Aww crap. I sure hope they will just wait a few months before introducing the 'new' 17"er like they did in the past.
One thought, is the Retina display one available in a matte finish? Hmmmmmmm...... I need the matte finish! And the Express Card slot is a great feature.
I guess it's a good thing Apple replaced my 2010 17" model with the latest/greatest because of a graphics problem last month. Should last me a few years.
Now, what's with the Mac Pro?!?!
PLEASE DON'T KILL THE REAL PRO COMPUTERS APPLE!!
Give it up dude...the 17" is dead! There's absolutely no reason why they wouldn't have updated the 17" model with Ivy Bridge technology. There was nothing stopping them from doing so. It doesn't fit their lineup and its not a big seller.
During the last number of macbook pro major updates, the 17inch model always lagged release by a number of months. I am a power user and require as much mobile screen real-estate as possible. I will wait for the release of the 17 inch retina display model. The extra case size should facilitate more USB ports and more SSD. I would like to see at least 1TB of SSD and more if they can squeeze it in. The move to 16 GM of RAM and the retina display was excellent as well as all the other enhancements. I will be amount the first to order a fully loaded 17 inch with retina display.
They took the current model of the 17 inch off the web site as it is now out of production. This makes sense since the manufacturing process is more refined for their current lineup. The new Retina 17 inch should be out by October. This is the historical pattern. The application development community is essential to the success of Apple and a large part of this community does want lots of horse power and screen real-estate. The same goes for all the power users in a lot of disciplines from science, to publishing, to videography.
They took the current model of the 17 inch off the web site as it is now out of production. This makes sense since the manufacturing process is more refined for their current lineup. The new Retina 17 inch should be out by October. This is the historical pattern.
They kept it for sale the last time there was a case update. This isn't happening. Don't expect it. Don't make purchasing decisions based on it.
Have you actually used a retina display, like on the iPad 3? A retina display is not about making text smaller or cramming more things on the desktop. A retina display is about making things look better, from text characters to pictures to whatever.
And if I wanted a large screen size, I'd just hook up a macbook or even a tiny macbook air to a huge external monitor. To be honest, 17" is not all that big to begin with, when comparing it to external monitors.
Funny though . . . no matter how nice the screen looks with a retina display, it's still smaller, which is the issue of dropping the 17" display.
And then there's the fact that one doesn't generally take a "huge external monitor" on the road with your laptop (it kind of defeats the whole portable computer thing, doesn't it?)
The point people don't seem to get is that the 17" MBPs are not really used as "laptops" in the classic sense. They are used as full featured, full powered, portable desktops. They are also used by people like my Mom, who have visual problems, but want a compact machine they can easily move around the house. The computer with the "huge external monitor" stays on her desk in her office. For like her (and most pros) a retina display is cool, but not at the expense of screen size.
For those who say the rest of us shouldn't have an optical drive in our MacBook Pros - PFFFT!
I still get DVDs and BluRay sets from Target (5% Target Card discount, plus a bonus 5% when I fill five prescriptions). I installed Diablo III from disk. My kids still play games that require the disk in the drive (and my disk image attempts often fail). Heck, my daughter's Wacom tablet demands one (don't know why...) (and, yes, she takes that tablet on the road). FYI, those disks go in my daughter's Phillips portable BluRay player, so digital downloads don't work for her.
Yes, I'm aware that NetBooks don't have optical drives either. Was really funny when I decided to do a system wipe and the instructions included "insert reinstallation disk into your external optical drive" which I don't own.
For you coders, the extra screen space makes file syncing in BBEdit a *heck* of a lot easier while you're on the train or at the ballpark. (External monitor folks aren't thinking about that.) Yeah, I should be watching the ballgame, but I HAVE coded in the stands at AT&T Park.
Oh, and ever try taking an external monitor to an on location shoot? I thought so...
For those who say the rest of us shouldn't have an optical drive in our MacBook Pros - PFFFT!
