A little less than a calendar month ago , Intel cite the high - technical school press to San Francisco so that it could bring out its trade name - fresh “ Santa Rosa ” rise to its Centrino chipset . The new chipset included , among other thing , a faster frontside bus and keep for 802.11n wireless networking . These improvements so locomote me that , in this very infinite , I predicted the Santa Rosa chips would line up their fashion into Apple ’s laptop production line . “ A matter of when , not if , ” I said . A practical foregone conclusion , I told everyone within hearing .
So not even a week after Intel ’s Santa Rosa case , Apple rolled out updated MacBooks . And , of course , these upgraded machines were completely , visibly , and entirely Santa Rosa - innocent . I materialise to be on a beach in Kauai when I find out the news , so that took a small bit of the gyp about being so in public amiss , just in case you were upset about my ego - esteem in any style .
Now Apple had its reasons for omit any Santa Rosa - based advance from the MacBook upgrade . “ We decided with this update that we would add more value with processor swiftness , RAM and heavy ride space , ” Apple conductor of portables product selling Todd Benjamin toldMacworldat the metre . And indeed , our benchmark let out that bumping up the processor speed , increasing the hard - drive capacity , and — in the case of the low - end MacBook , at least — elevating the amount of portion out L2 cache get a noticeable execution startle from the previous round of Core 2 duet - based MacBooks . Even more impressively , the contraband 2.16GHz MacBook even out - performed a 2.33GHz MacBook Pro in a couple of our trial .
Perhaps that ’s why when it total clip to upgrade the MacBook Pro line , Apple did go the Santa Rosa itinerary , finally validating my 27 - daytime - honest-to-god prevision that such a move was at hand . The MacBook Pro updates herald Tuesday boast dissolute CPUs , heavy storage capacity , and better computer graphic public presentation .
On the surface , the changes to processor speed do n’t come along that strong . The sure-enough MacBook Pros clocked in at 2.16GHz and 2.33GHz — the new manikin sports processors with swiftness of either 2.2GHz or 2.4GHz . But keep in nous that the Santa Rosa acclivity bring in an 800MHz frontside jalopy to the MacBook Pro — the late offerings had a 667MHz frontside bus . A quicker frontside bus moves data more chop-chop between the central processing unit and the chipset where the computer memory management is contained — an melioration there likely means a hike to overall performance .
How much of a boost ? David Moody , Apple ’s vice president of worldwide Mac production selling , told us that there ’s a 50 - percentage jump in some graphics program when compared to a Core twain - outfit MacBook Pro . That ’s interesting , but a head - to - oral sex comparison to the more recent Core 2 Duo good example will probably be more exemplifying — rest assured that Macworld Lab will commence those comparisons just as presently as the unexampled MacBook Pro shape go far at our offices ( which apparently happened while I typed this sentence ) .
Something else the laboratory is going to look at — the electric battery life in these raw MacBook Pros , peculiarly the 15 - in configurations . Those mannequin will feature mercury - devoid , LED - backlit exhibit ; Steve Jobs said such presentation were on their way inhis open letter on Apple ’s environmental policieslast calendar month . Apart from their reduced long - term environmental encroachment , these displays also consume less power . And that means long electric battery life — anywhere from 30 moment to an hour , Moody tell us . Apple’stech specs pagepromises 6 hours of shelling liveliness for the 15 - column inch example , which is an hour more than what the previous MacBook Pros listed . Again , Macworld Lab will weigh in with its own resolution before all is said and done .
Why no leave - backlit display for the 17 - column inch MacBook Pro ? If I had to hazard a surmise , I would say the resolution lies in the item of Jobs ’s open missive . Here ’s what he had to say about Apple ’s display programme , withitalicized emphasisadded by yours truly : “ Malus pumila plans to reduce and eventually eliminate the use of quicksilver by transition to precede backlighting for all displayswhen technically and economically workable . ” I would guess that a 17 - in pass - backlit display is n’t feasible at this point , and I ’d further play that it ’s the “ economically ” serving of that clause that ’s causing the hold - up . I would also mistrust to see the new display across the MacBook Pro short letter at some point in the nigh future tense — but like my ill - fill out Santa Rosa prediction , that ’s just a surmisal .
That ’s two feature right there that frame to importantly affect the MacBook Pro ’s execution and shelling life , and we have n’t even talked about the new Nvidia GeForce 8600 M GT chip that ’s powering the laptop ’ graphics or the fact that the Santa Rosa chipset promote the cap on installable system Aries the Ram to 4 gilbert . It ’ll be interesting to see what all of these changes intend for the MacBook Pro in our upcoming tests .
