October 16th, 2008 – Ok, unless you’ve been under a rock for the past 2 days, and yet somehow still have the internet connection to visit this site, you have heard of Apple’s new laptop releases. I didn’t really see the need to report on it since Peter at CreateDigitalMusic, and MusicRadar had already posted the same concerns as I had, but i figured that if you didn’t already know why you shouldn’t buy one, you should.
The new Macbook and MacbookPro laptops are beautiful, environmentally friendly and are more Apple-y than ever. So what’s the problem? They’re not that much faster processing-wise, they’re more expensive (lowest range Macbook has been discontinued), and you actually lose your firewire 400 port. For Macbook users, this means that you don’t have any firewire connection, and for MacbookPro users, this means you have one less option (you still get FW800).
Normally I would applaud simplication, after all, the snake of cords coming out of some set-ups is downright disconcerting; I hope those people have fire insurance. However, Firewire 400 is what many audio and video professionals use to get the analog world into their shiny Apple products. Isn’t this demographic the one that Apple relies on to give their products the professional reputation? Sure, there are a lot more college kids than professionals buying Macbooks so I’m not totally surprised that they are lowering costs by removing the port. However removing it on MacbookPro’s? That’s just insanity. The people who are going to pay over 2 grand for a laptop are professionals, and wealthy individuals who have other fancy gadgets they need the laptop to interface to.
No matter how much faster FW800 is than FW400, all firewire consumer gear and most prosumer gear are still running FW400. This hurts a lot of audio people, including myself, that have interfaces that run FW400. I prefer not to have my gear daisy-chained (using FW800 to FW400 adapters) but that would be the only option with the new MacbookPro. Currently my FW800 external harddrive and my FW400 audio interface get their own ports. Was this Apple’s way of nudging people to the faster firewire standard?
From what I’m reading in the comments on CreateDigitalMusic, no one is thinking of jumping to the new Macbook or MacbookPro. Guess we won’t be seeing any of the new laptops at the club this Friday night.
NB. People have pointed out that the real only upgrade is the dual graphic cards in the MBPro. Unfortunately, they do not run together which would lead you to think the graphics cards would run slower than a comparable Hybrid SLI on a PC laptop. However, preliminary tests show that the MBPro cards run Crysis at a higher framerate which means something else is going on.
5 Comments, Comment or Ping
Jeremy Lim
I hear you. I’m still sour on the discontinuation of PC Cards.
It’s a funny move by Apple, though. They position themselves as the “creatives” in the computing world. Yes, they’ve encouraged technology to move forward and even brought rise to a massive wave of iPod accessories, but they’re continuously alienating people.
Someday, people going to throw their iBrand down and call it quits. Maybe.
Nov 4th, 2008
Sean
@Jeremy Lim – My opinion is that Apple is becoming the victim of its own success. After their restructuring late last decade, they positioned themselves as “the creatives” as you put it. However, because their products like the iPod allowed their brand to gain exponential momentum, they have been under pressure to maximize on their buzz. This means cutting as much costs as possible to get their products in as many hands as possible. If outward design is what differentiates their products, then they’d rather spend the money on that, than being innovative in engineering.
Nov 4th, 2008
Sean
@Jeremy Lim – Btw…I checked out your website and I’m liking that first track you composed in the YouTube video. Reminds me of something I’d hear in CSI. Cheers!
Nov 4th, 2008
Nyarlat
There is an adapter from FW800 to FW400 priced at 8,-€ here in Europe.
The voltage gets routed through it so you can provide power to the device. I think a music professional should buy a MacBook Pro if he needs a new one. Maybe that is what apple want´s. Dont buy cheap MacBooks, buy the one whit the bigger price tag.
Nov 26th, 2008
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