Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2009/08/11
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]2009-08-11-15:28:06 Mark Rabiner: > Any thoughts on what I need on configuration as a photographer and guy > named > Mark Rabiner?? > Do I really need a faster thing or is the slower ones just fine? Compared to the G4 you're used to, they're all insanely fast. You'll like it. The higher clock speeds come at pretty high dollar deltas, and are unlikely to be worth it to you. One potential exception to that is -- note that some of the available CPUs: http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/specs.html ...have 6MB of cache instead of 3MB. A difference in available screaming-fast on-chip cache like that can make a more significant difference in overall snappiness than just the clock-speed bump alone might make you expect. So... if I were shopping, say, for a 15-incher, I'd try to see if my laptop dollar could stretch to the 2.8GHz model. But I'd skip paying extra for the additional bump to 3.06GHz. Obviously, for editing photos, the bigger the screen the better. A 15-inch would seem on the teensy side to me, but I'm spoiled. If the 17-incher is two expensive or seems too unwieldy, the 15-inch might be a sweet spot. The 13-inch seems for if you're carrying it around all the time, and not spending much time actually working on it. And you can get the big-cache CPU in the 15, and you get the two(!) selectable graphics subsystems: the slower one which might not kill your battery right away, and the faster one for when you're plugged in the wall. I have no personal experience with that setup, but note that with every MacOS release, they figure out how to move more of the machine's work onto the graphics controller. So a speedy one of those isn't just for games anymore, Skippy. Expect the trend to continue with Snow Leopard. When it comes to memory, you can scrape by with 2G, but 4G is a very comfy place to run big hungry apps like Photoshop. Apple's memory upgrade prices are usually completely ridiculous, but 4G is the base configuration for the 15-inch MacBook. 8G is harder to justify, and you definitely wouldn't buy it from Apple, anyway -- you'd upgrade later at market prices. A big reason laptops often feel slower than "real" computers is the slow hard disks. You might be able to ameliorate that problem by getting a 7200 rpm disk instead of the stock 5400 rpm disk which comes in the 15-inch/2.8. And if, as you say, you don't need vast tracts of land, you can order the 320G 7200 instead of the stock 500G 5400 and actually *save* 50 bucks. Woo hoo! There's a chance that a 7200 will make the machine run hotter or make a more annoying whining sound. There's also the solid-state disk option. No moving parts to make noise or break, either over time or when you drop the machine. Really fast read speeds, still darned fast write speeds. Low power consumption. An eventual limit on how many writes the device can take, but possibly not one you'll hit in practice. Kind of magical, actually. Still relatively new, still expensive (especially at Apple prices, and especially for something bigger than 128G -- but you don't think you need much space, right?) Did I mention magical? But maybe not this year, maybe not with your budget. The glossy screens seem to allow you to display photos with truer, blacker blacks, but at the cost of reflecting back more distracting images of you and your room, depending on the lighting. The matte screens, vice versa. -Jeff