Official "Waiting for Santa Rosa" thread.

[tristan]

Hey if your so happy with your "old" machine stop trolling our thread.

I'm no troll buddy, just another SR watcher & waiter just like you. But I read enough reviews & updates in the past two weeks to realize the update wouldn't be that great and did my best to try to deflate some of the hype.

For example, even though several people seem to be expecting LEDs in the MBP this round, everything I've read says that LEDs are still not cost-effective enough for mass market laptops.

Bottom line is there's just not that much cool stuff in the supply chain right now that would make for a great update. We're basically in an industry dead zone right now, waiting for prices to come down on LEDs, Blue-ray drives, WIMAX, and 200+ gig notebook HDs, and for Intel to make the switch to Penryn and introduce the mobile Quad CPUs.

But still, no updated graphic card? That's a kick in the walnuts. The GMA 3000 and other good cards *are* available now, AFAIK, and should have been used in the MB.

 

[wrxpert]

I'm no troll buddy, just another SR watcher & waiter just like you. But I read enough reviews & updates in the past two weeks to realize the update wouldn't be that great and did my best to try to deflate some of the hype.

For example, even though several people seem to be expecting LEDs in the MBP this round, everything I've read says that LEDs are still not cost-effective enough for mass market laptops.

Bottom line is there's just not that much cool stuff in the supply chain right now that would make for a great update. We're basically in an industry dead zone right now, waiting for prices to come down on LEDs, Blue-ray drives, WIMAX, and 200+ gig notebook HDs, and for Intel to make the switch to Penryn and introduce the mobile Quad CPUs.

But still, no updated graphic card? That's a kick in the walnuts. The GMA 3000 and other good cards *are* available now, AFAIK, and should have been used in the MB.

Fair enough. I am not looking for Santa Rosa to change my life either. But I have been wanting a Mac for almost 2 years now and in the last 3 months I have been in position to buy an new laptop. I just can't in good concience bring myself to do it knowing that Santa Rosa should be included soon.

 

[masse]

****.

/

 

[masse]

Well the wait continues. I feel like we are like the dinosaurs in The Land Before Time, marching along slowly getting weaker. Some of us are starting to drop off. Hopefully soon we will reach the oasis.

keep your hopes up little foot, we'll find the great valley soon!

 

[MacBoy69]

Santa Rosa where are you?????

UGH. What happened???

I should have stayed away from this forum. lol.

Anyways ... guess i'll wait to see what the MacBookPro will have. June ... right???

 

[dannewell15]

I bet that those of you guys who were expecting a SR Macbook are feeling kinda doubtful now, what with the current ones just upgraded. Does anyone think that they still will get SR? Too late for me, i already bought mine.lol

 

[wrxpert]

keep your hopes up little foot, we'll find the great valley soon!

"Yep yep yep"

 

[thegrandmaster]

I'm still guessing at a WWDC update, not sure why everyone assumed it would be yesterday, except that Apple releases stuff on Tuesdays.

 

[SHowHawk]

But still, no updated graphic card? That's a kick in the walnuts. The GMA 3000 and other good cards *are* available now, AFAIK, and should have been used in the MB.

As I correctly (sorta) predicted, Apple updated the consumer MacBooks today instead of the MacBook Pros.

My two cents worth on when we might see new MBs and MBPs:
...
I actually think that the MacBooks might see an update in mid-to-late May, before updated MacBook Pros are announced at WWDC in June.

Unfortunately, unlike what I had hoped and as I had begun to fear last week, they didn't update the most glaring weakness of the MacBook, its aging and weak Intel GMA950 GPU.

So, I agree with that sentiment Tristan. I am disappointed with the lack of a graphics chip upgrade, especially with Santa Rosa's X3100 on a bunch of new machines from HP, Gateway, Sony, etc.

Now I have to decide if I will wait to see if a decent Santa Rosa-based update is announced between now and WWDC for the MacBook Pros (which I think very likely) and, more importantly to me, whether that update will include something that costs less than $1800 (very unlikely, IMHO).

I may just end up getting one of these new MacBooks (like the 2.16GHz white one) anyhow.

 

[LaMerVipere]

The wait continues....

 

[Manic Mouse]

Well the wait continues. I feel like we are like the dinosaurs in The Land Before Time, marching along slowly getting weaker. Some of us are starting to drop off. Hopefully soon we will reach the oasis.

LMAO. Brilliant.

I feel very depressed...

 

[sinstoic]

Santa Rosa for new Macbook Pros? LED Screens? Given the current trend, hope the new Macbook Pro doesn't fall short of my expectations!

 

[masse]

given the current trend it probably will.

 

[kajitox]

Lame. That means another month till we MIGHT see updates to the Pro. Maybe. Possibly. Perhaps not.

If there are still no updates at WWDC I'm gonna be really depressed...I might actually consider buying a Windows machine.

 

[Telp]

Lame. That means another month till we MIGHT see updates to the Pro. Maybe. Possibly. Perhaps not.

If there are still no updates at WWDC I'm gonna be really depressed...I might actually consider buying a Windows machine.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!! Don't you even think about it!!!!

 

[iBeast]

you people are pathetic

 

[zioxide]

I bet that those of you guys who were expecting a SR Macbook are feeling kinda doubtful now, what with the current ones just upgraded. Does anyone think that they still will get SR? Too late for me, i already bought mine.lol

It will eventually. There's no more chips coming out for the Napa platform, so in order for there to be any more updates, they'll have to go to the Santa Rosa platform.



