Comments on: lazyweb: macbook or macbook pro for aperture use?

By: Paul R. Pival

Paul R. Pival — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 04:30:39 +0000

D'Arcy, I happened across this thread tonight on the same issue - seems performance on the MacBook would be fine...

By: dnorman

dnorman — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 04:02:03 +0000

cool. I think it’s settled. I’ll visit the Apple Store to see if Aperture on a MB makes me itch, and if not, that’s what it’ll be. thanks, all.

By: David Esrati

David Esrati — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 01:44:54 +0000

D’Arcy- I’m a big fan of the MacBook for portability- and connect it to a desktop monitor when needed for “real work”
Put the money into extra RAM- bigger HD (both easy to upgrade on your own).
I seriously question the lack of firewire in the new models- the only big question is do lighted keys make your nights?
I wish Apple would stop trying to force people into bigger machines- or the Mini.
They need to keep full features- in a small machine.

By: dnorman

dnorman — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 15:48:44 +0000

oh, wow. I hadn’t realized that the displays were dithered. that sucks! does it appear as grain? I mean, would I be fighting high ISO noise in Aperture, only to realize it was a 6 bit dithering? guess I’ll have to visit the Apple Store to see if I can play with Aperture on the MacBook and MBP (and Cinema Display) to compare displays…

By: Micheal J.

Micheal J. — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 07:33:23 +0000

Personally I would highly recommend the MacBook Pro – while the screens aren’t as colour accurate as a real external matte LCD I have noticed the MacBook Pro LCDs generally look better than the MacBook LCDs (at least at the Apple Store and ones I’ve seen around town).

That said thankfully the whole Glossy / Matte issue has become much less of an issue with a much more even and dependable backlight (LED) on the new MacBooks/MacBook Pros. I’m currently using an older MBP (work provided) and really miss my LED screen I had on the MBP I personally owned before it. (Work one is a generation older).

All that said if you plan on doing your editing on a second monitor it’s highly recommended as both the current MacBook and MacBook Pro use 6-bit LCDs – meaning they have to dither in order to display millions of colours. From my own experience the MBP seems to do a better job at dithering so it’s not noticeable compared to the MacBook.

The new 24″ LED Cinema Display (if you were inclined to obtain that) does display 16.7 million colours (8-bit LCD). As far as I can gather Apple started putting 6-bit LCDs into all their notebooks because of cost and the lack of power conservative 8-bit LCDs, hence the “… display with support for millions of colors” instead of “Display colors (maximum): 16.7 million” on the technical specification pages.

By: dnorman

dnorman — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 06:04:12 +0000

ah, and my bad. it’s not $1000 difference. it’s only $600. Still, that’s a lot of moolah…

By: dnorman

dnorman — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 05:59:04 +0000

thanks, king! I’d been leaning toward setting up a desktop at home, since it’ll be the main/only system there for awhile. but now I’m thinking even the lowly macbook will have more guts than the system I’m using now, so there shouldn’t be much of a problem. I mean, of course the other systems will be faster than the macbook, but it’ll be faster than what I’m used to, and possibly fast enough… hmmmm…

By: King Chung Huang

King Chung Huang — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 05:52:45 +0000

Personally, I’d go with the MacBook for portability. But, only because I have permanent desktops both at home and at work. Other than the obvious speed and screen size advantages of the MacBook Pro, the only thing you’d really be missing is FireWire, which would be handy if you shoot in RAW on the >15 megapixel SLRs and use the high speed cards and readers!