What makes Macbook Pro worth it ?

It's thicker for a reason. Better cooling that does quite a good job preventing your laptop from turning into a frying pan while enjoying its full power

 

But you still wouldn't want to use any notebook, Apple or not, on an actual lap while it is running at full speed so the point is kind of moot. Besides, gaming notebooks have almost always been traditionally thicker than non-gaming notebooks. The 17" sizes might be excluded from that rule (my Dell XPS Gen 2 from 2005 was the same chassis and casing as the 17" Inspiron Dell had at the time) from time to time. Gaming notebooks are designed to be under constant stress for multiple hours. Although it can handle games, the MBP's cooling setup wasn't designed with gaming in mind.

I still don't really understand the point of it though since notebooks have far progressed past the stage of being laptops. You can use them on your lap but only for basic tasks. Anything more, even with properly cooled gaming systems, and you will want to put them on a flat surface.

 

16:10 Display on a i5

 

And then you have 15 inch laptops like the w520, that are thick and still have poor cooling due to bad design choices. Like sticking the cpu and gpu on the same side right next to each other, sharing the same fan....

 

My W520 stays pretty cool unless you push it to the absolute limit (like F@H), in which case only that corner gets hot. The rest of the laptop stays cool.

Yes, it was a stupid design idea to use the same pipe/fan for the CPU and GPU, but its still better than using the shell of the laptop as a heat sink, without a fan (ala MBP).

 

Service and support with Apple have been stellar for me, and I've been using Apple products since early '04 (portables, desktops, and devices). Always had good experience, and that factors into the price, IMO.

The hardware and design is excellent, and I prefer using Mac OS X. The only PC OEM that comes close to quality and support is Lenovo, and I'm a big fan of ThinkPads as well.

Keep in mind, when you buy into the Apple ecosystem, you're committed. The integration between hardware, software, and devices is tight and works well, but you need to be "all-in" with it. I use an iPhone, a MBP, and iCloud, and it works well except for when I want to bring other non-Apple devices into the mix.

 

I am pretty sure all mbp have at least one fan than runs under load.

 

11-13= 1
15-17=2, one cpu, one gpu

 

what i do really like from Macbook is the screen, any other laptops with a quality screen like that ?

also should i wait for the upgrade ? cant be too long.

 

The only good thing about it is that it's 16:10, something that's absent from pretty much any other new laptop. Unfortunately, Apple will eventually run out of their supply of 16:10 displays, and will be forced to switch over to 16:9 completely. They've already did that for the MBA and iMac, iirc.

Otherwise, no, MBP displays aren't the best you can get. Depending on what you get (say, 1440*900), there are other notebooks with higher resolutions. Color is only so-so, since the MBP has a NTSC color gamut of about 77%. Clevo-based laptops, Dell's RGB-LED (like in the XPS 15's 1080p display), and many business laptops (including the W520) have NTSC 95% color gamut displays, making them more colorful.

So basically, MBP displays are only slightly better than the ones you get in bargin-bin laptops. It only looks better than it is due to that sheet of glass Apple sticks above it.

 

The upcoming refresh is supposed to have retina display which will put to shame most of those screens

 

And you have a source inside Apple that has confirmed this?

 

Nope, I just read between the lines. If you need a proof wait till June 11th.

 

I'd be skeptical. Retna screens are going to eat badly into battery life as was shown by iPad 3 etc so bat life could take a big hit. secondly im not certain an IGP in an air or 13" can push that many pixels properly for medium gaming letalone alot of pro work. I can kill my 13" easily trying to push 1600 lines.

lets use ipad as baseline. 5X boost in video chip. minimal increase in refresh

 

Any 1 have experience gaming on the apple trackpad?
I used to able to play most mmo and some degree of SLG using the eraser head nub.

Btw, is there place to try macbook other than applestore , cause I don't look like someone who going to buy stuff xD .I see ipad and iphone in bestbuy and I can just toy with them ~~

 

First, according to some sources, the battery will be bigger (30-40% increase). Second, the HD 4000 is almost 60% faster than the 3000 in some cases. It won't handle games at the iPad 3 res but should be alright for light use. And with the mediocre cooling system, gaming wouldn't be recommended by default. Every MBA I tested so far, would hit 100c (CPU) during light gaming.

 

Let's get one thing straight: there is absolutely no proof or any concrete evidence that has been released about ANY Mac refresh. That is the only cold, hard fact that we know of. There are rumors and speculation that really high resolution displays are coming but nothing is concrete, nothing. Trying to push that information as such (and even stating that the proof is coming on a specific day no less) is nothing more than BS. Sorry but it is true.

There have already been a bunch of threads that cover MBP/MBA rumors and speculation. We don't need this to turn into one of those. Leave the "secure" rumors from "super secret ultra mega inside sources" and other nonsense if one of the multiple rumor based threads.

 

Regarding service: my local Apple Store can usually turn repairs around overnight if I'm in a hurry or two days if I'm not. They used to take a week for repairs but I assume that they beefed up their staffing. It appears that their repair people work second or third shift.

We have a spare MBP too in case anyone needs a backup.

I expect an Ivy Bridge update for MBPs soon. I would like to see a high-resolution 15 inch screen (1920x1200) or better though 1920x1200 would be enough - that would get me to upgrade from my 2008 MBP which I am very, very satisfied for. I would get the upgrade for 1) better battery life (I get 2.25 hours now), 2) less weight (2.5 pounds), 3) smaller size, 4) I can play around with AVX extensions. As far as performance goes, my old 2008 Penryn is fine.

 

you are aware that you mentioned only one screen in the entire post right? Thats the only screen that is 95% gamut and comes in the varieties of matte and glossy.

 

The Sager 5160, P150HM; PowerNotebooks PowerPro R 11:36-580, 11:36-670, 11:36 Matte; and the Dell XPS 15 (L502x) are notebooks with 95% color gamut screens that I can think of off the top of my head.

To compare, I checked Google for the MBP's color gamut, and apparently it's somewhere between 60% and 72%.

Not that 60-72% is bad, it just means that it's not the best display you could buy for that amount of money.

----

Also, I didn't realize that the MBP 15 only allows for a max resolution of 1680*1050 (I assumed 1920*1200), so there's the issue of inexpensive laptops having pretty much always having a higher-res screen (1920*1080).

 

As kornchild2002 mentioned earlier, let's keep this thread on topic--I've removed a couple posts. That means discuss Mac rumors in the other threads. Thanks, guys

 

I never realized kornchild was a moderator until now.

Hmmph