLE MA896LL/A 15.4" MacBook Pro Intel Core 2 Duo Notebook (Leopard)

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the silver case. If you ask me, the old MBP had too much silver. EVERYTHING on the machine was silver aluminum. Don't get me wrong, i loved the old MBP, but this is just one step up. The Keyboard is also backlit so when you are in a darker environment, the keys light up, helping you see anything and everything on the keyboard. The Keyboard is absolutely beautiful on the machine and adds a nice touch overall to the look.











TRACKPAD

I find it weird that i can put an entire section on a review about a laptops trackpad, but this is undoubtedly necessary. The new trackpad is ALL glass and there is no button---per say. In reality the entire trackpad is the button. They took off the button on the bottom and extended the trackpad down to give you more real estate. Apple spent months designing this trackpad and i have to give them major credit for that. recently me and my friend were looking at laptops at Circuit City, and one thing we did was go through every single laptop and look at it's trackpad. It is absolutely amazing how much time and effort company's DON'T put into designing their trackpad, when in my book, it is a HUGE factor. The coefficient of friction on this trackpad is exactly what it needs to be. not too rough, not too smooth, just right. I absolutely love the MBP trackpad and think it is something apple needs to be commended for.









GRAPHICS

Apple and NVIDIA joined up and came up with a new video card for this MBP. The MBP actually has 2 graphics cards in it. One that is integrated, and one that is dedicated. The integrated graphics is NVIDIA instead of the old intel, so it is immensely better. The dedicated card (which can be easily switched on) is a powerhouse and almost puts a MBP in line with other gaming machines, almost. Needless to say, this notebook will do just about whatever you want it to do graphics wise, gaming, video editing, photo editing, you name it, it will do it pretty easily. no worries here.





OVERALL

overall this laptop is at the top of it's class and you might be wondering why i gave it 4 stars and not 5.....first and foremost, money. I have to say that this is still overpriced. You are paying for a collection of things like the operating system, graphics card, high end components and things like that, but come on apple, 2000 dollars is a lot to drop on any laptop, no matter what it is. Is it worth it? without a doubt yes, and that is why apple can jack up their prices, but at the same time, it seems like they are kind of taking advantage of us, especially in the economic slum we're in right now. Maybe i am just cheap (which i don't think most people would classify me as that) but that seems a little high to me. And another thing. what is up with the new display port? i have a 46 inch samsung tv and i will be hooking it up to my MBP but the cable is 100 dollars!!!! and that is just to dual link dvi----i still have to buy a dual link dvi to HDMI adapter after that. Ugh. apple (along with other company's...cough cough monster cables) is completely ripping us off on their cables and that makes a difference in my outlook on the big picture.







CONCLUSION

The new MBP is absolutely stunning in every aspect of its design. Apple continues to wow us, and they will also continue to prosper and grow. I will be enjoying my new Macbook pro and i hope this review helped you in any questions you might have had. It is an investment that will live for a long time and will be greatly enjoyed every day. good job apple.

APPLE MA896LL/A 15.4" MacBook Pro Intel Core 2 Duo Notebook (Leopard)

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which keeps me from typing fast. The backlit function is super sweet, though! It really comes in handy when I use it in a non-lit room... it also attracts the attention of passersby which is always cool hehe. BUT, this very function messes up the key's assigned functions (Spaces, Dashboard, Exposé, etc...) which makes it a toss-up between choosing either the Exposé functions or the Volume/Brightness functions. In this aspect, I prefer the Dell's response but backlit LED feature is not available.

The trackpad is nice and big enough for mouse activity but sometimes gets in the way of my typing and can mess up with my typing especially when I have to reach out to the G, H, V, B and M keys.

*LCD:
The LCD is nice and bright and self-adjusts its brightness when in a low-light environment. Its tricky getting used to it because sometimes it will self-adjust to very low levels and you'll then have to manually tweak it until you're satisfied. I haven't had any monitor problems like other users have stated and I hope I don't run into that problem!

*Speakers:
I can't really say much about the speakers except that I like their location which is at either side of the keyboard and thus gets out of your way when you lay your wrists on the laptop. The sound quality and volume are OK and really don't use them since I either plug my headphones or my external speakers. I can say that they're more powerful than the Inspiron's.

*Battery Life:
The battery life on the MB Pro is great, running at an average of 4 hours which will vary depending on how much stuff you do with the laptop. Inspiron's battery life runs at an average of 3 hours.

*Heat:
Oh, yes... the dreaded subject! This annoying bug takes the "lap" out of "laptop" unless you enjoy your thighs being subject to extreme heat... I kid you not! I can only stand holding the MB Pro on my lap for about 30 minutes and then it just gets unbearable; I either have to set it on a table or turn it off and wait for it to cool down. It seems that the sleek design comes at a very high cost and that's the heat since only one cooling vent is found where the LCD meets the chassis. The Inspiron handles this issue with better results.

*Weight/Size/Design:
The MB Pro will fit just fine on my backpack which was designed to carry my 15" Inspiron and the weight is nothing to either complain or brag about.

The design WILL make heads turn since its aluminum casing (also a con. See: Heat) makes it look cool, sleek and just brings the whole design together since it's not splashed with several colors like other laptops do.

SOFTWARE:

I have to admit that I almost returned the damn thing since Leopard was not pre-installed as "stated" on the Apple website; Apple had adroitly phrased their Leopard marketing pitch as "Ships with Leopard". Oh but Leopard was included all-right, in a drop-in DVD.

