Rate the MacBook

[stevento]

I'd like to hear peoples opinions about the MacBook and how good it is at media tasks.
Those "i'm a mac, i'm awesome at media out of the box. home movies and pictures, i do better than PCs." commercials is what made me buy this.
i mean just as it is out of the box; dont count any add on software you did.


OK
1. Apple DVD Player
You cant skip to the part of the video that you want to go to, you have to hold the
there's no bar on the bottom where you can just move the tracker to the part of the video you want go to.
Apple DVD player doesn't have the controls you need.

one of the things that wooed me to apple was front row. its visually appealing but little did i know, its slow and if something isn't right it just loads forever, i know somebody knows what i'm talking about.

this computer is supposed to be the best for home movies and pictures, but it has no card readers. if i cant find my camera cord, i cant upload pics.
shouldn't it have a 5 in 1 card reader?

the built in isight is .3 mega pixels (i phone i sight is 2mp)

ok from apple.com/getamac
1. it just works..... not true. my macbook doesn't work any better than any hp that i've ever had, i've rebooted, i've force quit, its not compatible with some things...

8. more fun with photos.... .... ....dont get me started on iPhoto please.
13. no hunting for drivers. just plug your stuff in... yeah with only 2 usb ports


All in all, i call this computer just a little better than ok.
nowhere near met my expectations.

what's your opinion on this?
btw, anger about crappy dvd player spurred this post.

 

[After G]

Hmm...that's a lot of complaints at once

Apple DVD Player - Have you tried the navigator (Command-Option-N)? You can skip straight to chapters. You can add bookmarks to your videos as well to get to all your favorite parts. (in the Window menu). You can change fast-forward and rewind speed if it's too fast/slow for you too in the Controls menu. Usually scenes are short enough that I don't need to scrub extensively. It would be nice to have a scrubber, but not necessary by any means. If scrub is a deal-breaker use VLC and you can scrub on DVD all day.

Card reader - Isn't it better to get your own if you truly need one? I got a USB one and I'm happy but OS X working with the camera = less stuff to buy. In fact, get a big enough camera memory and never swap cards again.

iSight - Not really an issue for the intended purpose in my opinion. When was the last time you needed DV quality for a 640x480 (307200 pixel - what do you know? .3 MP) web chat? I don't think broadband is fast enough yet to handle a 2 MP video chat (at least not in the US). And if you want better stills, you have that digital camera with you, no? Apple might just upgrade the laptops too so it might be a non-issue.

I completely agree with you on just works - it doesn't sometimes, but to me it is much easier to get rolling again when you stop than with another system.

"more fun with photos.... .... ....dont get me started on iPhoto please." - Do describe - but remember to be open minded because you won't learn if you are closed off to experimenting.

No hunting for drivers. just plug your stuff in... yeah with only 2 usb ports - Perhaps buy a hub? 4 USB ports on my mac mini is plenty for me. I wanted more Firewire Though I do realize that the Macbook is weak in this regard. You didn't have to hunt for a driver, did you?

I don't expect Macs to be the perfect computer. I just work well with them ... takes time to learn to be proficient as with using any new thing

 

[stevento]

i wasn't complaining. i was just saying its not all its cracked up to be.
i never understood what people mean when the say osx works with the camera
i hope that doens't just mean iphoto recognizes the camera and imports.
that's weak.
i agree osx bounces back from flubs better than xp.
when i went into the mac store, the sals reps made it seem as though firewire was an apple exclusive technology.
my issue with iphoto is that it saves photos 3 times. waste of space

most other built in webcams are 1.3 mp for recording and stills and when i'm on i chat, the video quality is just horrible.
the hp i wanted is so much more functional both as a work machine and a mdia machine.

 

[Jiddick ExRex]

Very few people annoy me on this board the ways you do. I am all for reviewing and giving critique but this is not the way it should be done. Yes the apps of OS X has some quirks, most of them which can be solved if you keep an open mind and don't expect to be given a god given, ever generic, self modifiable user experience.

i wasn't complaining. i was just saying its not all its cracked up to be.

