Comments Apple MacBook 13in - Aluminium 2008 Edition - Laptop - review

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Xiphias

2:56 AM on 11 November, 2008

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Could you clarify the 9400M situation please? You make it sound like only the 9400M has extra support for photoshop CS4 above the normal GPU acceleration (for any GPU with openGL 2.0, Shader Model 3.0 and >128mb of ram according to adobe's site) but I couldn't find anything in a quick search.

Also, are you sure HDMI can't do 2560x1600? That used to be the case in 1.2 but 1.3 has a lot more bandwidth and wikipedia lists it as being able to do 2560x1600.

With the disappointments and high price of this new macbook then how do you think it compares with the macbook air? If your going to sacrifice all those essentials like blu-ray, eSATA and firewire to get an apple laptop then do you think the size and weight reductions of the macbook air are more worthy of consideration then they were with the previous macbook?

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AndyVandervell

9:00 AM on 11 November, 2008

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@Xiphias:

1) No problem. Like you say any graphics chip with those specs can do GPU acceleration in Photoshop CS4, but Intel's integrated graphics cannot. So when we say it adds support for GPU acceleration, that's what we're taking about.

2) Not sure you're quite correct there. HDMI 1.3 can indeed output to 2560 x 1600, but HDMI 1.2 cannot and we've yet to see a notebook with a 1.3 output, mainly because PC manufacturers don't deem it worthwhile because most of the extra bandwidth is used for features that can't be supported on a PC - i.e. Deep Colour. It's a shame but that's the long and short of it.

3) Everyone's take will be different, since it rather depends on what you're planning to do with your notebook. From the performance point of view the MacBook is the better choice by some margin, so the Air is better suited to anyone who has relatively small processing demands - i.e. doesn't need CS4 GPU acceleration. On a personal note, though, the Air is still something of an expensive luxury even compared to the MacBook and I reckon the MacBook still brings enough tangible benefits.

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Peter

11:04 AM on 11 November, 2008

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Saw one of these in the Apple shop. Thought it was pretty good, but I found the lack of texture on the key and trackpad surfaces a bit weird.

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Darfuria

11:22 AM on 11 November, 2008

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I've wanted to get a Macbook for a long time now, but everytime I have come close to getting one, something has come up.

I'm torn between this and the Air now though.

Couldn't believe how awesome the glass touchpad feels when I tried it in the Apple shop. I'm quite disappointed by the loss of the BlackBook though.

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haim

12:14 PM on 11 November, 2008

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As an owner of the old white book I'm silently crying myself to sleep each night. Not that I get to use it anyway as my wife has practically left me for it (note she's hardly computer literate but loves this thing).

Even if I was in the market for a new one (oh that I were) the price is still pretty scary.

No mention of the alu body and finger prints.....is it like those ridiculous steel look kitchen appliances?

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tonkei

2:14 PM on 11 November, 2008

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I'm hopeing Apple's touchpad drivers for Windows have been updated.

I've got the previous gen macbook and have to use a mouse, as scrolling using the touchpad is horribly jumpy, while holding two fingers on the pad to enable a right-click usually just causes the screen to jump from the top to the bottom of the page. This makes using the touchpad almost impossible :(

It's at complete opposite to the touchpad behaviour using OSX, which is glorious.

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Gnormie

4:05 PM on 11 November, 2008

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I love the look, I like OSX (though personally prefer Windows) however I can't get over the price. Seriously, companies with better track records then Apple offer the same specification for less then half the price.

OK I'll be the first admit the new macbook demands a premium because of the construction however is it really worth twice the money for a body that although looks good is structurally worse then magnesium alloys which is used in quite a few laptops that are cheaper and have a better specification.

Just as a comparison take a look at the Dell m1330, which is no bad looking laptop, the base model which is almost £300 cheaper then the macbooks has the same graphics card, 1GB more of RAM, and a hard drive that is 90GB bigger and is the same in every other respect.

The macbook looks great, but simply not worth the premium.

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GherkingTR

5:09 PM on 11 November, 2008

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A niggle in my mind - the new Macbooks being Firewire800 only...

... are fw800 ports backwards compatible with fw400 with a suitable adaptor?

Surely it would be suicide to cut off all those Final Cut users with their video cameras? Even now, some HD cams use fw400, recording in mpeg2 to a normal mini DV tape (the widely used Sony Z1 point in case).

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OliverLevett

5:34 PM on 11 November, 2008

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"measuring just 24mm at its thickest"

Surely the "at its thickest" destroys your own argument about wedges, because the thickest point will not be affected by one end being thinner.

Does anyone else find it ridiculous that there's 2GB of DDR3 RAM, and yet the hard drive (160GB 5,400rpm) is about 4 years old? At which point, loading/saving anything at all becomes a major bottleneck, and with only 2GB of RAM, some virtual memory will be used creating a bottleneck in the whole system.

This Mac follows the trend of ever other Apple product: it's slightly better than the previous one, so Apple fans will go and buy a new one, but it's not enough of an improvement to be worth it for anyone else!

Also, has anyone noticed that Apple seem to have dropped the "Our OS is so much better" in favour of the "You can run Windows on our hardware, in case you realise quite how useless Mac OS X is!). At which point it becomes about hardware more than the OS (as you can run Mac OS X on any Intel based computer, and without a degree in computer science) and in that respect, the new Macs are no better than any Windows based computer of the last year or so (okay, so a slab of Aluminium might be nice, but for £300?)

