Apple announces new 13-inch MacBook - Page 12

Apple and even some of their fanboys on this forum like to say everything is wireless and wired standards are going the way of the Dodo, but the reality is a lot of people would beg to differ. The necessity for wired connections is becoming less common as wireless technologies move to higher bandwidths and better ranges, but there are some circumstances where wireless technologies just aren't practical(eg. large amounts of bandwidth). The lack of the EC34 slot seems rather odd insofar as that no matter how good you design a laptop invariably some users are going to want one more xyz port than was included. Instead of limiting the end users possibilities Apple ought to break down and include the EC34 slot so that the users can have eSATA , FW400/800, or some older port for an older application(RS232, parallel, etc.) if they want it.

People claim that Apple has to do this to prevent the cannibalization of the MBP sales, but even without the Expresscard/34 advantage the Macbook Pro has plenty of advantages over the Macbook such as a dramatically better graphics card, FW800, and a better resolution even for the 15" model. I think moving to the Geforce 9400 on the MB will do more to hurt the sales of the MBP then had they included Expresscard in the MB. Even Steve Jobs outright said that the graphics gap between the MB & MBP has dropped dramatically. That is practically an invitation for people to second guess whether they really need to buy the more profitable MBP. The old Intel graphics were so underpowered that a lot of games couldn't run well or in some cases at all despite the fact that the MB had a fairly good mobile processor.


Now there was somewhere where I thought Apple should have been ahead of the curve(a trailblazer in the industry). eSATA isn't some stillborn standard. I am shocked nobody asked about it in the Q&A. I can go to any Fry's and they will sell hundreds of external HDDs with eSATA every weekend. Even less specialized stores like Staples or Costco sell external drive that include eSATA. The potential number of people buying a Macbook that could immediately take advantage of the eSATA port is probably in the millions, which is more than I can say about Displayport. Furthermore, Apple could have integrated Target Disk mode with eSATA. ArsTechnica reported that Apple submitted a patent application for TDM through eSATA. Maybe it wasn't ready for primetime yet, but if it is ready that would have been a rational port to put in the place of the FW400 port. Displayport on the other hand, I am not so sure about.

How many monitors are there with Displayport? The Dell 2408 and their 3008 and this new Apple 24" LED display whenever it ships. Until you get past single link DVI where Displayport is supposed to provide better bandwidth I don't see the benefit of the move for Apple's customers. I never heard anyone complain that the Macbook didn't support resolutions beyond 1920x1200. The move at least on the Macbook seems slightly self serving insofar as AFAIK Apple is the only company selling mini-Displayport adapters whereas I can name at least two companies selling the Mini-DVI adapters that the old Macbook used(one for about half off the Apple adapter). Hopefully, Mini-Displayport catches on in some of the subcompacts so that Mini-DP cables and adapters are popular(cheaper than Apple) or at the very least someone other than Apple sees the profit potential and sells their own Mini-DP cables and adapters. Except for the pro market where resolutions beyond 1920x1200 exist I don't see a lot of demand for Displayport. For a laptop largely aimed at the consumer market DP seems a little overkill.

Moving and moved are two entirely different things. You must not work in video because you dont' understand how important this is. Panasonic is currently the only manufacturer with a prosumer camera that doesn't have firewire, and it's limted to model you posted. Sony for example just announced 3 new firewire based prosumer units. What will happen in 5 years should not reflect the state of computers now.

SSD fits into the MB the way it is. For Blu-ray Apple would have to license more DRM for OS X and could not have made the MB as thin as it is now.


Are you seriously equating the need of FireWire to the need of a screen.

If those basic features were really needed the MB nor the iPhone would sell as well as they do.



Equating the need for FireWire to the need of a screen is more rational?

Someone asked me if I use FireWire. I listed my current peripherals. Out of 8 only 2 have FireWire. Those two offer USB as an option. Its a fact that you wish to ignore, most of the computer market only uses USB. In realizing this you call irrational.



This notebook isn't the same as the MacBook in most cases. It uses the santa rosa chipset, less cache, slower RAM, CCFL instead of LED screen. The only place this notebook is better than the MacBook is the GPU.



Not true the MBA has a mini DisplayPort, USB port, and audio port.


This is overstating the current situation. Nearly all peripherals offer another option other than FireWire. The list of USB only devices is much higher than any that even offer FireWire as an option.


