Thursday 25 December 2008

Never ask questions about something you might buy.

And ignore this advice too.

Thanks to the link Dan provided I've found the Apple forums, and have been digging through those pertaining to the unibody Macbook. It doesn't make pretty reading.

While I appreciate that a relatively small number of people are reporting issues with the new MB through the forums, I suspect it represents less than one tenth of 1% of those that have issues. What sort of issues? Overheating after the 10.5.6 update, audio issues, poor display (also reported for the Macbook pro) use of a bad graphics chip (see here for details) that is not apples fault, but IS a big flaw in the machines. The graphics chip IS a show stopper, in that I specifically wanted to use the machine with a 20" Samsung panel, and this is exactly the kind of use that causes problems.

I am quite aware that these kinds of things are normal for the likes of Dell, HP etc, but Dell and HP make cheap boxes. I can get a well spec'd 13" Dell XPS for less than £800 with 3 years professional warranty, and although the casing isn't made as well as the unibody, I have to ask if the opportunity to run OSX is worth a £400 premium on top for known flawed hardware.

Lack of firewire is also a big deal for some purchasers, with them returning new machines for older ones that did have the port. Why do I care about firewire? Well it is THE system of choice for video work, and a lot of audio stuff works through it too. Plus data transfer is MUCH faster than USB2.0. And a part of the reason for getting a Mac is Garageband. So suddenly a tool that might have been useful for audio work may now not be.

I haven't started digging into the Macbook pro yet, but that's another £200 on top, and I'd much rather have a small unit I can plug into a screen for normal use, yet is light for travel. I just really don't want to spend £1200 on a heap of trouble when I could have exactly the same problems for £500 less.

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