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ilovethemonkeyhead

7:47 PM on 11 November, 2008

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in the end i passed up the temptation of a macbook pro with a sizeable university discount (almost £1,500 for the top of the line thing).

so i spent about £300 upgrading my computer and the rest on a netbook. figured if i can't have mega performance on the go, then at least i can come home to something i can enjoy - and that's my reasoning behind a netbook :D

sorry, but it's just too much to pay for something i can't be sure i'd gain enough benefit from. moving from windows to mac seems nice, but i'll hold off for even longer now. can't wait to test the windows 7 beta - microsoft seems to have gone all out on features.

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DougEllison

12:00 PM on 12 November, 2008

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"A niggle in my mind - the new Macbooks being Firewire800 only..."

Nope - this new Macbook has no firewire at all. Apple want £1400 for a laptop with Firewire in the form of the Macbook Pro. For me, this new machine is a no-sale. Glossy screen (don't like), £70 and a 4 week wait for an adaptor to plug it into a 30" TFT, another £20 to plug it into a Projector. Only two USB ports, and they're rammed too close together. No firewire (utterly unacceptable) and still, poor WiFi performance (as with all metal shelled Mac's - my £300 netbook performs better than my £1400 MBP in this regard). Damnit - I wish Apple would make a laptop I actually want.

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haim

12:20 PM on 12 November, 2008

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One thing people forget when comparing the specs is the chip in the macs. When I was looking you couldn't get a windows laptop with the same spec chip for much cheaper. Yes, you would get a fair bit more in terms of HDD and ram, even dedicated graphics (though I was specifically not interested in that), but the chip itself is up the top.

As a daily windows user I found OSX to be a complete joy, inspite of being quite concerned about making the switch.

Actually now I get most annoyed when getting on a windows laptop and not being able to do two fingered scrolling. Leads me to suspect that the more advanced multitouch actions are gonna be a joy when I get to use them.

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ruthless

12:49 PM on 12 November, 2008

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Looks like something from Space 1999.

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Pbryanw

5:26 PM on 12 November, 2008

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@ruthless - does that mean you think it looks futuristic, or dated?

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Gnormie

5:30 PM on 12 November, 2008

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@ Haim

What do you mean by 'chip'? The only thing I could think of was the processor and if you couldn't find another manufacturer offering better ones you obviously didn't look at all as almost every other manufacturer offers the same 'chips' for much less money.

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ruthless

7:52 PM on 12 November, 2008

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@ Pbryanw - dated. It just looks like something Tomorrow's World (remember that) would have shown as a vision of the future. Don't get the styling at all. But, as has been said, I guess you either love them or hate them.

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GherkingTR

8:47 AM on 13 November, 2008

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My bad. Seems fw800 is backwards compatible after all.

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Steve

3:33 PM on 3 December, 2008

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I've never owned a Mac before. Had a quick 10 min play with a friends Mac earlier and I am intrigued! Intrigued enough to consider buying one! It's an expensive gamble, but I loved the whole UI and everything.

Just bought a new laptop (which I love) but would buying another new machine be greedy? :)

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InsulinJunkie

6:24 PM on 17 April, 2009

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"Just bought a new laptop (which I love) but would buying another new machine be greedy? :)"

Don't think it'd be greedy; if you have the money for it. The question you should be asking yourself I think is 'is it a sensible thing to do'? If you want to 'experience' OS X and want a gadget to swoon over as a second machine and take out to coffee shops, get the Air, if you can afford it. If you say you already have a new notebook you love, why spend money on a second one that's probably similarly heavy and similarly spec'd to the one you have already?

That way you'd be getting a smaller, thinner machine to take around with you, and you'd still have the full-powered new laptop of yours for when you're at home, or aren't taking it far. Me personally I find owning two laptops that fulfill the same purpose rather pointless. But honestly it sounds like you just wanna own it for a while and play around with it... resale values of macs are generally quite high, so if you do decide to re-sell it after a couple of months I don't think you'd lose too much money in the process.

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phred

9:09 PM on 28 April, 2009

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This computer may have faults,but what I haven't heard anyone say is that the service is mich better than competitors.With Dell for example,you speak to someone in the Phillipines whose accent is hard to understand,and there seems to be a delay in the phone.And there are long waiting periods before you get to speak to someone.

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BigPerson

10:34 AM on 10 May, 2009

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I flipped from a PC user to Mac user about 2 years ago and haven't looked back. I love Apple! I love OSX! I now have a new MacBook and I love that too. You're all probably thinking that I work for Apple but I don't. I'm just NOT a computer geek! My use of the Mac is limited to basic office, the web, email, basic photo & video editing from holiday and home accounting using the brilliant CheckbookPro. And the MacBook does all that stuff for me quite brilliantly. I have no doubt that most cheaper, windows based PC's would do exactly the same but I bought the Macbook 'cos it looks great. Maybe that's the point. It's not always about the minutia. It's not always about competing with the highest spec hardware or software all the time. Sometimes it's just about what you like and what suits your needs and if that's the more expensive MacBook or the cheaper PC equivalent then that's great. Who cares .. really! If YOU like what you have and it does the job for you then you've made the right choice! I LOVE MY MAC! I LOVE OSX! I LOVE APPLE! I don't care about some of it's limitations or foibles. Mmm! Lovely Jubbly!

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What we have then is a product that's unlikely to win over too many sceptics. It's simply too fundamentally Apple-like to do so. But if you're already an Apple user and are looking to upgrade, then you should start saving now. Lack of FireWire excluded the new MacBook is better in pretty much every way and if you're already Apple-minded, is well worth the premium.

Overall

8/10

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Reviewed by Andy Vandervell

11 November 2008

Price as reviewed

£949.00

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