90% of the PC market does not use FireWire. Most of the PC's that offer FireWire are using the mini 4 pin variant which is nearly useless.



The overwhelming majority of the PC market uses USB for hard drives. There is no such thing as a flash drive for FireWire.



You guys are taking a George Bush "with us or against us" stance on this, without taking into account the reality of the computer market.

I would rather FireWire won over USB. But this is not the reality. The overwhelming majority of the computer market uses USB - the overwhelming majority of computer peripherals are made to interface through USB. That is the reality.


For most people buying the MacBook it won't matter because they've never used FireWire and never will. Or because most peripherals are either USB only or include USB along with FireWire.

Ultimately this strengthens Apple because it forces anyone who wants to use FireWire will have to buy the more expensive machine.

That's not true pretty much any 599 and up consumer laptop has 4-pin firewire 400 on it. Unless you're talking about netbooks you must not have looked at other manufacturers.

Perhaps, Blu-Ray playback will be a new exclusive feature of iDVD in Snow Leopard and we will see a CTO for Blu-Ray on the Mac Pro and the Mac Pro in January, but the argument that you can buy HD content through iTunes I find a really lame canard. The "HD" iTunes movies are only 720p as opposed to 1080p and for all the talk about how great the selection of films are I even after ~2 years since they started selling videos I feel underwhelmed. There are countless films that are top sellers in Bluray on Amazon that aren't even an option on iTunes. I couldn't find any hard numbers that are recent on the number of films on iTunes, but if iTunes has more options than Blu-ray it isn't by a lot and at least in my subjective judgement the iTunes collection of films leaves a lot to be desired.

http://www.nordichardware.com/news,8040.html


Many laptops now have a USB/eSATA port. Apple could have been progressive and utilized this features.

Jobs is fond of saying "we make the best computers available" but honestly I haven't been impressed with Mac in quite some time. I mean they look good but if you look at the overall picture and from the perspective of "computing". Apple still up to the same "style over substance" shenanigans.

Show me a 13" macbook pro from 1999 and I will buy it. I do not want or need a larger screen or heavier computer. Plenty of people have said this, firewire is not a $500 upgrade, that is a separate computer with many other things I don't want.

Well, I like very much the new design and the seemingly more solid construction but as I explained in previous posts I am not going to buy one. However, seeing the internals in the AI pictures, it seems that the package is very tight and probably FW was just impossible with the new internal design.

Hopefully, by next year we will see USB3 (where is this actually?) on the MB...

Yeah I wonder what Apple thinks of eSATA. Apple has never really been a company to put every port option on its notebooks. I can imagine from a design perspective they want to consolidate it down to a minimum. Which likely why the MacBook now only has USB.

Perhaps they believe USB 3 and FireWire 3200 are the most viable interfaces to support.


Apple being able to get Intel and Nvidia to design special chips for them that add great performance is pretty impressive. Especially in light of the Macs small marketshare.

From what I've read late 2009 to early 2010.

I guess toast 9 is a master piece then. Blu-ray support and software that read and burn bdr for like what? 70 bucks? I've used blu-ray drives on the mac pro as well as the lacie one on a mbp. It isn't complicated. I'm not saying that apple needed to include it this time around but you and the guy you quote are trying to make it sound like a mystical art, it's not. It's already here, toast can do it (and gives you the plugin) and adobe's encore can do it.

They probably just didn't offer it because like steve said licensing and because none of the slot load drives for br are that thin yet. I imagine it'll be a bto on the next mac pro.

People don't have to wait though, you can get one for a mac pro for less than 250 now.

The Apple fanbois around here really need to take their tongues outta Stevo's ass and step back from the glory that is Jobs. Some of you people would swallow just about anything Steve threw at you and believe it was for your own good.

Omitting FireWire was not a forward thinking move, It was a cost cutting, penny pinching, upselling exercise plain and simple. Some of you will not remember a time when Apple removed audio ports from their laptops. Others will remember the uproar over that move and the subsequent back pedalling by Apple. Any of you care to live without audio I/O now? Didn't think so.

