Apple's 2009 MacBook Pro: Battery Life to Die For
by Anand Lal Shimpi on June 12, 2009 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Mac
SSD: Optional and Non-Intel
My only major complaint about the MacBook Pro is, once again, that it does not come with a SSD standard. I understand, however, to cut costs and do such a thing would be impossible today. For $350 Apple will upgrade your hard drive to the latest 128GB Samsung MLC SSD; for $800 you'll get 256GB. I can't stress how much you shouldn't buy the 256GB drive; prices are dropping too quickly for that to be a good deal. If you can hold out until next year you'll be able to get that capacity at half the price.
My other major complaint is Apple's refusal to offer Intel's X25-M as an option on its MacBook Pro line. The Samsung drive Apple uses is the same drive Corsair is selling right now. It's a decent drive, offers good compatibility and reliability, but in terms of worst case scenario performance I haven't found it nearly as good as the Intel drive.
I'm not saying that Apple should only offer the Intel drive, but it should at least be an option. For a company obviously concerned with the overall package, it seems odd to leave out one of the strongest SSDs on the market. Especially given how close Apple and Intel are already.
A good, standard SSD is the only thing separating this MacBook Pro from perfection.
Update on Build Quality and Trackpad
The build quality of the new MacBook Pro remains unchanged and unparalleled. This thing is solid, and it looks pretty sweet too.
The glass covered trackpad that I had issues with in my original review now works totally fine. I no longer have any problems with clicks not registering under OS X. Within a month of the first unibody MacBook Pro release Apple put out an update designed to address those issues, so I believe this has been fixed for a while.
Thanks to the cool running Penryn core, the MacBook Pro doesn't really get more than warm at its base. The glass covered display is still quite glare happy, but indoors it looks great and in certain situations outdoors it’s acceptable.
I won’t go too much further into the displays or other features of the unibody MacBook Pro, I already did that in our original coverage of the machine.
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iwodo - Saturday, June 13, 2009 - link
I was going to Post about how great and cheap the Apple SSD upgrade was. Then i as i digg deeper and find out. The 128Gb SSD is using the old Samsung Controller. Which is very slow compare to Vertex. ( In the range of 100MB/s )i would guess the 256GB being much more expensive is because it uses the new Samsung Controller ( as used in OCZ Summit; funny it seems how every one seems to refer to chipset used in OCZ these days. They have done well and make a name out of their SSD products. )
The reason why it doesn't use other SSD as well as Intel's SSD is simply because of cost. Intel doesn't sell their SSD controller. They only sell it as a whole package.
Comparing to Samsung, Apple already has a long term contract from Samsung with some of the best price in industry. After all they are the largest Flash memory consumption company. SSD are nothing more then a bunch of Flash Memory Chips and a Controller chip linked together. Apple can already get Flash Memory for discounted price, all they need is to pay the added Samsung's controller price and packaging price.
I really hope Samsung make a breakthrough in SSD controller. Then I suspect all future Apple computer will be equipped with an SSD. ( Hopefully it will come with SATA 3.0 Spec )
sprockkets - Friday, June 12, 2009 - link
I'm still trying to figure out where this thing gets its air intake and output to if the fan's exhaust goes right into the screen hinge and there are no readily apparent air intake ports on the bottom."For the most part, the 9600M was useless on the MacBook Pro unless you were gaming under Vista or did any heavy 3D accelerated work under OS X."
Classic.
Pirks - Friday, June 12, 2009 - link
Air intake is through keyboard.P.S. I wish you had some notebook repair technician buddies like mine who repaired hundreds of various notebooks of the past decade including Apple ones. You'd post MUCH less dumb BS about Apple then :P
sprockkets - Friday, June 12, 2009 - link
What BS? My coworker and I both repair laptops. The G4 macbook he had to fix is not a good example of a laptop being easy to take apart.Are you trying to say that MacBooks are more reliable than the competition? Because most people complain just as much as anyone else about their share of issues, and Apple dismisses them like any other large company. Case in point, the intermittent fan issue.
And, you didn't answer the question about how the air gets out.
A simple picture of the back would solve this issue, but no one has a picture of it, not even apple.
Bottom line: When Apple decides to stop their BS with Windows being a helpless virus ridden victim and instead simply promote what makes a MacBook worth the extra $500, I'll get one.
LOL like that will ever happen!
sprockkets - Sunday, June 14, 2009 - link
Oh, shit, I didn't look at who I was replying too, no wonder why...Pirks - Saturday, June 13, 2009 - link
Lame winzealot's excuse. You can buy and try any MacBook right here right now and sell it later after a few months if you don't like it. At least THEN you'll stop posting BS about something you only seen in pictures :P BTW new MBP 13" is the perfect choice for that since it's cheap for a Mac Pro-line notebook, only $1199 ;)Pirks - Saturday, June 13, 2009 - link
Nah, screw that, don't buy any Mac stuff, I just recalled another crazy guy whaaasomething who went nutso after buying MBP. I don't want another lunatic like him in here, so forget it. Better post anti-Apple posts like you do now, they are at least bearable.charlienail - Friday, June 12, 2009 - link
apple and some other manufacturers have been shipping lithium polymer batteries for years!! this is not something new to these laptops. what is new is that they have used the space gained by removing the ability to exchange batteries.only a low percentage of laptop owners have a second battery so apple is targeting the much larger majority of people who never make use of the replace battery. this is similar to the new SD slots, if less than 1% of your customers are using the express card slot why not give them something they are much more likely to make use of. (plus windows laptops have had these readers for years)
i can see how the evolution of apple away from pro needs (replacable battery, anti-glare screen, express card) could be worrying for them but i like the direction they're going because i'm not a pro user and i want cheaper macs. the pros can at least take heart that the amazing 17inch is now only 2500 and still caters to their needs. (who needs a replacable battery when you've got almost a 100 watt hours in the thinnest lightest 17inch available)
araczynski - Friday, June 12, 2009 - link
my favorite part: " If you can hold out until next year you'll be able to get that capacity at half the price."i'm sure if you wait until next year you can probably also have the laptop at half price too, so do yourself the double favor and just don't buy the laptop at all :)
DigitalFreak - Friday, June 12, 2009 - link
Question is, do you still get the battery life if you run Windows?