The thing that bothers me about MWSF isn't the debut of anyone product but the lack of good rumors for any new products. I'd like to say it is a sure thing but I just don't have that warm fuzzy feeling right now.
Frankly I'm wondering what exactly they are waiting on. It can't be the Uni-body as that is simple CNC programming. So this has me thinking two different things. One is that they have a line on a quad core chip and are waiting for Intel to deliver. The other is that the 9400M has a big brother with better performance to enhance 3D when on the road, that and maybe a few more I/O ports.
Heck they might be waiting on a 9400M with built in Firewire 3200! Wouldn't that rock every bodies boat.
I don want to pay more than 2800$ for that 17 inch macbook pro........
Unfortunately I have no idea what a 17 inch MBP goes for now or in the future. I went 15 inch this spring to keep the size managable.
What I find interesting is that the 17 inched was delayed in the first place. This may indicate a departure from the electronics in the 15 inch model. Or it could mean more than one 17 inch model or other innovation. The 17 inchers delay makes me wonder why it is special.
apple is selling its old 17-inch mbp with minor adjustments (bigger hard-drive, better screen resolution and 4gb memory) for $2800. You can get a refurbished one without these "improvements" for $2000.
I am hoping the entry level for the new unibody 17-inch mbp is also around $2800
the biggest appeal for a 17-inch for me atleast is the screen resolution and the protability.
Quote:
Originally Posted by wizard69
Unfortunately I have no idea what a 17 inch MBP goes for now or in the future. I went 15 inch this spring to keep the size managable.
What I find interesting is that the 17 inched was delayed in the first place. This may indicate a departure from the electronics in the 15 inch model. Or it could mean more than one 17 inch model or other innovation. The 17 inchers delay makes me wonder why it is special.
There were rumors/reports about technical issues preventing Apple to introduce the unibody 17" MBP along the other two sizes. Supposedly drive issues and screen issues.
Since the 17" MBP has always been the only MBP displaying true 1080 HD resolution, I was wondering whether Apple intended to release the 17" MBP with a BluRay drive. It would make sense IMHO.
(And knowing Apple's pride they might not want to compromise the top HD model by offering a SuperDrive instead.)
This would also tie in with reports that the developer version of OS X 10.5.6 had BluRay related strings in it for the first time, indicating that 10.5.6 was intended to support BluRay.
Now we all read about the 'Bag of Hurt' quote from Steve. I wonder whether it was also hurting the unibody 17" MBP release...
Since all unibody MBPs use the same design I can't really think of any design issues particular only to the 17" model. Screen rigidity has long been resolved in the current model as well as unibody enclosures are more rigid to begin with.
No matter how hard I think I can't really come up with any technical reason for a 17" unibody MBP delay that would not also affect the other models. Even if originally intended GPUs and/or CPUs are constraint, Apple could still just use the same parts as in the 15" model and upgrade the innards later. So why not do it?
If BluRay really caused the delay I wonder whether we'd have to wait until Snow Leopard to see the unibody 17" MBP, i.e. around March?!?
You may be right. The apple insider article in Oct also stated some optical drive issues with the 17inch mbp.
I'm not sure what is up with Apple and the Blu-Ray folks. Steve left me with the impression that Blu-Ray wasn't even in the cards. What he could have meant though is that they where having a lot of trouble getting a hardware and software system inplace that satisfies the Blu-Ray stake holders.
What I mean here is that it is likely that Apple would want to implement the required software and hardware in a way that doesn't crap up Mac OS/X the way MS did Vista. One possibility here would be the connection of the Blu-Ray drive directly to a video chip with the DRM built into that chip. This would keep the decoded stream away from the CPU or other intercept points.
Of course this requires working with Nvidia or other GPU supplier. It would also require a CPU on board along with all the GPUs and likely some specialized decoding hardware. Such an approach ought to make the studios happy and at the same time Apple as they would not need to slow down their hardware with DRM encrusted OS software.
Quote:
I wonder if it will be a good idea to get anything with snow leapord since the first release will have a lot of glitches
I wouldn't in the first few weeks. Better to let the rest of the world find the compatibility problems. Of course that depends a bit on how much you focus on non Apple supplied software. Hopefully everything Apple delivers will be solid.
Note that it seems to me a lot of people underestimate just how big of an update Snow Leopard is. There are some pretty major changes to the underlying system software. Sure user space won't change much depending on your perspective. I guess it depends on what you think of an all COCAO environment.
