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News & Opinion
Western Digital Preparing 2 TB 2.5" Drive
Fudzilla's Peter Scott reports that Western Digital is apparently
gearing up to introduce the world's first 2.5" 2 TB drive.
The rumored new drive is set to debut in a Western Digital My
Passport Studio chassis oriented toward Mac users, featuring an
all-metal design and preformatted for the Mac by default. Scott notes
that sadly it doesn't feature USB 3.0, but does have two FireWire 800
ports.
However, Scott observes that the real takeaway here is that 2 TB
drives in 2.5" format are apparently just around the corner and could
be implemented in other products soon.
Link: Western Digital
Readies 2.5-inch 2 TB Drive
Western Digital About to Launch 2 TB 2.5" Hard
Drive, but Will It Fit Into MacBooks?
However, if you're Jonesing for a 2 GB internal drive for your
MacBook Pro, note that riffing on the Fudzilla report, Hardmac's Lionel
recalls that in July 2009 Western Digital was the first manufacturer to
launch a 1 TB 2.5" hard drive featuring three platters of 333 GB
each. It took nearly two years to put that same capacity on only two
patters of 500 GB each in order to reduce the thickness of the disk
from 12.5 mm down to 9.5 mm.
Link: Western Digital
Would Be About to Launch a 2 TB 2.5" Hard Drive
'Apple Shock' Reconstructing the IT Industry
DigiTimes Research's Joanne Chien says that Apple, with its success
with the iPad and second-generation MacBook Air, started its assaults
on the Wintel-related PC industry in 2010 and is gradually taking back
its position in the PC market.
Apple's impact, identified by Ms. Chien, senior analyst at DigiTimes
Research, as "Apple Shock", and has expanded along with the global
economic downturn, sending waves across the PC industry and causing a
reconstruction in all areas from market scale, brand operation, and
supply chain structure.
Chien's analysis identifies three major effects that Apple Shock has
had on the PC market.
- First, combined shipments of Apple's notebooks and tablet PCs have
surpassed all the other brand vendors in the global mobile computing
device market (notebooks plus tablet PCs) in 2011.
- Second is Apple Shock's impact on the notebook market. The
appearance of tablet PCs has quickly bitten off demand for devices that
are pushed mainly for Internet surfing, while the process has also
accelerated the notebook industry's transition into the early stage of
the mature phase. With the additional impact from the economic
downturn, global notebook shipments, for the first time, will suffer a
year-over-year drop in 2011 of approximately 0.3%.
- Third is the affect to the Wintel structure, PC brands and related
supply chain. Seeing weak performance, players within these industries
are working aggressively to transform in order to fight together
against their common enemy, Apple, Chien noted.
Link: 'Apple
Shock' Reconstructing the IT Industry (subscription required)
Steve Jobs to Shape PC Laptop Future for Years to
Come
Cnet's Brooke Crothers predicts that Steve Jobs' imprint on PC
laptop design in 2012 and beyond will continue to loom large.
Crothers notes that Apple introduced the MacBook Air in January 2008, a
groundbreaking design bearing most of the attributes of the PC
"Ultrabook" laptops expected to flood the market in 2012.
He cites highlights of Jobs' MacBook Air presentation in January
2008:
- "Instant-on the minute you open it up"
- "Generous trackpad"
- Multitouch gesture support
- Solid-state drive
- Under 0.8" thick
- Aluminum chassis
- About 3 pounds
Crothers observes that those characteristics are essentially the
same specifications Intel and the PC industry are building into their
much-ballyhooed Ultrabooks, which are expected to hit the market in
volume in 2012.
Link: Apple's Jobs
Still Shapes PC Laptop Future
Get the Most Out of Your MacBook's Battery
MacFixIt's Topher Kessler says that Apple's batteries should last
well into five years of service, but over time you can expect a
battery's capacity to diminish gradually. However, there things you can
do to help maximize both the battery's longevity in addition to the
available time on a given charge.
Link: Get the Most Out
of Your MacBook's Battery
Reviews
13" Early 2011 MacBook Pro 'Still Offers the Most
Power and Expandability for Your Money'
512 Pixels blogger Stephen M. Hackett has posted a review of the
Early 2011 13"
MacBook Pro, noting that in 2009, when he was managing an Apple
Authorized Service Provider, he picked up a 13" MacBook Pro as a work
machine and closed his review of it with this comment:
"Over the years, I've used a Clamshell iBook G3, a PowerBook Pismo G3, a Titanium PowerBook, both a
12- and 15-inch aluminum PowerBook, two
pre-unibody MacBook Pros and a black MacBook.
"I'm confident in saying this machine smokes them all and is finally
a decent replacement for the 12-inch PowerBook. Simply put, Apple is
shipping the best notebooks they've ever built, and you're not going to
find a better machine out there for $1,199."
However, with the MacBook Air having transitioned from an
overpriced, underpowered notebook to the crown jewel of Apple's
notebook line, Hackett notes that the 13" MacBook Pro's future is in
question. Nevertheless, he says he recently upgraded his work machine
from a Core 2 Duo 15" MacBook Pro to the new i7 13" MacBook Pro.
His overview take is that this little MacBook Pro is insanely fast,
feeling as quick as a MacBook Air, just with lots of ports and a
SuperDrive, but all that power comes with a drawback - to wit: under
load, this MacBook Pro runs loud and hot, but it still offers the most
power and expandability for your money that you can get in any compact
Apple notebook.
