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Macbook buy now or wait till rev B?

The high processor temperatures of the MacBook really worry me.
http://www.intelmactemp.com
I was going to buy a MacBook 2 Ghz but now I am considering an Imac 17" 1.83 instead. This one is not that heavy either and I only need the capability to move it to different rooms at home. For the same price, I will have a larger and faster HD, dual layer DVD, larger screen and lower CPU temperatures, so I guess the Imac will me more reliable in long term.
True, I admit missing the compatibiliy to take my Mac occasionally to the school where I work, but I can live with that.
If I am careful, I don't think that I will damage an Imac when I move it to another place in my house 10 times in a week. Or am I wrong?
 
Mac Hammer Fan said:
The high processor temperatures of the MacBook really worry me.
http://www.intelmactemp.com
I was going to buy a MacBook 2 Ghz but now I am considering an Imac 17" 1.83 instead. This one is not that heavy either and I only need the capability to move it to different rooms at home. For the same price, I will have a larger and faster HD, dual layer DVD, larger screen and lower CPU temperatures, so I guess the Imac will me more reliable in long term.
True, I admit missing the compatibiliy to take my Mac occasionally to the school where I work, but I can live with that.
If I am careful, I don't think that I will damage an Imac when I move it to another place in my house 10 times in a week. Or am I wrong?
Click to expand...

Well as a current MacBook and iMac Core Duo owner, moving the imac even a few times a week was a pain in the butt. (Edit: and that's with a bt kb and mouse, by the way) I'm selling the iMac because i got a faster (2.0 vs 1.83, hard drive speed slower though) and more portable and sexy laptop. I don't regret getting the macbook one bit. It flies, and it's drop dead gorgeous. The few things I lose: 7200 rpm drives, x1600 video card, and 250 gig storage (now 120 gig). The biggest and most important thing I gain: portability. The tradeoff is fine by me, drop a 7200 rpm drive in the macbook at some point in the future, and i think i'll be set for quite awhile.

ft

Oh yeah, it's black too. :D
 
Hands-on report

I've had my MacBook for three days now, and this machine is awesome. I maxed out the RAM, and changed the HD to a 100 GB / 7200 rpm Hitachi. The machine it replaces is a 12" PowerBook G4 1.33 GHz. Let me address the most feverishly discussed topics in brief:

  • Heat: Do I want t a fast machine? Yes! Do I want a lot of fan noise? No! Do I want a lot of heat dissipation thru the casing? YES!
  • Display: People complaining have seen some other glossy display, but not the MacBook's display. Few actual MacBook owners say that the display is too reflective—because it isn't. But it's three times brighter!
  • Keyboard: Awesome.
  • Speed: Even Rosetta apps seem faster than before. (Tested with Sibelius, Photoshop Elements, Dreamweaver.) For Intel native apps, TBR (this baby rocks)!
  • Windows: If you ever had to use the Redmondish Mischief(TM) on your Mac, the move from Virtual PC to Parallels is, well, cool.

Room for improvement:

  • The arms rest area has a really sharp edge.
  • I'd love to see the iSight turn around like the Webcam on the Sony Vaio does.
  • The black casing is tempting, but I'm not that much a design junkie to shell out another $150. Good marketing move, though.

I'm one happy customer.
 
um, when Merom comes out, isn't that going to be Rev. B? I can't forsee Apple waiting to put Merom into their laptops either, so we'll be seeing Merom in < 3 months.
 
NewSc2 said:
um, when Merom comes out, isn't that going to be Rev. B? I can't forsee Apple waiting to put Merom into their laptops either, so we'll be seeing Merom in < 3 months.
Click to expand...


I don't see them waiting to put it into the macbook pro.

But the macbook? Yes, I do see them waiting bit before that happens...
 
I do think the MacBooks I've seen run too hot. What I am primarily concerned about is not the CPU -- the 73C idle on that database website has to be a warranty defect -- but the area around the power intake which is hot even at idle, both top and bottom, much in the same way as the 550/667 series of titanium books were. This is definitely a machine that you want to consider using on battery and charging when you're away from the machine.

The ones I've seen also get too hot on the bottom under the processor, which I suspect is something that can easily be dealt with via proper use of thermal paste. At times that the fan is not running, the heat around the processor ought to be on the side with the heatsink (the top), not the side AWAY from the heatsink.

But I do think the Macbook is more comfortable to type on than the MBP -- you don't have that radiator effect on the palmrests that you do with the MBP. I might add I never purchased the iBook for the same reason -- its heat sink seriously heated the left palmrest, and unlike with the MacBook, the iBook heat sink was not well ventilated by the fan.

On the whine -- not enough to be worried about. It is night and day from the early MacBook Pros and still better than the current MBPs. I would describe it as comparable in intensity to the video chip on the 1GHz titanium book I had, although actually if I had to pick a noise to live with I'd prefer the MacBook one over the TiBook one because it is less attention grabbing. The TiBook one would always act up when you were scrolling or moving a window -- this one just seems steady.

The screen I quite like. Text is a bit easier to read on the glossy, which is a good thing because you have the same horizontal resolution as the TiBook compressed into a significantly smaller space. Glare is definitely a problem if you are working under bright direct light fixtures. You won't see it in an Apple Store because of their indirect lighting, but go someplace like MicroCenter and you'll see it. I think it will be better outside than matte though.

I am going to have to buy one now because I already let my TiBook go several months ago and I cannot be without a portable any longer. I don't think Apple has the MBP sorted out yet, and if nothing else, the MacBook is clearly easy to take apart and sort out yourself. Besides the battery life is an important factor for me -- I need this to equal or beat the TiBook, and the MBP certainly does not do either of those things. If you have the luxury of waiting, my suspicion is that Apple probably won't do much more than figure out how to apply thermal paste. The idea behind Merom chips is that they'll have more actual speed for the same clock cycle and power output, so power users might notice cooler actual running as it gets tasks done faster, but I don't think it will run any cooler at idle.
 
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