New 17" MacBook Pro
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Hi Guys,
As you may know I am a Mac NUT since I switched over 18 months ago. The experience has been great with little of no downtime. Gone are the days of Alt-Control-Delete Also I don't even remember the name of my local maintenance guys! If I was still using a Windows (Dell) machine I reckon I would be down at least the cost of 6 maintenance visits over this period which would have set me back €500 plus!
I've been waiting for details of New 17" and after viewing this, MacBook Pro http://www.apple.com/ie/macbookpro/, and am extremely pleased with what is going to be on offer at the end of the month. The spec that I will be going for is,
2.93GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
8GB 1066MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 2X4GB
320GB Serial ATA Drive @ 7200 rpm
MacBook Pro 17-inch Hi-Resolution Antiglare Widescreen DisplayOkay, the downside is that this is going to cost up to €3,700! I have yet to work out a discount with my local suppliers. The upside is that they will take my current 17" MacBook Pro as a Trade In, just like buying a new car! I advise anyone interested in going for a mac to deal with local resellers as they normally have a demand for secondhand Mac equipment from graphic students etc. This makes upgrading lighter on the pocket. I will keep you posted on how the figures work out.
I have also watched a pre release of KeyNote '09 and missed Steve Jobs, I hope he gets over his health problems soon The link is here, http://www.iclarified.com/entry/index.php?enid=2584 Its well worth watching the iMove new features demo!
Mike
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Congrats Mike,
I have a 2.4 core 2 duo MBP. I hook it up to a 30" Dell screen and love it for SU, CAD, photographs and all. I was particularly blessed as I received this for free from Apple (under AppleCare) when my 17" G4 started having screen problems (so get AppleCare, nothing is perfect). They also gave me an upgrade from Tiger to Leopard (not loaded when it shipped) as if I had paid for the machine. Usually have it with me. The main problem is I have "withdrawal" symptoms if I leave it for the weekend!
Enjoy,
Peter
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Whats all the ram for mike? Its a pretty expensive addition, and unless you need it for something specific you could probably save 800 euros or so...
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Good to hear that you got agood backup service Peter
This might answer your question Remus, http://www.flickr.com/photos/burnflare/2387682004/
Only kidding of course but I understand that you can never have too much Ram. I know of some programs that allow total running of apps in Ram under Windows but none for Mac yet! Might be worth a search.
Mike
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it is true that more RAM is good, but mac ram is so hugely overpriced. As an example, 8gb of ram from apple:£800-940 8gb from anywhree else: £200-300. SO your paying a £500 premium.
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You needn't get your RAM from Apple. I got 16 gb of - if I remember correctly- Kingston RAM installed. Works just fine. Cost me about € 700. The same amount of Apple RAM would've cost me around € 2000.
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You can get 8GB DDR2 PC5300 SODIMM kit (2x4GB) from Newegg for $299, remember the new Mac's are just shiny Intels these days with a different OS, so the ram is no longer different, unless you get suckered into the whole 'Apple certified' ram that the anal purists keep talking about being the only way to Mac nirvanna.
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@mike lucey said:
As you may know I am a Mac NUT since I switched over 18 months ago.
@mike lucey said:
If I was still using a Windows (Dell) machine I reckon I would be down at least the cost of 6 maintenance visits over this period which would have set me back €500 plus!
Naturally I have my fingers and toes firmly crossed and my left hand planted flat on a wooden plank while I type this (not easy!), but I've had my hp dv8000 laptop for over 3 years and have never had to take it to any repair shop. I recently cloned my 100Gb primary HDD onto a 250Gb HDD and switched them without any problem- it booted up exactly as it did before. Most days I've got at least one instance of SU open, plus Photoshop and IE. V-Ray is invariably rendering something in the background while I model in SU and edit textures and backgrounds in Photoshop. The only maintenance I do is defrag the HDD every few months, run Registry Mechanic maybe once a month and air-clean the fans and fins about once a year. I use Symantec Anti-Virus as my office insist on it to be able to connect to their network. It sounds like you had a really bad experience with your Dell machine (I've been there: my dv8000 replaced a faulty zd7000 to which hp "forgot" to add a real graphics card heat sink, electing for a piece of tin foil instead. I think every single zd7000 failed catastophically within 3 years of use). By comparison a friend of mine tried to convince me to buy a Mac when I was looking for a new laptop a few years ago. Despite the fact he only uses his for word processing and minor DTP stuff he has had been to the repair shop at least 3 times in the last 4 years, twice losing all data on his HDD (fortunately he had it backed up).
It's very hard to be objective about these things- 4 years ago I would have said hp laptops were terrible as my zd7000 was a time bomb. Now I would say recommend them (well, up to a point) as my dv8000 has been a workhorse, never complaining and taking just about anything I throw at it. When it comes to PCs (and especially laptops) the most important things is to read as many reviews as you can and be patient- what's the point of buying a brand new model as soon as it hits the shelves when you can wait just a couple of months and read dozens of user reviews and pick it up for maybe 25% less?
Just trying to even up the debate.
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@unknownuser said:
The 15- and 17-inch MacBook Pro notebooks combine the efficiency of an integrated graphics processor with the desktop-class performance of a discrete graphics processor. That’s because they have both. Out of the box, they run the integrated NVIDIA GeForce 9400M processor, which provides plenty of performance for everyday use with up to 5 hours of battery life for the 15-inch MacBook Pro and up to 8 hours for the 17-inch model.* But when you need turbocharged performance for the most graphically intensive tasks, the discrete NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT processor delivers.
What could this mean in regards to SU? Any expert opinions here?
Peter
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I wouldnt say im an expert, but as long as nvidia/apple have decent drivers for the cards it should be fine.
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