Bits 'n Bytes

I just ordered the mid-2009 13″ MacBook Pro.  Even though I do not have it my hands yet, I thought I would share why I chose it over other laptops.

First of all, I love the aluminum unibody design.  The fit and finish is unlike anything I have seen before — the whole unit has a solid feel.  Laptops get a lot of wear and tear while being carted around and Apple’s rigid construction feels like it can take a lot of punishment.  The silver matte finish with black keys looks nice as well.

I must say I like the MacBook Pro’s large, glass trackpad that also operates as a mouse button.  At first, I was skeptical about the lack of separate buttons, but the trackpad gives a nice response when pressed and I had no trouble clicking just when I wanted it.  Right clicks are accomplished by pressing with two fingers instead of one.  Fingers glide easily over the glass surface and the operating system allows multi-touch gestures to expose and switch between applications.  I have feeling I am going enjoy using the finger swipes over pressing Alt-Tab all the time.

All the MacBook Pros now have a built-in battery that provides long life between charges (up to 7 hours on the 13″ model).  The downside is that the batteries cannot simply be swapped out when they reach their end-of-life.  Apple says their smart charging method allows up to 1000 recharges and batteries should last for up to 5 years.  Since this is a new technology, I am not sure we really know if the batteries will live up to Apple’s claims, but let’s hope they do — I am all in favor of longer battery life.  However, the inability to swap in a fresh battery could be a big issue for people that take long intercontinental plane trips.

All the MacBook Pros have LED backlit displays that provide a larger color gamut.  This is a big improvement over the MacBook and is a major plus for art and photography applications.  A lot of people complain the glossy display makes the MacBook Pros hard to use outdoors.  That may be, but I like the sharpness of the glossy screen and mostly use laptops under indoor lighting.  Since I wear eyeglasses, I may be used to ignoring stray reflections, but I can see how this might annoy some users.

Other improvements over the previous unibody MacBook are the inclusion of a FireWire 800 port and support for up to 8GB of RAM.  Currently, the cost of a full 8GB of memory is prohibitively expensive, but 4GB is quite reasonable.  Eventually memory prices should drop and the MacBook Pro can be inexpensively upgraded to its full potential.  The support for more RAM is a welcome feature as we enter the age of 64-bit operating systems.

All MacBook Pros now include the keyboard which automatically lights up as the room light dims.  This can be demonstrated by covering the built-in iSight camera with a thumb.   I am not sure if this is an essential feature (especially for touch typists), but I think it will be useful for picking out the correct function keys after dark.

MacBook Pro is a reasonable value for the money, but there is no question cheaper laptops are available.  Like Lauren, you can purchase a Windows laptop for less money.  I leave it to others to argue the merits of one operating system over the other.  However, if I was going to purchase a Windows laptop or netbook at this point, I would definitely wait for the release of Windows 7 since everyone will want the new version when it comes out in late October.  Apple is also coming out with a new version of their operating system, Snow Leopard, which purchasers of the new MacBook Pros can upgrade this fall for $9.95.

What don’t I like?  The 13″ and 15″ MacBook Pros do not have an ExpressCard slot which limits their expandability.   Apple is probably right that most users will be satisfied with the SD slot, but there are probably a lot of pro photographers that would prefer to insert their compact flash card.

Apple initially had an issue with a lowered SATA bus speed.  However, Apple addressed this with a firmware update today.  It has only been a week since this issue was reported and Apple’s rapid response actually builds my confidenence in their support team.

The NVIDIA 9400M graphics chip should be adequate for anyone that in not into heavy gaming or 3D rendering.  3D graphic designers might want to consider one of the higher end MacBook Pros that have a separate graphics processor.  Hard core gamers should probably invest in a PC.

Finally, when are we going to see the inclusion of a Blu-ray drive?  I guess there are loads of licensing issues that still need to be worked out, but a writable Blu-ray drive is still on my wish list.

The 13″ model is perfect for someone like me that likes a light laptop that’s easy to carry around.  The MacBook Air is even more portable, but it has less battery life and is not as expandable (plus it is convenient having a built-in DVD drive).  If I want to do work on a larger screen, it is easy enough to plug the laptop into standalone display and then the MacBook Pro becomes a desktop machine.

The 13″ MacBook Pro is ideal for a software developer on the move.  Xcode, the OS X software environment can be downloaded from Apple for free. Because the Macs are Intel-based, they can still be used to run Windows, either through Apple’s Boot Camp or virtual machine applications such as Parallels or Fusion.  I can tell you, I would have loved to have a MacBook Pro when I had to march 20 minutes to campus for computer science classes.