Upgrading was a breeze (around 40 minutes) and I didn't have to go back to the laptop every minute for annoying "Would you like to..." pop-ups. I can say that Leopard didn't recognize my wireless connection until after the computer was all setup.

I can honestly say that Leopard is a great piece of software and its features (too many to discuss here) really blow Vista and/or XP out of the water; there's simply no point of comparison! And no, the OS is not perfect either. It will lock up but not as often as Windows... in fact, it has only locked up 3 times since I got the laptop on Nov 24 and I use it every day.

I have really learned to enjoy the difference between platforms and although they're both flawed systems, OS X is the winner in this category. Who says you can't be productive and look cool at the same time!

Bottom line, I don't have any reason to go back to Windows...er, well actually I do have XP installed thanks to VM Ware Fusion, which rocks by the way! Ok then, let me rephrase: I don't see myself buying a PC unless some major development happens in the hardware scene. Sony, HP, Dell, Toshiba... I'm talking to you!

As for the software side, if a major release of Windows happens to be ground-breaking I'll just buy the damn thing and install it on my Mac, ha!

I do have some suggestions though: I honestly believe a memory card reader is needed and don't give me the "oh but you can buy an express card for that purpose" excuse! The heat issue is a big one too: it's like having a Ferrari and not being able to get the juice out of it because the steering wheel gets hot after 30 minutes! The keyboard needs some work, it can be more responsive; the backlit feature rocks though!

APPLE MA896LL/A 15.4" MacBook Pro Intel Core 2 Duo Notebook (Leopard)

...

which keeps me from typing fast. The backlit function is super sweet, though! It really comes in handy when I use it in a non-lit room... it also attracts the attention of passersby which is always cool hehe. BUT, this very function messes up the key's assigned functions (Spaces, Dashboard, Exposé, etc...) which makes it a toss-up between choosing either the Exposé functions or the Volume/Brightness functions. In this aspect, I prefer the Dell's response but backlit LED feature is not available.

The trackpad is nice and big enough for mouse activity but sometimes gets in the way of my typing and can mess up with my typing especially when I have to reach out to the G, H, V, B and M keys.

*LCD:
The LCD is nice and bright and self-adjusts its brightness when in a low-light environment. Its tricky getting used to it because sometimes it will self-adjust to very low levels and you'll then have to manually tweak it until you're satisfied. I haven't had any monitor problems like other users have stated and I hope I don't run into that problem!

*Speakers:
I can't really say much about the speakers except that I like their location which is at either side of the keyboard and thus gets out of your way when you lay your wrists on the laptop. The sound quality and volume are OK and really don't use them since I either plug my headphones or my external speakers. I can say that they're more powerful than the Inspiron's.

*Battery Life:
The battery life on the MB Pro is great, running at an average of 4 hours which will vary depending on how much stuff you do with the laptop. Inspiron's battery life runs at an average of 3 hours.

*Heat:
Oh, yes... the dreaded subject! This annoying bug takes the "lap" out of "laptop" unless you enjoy your thighs being subject to extreme heat... I kid you not! I can only stand holding the MB Pro on my lap for about 30 minutes and then it just gets unbearable; I either have to set it on a table or turn it off and wait for it to cool down. It seems that the sleek design comes at a very high cost and that's the heat since only one cooling vent is found where the LCD meets the chassis. The Inspiron handles this issue with better results.

*Weight/Size/Design:
The MB Pro will fit just fine on my backpack which was designed to carry my 15" Inspiron and the weight is nothing to either complain or brag about.

The design WILL make heads turn since its aluminum casing (also a con. See: Heat) makes it look cool, sleek and just brings the whole design together since it's not splashed with several colors like other laptops do.

SOFTWARE:

I have to admit that I almost returned the damn thing since Leopard was not pre-installed as "stated" on the Apple website; Apple had adroitly phrased their Leopard marketing pitch as "Ships with Leopard". Oh but Leopard was included all-right, in a drop-in DVD.

Upgrading was a breeze (around 40 minutes) and I didn't have to go back to the laptop every minute for annoying "Would you like to..." pop-ups. I can say that Leopard didn't recognize my wireless connection until after the computer was all setup.

I can honestly say that Leopard is a great piece of software and its features (too many to discuss here) really blow Vista and/or XP out of the water; there's simply no point of comparison! And no, the OS is not perfect either. It will lock up but not as often as Windows... in fact, it has only locked up 3 times since I got the laptop on Nov 24 and I use it every day.

I have really learned to enjoy the difference between platforms and although they're both flawed systems, OS X is the winner in this category. Who says you can't be productive and look cool at the same time!

Bottom line, I don't have any reason to go back to Windows...er, well actually I do have XP installed thanks to VM Ware Fusion, which rocks by the way! Ok then, let me rephrase: I don't see myself buying a PC unless some major development happens in the hardware scene. Sony, HP, Dell, Toshiba... I'm talking to you!

As for the software side, if a major release of Windows happens to be ground-breaking I'll just buy the damn thing and install it on my Mac, ha!

I do have some suggestions though: I honestly believe a memory card reader is needed and don't give me the "oh but you can buy an express card for that purpose" excuse! The heat issue is a big one too: it's like having a Ferrari and not being able to get the juice out of it because the steering wheel gets hot after 30 minutes! The keyboard needs some work, it can be more responsive; the backlit feature rocks though!