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MacBook Pro gets Retina Display; MacBook Air updated with Ivy Bridge

arstechnica.com

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Re: MacBook Pro gets Retina Display; MacBook Air updated with Ivy Bridge

#371

Post by rdl »

bzbarsky wrote: post #359
rdl wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not thinner than the MBA 2011. The MBA 2011 has regular MagSafe. Maybe they needed to go thinner for engineering reasons to put other stuff inside, but that seems lame.

With the MBA 2011 the connector sits very low such that simply putting the laptop down on a couch will disconnect the connector in my experience. It's the #1 issue I've had while trying to use an MBA. If using a thinner connector let Apple fix that problem, that would be quite nice. Of course it's possible that it didn't. I haven't had a chance to try the new thing.

I noticed that, too -- adding a snap-on case to the Air solves that, at the expense of making it slightly thicker. However, I strongly prefer the texture/grippiness of the case, and it protects the laptop from a lot of damage (I still use a sleevecase, but I've had the laptop fall ~3m, cracking the plastic case, and otherwise fine). The cases have little feet on them, too, which raises it up to protect the connectors.

(http://www.speckproducts.com/satin-macbook-air-case-13-black...)

Re: MacBook Pro gets Retina Display; MacBook Air updated with Ivy Bridge

#372

Post by kstrauser »

jonknee wrote: post #20
tcox wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Presumably you'll have that option? Can't see why not. I'm guessing there'll be an option in the Display control panel.

Being a non-native resolution, it would look awful.

Scaling to 800x600 on a 1024x768 screen looks awful. I'm not sure that scaling a 2880x1800 screen to 1920x1080 is going be distinguishable from native resolution for anyone with eyes more than 15 years old.

Re: MacBook Pro gets Retina Display; MacBook Air updated with Ivy Bridge

#373

Post by rorrr »

jonpacker wrote: post #335
dirkdeman wrote: post #311

Why for heaven's sake is the new macbook pro €2279 when it's only $2199 in the US? It's a beautiful machine, and I'm used to some price differences between the US and Europe (USD = EUR, right, Apple?) but this is outrageous! That's almost 500 dolars more...

Presumably because the € price includes VAT (which is usually 20%+ in the EU), and the US$ price does not. The real US price would vary by state, and they usually don't show the amount of sales tax on the purchase price. This is a tax thing, not an apple thing.

$2,199 + 20% = $2,638.8 = 2,111€

Still doesn't explain a higher price.

Re: MacBook Pro gets Retina Display; MacBook Air updated with Ivy Bridge

#374

Post by aes256 »

slig wrote: post #42

Finally they removed the DVD driver.

As someone who appreciated the DVD drive because it could be removed and the space/connector used to install a second 2.5" hard drive, I see the removal of the DVD drive altogether as a negative.

This combined with on-board RAM and on-board SSD storage... are any of the components in these new retina display MacBook Pros replaceable?

Re: MacBook Pro gets Retina Display; MacBook Air updated with Ivy Bridge

#376

Post by Homunculiheaded »

fjorder wrote: post #226
fjorder wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've spent a reasonable amount of time using Windows, Linux, and OSX. All of them suck. All of them are also awesome, at different things. If you want an living room PC for entertainment, Windows is king. Neither Linux or OSX support Bluray properly and Windows still has a huge edge in gaming. Windows also supports the most hardware. That's become unimportant to most people, but if you work in a research lab with var…

One further note on hardware quality: Perceived hardware quality is something Apple is fantastic at. Their laptops look and feel great. They feel like they'll last decades. This is misleading since they're actually built to be disposable. e.g. If you spill coffee on your Macbook Air, it's dead. You can't fix it because you can't remove the battery in a timely fashion and don't have the tools to open it. Apple won't f…

In the case of a spill it's most likely the case that something in your top case has been ruined. I had this happen to me on 2008 macbook that was otherwise fine. I looked into the used parts market and you can get a fine topcase for $50 and the install if pretty easy if you can use a screw driver. (I'm assuming the MBA is different in this regard, browsing around this seems to be the case)

Looking into it further at the time there's actually a good chunk of your macbook that you can fix yourself it's just not officially blessed by Apple

Re: MacBook Pro gets Retina Display; MacBook Air updated with Ivy Bridge

#377

Post by AncientPC »

barrkel wrote: post #225
lazerwalker wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of curiosity, if you're comfortable with Linux and do a lot of work in a Cygwin environment, what are your reasons for running Windows as your MBA's main OS rather than a Linux flavor?

Ask that question the other way around: if you could get all the command-line goodness you want from Linux but also have all the device support (particularly, solid graphics card drivers), apps, games etc. of Windows, isn't that better? Linux GUIs (Android only partially excepted), in my experience, are amateur in the worst way: dilettantish, faddish, inconsistent, incomplete, and replaced with something new and diff…

What about package managers? Windows management (e.g. Xmonad)?

You don't like the KDE/Gnome defaults and don't want to spend time customizing. Fonts? Install from package manager. Themes? Install from package manager. Or download from gnome-look.org and install using gnome-tweak-tool. Yet you go out of your way to tweak Windows to your liking.

I don't have driver issues, but that's from researching purchases before buying.

Re: MacBook Pro gets Retina Display; MacBook Air updated with Ivy Bridge

#378

Post by wmf »

rorrr wrote: post #361
alexobenauer wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's interesting... I didn't realize this until you said it. I currently have the 15" MBP at 1680x1050. Buying the new retina display would be a downgrade in screen real estate, since it would show an equivalent 1440x900. Sure it would be crisper, but when I'm developing on my laptop, it's all about screen real estate. This is odd.

How the fuck is it a "downgrade"? You get higher resolution.

Less stuff fits on the screen.

Re: MacBook Pro gets Retina Display; MacBook Air updated with Ivy Bridge

#379

Post by moe »

pclark wrote: post #23

all I want is 3g on laptops

I want that too.

In the meantime I got myself this[1] and can highly recommend it. No more fiddling with USB-dongles, you can just leave it in the bag and a single button press gives you a Wifi->3G bridge (for up to 5 clients).

[1] http://www.amazon.com/UNLOCKED-HUAWEI-HSDPA-MOBILE-Velvet/dp...

Re: MacBook Pro gets Retina Display; MacBook Air updated with Ivy Bridge

#380

Post by mwyvern »

falling wrote: post #304
mwyvern wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It always shocks me tha Finder doesn't have cmd-X cut... cutting is by far the most frequent operation I do in other non-dual-pane file managers. But what do you like better about windows explorer? Finder's "view as columns" makes it feel a little bit more powerful to me.

it doesn't have Cut, but it now (as of Lion, I think), Move Here as an alternative to Paste, use it with Cmd-Opt-V.

Thank you!
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