MacBook Pro as my primary computer for a number of years and, even though they’re an expensive laptop, they just keep getting better and better with every variant. The newest version sports a faster processor, faster graphics and faster RAM and Thunderbolt. The version using for quite a while is the MacBook Pro version 5.3, 2.66 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo. It has a single processor with two cores and 4GB of 1067 MHz RAM. The video card is an NVIDIA GeForce 9400 and 9600M GT and it has a 320GB Hard drive. It has two USB 2 ports, a Mini Display Port, FireWire 800 port, Gigabit Ethernet port plus ExpressCard slot. Test version is the MacBook Pro version 8.2, 2.2 GHz Intel Core i7. It has a single processor with four cores and 4GB of 1333 MHz RAM.
The video card is an AMD Radeon HD 6750M and Intel HD Graphics 3000. It has a 750GB hard drive, two USB 2 ports, Gigabit Ethernet port, a FireWire 800 port, Thunderbolt port and SDXC card slot. No more mini display port, the Thunderbolt port works with a Mini Display adapter for Cinema Displays the obvious problem being that if the Cinema Display is taking up the Thunderbolt port, then how does one add an external Thunderbolt device? To take a step back, Thunderbolt was first developed by Intel and has the fastest I/O transfer rate available.
For example, USB 2 will transfer 480 Mega bits per second (Mbps). For information’s sake, Mbps is defined as 1 million bits per second of data, so 480 Mbps equals 480 million bits per second. Thunderbolt transfers up to 10 (Giga bits per second) Gbps, or a little over 20X faster than USB 2, and Thunderbolt, because it runs on two channels, will transfer at that rate in both directions. It’s REALLY fast. When Thunderbolt compatible external hard drives become more popular, it’ll take downloading and saving huge files from a sometimes-onerous task to something that’s accomplished very quickly. Consumers will love it.
So what’s this all mean to the user? Simply put it means that the new MacBook Pro is screaming fast.
The new processor is twice as fast as the last version and the graphics rendering is about three times faster. Thunderbolt means you can transfer massive files easily and when you load up photos to fool around with you’ll be amazed at how fast programs like Photoshop fly. The new MacBook Pro has FaceTime on-board, so you can video conference in HD with any other FaceTime user on their iOS device whether its iPad, iPod Touch, iPhone or another Mac computer there’s FaceTime for all Mac users now. The Multi-Touch Trackpad brings the touch experience to the same level as the MacBook Air and much closer to the experience enjoyed by iOS users on their iPads.
The SDXC card slot on the 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Pros will support up to 64GB cards, making it a snap for you to take your SDXC card out of your camera and plug it directly into the computer to upload.
The unibody construction continues, so outwardly the new MacBook Pro looks little different than several preceding versions. There’s a good reason for that this unibody construction is very rugged and makes this one of the toughest notebooks around. The MacBook Pro comes in five different variants which you can add RAM to or customize further. The 13-inch 2.3 GHz models start at $1,249, with the 2.7 GHz version retailing at $1,549.
The 2.0 GHz 15-inch model sells for $1,849 and the 2.2 GHz version sells for $2,249. The big guy, their 17-inch model, sells for $2,499. MacBook Pros are not inexpensive computers. But you get what you pay for with Apple products these computers are rugged, and durable, screaming fast, have great battery life, lots of RAM and hard drive space in the basic models, are loaded with technology and can be customized easily.
PROS: Fast, easy to use, feature-packed and Thunderbolt is an exciting new development to make them even better. They’re great computers.
CONS: Expensive, you need to download the software update as soon as you get the computer because it offers a firmware fix for several minor problems early versions experienced.
For example, USB 2 will transfer 480 Mega bits per second (Mbps). For information’s sake, Mbps is defined as 1 million bits per second of data, so 480 Mbps equals 480 million bits per second. Thunderbolt transfers up to 10 (Giga bits per second) Gbps, or a little over 20X faster than USB 2, and Thunderbolt, because it runs on two channels, will transfer at that rate in both directions. It’s REALLY fast. When Thunderbolt compatible external hard drives become more popular, it’ll take downloading and saving huge files from a sometimes-onerous task to something that’s accomplished very quickly. Consumers will love it.
So what’s this all mean to the user? Simply put it means that the new MacBook Pro is screaming fast.
The new processor is twice as fast as the last version and the graphics rendering is about three times faster. Thunderbolt means you can transfer massive files easily and when you load up photos to fool around with you’ll be amazed at how fast programs like Photoshop fly. The new MacBook Pro has FaceTime on-board, so you can video conference in HD with any other FaceTime user on their iOS device whether its iPad, iPod Touch, iPhone or another Mac computer there’s FaceTime for all Mac users now. The Multi-Touch Trackpad brings the touch experience to the same level as the MacBook Air and much closer to the experience enjoyed by iOS users on their iPads.
The SDXC card slot on the 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Pros will support up to 64GB cards, making it a snap for you to take your SDXC card out of your camera and plug it directly into the computer to upload.
The unibody construction continues, so outwardly the new MacBook Pro looks little different than several preceding versions. There’s a good reason for that this unibody construction is very rugged and makes this one of the toughest notebooks around. The MacBook Pro comes in five different variants which you can add RAM to or customize further. The 13-inch 2.3 GHz models start at $1,249, with the 2.7 GHz version retailing at $1,549.
The 2.0 GHz 15-inch model sells for $1,849 and the 2.2 GHz version sells for $2,249. The big guy, their 17-inch model, sells for $2,499. MacBook Pros are not inexpensive computers. But you get what you pay for with Apple products these computers are rugged, and durable, screaming fast, have great battery life, lots of RAM and hard drive space in the basic models, are loaded with technology and can be customized easily.
PROS: Fast, easy to use, feature-packed and Thunderbolt is an exciting new development to make them even better. They’re great computers.
CONS: Expensive, you need to download the software update as soon as you get the computer because it offers a firmware fix for several minor problems early versions experienced.