I don't think anyone has said you shouldn't have one, but what people are saying is that here comes a point when obsolescing tech is satisfying such a smaller percentage of an ever shrinking number of users — most whom most have very valid individual reasons for keeping antiquated tech — that it's hurting the majority by keeping technology from progressing upward.
"It is unclear whether Apple will bring the model back when high-resolution display pricing drops, but it seems that most users, including professionals, are content with 15-inch products."
I'm not content with the 15" product. I hope Apple brings back the 17" version.
Apple is free to discontinue whatever they want, but that doesn't mean we have to "settle" for whatever they choose to offer. If Apple doesn't want to support the pro market, those of us who need pro machines will simply go elsewhere. Asus has some nice offerings. I prefer OSX over Windows, but I also prefer getting my work done efficiently over spending several minutes of every hour shuffling things around the screen.
I'm a little surprised by those who suggest that because THEY don't need the larger screen, NOBODY should. If your situation and/or preferences make a Retina 15" suitable for your application, you're lucky. If I need/prefer a larger screen, and have no difficulty transporting the larger device, why would being disappointed by the absence of that option make me a "whiner?"
The article says there was no official announcement during the keynote, but Phil said (of the 15" Retina MBP) "This is now our flagship computer," which I took as meaning the 17" was gone.
The article says there was no official announcement during the keynote, but Phil said (of the 15" Retina MBP) "This is now our flagship computer," which I took as meaning the 17" was gone.
Now just means NOW. The new 15" display makes the old 17" look like on old standard def TV. It doesn't mean there will never be a retina display 17" model (although that is likely).
If I was a 17" fan and needed a machine, I'd buy a refurb or old stock somewhere right now. Otherwise 15" retina IS the new 17".
A 17" with a 3091x1987 pixel display (extrapolated from the 15.4" model's resolution) would be nice. It's interesting that they went with a 14x9 aspect ratio - maybe to allow 16x9 video plus controls above or below?
Videographers who travel with their work often prefer the larger portable display. Improved clarity is nice, but you need to be able to read the legend and see the thin bars and/or lines on a graph (spectrometer, volume, whatever) too. With this display on a 17" model, you will be able to work with full-size full-HD video with more room for legible controls. Though I would like to see the resolution bumped slightly to support 3840x2160 (maybe x2469, keeping the same ratio) or more, so that full-HD video can be evenly doubled and eliminate scaling artifacts.
Another interesting omission is the drop of FireWire, considering videography is a major user focus. Most cabled cameras use FireWire for video, and many of the ones that also support USB cannot transfer video over it. Granted, many new cameras are moving to digital storage like SDXC cards, but it will be an annoyance to now need to always carry a Thunderbolt/FireWire dongle. I have many FireWire 800 drives as well, which don't support USB 3, and I don't relish having to either replace them or use bottleneck adapters.
A 17" with a 3091x1987 pixel display (extrapolated from the 15.4" model's resolution) would be nice. It's interesting that they went with a 14x9 aspect ratio - maybe to allow 16x9 video plus controls above or below?
Videographers who travel with their work often prefer the larger portable display. Improved clarity is nice, but you need to be able to read the legend and see the thin bars and/or lines on a graph (spectrometer, volume, whatever) too. With this display on a 17" model, you will be able to work with full-size full-HD video with more room for legible controls. Though I would like to see the resolution bumped slightly to support 3840x2160 (maybe x2469, keeping the same ratio) or more, so that full-HD video can be evenly doubled and eliminate scaling artifacts.
Another interesting omission is the drop of FireWire, considering videography is a major user focus. Most cabled cameras use FireWire for video, and many of the ones that also support USB cannot transfer video over it. Granted, many new cameras are moving to digital storage like SDXC cards, but it will be an annoyance to now need to always carry a Thunderbolt/FireWire dongle. I have many FireWire 800 drives as well, which don't support USB 3, and I don't relish having to either replace them or use bottleneck adapters.
