Review - Apple's MacBook Pro

Provataki writes "OSNews posted a 2-editor review of Apple's MacBook Pro laptop. The whole review feels like a long conversation between the two editors with agreements and disagreements on several issues and topics. They both agree that the laptop is too hot, but there is disagreement on the screen quality for example."

Summary

[ThinkingInBinary]

• Screen: Adam likes the bright screen, Thom dislikes the viewing angle (color distortion) problems
• Speed: Both of them love it.
• Speakers: Both agree, the speakers are too quiet and distort at loud volumes. Thom notes it has digital optical audio out.
• Keyboard: Adam likes it, Thom finds the layout too cramped, calls it "form over function". Both like the backlighting.
• Airport: Adam has no problems. Thom finds the reception worse than his iBook.
• Heat: Both agree, it is too hot.
• Rosetta: Both agree, it is awesome, but native apps are eagerly anticipated.
• Build Quality: Both like it. Adam wants more USB ports.
• Battery: Both agree, battery life is skimpy.
• Running Windows: Thom says it's "a breeze", Adam doesn't plan to try it.

Frankly, I guess this points out that the MacBook Pro isn't "above" anything else. It's got its share of problems, and feelings are mixed about many features. Unlike the MacBook, though, the MacBook Pro isn't priced competitively with other brands. (The regular MacBook, surprisingly enough, since Apple is usually overpriced, matches up pretty well with PC manufacturers. It's hard to compare it directly because of the odd screen size, but it's only $100-$200 more than a PC, if even that.)

Re:Summary

[conigs]

Thom finds the reception worse than his iBook.

This is also the case than with the PowerBook G4 (non titanium) when compared to the iBooks. iBooks always got better reception.

Many people seem to forget that the MacBook (and also the PowerBooks) are aluminum cases. the iBook is plastic. Here's a fun experiment. Take your cell phone (or notebook) and wrap it in aluminum. Those little gray plastic strips on either side of the display are for the antenna.

Re:Summary

[pVoid]

Frankly, I guess this points out that the MacBook Pro isn't "above" anything else.

Well, I'm a long time Microsoft'y, in that I've worked mainly on windows platforms (professionally) for the last decade. I just recently got a mac book pro. I'll tell you this much: I looked for a LONG time for a PC laptop that I could get instead. The only thing that came near in ergonomy was the LG laptops which were ridiculously overpriced. I mean, compare a Dell laptop (which looks like a tank) to a macbook pro, i.e. hold both in your hands, and you will see there is an order of magnitude in difference.

That being said, there are aspects of my Macbook that I am surprisingly disappointed about. Namely: Apple.

From everything I had read - especially anti microsoft bashing comparing how Windows has so many bugs etc - Apple is unbelievably bad at both hardware and software tech support.

Examples: there is a high pitch whining noise that comes from the MacBook Pros. It is quite obviously an electrical leak, which consistently goes away if you switch off the second core. Apple has yet to *officially* acknowledge this problem. It's one thing to acknowledge, it's another thing to replace. They could easily say "yeah, sorry, that's not repairable", but it's quite insulting to go to an authorized dealer and say "there, don't you hear it? it's driving me insane" and get an answer "uhm, sorry, no, I don't hear it". Same for AppleCare.

Speaking of apple care, they treat their custommers like idiots. I had a problem with my fan making a rattling noise - clearly a ball bearing problem. I call apple care, it was so loud she could hear it on the phone without my even putting the phone up to the laptop. I was just laughing when she took me step by step through how to put the installation CD in, boot off of it, and run checkdisk (which btw, yielded all green, to which she grunted in disappointment - I guess people shut off their computers often enough that they always get red warnings about filesystem problems...) Anyways...

And last but not least, they recently came out with a patch for Quicktime that would effectively freeze your entire UI if you ran certain programs. When contacting AppleCare, they asked me which program did this, and I said "Unrar", "Graphviz" and "Adobe apps", to which his 'straight faced' reply was: we're sorry, Apple can not take responsability for third party software. Which is preposterous because it wasn't the third party software failing so much as the *entire* OS freezing up.

They later reissued a new patch that fixed this problem - but Apple *never* admitted that their initial fix was broken.

All of this is that kind of stuff that would turn into a flame storm for Microsoft.

All that aside, I still like my mbp.

Re:Summary

[Darsovit]

Funny, I have found that the Macbook Pro 17" is cheaper than a comparably equipped Dell XPS M1710 17". I've left the Macbook Pro with the default settings (although the hard drive can be changed to truly match the Dell's 100GB 7200 rpm drive since the Dell doesn't have the 120 GB 5400rpm option that the Macbook Pro has) and it's listed on the online store at $2799.00. For the Dell XPS M1710, I chose the basic model, then upgraded the processor to 2.16GHz Intel Core Duo, added the Remote for Windows XP Media Center (the Macbook Pro comes with a remote standard, $29), upgraded the hard drive to 100 GB as noted ($215), upgraded to the CD/DVD Burner combo drive ($50), and added the Bluetooth ($49) and the total at their online store is $3118.

I could upgrade the memory on the Macbook Pro to 2GB and still be under the Dell with 1 GB of RAM.

Granted, this is only a comparison with one competitor, but with the use of the Intel processor in the Mac it can now be compared pretty closely and it would seem to be competing fairly well, at least with this brand.