Link: Review: The MacBook Pro
(13-inch, Early 2011)
Apple Updates
MacBook Pro: About Automatic Graphics Switching and
OpenGL Applications
A new Apple Knowledge Base article says:
You may notice your battery life seems decreased while certain
applications are running, even when you have enabled the "Automatic
graphics switching" option in the Energy Saver preferences.
Products Affected: MacBook Pro (17-inch,
Early 2011), MacBook Pro (15-inch,
Early 2011), MacBook Pro (17-inch, Mid
2010), MacBook
Pro (15-inch, Mid 2010)
Resolution
On Mac computers that support automatic graphics switching between
two graphics processors, some software using OpenGL technology may
engage the discrete, higher performance graphics automatically. For
best battery performance, consider closing OpenGL-based applications
when you finish using them.
Examples of OpenGL applications include Google Chrome version 13 and
Firefox web browsers version 4.x-6.0, Graban application used for
capturing screenshots, and some iLife and iWork applications, such as
iPhoto, iMovie, and Keynote.
Utilities with the ability to force the use of either the integrated
or discrete graphics may not always allow for better battery life and
are not recommend by Apple.
Link: MacBook Pro: About Automatic
Graphics Switching and OpenGL Applications
Tech Trends
Acer S3 Ultrabook Cracks $1000 Barrier
IDG News Agam Shah reports that Acer has shipped its Aspire S3
Ultrabook starting at $899, becoming the first Ultrabook to crack the
$1,000 price barrier in Intel's new category of thin and light laptops,
and undercutting the cheapest 11.6" MacBook Air by $100.
The Acer Aspire S3 ultrabook has the customary 13.3" screen, is
0.51" (1.30 cm) thick, weighs 2.98 pounds (1.35 kg), has an Intel Core
i5 processor, a 20 GB solid-state drive, and a 320 GB hard drive.
One reason Acer has been able to beat the base MacBook Air price is
by having its primary storage in hard drive media, with the little 20
GB SSD acting more as an auxiliary cache, although variants with SSD
for primary storage are projected for future release according to an
Acer spokeswoman.
Link: Acer's S3
Ultrabook Cracks $1000 Barrier
Acer Aspire S3 Ultrabook 'Cuts Too Many
Corners'
Laptop Mag's Michael A. Prospero reports that The Acer's new Aspire
S3 Ultrabook costs a lot less than the 13" MacBook Air but cuts too
many corners to make it worthwhile.
The 13" Ultrabook channels the MacBook Air's aesthetic with a
brushed aluminum lid, 3 pound weight, and half-inch thick chassis, and,
at $899, it's $100 to $300 less expensive than the Air, but are the
tradeoffs worth it?
Prospero observes that Acer had to make sacrifices to keep its price
low - no unibody designs here with the computer's the underside and
deck made of a silver-colored plastic masquerading as a unibody design
even though it is not, and there's no SSD either.
He says that heat dissipation is efficient and the S3's island-style
(most people call it chiclet style - ed) keyboard isn't the worst he's
ever used, but it was a bit stiff with a tendency to misfire, as did
the "mushy" trackpad. The S3's low-quality 13.3" 1366 x 768-pixel
display was particularly underwhelming, and battery life was
miserable.
Link: Acer Aspire S3
Ultrabook Review
Intel Wants to Put 'Retina' Displays in
Ultrabooks
Hardmac's Lionel notes that Intel is trying to impose Ultrabooks as
a new industry standard, and reports that the chipmaker is apparently
thinking about specifying "Retina" displays for Ultrabooks, ergo:
displays with such a high resolution that human eyes can't see the
pixels a la the iPhone's display.
Lionel says Intel is hoping to have 13" displays with the same 2560
x 1440 pixel resolution as the current 27" iMac. However, there are several
problems that will have to be solved before such displays can be
marketed - not least being the challenges of mass producing screens
displaying 3.5 million pixels at a reasonable price while keeping their
power demand within reasonable parameters.
Editor's note: It seems that Intel can't quite make up its mind. It
wants Ultrabooks
to have at least five hours of battery life, use SSDs instead of hard
drives, use Intel CULV processors, and sell for under $1,000. Of eight
Ultrabooks listed in the Wikipedia article, a 13.3" 1366 x 768 display,
128 GB SSD, and 1.6-1.7 GHz Core i5 processor are typical features -
and that's already $100 to $300 over Intel's target price. Adding the
cost of a 2560 x 1440 display is going to make it even harder to hit
the $1,000 price point. (Besides which, if such high resolution
displays do become affordable, you can pretty much bet on Apple
monopolizing the market, as it's already done with SSDs and aluminum
unibody construction.) dk
Link: Intel Wants to Put
'Retina' Displays in Ultrabooks
Retina Quality 13.3" 2560 x 1600 Panels Speculated
for Ivy Bridge Ultrabooks
VR-Zone's Nebojsa Novakovic reports that with 2560 x 1400 "retina"
displays expected on Ivy Bridge Ultrabooks next year, even the rumored
2048 x 1536 iPad 3 may not maintain the portable hi-res lead for
long.
Novakovic notes that during the past month's Intel Developer Forum
(IDF), beautiful slim Ultrabooks on the show floor had typically a 13",
1366 x 768 "HD ready" display, which would pale by comparison with a
9.7" iPad 3 2048 x 1536 display that would feature not only three
times the pixel count, but also much more useful 4:3 aspect ratio.
Enter "retina quality" Ultrabooks. Novakovic says that by early next
year, when Ivy Bridge Ultrabook models arrive, we can expect to see
2560 x 1440 13.3" displays just some 3 mm thick.
Link: From IDF: Retina
Quality 2560 x 1600 HD Panels on Ivy Bridge Ultrabooks
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