The Thunderbolt-to-Firewire adaptor should offer effectively the same performance as a native PCIe Firewire card. I know, it will end up being one more cable to carry around; but it shouldn't create any new bottlenecks.
Cute, but not far from the truth. A large-market broadcaster recently upgraded to Avid Nitris. Previous Avid systems in this facility were run on Macs. This time they went with HP.
Went with a new MacBook Pro late last year and decided to go with the 15" to replace the older 17" I was using. Seemed like more bang for the buck with the 15". Have to say that I miss the 17" when in the office and am very happy I chose the 15" when on the road. I have an external monitor in the office but it does clutter up an already cluttered desk!
For better or worse, Apple is ruthless when it comes to eliminating products that don't generate desired revenue / profit. That said, it would be sad to see the 17" MacBook Pro gone for good.
Everyone who thinks turning 1 pixel in 4 improves CLARITY needs to understand that Retina only makes each pixel physically smaller. That's it. All this hype over tinier pixels.
Retina technology is only needed on mobile devices where you can easily put your nose a couple of inches from the screen. On a 17" to 24" screen it's impossible to SEE a single pixel because you don't get that close to the screen. So Retina is pure marketing hype for computers.
Worse, do you fanboys realize that there is NO mode that lets you show video or pictures at FULL SCREEN resolution. It would be great if one could show a full-screen of pixels from a photo. But, you can't! You always get upscaled video from a lower rez pix. (So much for wanting a QuadHD screen.)
Now you FaceBook and Twitter fans who live at home, get this: "Videographers [and photographers] need to be able to read the legend and see the thin bars and/or lines on a graph (spectrometer, volume, whatever) with non-Apple applications. Like Adobe and Avid. With the old 17" model, you can work with full-size full-HD video with more room for legible controls."
What you GameCenter kids don't understand is that UPSCALING -- which is how ONE pixel becomes FOUR -- always causes scaling artifacts IN ADDITION to the fact that upscaling always causes a lose of image clarity [yes, a LOSS OF CLARITY] because interpolation forces the GPU to guess every-other pixel.
What to do: long-term we have to see how bad Windows 8 will be. Hopefully, after turning Metro off, one will have a useable OS. At least it won't be full of support for Apple's toys. Twitter in an OS? iTunes? Pages? Numbers? There is a whole world building PRO computers that are faster and cheaper. Then there is Linux which may be where pros have to go to get away from the kids -- the one's you see at the Apple store.
Short-term, go to the Apple refurb store. For $2000, I just bought a 17" anti-glare with the OpenCL 1GB GPU needed by Adobe CS6 and a 750GB 7200rpm drive. A $100 of PLUG-IN RAM -- not soldered like the new MBs -- and I've got a system that will last until we see if Apple totally decides to turn itself into ToysRus.
The other thing to do, buy Apple stock. The world is not getting brighter. I was programming in machine language in 1961. A few years later folks my age could program in BASIC or FORTRAN. Walk into an Apple store and ask how many can program in any language -- despite Apple's excellent tools. So with a whole world of uneducated kids -- Apple will have a huge potential market who want to buy toys. (Think 1960 American cars with BIG fins verses Euro cars with fuel injection and disk brakes.) Take your earnings and buy a REAL computer -- not a vending machine for iTunes and the App store.
PS: you can burn Blu-ray content on a SuperDrive. With BD player's at $99 everyone can have one. So BD makes a great distribution media. In fact a wedding videographer -- you know someone who actually earns a profit with their computer -- can afford to bundle a player in a package they sell.
Comments
Quote:
Originally Posted by studiomusic
Aww crap. I sure hope they will just wait a few months before introducing the 'new' 17"er like they did in the past.
One thought, is the Retina display one available in a matte finish? Hmmmmmmm...... I need the matte finish! And the Express Card slot is a great feature.
I guess it's a good thing Apple replaced my 2010 17" model with the latest/greatest because of a graphics problem last month. Should last me a few years.