The MacBook is certainly not a 'consumer' machine, not at this price. It is, if anything a PROsumer device with a price tag to match and that is why the lack of FireWire is really pissing people off. There are plenty of 'consumer' machines out there with reasonable price tags and specs to match which do not cost anything like the MacBook. The reason the MacBook is priced the way it is is because of its enormously expensive production costs and practices. The thing is way overcooked. As for USB being 'as good as' or a worthy alternative to FireWire... USB is craptastic for audio work and even worse for video. There is not one single digital video camera available that can be operated through USB as can be through FireWire. USB video importing is far from reliable also.

Oh, and before you say that some of us are being too emotional and not thinking logically about this whole debacle, well I apologize for being a human being and not operating just like that pretty MacBook. You can go recharge your Li-ion brains now.

Last year there was talk about 2008. What happened in the meantime?

Panasonic released a 9mm Bluray drive at CES nine months ago! You can order one and put it in your Macbook today. Unless Apple has moved to 7mm this argument that there are no Bluray drives that can fit in the chassis is a canard by Apple apologists. Furthermore, why was making the MB thinner such a priority? I didn't see a lot of people saying they wouldn't buy the MB because by gosh it is a few mm too thick!

I realize that MacOS currently doesn't support Bluray playback, but Apple can pad the price of the drive to cover the licensing for the playback software. There are companies that are selling bluray playback software for Windows less than $100 so add $100 plus the cost of the drive plus a 20-30% profit margin and finally round up to the near $50 and offer it as a CTO option. A BD-ROM option would probably be cheaper than an SSD option! While it wouldn't be a popular option, I have a feeling neither is the 128GB SSD either, but Apple is including that option.

I completely agree. well put.

I was using an extreme example to illustrate how far some will go to justify anything Apple does as correct and good for the market. You're ostensibly an intelligent person who should have picked that up.


I could say that you are taking a George Bush "nothing we (Apple) do is wrong" stance on this.


Except that Apple only provides FW on a 15" notebook. If they had a model that was 13" with FW that was also more expensive, you'd have a point.

Not really sure why a civilized conversation has to degrade into personal insults. Outside of the point that you have no evidence or facts to back up your position.


People have been giving this PC with better specs and lower price cliche for years now. It looks like a tired worn out excuse in the face of the fact that Mac sales are growing faster than the sales of these supposedly better and cheaper PCs.

Ultimately we will have to see if MacBook sales suffer from the lack of FireWire, even though most of the market does not use FireWire.

You lay fanboy insults all you want. But in the end that is what it comes down to.

That extreme example is so ridiculous its not a good example.



I never said Apple can do no wrong. I've said several times I would prefer they keep FireWire until a suitable replacement comes. At the same time looking at the reality of the computer market I can understand this choice.

Will most people stop buying MacBooks because it has no FireWire?



My point is that the 15" is the more expensive machine.

I don't know where the data is coming from that postulates that
people aren't using firewire.

Did my Western Digital drive purchase get counted as a USB drive for a Firewire drive? I
use it with my FW connection but my phone has never wrang with someone asking me
just how I hooked up my drive.

My Canon ZR950 has USB but I cannot transfer video data over this connection.


Apple still makes computers ..we still need to see functionality even if that functionality is only used every now and then (Target Disk Mode).

Premium computers should come with premium performance. USB only laptops at @ $1300 are the antithesis of good price/performance.

Certainly not a personal insult... unless you consider yourself a fanboy?
Evidence? Facts? What are you looking for? I'm giving you my personal experience just like many others here who share my concerns.


I did not mention anything about a PC with better specs. I was alluding to any consumer PC with decent specs and a price tag to match.
The MacBook may be slightly better specced than most but it also has a much higher price tag. Mac sales may be growing fast but PCs still outsell Macs by at least 15 to 1. You may not like it, I really don't either but Apple still have a hell of a long climb.

LOOK HERE


Where is the evidence to show that most of the 'market' do not use FireWire? How do you know for sure what the majority do or do not use? Maybe if they knew what they were missing then the 'majority' would want FireWire on their fancy prosumer notebook with large price tag to match.
Sales have already suffered. I'm not buying and neither are dozens of others who have said so publicly on these and other boards, never mind those who have quietly read and decided not to buy because FireWire looks 'pretty darn useful now that you mention it.'

Apple is the only OEM that so widely supports FireWire. Intel doesn't support FireWire at all. Its possible to opt for FW most PC users don't see the need and do not opt for it. This is all commonly known.