Yes you were complaining and yes you were making assumptions. If you opened up your eyes this much and asked for help instead of judging it, most of your problems would probably be solved.

i never understood what people mean when the say osx works with the camera
i hope that doens't just mean iphoto recognizes the camera and imports.
that's weak.

Then what did you think? This is basically the only thing I can think of functionality wise that OS X should support.

i agree osx bounces back from flubs better than xp.

O...k...

when i went into the mac store, the sals reps made it seem as though firewire was an apple exclusive technology.

It is, Apple invented it. That doesn't mean they won't make money off of it selling the use to other hardware vendors.

my issue with iphoto is that it saves photos 3 times. waste of space

That's actually a good idea if you think about it. You have the source, which you don't want to edit and make changes. Then you have the imported photo assorted in a folder based on date, and then you have the newly edited photo, where you can always revert back to the original.
What I like about iPhoto is that you don't have to manually create folders for your edited pics, thus having a dictatorlike control with your file system. Consumerwise iPhoto handles all that stuff for you, great for non-computer savvy consumers, a little bit annoying for people who doesn't need it. Btw, if you are a photoshop geek, iPhoto is not for you, so stop bothering use it.

most other built in webcams are 1.3 mp for recording and stills and when i'm on i chat, the video quality is just horrible.

I guess that's a matter of what you are using it for. Basically a webcam is pretty useless for anything other than having fun (photobooth being a great example).

the hp i wanted is so much more functional both as a work machine and a mdia machine.

Then crawl back into you HP/Windows XP troll hole. Doesn't really make sense with your previous statement that OSX was better than XP but whatever. What do you expect me to say to you about that if you do not elaborate on your opinions? You are impossible to argue with if you only dish out subjective and annoying statements like this.

 

[After G]

i wasn't complaining. i was just saying its not all its cracked up to be.
i never understood what people mean when the say osx works with the camera
i hope that doens't just mean iphoto recognizes the camera and imports.
that's weak.
i agree osx bounces back from flubs better than xp.
when i went into the mac store, the sals reps made it seem as though firewire was an apple exclusive technology.
my issue with iphoto is that it saves photos 3 times. waste of space

most other built in webcams are 1.3 mp for recording and stills and when i'm on i chat, the video quality is just horrible.
the hp i wanted is so much more functional both as a work machine and a mdia machine.

How long have you had your Mac? Give it a decent chance to change your thinking. If you honestly try to use the Mac exclusively for a few weeks, you will find that things get easier on OS X with experience, and you will see Windows and PCs in a new light. It's okay to have high expectations, but don't forget that Mac OS X isn't just "Windows++"

Mac OS X recognizing your camera seamlessly is a big deal. You don't get a funky "Camera and Scanner Wizard", you get your photos. You can even pull them out of the iPhoto Library by browsing a easily understood folder hierarchy by date. Even if you didn't have iPhoto, you could get your pictures out with Image Capture (no wizard, just click to retrieve). What else did you want Apple to do with a digital still camera?

Firewire isn't Apple exclusive despite what Apple store reps say; it is known as IEEE 1394/i.Link in the PC world, but the Apple implementation is the most complete, as i.Link is 4 pin (no power pins) and most PCs either have the cruddy i.Link version to save space or don't have FW 800 as an option.

You can have iPhoto not save photos three times; just set it to leave the organization to you. But you lose the ability to change the photo back from the way you edited it. There is an application (iPhoto Diet) that will let you slim down your library, but 3 is the minimum workable number of images in my opinion:
(1) original
(1) thumbnail
and (1) changed version.
Note that Vista makes multiple copies of your photos as well to make viewing and editing faster and safer.

The beauty of Apple is that you can be as involved or uninvolved as you want. You can just dump the photos and use iPhoto as storage, or you can use iPhoto as a tool to organize your pictures and be able to find the picture of you and your girlfriend doing that embarassing thing on that one Halloween 13 years ago and be able to call it up on the spot. It doesn't mean there aren't flaws; I'd like a better webcam and an easier to change HD on an MBP. But if something doesn't behave as you expect it to, be prepared to learn something new.

i agree osx bounces back from flubs better than xp.