Now, what's with the Mac Pro?!?!
PLEASE DON'T KILL THE REAL PRO COMPUTERS APPLE!!
Give it up dude...the 17" is dead! There's absolutely no reason why they wouldn't have updated the 17" model with Ivy Bridge technology. There was nothing stopping them from doing so. It doesn't fit their lineup and its not a big seller.
During the last number of macbook pro major updates, the 17inch model always lagged release by a number of months. I am a power user and require as much mobile screen real-estate as possible. I will wait for the release of the 17 inch retina display model. The extra case size should facilitate more USB ports and more SSD. I would like to see at least 1TB of SSD and more if they can squeeze it in. The move to 16 GM of RAM and the retina display was excellent as well as all the other enhancements. I will be amount the first to order a fully loaded 17 inch with retina display.
Quote:
Originally Posted by tommy tomkins
I will wait for the release of the 17 inch retina display model.
You'll be waiting forever. Apple took it off their website entirely. Unlike the 13", which will eventually get a retina display, the 17" is toast.
If you think users can bring it back, feel free to fight for it, however.
They took the current model of the 17 inch off the web site as it is now out of production. This makes sense since the manufacturing process is more refined for their current lineup. The new Retina 17 inch should be out by October. This is the historical pattern. The application development community is essential to the success of Apple and a large part of this community does want lots of horse power and screen real-estate. The same goes for all the power users in a lot of disciplines from science, to publishing, to videography.
Quote:
Originally Posted by tommy tomkins
They took the current model of the 17 inch off the web site as it is now out of production. This makes sense since the manufacturing process is more refined for their current lineup. The new Retina 17 inch should be out by October. This is the historical pattern.
They kept it for sale the last time there was a case update. This isn't happening. Don't expect it. Don't make purchasing decisions based on it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Apple ][
Have you actually used a retina display, like on the iPad 3? A retina display is not about making text smaller or cramming more things on the desktop. A retina display is about making things look better, from text characters to pictures to whatever.
And if I wanted a large screen size, I'd just hook up a macbook or even a tiny macbook air to a huge external monitor. To be honest, 17" is not all that big to begin with, when comparing it to external monitors.
Funny though . . . no matter how nice the screen looks with a retina display, it's still smaller, which is the issue of dropping the 17" display.
And then there's the fact that one doesn't generally take a "huge external monitor" on the road with your laptop (it kind of defeats the whole portable computer thing, doesn't it?)
The point people don't seem to get is that the 17" MBPs are not really used as "laptops" in the classic sense. They are used as full featured, full powered, portable desktops. They are also used by people like my Mom, who have visual problems, but want a compact machine they can easily move around the house. The computer with the "huge external monitor" stays on her desk in her office. For like her (and most pros) a retina display is cool, but not at the expense of screen size.
For those who say the rest of us shouldn't have an optical drive in our MacBook Pros - PFFFT!
I still get DVDs and BluRay sets from Target (5% Target Card discount, plus a bonus 5% when I fill five prescriptions). I installed Diablo III from disk. My kids still play games that require the disk in the drive (and my disk image attempts often fail). Heck, my daughter's Wacom tablet demands one (don't know why...) (and, yes, she takes that tablet on the road). FYI, those disks go in my daughter's Phillips portable BluRay player, so digital downloads don't work for her.
Yes, I'm aware that NetBooks don't have optical drives either. Was really funny when I decided to do a system wipe and the instructions included "insert reinstallation disk into your external optical drive" which I don't own.
For you coders, the extra screen space makes file syncing in BBEdit a *heck* of a lot easier while you're on the train or at the ballpark. (External monitor folks aren't thinking about that.) Yeah, I should be watching the ballgame, but I HAVE coded in the stands at AT&T Park.
Oh, and ever try taking an external monitor to an on location shoot? I thought so...
Do you think someone will fire-off an email to Tim about this and we'll all be reading his reply in an article here on AI within the next week?
