Technology news and Jobs 
Fuzzy Logic New MacBooks, new 24” screen but no $800 netbook - meh
Fuzzy Logic New MacBooks, new 24” screen but no $800 netbook - meh | New MacBooks, new 24” screen but no $800 netbook - meh |
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| by Alex Zaharov-Reutt | |
| Wednesday, 15 October 2008 | |
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Page 2 of 5 First, let’s hear from Apple’s CEO, ye olde Steve Jobs, who even went so far as to display a slide in his presentation showing his good blood pressure in an attempt to ward off concerns about his health. Featured Whitepaper
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Jonathan Ive, Apple’s Industrial Designer, said: “Traditionally notebooks are made from multiple parts. With the new MacBook, we’ve replaced all of those parts with just one part—the unibody. The MacBook’s unibody enclosure is made from a single block of aluminium, making the new MacBook fundamentally thinner, stronger and more robust with a fit and finish that we’ve never even dreamed of before.” When it comes to green claims, Apple says that its entire “MacBook family meets stringent Energy Star 4.0, EPEAT Gold and RoHS environmental standards, and leads the industry in the elimination of toxic chemicals by containing no brominated flame retardants, using only PVC-free internal cables and components, and using energy efficient LED-backlit displays that are mercury-free and made with arsenic-free glass.” Also included is the new NVIDIA GeForce 9400M, a “3D integrated graphics processor that features 16 parallel processing cores and delivers up to five times the 3D graphics performance” of previous models using integrated Intel graphics chips. Apple is the first to bring this technology to market, but expect Windows-based notebooks to soon include this technology too, with less than 10% market share in the US and less than 4% market share worldwide, NVIDIA can’t count on Apple alone in the quest for profits. There’s also a bigger trackpad, now with more multi-touch and 40% more room to glide your finger around, along with the removal of the separate mouse button – the entire trackpad is now a button instead. Apple is also using LED-backlit display technology which instantly turns on (not that I ever notice my LCD screens taking eons to turn on), and draws 30% less power than fluorescent tube backlights on LCD screens, while the glass is “completely arsenic-free”. Sadly, however, they only come in glossy models – too bad if you hate glossy and wanted a matt option. The 15-inch MacBook Pro gets two graphics cards – the aforementioned NVIDIA GeForce 9400M integrated graphics processor, and a superfast NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT processor for “higher performance”. When you’re on the go, and battery power is more important to you, you can switch to the 9400M, but when you’re connected to power, or simply want faster graphics performance (whether you’re connected to power or not), you can fire up the power-hungry but graphically powerful 9600M GT instead. The MacBook Air got an update – the NVIDIA 9400M graphics chip and a 120GB hard drive or a 128GB SSD. It’s still too expensive, and still only has one lousy USB port. The 17-inch MacBook fared the worst of all, keeping its “original aluminium design”, but coming instead with a 1920x1200 LED-backlit display, and the choice of a larger 320GB hard drive or a 128GB SSD. Apple also released a “Mini DisplayPort” connector, which means yet another new standard for connecting your computer to your monitor, and then need for yet another adapter to add to your collection. Apple also released its new 24-inch LED Cinema Display at US $899 or a whopping AUD $1499. You can buy a Viewsonic 28-inch screen for AUD $729, while 24-inch screens go from AUD $355 to $509 in Australia, at least at the price list I’m looking at (PDF link). Endless specs and Australian pricing is on page 3. Still got that credit card handy? |
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