Jiddick ExRex, he agrees that OS X is more robust than XP. I made this comment and he was responding to me.

 

[jnc]

Oh man... where to start on this post?

How many USB devices do you wish to plug into your portable computer? seeing as you already have a webcam, keyboard and mouse built in. I can think of printer, camera, iPod, tablet, maybe some USB speakers... but then if you're using all of those, it's not exactly mobile and you can live with a hub.

Tell me where 4 or 5 USB ports and a media card reader have a place to go on a MacBook, even the 17 inch MBP can't physically accomodate more tnan 3 with its enclosure!

How much ram is in your MacBook? Can you really moan about slowness or are your expectations too high and your RAM too low?

I know every time I get a Mac, there are certain FREE apps I make sure to download straight away - Apple might include alternatives "out of the box", but I know I don't like them, so I simply don't use them rather can complain. I mean, you clearly have the Internet!

So much wrong with this post I'm amazed...

 

[iW00t]

You can try getting a T3Hub from Dr Bott. It matches the Macbook so well man!

As for your complaint about DVD Player... yeah... DVD Player really sucks. First the region locking ****. And trying to skip FBI messages = Not Permitted?! WTF?! I paid for the computer, not the media cartels who Apple is babysitting for.

It is ridiculous.

Cyberlink DVD Player wins anything Apple hands down. Too bad it runs only on Windows, the same OS that runs the entire world's applications.

 

[XP Defector]

MacBook, overall it is an excellent computer though I've found with mine that there are a few things that undermine it.

Poor build quality:-

Feels quite delicate, scratches quite easily and I've discovered the inner matt casing is already coming apart from the shiney outer case. I suspect Apple under estimated the strengh of the magnets they implimented as an alternative to the common latch on notebooks.

I've also noticed the Trackpad is misbehaving quite frequently as of late, not to mention somethings happened to the trackpad button. It's difficult to describe but it's as though somethings come loose and it 'double clicks' when you press it, really annoying, feels cheap.

Could have done with another USB port, but that's not a major issue.

Positives:-

Great design, looks beautiful.

Incredible screen (I'm using glossy), if I use a high-res picture as my desktop, looks pracitcally like a photo.

I thought the keyboard looked funny at first, but it's really grown on me. Easy to clean between the keys, but would have nice to have seen a back lit feature (would be seriously cool if the whole thing lit up green like the caps lock etc).

Great wireless range.

OSX (OF course it is not perfect, but its close and I've swore by Windows since 1.3)

 

[eXan]

1. Apple DVD Player
You cant skip to the part of the video that you want to go to, you have to hold the
there's no bar on the bottom where you can just move the tracker to the part of the video you want go to.
Apple DVD player doesn't have the controls you need.

This annoys me as well when I have to watch a DVD on my computer, but I watch 99.9% of DVDs on my DVD player hooked up to amazing speakers with huge subwoofer and 32" TV, so this isnt really an issue.

the built in isight is .3 mega pixels (i phone i sight is 2mp)

Why do you need more than 640x480 picture frame for video chat?

You are also saying that the quality in video chats is terrible. I'm sure this is because of your (or the one you chat with) slow internet.

ok from apple.com/getamac
1. it just works..... not true. my macbook doesn't work any better than any hp that i've ever had, i've rebooted, i've force quit, its not compatible with some things...

Of course its not compatible with .exe

I've forgot the last time I had to reboot my Mac because it crashed. Probably it was a couple of times on my previous Mac, but not on this one (its over 1.5 years old now)

You can have iPhoto not save photos three times; just set it to leave the organization to you. But you lose the ability to change the photo back from the way you edited it. There is an application (iPhoto Diet) that will let you slim down your library, but 3 is the minimum workable number of images in my opinion:
(1) original
(1) thumbnail
and (1) changed version.

iPhoto doesnt have the best approach to solving this duplicate image issue. Aperture is far superior in this way - it saves only changes you made to a photo, so it weights almost nothing.