I don't think anyone has said you shouldn't have one, but what people are saying is that here comes a point when obsolescing tech is satisfying such a smaller percentage of an ever shrinking number of users — most whom most have very valid individual reasons for keeping antiquated tech — that it's hurting the majority by keeping technology from progressing upward.
Quote:
"It is unclear whether Apple will bring the model back when high-resolution display pricing drops, but it seems that most users, including professionals, are content with 15-inch products."
I'm not content with the 15" product. I hope Apple brings back the 17" version.
I guess I won't be getting a new Mac this year.
Apple is free to discontinue whatever they want, but that doesn't mean we have to "settle" for whatever they choose to offer. If Apple doesn't want to support the pro market, those of us who need pro machines will simply go elsewhere. Asus has some nice offerings. I prefer OSX over Windows, but I also prefer getting my work done efficiently over spending several minutes of every hour shuffling things around the screen.
I'm a little surprised by those who suggest that because THEY don't need the larger screen, NOBODY should. If your situation and/or preferences make a Retina 15" suitable for your application, you're lucky. If I need/prefer a larger screen, and have no difficulty transporting the larger device, why would being disappointed by the absence of that option make me a "whiner?"
The article says there was no official announcement during the keynote, but Phil said (of the 15" Retina MBP) "This is now our flagship computer," which I took as meaning the 17" was gone.
Quote:
Originally Posted by v5v
I guess I won't be getting a new Mac this year.
Too bad... so here's your next computer...what's stopping ya?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bregalad
They obviously didn't talk to my co-workers.
No, they probably just went by looking at their general sales data.
What where they thinking? In fact, if they talked to my coworkers, they would have announced a 21.3456 inch laptop with a Zip drive.
Now just means NOW. The new 15" display makes the old 17" look like on old standard def TV. It doesn't mean there will never be a retina display 17" model (although that is likely).
If I was a 17" fan and needed a machine, I'd buy a refurb or old stock somewhere right now. Otherwise 15" retina IS the new 17".
A 17" with a 3091x1987 pixel display (extrapolated from the 15.4" model's resolution) would be nice. It's interesting that they went with a 14x9 aspect ratio - maybe to allow 16x9 video plus controls above or below?
Videographers who travel with their work often prefer the larger portable display. Improved clarity is nice, but you need to be able to read the legend and see the thin bars and/or lines on a graph (spectrometer, volume, whatever) too. With this display on a 17" model, you will be able to work with full-size full-HD video with more room for legible controls. Though I would like to see the resolution bumped slightly to support 3840x2160 (maybe x2469, keeping the same ratio) or more, so that full-HD video can be evenly doubled and eliminate scaling artifacts.
Another interesting omission is the drop of FireWire, considering videography is a major user focus. Most cabled cameras use FireWire for video, and many of the ones that also support USB cannot transfer video over it. Granted, many new cameras are moving to digital storage like SDXC cards, but it will be an annoyance to now need to always carry a Thunderbolt/FireWire dongle. I have many FireWire 800 drives as well, which don't support USB 3, and I don't relish having to either replace them or use bottleneck adapters.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Michael Pollard
A 17" with a 3091x1987 pixel display (extrapolated from the 15.4" model's resolution) would be nice. It's interesting that they went with a 14x9 aspect ratio - maybe to allow 16x9 video plus controls above or below?
Videographers who travel with their work often prefer the larger portable display. Improved clarity is nice, but you need to be able to read the legend and see the thin bars and/or lines on a graph (spectrometer, volume, whatever) too. With this display on a 17" model, you will be able to work with full-size full-HD video with more room for legible controls. Though I would like to see the resolution bumped slightly to support 3840x2160 (maybe x2469, keeping the same ratio) or more, so that full-HD video can be evenly doubled and eliminate scaling artifacts.
