Got some bad news for those MacHeads that pre-ordered the new, unibody 17-inch MacBook Pro. Said notebook has been delayed by two weeks but chances are you already know that from the same email we received from Apple explaining the whole situation. It seems the company is wrapping up whatever magic is within the latest, lap-scorching MBP and will ship ‘em out starting on February 19th. → Read More
So how hot does your MacBook Pro get? Like, hot hot or just hot? (I have an old MacBook that’s not too bad about that kind of thing.) There’s a delightful message today on Penny-Arcade about how their MacBook Pro, when left to its own devices, becomes extraordinarily hot. Like, otherworldly hot. → Read More
A third-party Mac repair company will now slap a matte screen on your 15-inch MacBook Pro. You’ll remember that when the MacBook Pro was introduced in October, plenty of people freaked out because Apple didn’t offer a matte option. → Read More
Hot on the heels of the MacWorld announcement of the new unibody 17″ MacBook Pro comes word of new Tom Bihn bags to hold those unibody MacBook Pros. With names like Smart Alec, Empire Builder, and Super Ego, you know they’re good! → Read More
Targus has released a line of eco-friendly bags for the 15″ MacBook Pro that they are calling Spruce EcoSmart. Read for all the details and a full press release. → Read More
At the unibody MacBook event back in October, Apple remained mum on the unibody 17″ MacBook Pro, though hinting that one was in the works.
During today’s Keynote, Phil Schiller made it official. → Read More
MacWorld is going to be amazing this year because, get this, there will be a new MBP announced. 9to5Mac reports that the 17-inch MacBook Pro will come in the unibody aluminium design and include a long-life battery pack that is not removable. D’oh! → Read More
I’d say this irresponsible and inflammatory rumor is half-true. With Snow Leopard likely being shown off at MacWorld (by Schiller, alas), Apple will want something to make the OS pop a bit. Since Intel’s new budget quad-core processor is just starting to make its rounds, it’s not totally out of the question that Apple will want to include it in the comparatively old 17-inch MacBook Pro. → Read More
Last week the Inquirer asserted that NVIDIA had knowingly put faulty moble GPUs into the new MacBook Pros — a serious allegation. The 9600M the Inquirer’s well-informed friends examined had the same high-lead solder that failed in so many other laptops. NVIDIA hit back today, saying that although they had promised a “new materials set,” what they meant was that the solder would be better, if not a different compound. So the new solder bumps are high-lead but are just “more robust” and hopefully won’t fail quite so easily. Well, we will soon find out as MBPs begin to drop like flies… or not. → Read More
Unibody Macbooks and MacBook Pros, along with newer MacBook Airs, have gotten a firmware update from Apple, ostensibly addressing “stability issues.” I think they’re talking about that RAM thing because a firmware update isn’t going to change your 9600M’s faulty high-lead solder into eutectic. Oh yes I went there! → Read More
This is exactly what I feared might happen when I heard Apple was moving to a full NVIDIA solution, complete with the faulty parts that caused so many other mobile setups to croak. A very thorough article at the Inquirer, based on analysis of a new MacBook Pro teardown by parties who wish to remain anonymous, shows that the solder bumps used in at least their test MBP are in fact the infamous high-lead solder that overheated and cracked without fail. An NVIDIA spokesperson has stated that the 9600s in MBPs use the new eutectic solder, but the tests show otherwise. There are a number of explanations for the bad solder being in the new 9600s, but none of them are good for NVIDIA or Apple. There’s no way to tell if your MBP has the bad solder, but if it starts overheating and freaking out like crazy, be assured it isn’t your fault. → Read More
Both the MacBook and the MacBook Pros can now be had below MSRP thanks to a Best Buy sale. This extremely rare opportunity only comes by once every hundred years and isn’t limited to just the old MacBooks with the new all-aluminum models applicable as well, so take advantage of it. Word is that Apple Stores might start matching the Best Buy special pricing in the next few days, too. What a great Holiday sale season! → Read More
Flickr’d Don’t bother using your MacBook or MacBook Pro without the battery installed unless you’re cool with a huge performance decrease. Gearlog notes that, in the process of doing the thankless task of RAM benchmarks, the MacBook’s performance, as rated using Cinebench, dropped some 37 percent without an installed battery. That is, when plugged into a power outlet without the battery installed—some people do this to extend the life of their battery, having it installed only when necessary—the MacBook suffers quite a bit. Apple saysthis is a feature, not a bug. The idea is that the MacBook can detect wether or not there’s a battery installed. If not, performance drops in order to “prevent[s] the computer from shutting down if it demands more power than the A/C adapter alone can provide.” So, unless you’re a glutton for punishment, keep the battery in there. → Read More
The above is a scan of some Windows Vista promotional material. But, is that an old MacBook Pro this perfect family is using? Now, Apple doesn’t have a monopoly on silver laptops chassis but wouldn’t it have been wiser to have something more distinctly PC? → Read More
The kids at GearLog installed a beta copy of Windows 7 on their fresh new MacBook Pro and found that it wasn’t working quite as expected. Most of the functions were working but some of the little tweaks failed. → Read More
digg_url = ‘http://digg.com/apple/MacBook_Trackpads_Suck_and_Doesn_t_Register_60_of_Clicks’; A tip came in this weekend from someone with a fleet of new MacBooks. His complaint? Every 50 or so clicks and the trackpad freezes for 5 to 10 clicks and then wakes back up. The tipster writes: So we’ve bought about 10 of them, all of them have awful problems recognizing clicks. The trackpad has a bug where it does not click about 60% of the time. → Read More
That Apple eliminated FireWire 400 from the MacBook Pro wasn’t lost on Western Digital, which just original story titlereleased a FireWire 800 version of the My Passport Studio portable hard drive. The HDD, which tops out at 500GB, is designed for mobile professionals—photographers and videographers—who need to carry large files with them. It weighs less than seven ounces, not that the average person has any idea of how to conceptualize that. Of course, the drive also works just fine over USB and FireWire 400, but that interface will be dead soon enough. She costs $250 for the 500GB model and $230 for the 400GB model, which means you’d be a damn fool not to spring for the larger one. → Read More
Back when we announced ahead of time that Apple was switching to an NVIDIA chipset, you might have taken a look at what was then already suspected of being the new laptops’ GPU. Notice if it promises anything the MacBook Pro doesn’t have? Like say some major selling points like Hybrid SLI and on-the-fly switching between the two GPUs? That’s funny; other laptops can do it! Apple has confirmed that the chipset and GPU are capable of working together, and of switching between modes without logging out, as well. They can’t yet, though, and no explanation was really given. Did it not work right but shipping time was upon them? That’s my guess, as a solution that requires the user to log out is incredibly annoying and very unlike Apple. Let’s hope they fix it with a firmware upgrade — you know, like they enabled my MacBook Pro’s H.264 hardware decoding. → Read More
How exciting! I’ve always been skeptical of the actual popularity of netbooks, but I think this makes them out to be actual successful products and not just industry darlings. I don’t think anybody is surprised at the new MacBooks being on the top 10 in computers and hardware, but I am surprised that the white ones and the last-generation MacBook Pros are still selling better. I expected a lot of opportunistic buying of the old models, but more than the new ones? I’ll list the top ten here, you know, just in case all our traffic takes Amazon down. → Read More
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