 

[dextertangocci]

I LOVE my MB. I can't live without it

 

[timswim78]

I really like my MB, but yes Apple does have some flaws in their applications.

Personally, I agree with you that iPhoto is not the best program. Perhaps if we keep asking, Google will port Picasa over to OS X. They've already done it for the linux geeks.

 

[iJawn108]

I have a black book, I love it. i need more ram, but its wonderful.

 

[breakfastcrew]

I guess it is perfect when it works but crappier than windows when it doesn't cause nobody knows how to fix it.

 

[aristobrat]

Very few people annoy me on this board the ways you do.

I agree. If you look at the number of threads he's started on pretty much this same topic, and that in each thread he's given the same advice, it becomes pretty apparent that he's not looking for solutions.

He apparently was told that Macs were great for audio/visual stuff, but because OS X and iLife doesn't always work out when he tries to use his Windows workflow (i.e. when you upload a a photo, you dig through the hard drive to find the file vs. dragging the photo from iPhoto to the browser's upload window and letting iPhoto fill in the path for you), he seems to feel that all of the advertising about Macs is crap.

He's not open to the idea that he might try doing things different in OS X than he does in Windows, and in his "I hate how iPhoto handles files" thread, he keeps bashing it against Vista, when the Photo Manager in Vista does almost all of the very things he's complaining about in iPhoto.

All I know is that he has an HP with Vista coming soon, and for me, it couldn't come soon enough.

I've never used the control panel here to block a MacRumors member before, but I think stevento will be the first.

 

[After G]

This annoys me as well when I have to watch a DVD on my computer, but I watch 99.9% of DVDs on my DVD player hooked up to amazing speakers with huge subwoofer and 32" TV, so this isnt really an issue.

iPhoto doesn't have the best approach to solving this duplicate image issue. Aperture is far superior in this way - it saves only changes you made to a photo, so it weights almost nothing.

How does your DVD player work? My only real complaint about DVD Player is the fast forward and rewind which do not behave like I want (hold the button down to go faster, let go to stop). Don't really need a scrub bar unless the chapter sequencing is not up to par.

I actually like the iPhoto way since you have a whole image file with changes and not a "changes only" file. Pictures don't take up that much space where you need to conserve every single bit. And "changes only" files tend to be useless without the originals and hard to use in other applications. That said, how does Aperture do thumbnails?

Hardware issues ... build quality on Macbooks - I've seen the "separation" problem in stores and the trackpads on Mac consumer laptops have been bad since the iBook.

All I know is that he has an HP with Vista coming soon, and for me, it couldn't come soon enough.

If he's not using his Apple, can I have it for free?

 

[dizastor]

I wouldn't buy any mac that had a 5 in 1 cardreader in it. Although I imagine when Steve leaves we may see some garbage like that soon after.

With that, my biggest complains with my Black MacBook are:

1) Fingerprints (I'm constantly wiping it down as if it were some sort of antique car)
2) Ethernet Port Dead - It's still under warranty, but my ethernet port is fubar. Apparently it's a common problem. I've been using the airport and firewire networking to compensate, so I haven't "brought it in" yet to be fixed.

The glossy screen rocks btw.

 

[valdore]

With that, my biggest complains with my Black MacBook are:

1) Fingerprints (I'm constantly wiping it down as if it were some sort of antique car)

It's probably even worse with the white macbook. I've got to scour it with a 409 anointed paper towel frequently to get rid of all the crap that sticks to it.

 

[After G]

I wouldn't buy any mac that had a 5 in 1 cardreader in it. Although I imagine when Steve leaves we may see some garbage like that soon after.

With that, my biggest complains with my Black MacBook are:

1) Fingerprints (I'm constantly wiping it down as if it were some sort of antique car)
2) Ethernet Port Dead - It's still under warranty, but my ethernet port is fubar. Apparently it's a common problem. I've been using the airport and firewire networking to compensate, so I haven't "brought it in" yet to be fixed.