Existing owners' CPU whine-logic board replacement

[mccalli]

I own a 15" 1.83Ghz MacBook Pro, and the whine is appalling on it. As of yesterday, there's now a programme for swapping the logic boards out. That story takes place in the US - I've just called in the UK and found that although the swap exists, I'll have to go in to an Apple service centre to get the fault confirmed before I can go ahead with it.

Cheers,
Ian

Comparing MacBook Pro and Dell Inspiron e1705

[ThinkingInBinary]

Funny, I have found that the Macbook Pro 17" is cheaper than a comparably equipped Dell XPS M1710 17"

Of course Dell's high-end gaming laptop is going to cost more! A much more realistic comparison would be with the Dell Inspiron e1705. I set them up with the following config: 2.16 GHz processor, 2 GB 667 MHz RAM, 120 GB 5400 RPM HDD (available on the e1705, if not the XPS M1710), remote (added on the Dell), DVD burner, Bluetooth. The Dell came out to $2708; the Mac came out to $3099. With 1 GB of RAM and a 100 GB 7200 RPM HDD, the Dell comes to $2638 and the Mac comes to $2699. A lot closer. But that's the highest-end configuration of the Dell. If we start with the second-lowest and configure it the same, it comes to $2480. Pretty much no matter what you do, you get the same specs for $200-$400 less with a Dell.

misquoted parent

[pikine]

This is what actually appears on the second page of the review.

The Speakers

TH: The sound quality of the speakers is appalling. Again, I'm sorry to say, but my cheap Dell has better speakers. Seriously better speakers.

AS: I can't argue with you there. The speakers on the Macbook Pro suck. On top of that, the volume is way too quiet. Plus, even with normalized music files the speakers sometimes distort with maximum volume. That's not unacceptable, but for a computer aimed at excellence in audio processing, this is a shortcoming, plain and simple.

TH: However, don't forget that the machine does have the ability to connect to other audio equipment via digital (optical) means. So you can get good quality audio from the MacBook; you just need to hook it up to other equipment.

AS is the one suggesting that a computer aimed at audio processing (I take it to mean sound engineering) should have good internal speakers.

I am happy

[tsa]

I bought a MacBook Pro four weeks ago, and I was a bit afraid of problems after reading all the horrorstories on the Internet. But I have no whine, and although it can get quite hot, it also cools down fairly quickly when it doesn't have to work hard. I'm happy with the wide screen, and the battery life (3 hours if I just surf the web and do email). The reception is comparable the that of the iBook G4 I had. All in all, I am very satisfied with my shiny new MBP. The only thing I don't like about it is the size; if there had been one with the size of the MacBook I would have bought that one.

Re:Speaker quality?

[swtaarrs]

I have an Inspiron 9300 (basically the same as the e1705 but single core cpu) and it does have very nice sound, noticably better than any other laptop I've seen. However, it doesn't have very big speakers. I've taken it apart a few times and the speakers are about .5in x 1in x 2.5in. That might be large for laptop speakers, but I think biggest difference is made by the small subwoofer on the bottom. I can turn off the subwoofer and when it's off my laptop doesn't sound much better than most others, but with the subwoofer on, it removes the main weakness of laptop sounds and gives a nice bass sound.

Re:Correction

[Darsovit]

The RAM upgrade on the apple is $300 more. But I think you also need to upgrade the video card from the Dell e1705. The ATI Mobility X1400 with Hypermemory (when you click on the Help Me Choose on the Dell website) seems to indicate that it uses 256MB of shared System memory vs. the Macbook Pro's 256MB of GDDR3 on the ATI X1600. So, yes, I did indeed compare it to the high-end gaming laptop because of this.

Re:2 day review of the 1.83/intel dual core

[splatterboy]

I wasn't fujitsu - PPC was a product of the AIM consortium - Apple, IBM, Motorola... Moto designed the G3 & 4 using the PPC architecture from IBM and the G5 was all IBM

Re:This irked me

[TheGreek]

AS: My closing thoughts: the transition to Intel is nearly complete.

Umm. No?

The iPod-centric portion of the Apple lineup is all Intel, but how about a real desktop?

Entry-level desktop (Mac Mini): Intel.
Consumer portable (MacBook): Intel.
Consumer desktop (iMac): Intel.
Pro portable (MacBook Pro): Intel.
Pro desktop (PowerMac): PPC.
Rack-mount server (Xserve): PPC.

4/6 of Apple's computer models are now Intel, and these 4/6 comprise the bulk of Apple's sales. The two stragglers await the chips from Intel.

That Apple's transition isn't complete enough for you doesn't make the transition any less nearing completion.

Kernel panics related to wireless

[jks]

Some of the MacBook Pros have a faulty motherboard causing kernel panics when using a wireless connection. See this thread [apple.com] for details, but the upshot is that if you buy a MBP, it might be a good idea to download some big files over wireless immediately, so if you have this problem you can get a replacement computer immediately. There is some short window (one or two weeks?) within which you can get the computer declared DOA, and if you find out about the problem after that you will have to send the computer to be repaired, which might take a long time.

Re:Comparing MacBook Pro and Dell Inspiron e1705

[Paradise Pete]

Are you placing no value on the (I'm guessing here) optical audio out, the camera, firewire, backlit keyboard, iLife applications, OS X itself, fancy power chord thing, the fact that it can run either OS (or both), etc? I'm really asking, not arguing.