11.6 Running Aperture 3

[iTiki]

I stopped by the Monterey Apple store to check out the new Airs. To my surprise they had both base models set up with Aperture 3. One of my reasons for wanting the Air was for portable photo editing. I use Aperture 3 on my home 2.8 iMac with 4GB ram and I was pleasantly surprised and impressed at how well even the base models with 2GB ram handled the software. Seemed every bit as fast doing varied tasks as my home machine. I think I will still go BTO and get 4GB ram just to be sure. Now to decide whether to go 11.6 for ultra portability or the 13 for screen size....

 

[PieMac]

I stopped by the Monterey Apple store to check out the new Airs. To my surprise they had both base models set up with Aperture 3. One of my reasons for wanting the Air was for portable photo editing. I use Aperture 3 on my home 2.8 iMac with 4GB ram and I was pleasantly surprised and impressed at how well even the base models with 2GB ram handled the software. Seemed every bit as fast doing varied tasks as my home machine. I think I will still go BTO and get 4GB ram just to be sure. Now to decide whether to go 11.6 for ultra portability or the 13 for screen size....

Thanks for posting this! I, too, am an Aperture user and am debating on which 11.6" MBA to get as a secondary computer for light stuff and for travel. Of course, on the road it would be nice to import my RAW files directly into Aperture. I'm not really planning on doing any kind of major processing work...just sorting and maybe a few slight touch-ups until I can get home and off-load to my 17" i7 MBP workhouse laptop. I am thinking of getting the stock 128GB model with the stock 2GB RAM as I can get it here by Tuesday and the sooner the better! Do you think 2 GB is enough for this purpose with your hands-on experience?

 

[iTiki]

Thanks for posting this! I, too, am an Aperture user and am debating on which 11.6" MBA to get as a secondary computer for light stuff and for travel. Of course, on the road it would be nice to import my RAW files directly into Aperture. I'm not really planning on doing any kind of major processing work...just sorting and maybe a few slight touch-ups until I can get home and off-load to my 17" i7 MBP workhouse laptop. I am thinking of getting the stock 128GB model with the stock 2GB RAM as I can get it here by Tuesday and the sooner the better! Do you think 2 GB is enough for this purpose with your hands-on experience?

Based on the 1/2 hour I spent using the stock model with Aperture at the Apple store, I would say yes. I want 4GB as "insurance" and willing to wait for BTO to get it. However, I do understand wanting it "tomorrow"

 

[PieMac]

Based on the 1/2 hour I spent using the stock model with Aperture at the Apple store, I would say yes. I want 4GB as "insurance" and willing to wait for BTO to get it. However, I do understand wanting it "tomorrow"

Thanks for getting back to me so quickly..just placed an order for it with Amazon.com and it should be here Tuesday with $3.99 next day delivery! If you change your mind about upgrading the RAM, the 128 GB are in stock right now!

 

[biosci]

This is good to hear. I too do just very minimal Aperture and Lightroom work. I rarely use high end processes. Just levels, contrast, exposure etc. I just wish the 11incher had a 256gb SSD and the SD card slot!

 

[iTiki]

Thanks for getting back to me so quickly..just placed an order for it with Amazon.com and it should be here Tuesday with $3.99 next day delivery! If you change your mind about upgrading the RAM, the 128 GB are in stock right now!

Thanks for the info. Please post your impressions after you get it.

 

[PieMac]

Thanks for the info. Please post your impressions after you get it.

Will do!

 

[PieMac]

So far, so good

I've had my 11.6" MBA for a little over a week now, and I have played around with Aperture a little bit. For my purposes, it will be fine. Basically I will be using it to sort and rate and for some light adjustments here and there while traveling. For this, it does fine...it does take a few seconds to load each RAW file, but we are talking about an average size of 18 mb for each one, plus I just have the base 2 GB ram. As far as importing from the SD card, very zippy. All in all, very nice!

 

[hsl]

11.6 1.6Ghz 4GB ram running aperture3 with the library on a external USB2 drive runs fine! a lot better than on my 2,53Ghz 15" MacBook Pro.
Even with a 27" ACD it works like a charm.

 

[teerexx52]

11.6 1.6Ghz 4GB ram running aperture3 with the library on a external USB2 drive runs fine! a lot better than on my 2,53Ghz 15" MacBook Pro.
Even with a 27" ACD it works like a charm.

My wife does the same thing with a 1.4, 2gb ram

 

[maratus]

11.6 1.6Ghz 4GB ram running aperture3 with the library on a external USB2 drive runs fine! a lot better than on my 2,53Ghz 15" MacBook Pro.
Even with a 27" ACD it works like a charm.

What do you mean by "a lot better"?

 

[loslosbaby]

MacBook Air with Aperture (and another computer)

Hiya! I don't want to go OT, but, I have done my own research about 13" airs and have come to a conclusion: for my app mix (developer + photographer) its actually faster than my pre-Unibody 2.5GHz MBP 17"!

I brought a USB drive to the Apple store and loaded XCode as well as Eclipse (used for Java with my "legacy" customers as I convert over to 100% iPhone/Android) and loaded both, and, I was amazed! Eclipse, being in Java itself, is a big fat pig. Add the Android stuff and its ridiculous! XCode and Eclipse both flew, with safari open, skype, firefox, apple mail, iphoto, itunes. I put in menumeters as well, and watched the swap activity...yeah, I got it swapping, but it hardly "felt" like swapping. I turned on google earth and then it started to suck, but, google earth sucks on my MBP17 too!

So, my Q is this: how does one use Aperture, with levels, ratings etc., and then "merge" that work (images + metadata) into one's big-fat-mac at home? My theory is that in the next 2 years, all macs portables will be "like the macbook airs"...optical disks gone, more battery life, amazing disk subsystem + HD.

Details:

I'm trying to figure out a way to side-grade from my 7lb MBP 17" to the 13" MBA (BTO max'd out) and still have some a lot of functionality when I'm "detached". Will get an Apricorn 750Gb encrypted portable disk to go along as TM disk.

My plan:
- Move iTunes onto my drobo, have 4-5 star rated lists on iphone 4
- Move iPhoto onto my drobo, have rated photo lists on iphone
- Aperture db's are already on the drobo
- Discontinue use of Adobe web-bundle CS3 (I despise it), for pixelmator
- Use a system cleaner of some sort before migration

Additionally:
- Maybe build a sparse bundle on the Apricorn so it won't take all the disk up as TM and use that for "portable iTunes/iPhoto?"
- Maybe SuperDuper the TM sparse bundle on the Apricorn onto the drobo?

I've got a 320GB now, have 40GB set aside for bootcamp (VMWare, 9Gb free) and have only 2Gb free now in the whole system...so weight loss is imperative! There's some steam games (on windows AND the mac side) that can go as well.

Thanks again guys! Long-winded but I hope "typical" for some power users out there looking to "lose the brick"!

G.