The glossy screen rocks btw.

Can speak for the fingerprints. The shiny sample blackbooks in the Apple stores are gross.

 

[holamiamigos]

I LOVE my MB. I can't live without it

same here too!!

and i thought this thread was gona be about rating the macbook out of 10 lol... welll i'll give it a 10 anyway

 

[Abstract]

With the exception of DVD Player, I don't hear a real complaint in this entire thread. I'm not even talking about the region locking stuff with DVD Player (which isn't Apple's fault or choice), but the overall functionality.

The rest of it isn't worth responding to.

 

[eXan]

How does your DVD player work? My only real complaint about DVD Player is the fast forward and rewind which do not behave like I want (hold the button down to go faster, let go to stop). Don't really need a scrub bar unless the chapter sequencing is not up to par.

I actually like the iPhoto way since you have a whole image file with changes and not a "changes only" file. Pictures don't take up that much space where you need to conserve every single bit. And "changes only" files tend to be useless without the originals and hard to use in other applications. That said, how does Aperture do thumbnails?

Hardware issues ... build quality on Macbooks - I've seen the "separation" problem in stores and the trackpads on Mac consumer laptops have been bad since the iBook.

If he's not using his Apple, can I have it for free?

My only complain about the DVD Player is fast forward/rewind issue.

Aperture has a much more effective way of working with multiple versions of photos and there's no way to access those "changes files", other than manually openning Aperture Library's package contents. If you need a particular image version, you just export that version from Aperture. And no, images aren't that small - 40+ MBs per pic.

I dont really know how Aperture works with thumbnails, I think it creates and stores them as separate images inside it's library.

 

[stevento]

I agree. If you look at the number of threads he's started on pretty much this same topic, and that in each thread he's given the same advice, it becomes pretty apparent that he's not looking for solutions.

I was looking for a solution... then I found Vista.
There's no solution to the things i dont like about the macbook other than to rewrite the software of iLife to do things differently.
or to switch back to Windows.
I was wondering if macs are so much safer and more reliable, then why is everyone buying PCs?
then i got a macbook...
hey, live and learn.

what i'm wondering (and why i came to this board) is how many people like the macbook for what it is and how many people like the macbook just because apple made it.

sorry if there's one person on this board who's not head over heals in love with apple.

 

[Reel1]

I have been a pc user for many many years. On these PCS I have run Windows/Windows 3.1/Windows 95/OS2 Warp/Windows XP Pro and Home/RedHat/Mandrake/Slack/Suse/Beta Vista.

I purchased my iMac in October, and found OSX to be much more stable and user friendly then any other OS I have tried, as well when I want/need to run something in Windows I start up Parallels and run it.

I have been so happy with my iMac that I purchased a MacBook (didnt think i needed the MBP due to having an iMac), like the iMac if I need to run windows I do. Whats interesting is that I use Windows less and less each week.

 

[e12a]

the .3 isight isn't meant for use as a point-and-shoot camera...

it has better quality than a lot of webcams though.

 

[stevento]

Oh man... where to start on this post?

Tell me where 4 or 5 USB ports and a media card reader have a place to go on a MacBook, even the 17 inch MBP can't physically accomodate more tnan 3 with its enclosure! .

...hence my point that the macbook isn't that great.

How much ram is in your MacBook? Can you really moan about slowness or are your expectations too high and your RAM too low?

i paid extra for 1G to avoid the very problem.

oh yeah i have more improvement suggestions for the next gen
the magport has got to go. it never stays in.
another thing was that the speaker max volume is lacking (no woofers)... on a computer that is supposed to be a the best media machine out there

i'm not saying its a bad computer, its just not nearly what everyone wants to say it is.

I've been with mac since september. i gave it a chance. i even approached it with that "i'm awesome becuase i use mac" pompus attitude, expecting to be able to laugh at Dell computers... but those $700 inspirions are blowing my speakers away and their power cords actually stay with the computer when you move it.