Another interesting omission is the drop of FireWire, considering videography is a major user focus. Most cabled cameras use FireWire for video, and many of the ones that also support USB cannot transfer video over it. Granted, many new cameras are moving to digital storage like SDXC cards, but it will be an annoyance to now need to always carry a Thunderbolt/FireWire dongle. I have many FireWire 800 drives as well, which don't support USB 3, and I don't relish having to either replace them or use bottleneck adapters.
The Thunderbolt-to-Firewire adaptor should offer effectively the same performance as a native PCIe Firewire card. I know, it will end up being one more cable to carry around; but it shouldn't create any new bottlenecks.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ThePixelDoc
Too bad... so here's your next computer...what's stopping ya?
Cute, but not far from the truth. A large-market broadcaster recently upgraded to Avid Nitris. Previous Avid systems in this facility were run on Macs. This time they went with HP.
Went with a new MacBook Pro late last year and decided to go with the 15" to replace the older 17" I was using. Seemed like more bang for the buck with the 15". Have to say that I miss the 17" when in the office and am very happy I chose the 15" when on the road. I have an external monitor in the office but it does clutter up an already cluttered desk!
For better or worse, Apple is ruthless when it comes to eliminating products that don't generate desired revenue / profit. That said, it would be sad to see the 17" MacBook Pro gone for good.
Everyone who thinks turning 1 pixel in 4 improves CLARITY needs to understand that Retina only makes each pixel physically smaller. That's it. All this hype over tinier pixels.
Retina technology is only needed on mobile devices where you can easily put your nose a couple of inches from the screen. On a 17" to 24" screen it's impossible to SEE a single pixel because you don't get that close to the screen. So Retina is pure marketing hype for computers.
Worse, do you fanboys realize that there is NO mode that lets you show video or pictures at FULL SCREEN resolution. It would be great if one could show a full-screen of pixels from a photo. But, you can't! You always get upscaled video from a lower rez pix. (So much for wanting a QuadHD screen.)
Now you FaceBook and Twitter fans who live at home, get this: "Videographers [and photographers] need to be able to read the legend and see the thin bars and/or lines on a graph (spectrometer, volume, whatever) with non-Apple applications. Like Adobe and Avid. With the old 17" model, you can work with full-size full-HD video with more room for legible controls."
What you GameCenter kids don't understand is that UPSCALING -- which is how ONE pixel becomes FOUR -- always causes scaling artifacts IN ADDITION to the fact that upscaling always causes a lose of image clarity [yes, a LOSS OF CLARITY] because interpolation forces the GPU to guess every-other pixel.
What to do: long-term we have to see how bad Windows 8 will be. Hopefully, after turning Metro off, one will have a useable OS. At least it won't be full of support for Apple's toys. Twitter in an OS? iTunes? Pages? Numbers? There is a whole world building PRO computers that are faster and cheaper. Then there is Linux which may be where pros have to go to get away from the kids -- the one's you see at the Apple store.
Short-term, go to the Apple refurb store. For $2000, I just bought a 17" anti-glare with the OpenCL 1GB GPU needed by Adobe CS6 and a 750GB 7200rpm drive. A $100 of PLUG-IN RAM -- not soldered like the new MBs -- and I've got a system that will last until we see if Apple totally decides to turn itself into ToysRus.
The other thing to do, buy Apple stock. The world is not getting brighter. I was programming in machine language in 1961. A few years later folks my age could program in BASIC or FORTRAN. Walk into an Apple store and ask how many can program in any language -- despite Apple's excellent tools. So with a whole world of uneducated kids -- Apple will have a huge potential market who want to buy toys. (Think 1960 American cars with BIG fins verses Euro cars with fuel injection and disk brakes.) Take your earnings and buy a REAL computer -- not a vending machine for iTunes and the App store.
PS: you can burn Blu-ray content on a SuperDrive. With BD player's at $99 everyone can have one. So BD makes a great distribution media. In fact a wedding videographer -- you know someone who actually earns a profit with their computer -- can afford to bundle a player in a package they sell.