The underlying system changes and updated libraries could have an impact on third party apps. So I'd keep an eye on apps that you use and update when it becomes clear that they are trouble free.
one thing i dont get is why not do all of this with the more popular 15-inch mbp? It does not make sense to incorporate radical changes to the 17-inch mbp, which has a much smaller niche.
Comments
Frankly I'm wondering what exactly they are waiting on. It can't be the Uni-body as that is simple CNC programming. So this has me thinking two different things. One is that they have a line on a quad core chip and are waiting for Intel to deliver. The other is that the 9400M has a big brother with better performance to enhance 3D when on the road, that and maybe a few more I/O ports.
Heck they might be waiting on a 9400M with built in Firewire 3200!
Dave
I don want to pay more than 2800$ for that 17 inch macbook pro........
Unfortunately I have no idea what a 17 inch MBP goes for now or in the future. I went 15 inch this spring to keep the size managable.
What I find interesting is that the 17 inched was delayed in the first place. This may indicate a departure from the electronics in the 15 inch model. Or it could mean more than one 17 inch model or other innovation. The 17 inchers delay makes me wonder why it is special.
Dave
I am hoping the entry level for the new unibody 17-inch mbp is also around $2800
the biggest appeal for a 17-inch for me atleast is the screen resolution and the protability.
Unfortunately I have no idea what a 17 inch MBP goes for now or in the future. I went 15 inch this spring to keep the size managable.
What I find interesting is that the 17 inched was delayed in the first place. This may indicate a departure from the electronics in the 15 inch model. Or it could mean more than one 17 inch model or other innovation. The 17 inchers delay makes me wonder why it is special.
Dave
There were rumors/reports about technical issues preventing Apple to introduce the unibody 17" MBP along the other two sizes. Supposedly drive issues and screen issues.
Since the 17" MBP has always been the only MBP displaying true 1080 HD resolution, I was wondering whether Apple intended to release the 17" MBP with a BluRay drive. It would make sense IMHO.
(And knowing Apple's pride they might not want to compromise the top HD model by offering a SuperDrive instead.)
This would also tie in with reports that the developer version of OS X 10.5.6 had BluRay related strings in it for the first time, indicating that 10.5.6 was intended to support BluRay.
Now we all read about the 'Bag of Hurt' quote from Steve. I wonder whether it was also hurting the unibody 17" MBP release...
Since all unibody MBPs use the same design I can't really think of any design issues particular only to the 17" model. Screen rigidity has long been resolved in the current model as well as unibody enclosures are more rigid to begin with.
No matter how hard I think I can't really come up with any technical reason for a 17" unibody MBP delay that would not also affect the other models. Even if originally intended GPUs and/or CPUs are constraint, Apple could still just use the same parts as in the 15" model and upgrade the innards later. So why not do it?
If BluRay really caused the delay I wonder whether we'd have to wait until Snow Leopard to see the unibody 17" MBP, i.e. around March?!?
I wonder if it will be a good idea to get anything with snow leapord since the first release will have a lot of glitches
You may be right. The apple insider article in Oct also stated some optical drive issues with the 17inch mbp.
I'm not sure what is up with Apple and the Blu-Ray folks. Steve left me with the impression that Blu-Ray wasn't even in the cards. What he could have meant though is that they where having a lot of trouble getting a hardware and software system inplace that satisfies the Blu-Ray stake holders.
What I mean here is that it is likely that Apple would want to implement the required software and hardware in a way that doesn't crap up Mac OS/X the way MS did Vista. One possibility here would be the connection of the Blu-Ray drive directly to a video chip with the DRM built into that chip. This would keep the decoded stream away from the CPU or other intercept points.
Of course this requires working with Nvidia or other GPU supplier. It would also require a CPU on board along with all the GPUs and likely some specialized decoding hardware. Such an approach ought to make the studios happy and at the same time Apple as they would not need to slow down their hardware with DRM encrusted OS software.
I wonder if it will be a good idea to get anything with snow leapord since the first release will have a lot of glitches
I wouldn't in the first few weeks. Better to let the rest of the world find the compatibility problems. Of course that depends a bit on how much you focus on non Apple supplied software. Hopefully everything Apple delivers will be solid.
Note that it seems to me a lot of people underestimate just how big of an update Snow Leopard is. There are some pretty major changes to the underlying system software. Sure user space won't change much depending on your perspective. I guess it depends on what you think of an all COCAO environment.
The underlying system changes and updated libraries could have an impact on third party apps. So I'd keep an eye on apps that you use and update when it becomes clear that they are trouble free.
Dave
one thing i dont get is why not do all of this with the more popular 15-inch mbp? It does not make sense to incorporate radical changes to the 17-inch mbp, which has a much smaller niche.