I think we'll see the next revisions of the Macbook Pros at WWDC. Apple posted the 'A Greener Apple' a couple of weeks ago, and we'll probably see more about this. And Steve will do his "One more thing..., we're updating the Macbook Pro with environmentally friendly LED displays and faster and more efficient processors."

 

[sinstoic]

you people are pathetic

and you are sympathetic?

 

[CrimsonScythe]

Pro Photography Seminar?

Any chance that they'll release MBP's at the Pro Photography Seminar in London next Tuesday? The page says amongst other things

This seminar is designed for serious photographers who want to take full advantage of the all-new Adobe Photoshop CS3 running natively on the latest Intel-based Macs.

I wonder why they specifically say "lateste Intel-based Macs" instead of just "Intel-based Macs". I guess it wouldn't be inconceivable for them to launch the MacBook Pro's at this pro event, even if it's just a seminar? Oh, well, time will show...

 

[hvfsl]

you people are pathetic

Not only are you called iBeast, but your post is No 666 and you come in here just to annoy others. If I was superstitious I might make something of that.

 

[yetieater]

Back onto the subject of GPUs in the coming MBP, perhaps it makes sense for Apple to look towards NVIDIA for its discrete graphics solutions. ATi's R600 chips have been flailing miserably against NVIDIA's 8000-series - so much that HardOCP has even seen it fit to deem the new HD 2900XT a flop.

To give some background into the current situation regarding GPUs do take a look at AppleInsider's article: http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/07/05/15/next_gen_mac_graphics_hardware_roundup.html

As stated in HardOCP's article:

For the past six months NVIDIA has been leading in performance and features with the GeForce 8 series (G80). The GeForce 8800 GTX and 8800 GTS were announced and launched on November, 8th 2006. These two video cards shocked the hardware community with an unprecedented leap in 3D performance from the previous generation GPUs. We experienced something which was quite extraordinary, the ability to run every current game at the highest possible in-game settings at high resolutions with high levels of AA.

...

NVIDIA did not stop there though, a month ago they released their mainstream lineup, the GeForce 8500 GT, 8600 GT and 8600 GTS offering the best performance in that class.

ATi's new R600 cards put up a healthy fight on 'canned' benchmarks; specifically Futuremark's 3DMark line of 'gaming' benchmarks. HardOCP's real-world game tests show that the HD 2900XT cannot hold its own when pitted against the NVIDIA 8800 line. Note that ATi has been given from mid-November to mid-May in order to play catch up with NVIDIA - two quarters later, and the R600 is still floundering.

With high power draw, lukewarm efficiency, and clumsy drivers, I'm not expecting very much out of ATi this time around. NVIDIA has proven themselves with stronger drivers and more capable GPUs since the release of G80. I bet the NVIDIA 8600M line of GPUs will be popping up in the next MBP.

:\

 

[Eidorian]

From NotebookReview.com

What's interesting is that it comes equipped with a Mobility Radeon HD 2600 XT, essentialy ATI/AMD's answer to nVidia's 8600M series. The benchmarks for 3dmark06 are very impressive, as it scored 4,002, handily beating the 8600M GS's score of 2459. Sure, the HDX comes with a T7700 and 4 Gigs of ram, but the synthetic tests are still very promising. Maybe a good mid-range chip is what ATI/AMD needs to seriously get back in the laptop graphics game.

 

[yetieater]

Note that the HD 2600 XT was benchmarked against the 8600M GS. The 8600M GT is the faster of the two 8600M cards, with an enhanced texture fill rate. As quoted from NotebookReview.com:
http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=3699

The 8600M series is the performance GPU; it will probably fill the role currently occupied by the Go7600/Go7700 series, and will appear in gamer's notebooks. There are two variants, the 8600M-GS and the 8600M-GT. Both variants have the same memory bandwidth (22.4GB/s), but notice the difference in texture fill rate - the GS has 4.8 billion/s vs the GT's 7.6 billion/s.

Further, the review that Mr._Kubelwagen quoted from says nothing about the 8600M GS' 3DMark scores. Read the review for yourself here: http://laptopmag.com/Review/HP-Pavilion-HDX-Entertainment-Notebook-PC.htm

We expected to see high scores from the HDX, and we weren't disappointed. This preproduction model wouldn't run PCMark05, but its 3DMark03 score of 12,240 and 3DMark06 score of 4,002 mean this system can plow through graphics-intensive applications. Strangely, the HDX notched 31 fps on our F.E.A.R gaming test on autodetect, and 26 fps with the settings maxed out. (We suspect this subpar showing might be a driver issue related to Windows Vista.)

Once again, this is on a canned benchmark. I made a point of linking to the HardOCP article earlier. The 8800GTX and the HD 2900 XT earn very similar 3DMark06 scores, but the 8800GTX has no problem ousting the HD 2900 XT on gaming tests. Power consumption on the HD 2900 XT is also greater, leading me to believe that power management on the HD 2600 XT can't be very solid either. Certainly this is an assumption on my part.

 

[Eidorian]

I'm not discrediting you and yes I did note that it was the HD 2600 XT Vs. 8600M GS. I didn't think it was necessary to go even deeper with all the sources. I guess I'll have to with you around.

Canned benchmarks need to make way to real world tests as always. So it's more waiting...

 

[yetieater]

So it's more waiting...

Sad, but true. If I want my MBP for the summer, I'm going to have to order it by next week. Prices in Malaysia for Apple products are higher than those in the United States, and I personally don't mind the thought of saving some money with such a higher-dollar purchase. Buying a MBP 15" 2.33GHz C2D, 120GB HDD, 256MB X1600 is ~$2800 USD here, whereas the same computer can be had from Macmall.com for $2344 after rebates.

Come on, Apple !