Looking at the current state of peripheral market most people can get along fine without ever using a FW device. Its impossible to only use FW and never use USB.

Here again is my own list of peripherals and their interfaces. I actually hadn't paid much attention before to the fact that so much is USB. Outside of the hard drive or DVD burner, most other peripherals don't offer a FW option at all.


- Hard Drive (FireWire 400/800, High Speed USB, eSATA)
- DVD Burner (FireWire, USB)
- TV Tuner (USB)
- Digital Camera (USB)
- USB Flash Drive (USB)
- Printer (High Speed USB)
- iPod Video (USB)
- iPhone 3G (USB)

The MacBook's screen resolution is 1280x800. Why exactly would you want to watch scaled-down (and much larger, in terms of file size) 1080p content instead of native 720p content on that display?


Correct, FireWire is not a $500 upgrade. It is not even a $1 upgrade. It is a near-dead standard.

Buy USB peripherals like the rest of the market, or keep your current computer.

Actually, if you had taken time to read and think about my post before going off on your rant about your personal experience, I was not refuting the fact that aluminum will likely be worse for wi-fi reception than plastic; my only point was that the poster was dead wrong when he said that aluminum "killed it." This is absurd. What does "killed it" mean to you? To English speaking people, this sounds like he is saying that it is so bad that no reasonable person would ever use it.

Thanks for proving my point about the pure ignorance of posters like you, who bring up TWELVE inch laptops (with inferior screens, build quality, graphics, no backlit keyboards, etc.) and try to compare it to the new MB.

Instead of trying to answer a European XPS, I can only look at a North American one because we all know that Euro pricing can vary so widely in different European countries.

As of today at dell.ca:

PROCESSOR\tIntel® Core™ 2 Duo T8100 (2.1GHz/800Mhz FSB/3MB cache), English\tedit
OPERATING SYSTEM\tGenuine Windows Vista® Ultimate Edition SP1\tedit
SYSTEM COLOUR\tTuxedo Black\tedit
LCD AND CAMERA\tSlim and Light LED Display with VGA Webcam\tedit
MEMORY\t3GB DDR2 SDRAM at 667MHz (1GB x 2GB)\tedit
HARD DRIVE\t320G 5400RPM SATA HDD\tedit
OPTICAL DRIVE\t8X CD/DVD Burner (DVD+/-RW) with double-layer DVD+R write capability\tedit
WIRELESS CARD\tDell Wireless 1505 Wireless-N Mini-card\tedit
BATTERY OPTIONS\t6 Cell Battery\tedit
SOUND OPTIONS\tIntegrated Sound Blaster Audigy HD Software Edition\tedit
GRAPHICS CARD\t128MB NVIDIA® GeForce® Go 8400M GS

$1349 CAD, which is, shocking, wait for it....wait....THE SAME PRICE AS THE ENTRY MACBOOK (educational)!!!! WOW!!!

You do get more RAM and a bigger HDD but an older graphics card and an older CPU. BTW, the HDD and RAM are easy and cheap to replace; you cannot replace the GPU and the CPU. The XPS also lacks a backlit keyboard and is still mostly plastic, with some aluminum accents.

I'm not an Apple "apologist." Stop making sweeping generalizations about other people when you so ardently condemn such an act. In other words, stop being a hypocrite.

I have no intention of buying a new MacBook.

As far as BD goes, a company called AMEX just released a tiny portable slot loading BD burner (the size of the Air Superdrive) that is USB bus powered, like the Air superdrive, for $300. That would solve that issue for me entirely until Apple gets around to putting them inside.


http://gizmodo.com/5064634/amex-port...ay-fashionable

It's funny that you should mention Toast because I do consider it to be somewhat of a "masterpiece." I certainly wouldn't use anything else to burn stuff.

However, the fact remains that Apple itself doesn't have the software to RUN blu-ray smoothly. By run, I mean play the films, not just read data.

I think it's very funny that if you see the lack of Firewire from a different perspective and you rationally try to explain why you are not up in arms about it, then you are a fanboy.

Just to prove you wrong, here are a few random PC laptops without FW, all listed on Futureshop's front page:

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...E25BADB50ADADA

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...52F1826CE417BD

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...52F1826CE417BD

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...0111628&catid=



Here is a Sony with one, but is is $1K
http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...52F1826CE417BD

A 13" laptop without FW:

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...0101467&catid=


As you can see, not "pretty much every every 599 and up consumer laptop has 4-pin firewire 400 on it."

