October 14th, 2008

Observations on the New MacBooks

An unordered list of observations regarding the lesser-known features of the new MacBooks and MacBook Pros announced at today’s Apple Event:

  • The 3.5mm stereo jack in the MacBooks and MacBook Pros will now recognize the microphone in the iPhone earbuds. Interestingly enough, the click remote on the headphones also work, playing, pausing, or skipping a song in iTunes.

  • Apple chose to focus their new notebook lineup on graphics over raw CPU power (as seen from the 2.1Ghz white MacBook selling for $999, and the 2.0Ghz aluminum MacBook for $1299). With a big push in Snow Leopard for GPU-accelerated computing, we’ve reached the end of measuring computer performance simply by the processor. The Nvidia 9400M looks like the perfect mobile chipset—providing a good compromise between battery life, compactness, and performance.

  • As I mentioned earlier today, Steve Jobs and Jony Ive seem committed to make the next generation of Apple computers as simple as possible: “We’ve refined and refined every detail in the service of the user. Just to get rid of complexity. If something doesn’t need to be there, it’s not there.” From removing buttons and latches to an impeccable attention to detail, Apple is determined to making the MacBook the simplest notebook ever.

  • FireWire 400 is dead. And even worse, FireWire is nonexistent from the MacBooks. I anticipate that consumer camcorders will continue to move towards solid-state capture, and higher-end HDDs will adopt the pro FW800 standard. Similar to the uproar over Apple removing a modem from their original MBP, FW400 will die a slow and quiet death.

  • Apple has had a big push towards accessibility with their new laptops. Both include removable batteries and user-serviceable hard drives and RAM.

  • Steve commented on transitioning all the Macs over to the new DisplayPort “standard”, where “standard” refers to a standard that doesn’t exist yet. Apple’s always accustomed to being slightly ahead of the curve though (recall 802.11n and ExpressCard adoptions). DisplayPort is able to carry audio as well as flexible resolutions of video, and is smaller than HDMI, enabling all of Apple’s future Macs to potentially power the 30-inch Apple Cinema Display.

  • The downside to DisplayPort is it hasn’t been widely adopted by many manufacturers. Want to connect to a third-party display? Adapter. Want to connect to a projector? Adapter. Want to connect to Apple’s own 30″ display? $100 adapter. It won’t be long until a third-party capitalizes on this and starts including “adapter compartments” into new MacBook bags.

  • Will the new 24″ LED Cinema Displays work with older MacBook Pros via an adapter?

  • Mobile storage has improved since the last time I bought a notebook. 320GB 7200rpm drives are available for the MBPs and 128GB SSDs have been added as an option across the board.

  • Personally, I’m fascinated by the dual-graphics cards in the MBPs. The 9400M integrated graphics perform at 80% of the performance of the previous 8600M GT for standard use, and allow for an extra hour of battery life. When connected to a power adapter, the MBP switches over to the more powerful, dedicated 9600M GT graphics card.

    A few questions remain: Is there a UI for switching graphic cards on-the-fly? Will the screen go black for a few seconds or flicker? Can both the 9400M and the 9600M GT run simultaneously? No doubt, having two GPUs will be an interesting combo for pros looking for a tradeoff between battery life and performance.

    U P D A T E: Looks like the GPUs can be controlled from the display preferences, and require you to log out in order to take effect.

  • Most interesting is how Apple is positioning the MacBooks in their mobile lineup—as mini MacBook Pros. With an aluminum finish and a decent graphics card, Apple has finally brought back the 12″ PowerBook, albeit in a larger form-factor. These beasts are more Pro than MacBook now, and as John Gruber extrapolated, the $999 white MacBook can be compared to the new MacBooks as the iBooks were compared to the 12″ PowerBook.

    I think we will see more of Apple blurring the lines between ‘pro’ and ‘consumer’ in the near future.