Define "near dead"

If no one cared ..there wouldn't be the anger being displayed out here. Just because you don't use it doesn't mean that plenty of others don't.

Yes moron is a much better title.

I think that "near dead" means that almost no consumer electronic uses FW exclusively anymore, and he is correct.

The outrage on this board reflects several things:

1. Ignorance by some
2. Genuine complains by those who really do need it

For those in the 2nd group, I understand their disappointment, but their group is still very small compared to the the large consumer market that doesn't even use FW.

I disagree the anger to me reflects


1. An understanding that Apple is a premium computer manufacturer and that means that we understand that they don't scrape bottom barrell but we also understand that we expect them to go the extra mile in a few areas to deliver premium performance.

2. The assumption that the consumer market is what should dictate Apple's featureset is quite absurd. The consumer market doesn't dicatate aluminum chassis but Apple has delivered that. In fact most consumer laptops have more connectivity options (card reader, expresscard, eSATA ports) yet Apple remains ignorant of those features.


Apple has long been the company that gave "more" perhaps the RAM and HDD storage didn't match but dammit we could point to the Superdrive or the built in SCSI or Gigabit Ethernet and say "we're cutting edge" .

The Macbooks are sadly missing cutting edge save for the gorgeous case.

The aluminum manufacturing process and 65nm Nvidia chipset on one die are both cutting edge. The disappointment of firewire cannot take away from that fact.

eSATA ..can't add it
Future wireless technology like Wimax can't add it
Card Reader ...not there use a USB port

They have no expansion and have jettisoned the only other viable connection they had yet they are %10. That is not value.

Apple's legacy of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is legendary. If companies had afflictions like ADHD ...Apple would be the poster child.

I am a filmmaker. Yes I do understand how important Firewire is. Most of the people I work with are using MacBook Pro, Power Mac, and Mac Pro. I cannot think of anyone around me who is using MacBook for professional video work.

You need to look more closely at Sony's consumer line of cameras USB across the board. Panasonic, JVC, and Canon are using USB across the board prosumer and consumer.

If I don't agree with you, I'm a moron? Good to know that I should automatically discount your thoughts on this for irrationality.

Yes but if a person is moronic ...would I really need them to "count" my thoughts? The minute I begin to agree with morons means I am in fact a moron. I don't want to be a moron.



TenoBell- I can definitely see the video market moving away from any kind of wire connection save for say SDI or HD-SDI. You have Panny and the P2 and Sony and their SxS Expresscard based memory sticks. It makes sense to capture and then remove the card ..ingest and and edit.

Firewire for audio tends to be a bit different. It's more bi-directional. You have high end FW effects boxes like

Duende
TC Electronic Powercore

and a plethora of audio interfaces where firewire does indeed make a difference over USB.

I've seen a bunch of dumbed down responses that center around "well I don't have any firewire devices so it must not be necessary"

Because of Apple's narrow product line the removal of some features affect users in other areas. I know I've been a bit obtuse about glossy vs matte screens. But then I got to thinking. Apple has a BTO program...there's no reason to have customers upset because they've been forced into buying one type of LCD. Macbooks should come in what the majority favors but Macbook Pros should be offered in a choice.

However, three of those five laptops without built-in FireWire still can be outfitted with the capability by simply buying a FireWire ExpressCard.

"Relatively uncommon on electronics devices, and if present is in the company of at least one other connection port." External hard drives are almost never found without USB, and consumer video cameras have switched over to USB; at this point, the only equipment that truly needs FireWire is external audio equipment for professionals, which is a pretty niche market segment. Or at the very least, they fall outside of the market Apple wishes to serve with the MacBook.


The anger is over older equipment without USB slots. Again, the options are to retain your current equipment, buy a Pro, or buy a white MacBook.

I didn't think you had a sufficient reason for your "near dead" comment. Firewire does things that USB cannot do and that's why it's popular in some areas. Because the masses only do mundane things like hook up printers or extra hard drives doesn't mean there isn't a need for "smarter" technology.

SCSI does somethings that IDE/SATA do not do.

Even ADB does something USB doesn't do (power key on the keyboard).

Newton does something(handwriting recognition) no other PDA/cell phone could do even today.