It’s the day after Thanksgiving and that means Black Friday sales in the US. We’re already hearing that parking spaces outside US malls are full up – and it’s only just gone 4am on the east coast – so if it’s cut-price Apple tech you’re after then why not do your shopping online? As is somewhat traditional by now, Apple have discounts across various parts of their store today: save just over $100 on a new iMac, for instance, or the same off a MacBook Pro.
Apple may have told us that the new MacBook, Mac mini and iMac updates finalize their holiday 2009 line-up, but that doesn’t mean they’re not thinking ahead. Digging through the configuration files in the 10.6.2 update of OS X 10C531, Spanish site Applesana.es have spotted two references to new MacBook Pro notebooks, and believe that they might bring with them quadcore processors and ATI Radeon 4500-series graphics.
I used to be a total Macintosh user; however, over time, various places I worked depended on Microsoft Windows and other MSFT technologies so that I was forced to use Windows for much of what I do. I still kept using a Mac, mostly for creative work and where business use allowed, but I had to have Windows in my life. Over the last few years, Apple has created a new line of machines that more closely match my laptop needs and have made a lot of changes to their core platform OS X. The result is a combination that makes for a very compelling argument to use Macintosh full time.
We’ve heard from TwelveSouth before, and so we figured we should keep our eyes on these crazy designers. Looks like it paid off. Much like the first iteration of their crafty designs we saw, the BookArc is meant to keep your desk nice and tidy. And let’s face it, you probably need it. But unlike the BackPack, the BookArc is meant for bigger and better things: your Macbook.
Apple have delivered on what must be one of the most-requested options for their MacBook Pro range, and made an antiglare display available for the 15-inch model. Priced at $50, the option keeps the 1,440 x 900 resolution and LED backlighting, but does mean you lose the borderless panel.
Apple have announced their Q3 2009 financial results, and as you might expect they’re continuing to buck the economic trend. The Cupertino company described the last quarter as their best non-holiday quarter for revenue and earnings, marking revenue of $8.34 billion and profits of $1.23 billion. Sales figures were also healthy, with 2.6m Mac computers sold during the three month period – up 4-percent over the same quarter last year – and 5.2m iPhones sold, up 626-percent from last year.
At the other end of the scale from ASUS’ new Eee PC colors comes an admittedly more-tempting prospect: ColorWare’s Stealth MacBook Pro. Taking a 15-inch 3.06GHz MacBook Pro as its base, the ink-wielders then throw their own soft-touch “zero gloss” finish at the unibody casing, and finish off the display with a matte coating.
We’re over the surprise of seeing new MacBook Pro models arrive at Apple’s WWDC keynote, and on paper the new 13- and 15-inch notebooks certainly tick most of the consumer boxes. Our first-impressions – which you can find with our video unboxing – were that the new Pros have emphasized the most-used functionality at the expense of dropping some of the more marginally used features. Have those opinions changed? Check out our full review after the cut.
The recently-released MacBook Pro firmware that promises to enable 3.0Gbps SATA connectivity has ironically been causing problems in third-party drives. Apple released the upgrade earlier this week, after users of the new 13- and 15-inch MacBook Pro models reported that the notebooks were limited to 1.5Gbps SATA; this did not affect the speed of standard-fit hard-drives, but may have limited future performance should the user upgrade to a faster HDD or SSD. Now, some users with third-party drives already installed are reporting frequent pauses, usage spikes and data errors with the new firmware.
Apple have released a firmware update for their latest MacBook Pro notebooks that fully enables their SATA 3.0 Gbps interface. The move comes in response to vocal complaints from MacBook Pro 13- and 15-inch buyers who discovered Apple had seemingly limited their new unibody machines to the older 1.5 Gbps SATA. However the company has distanced itself from drives that actually use the faster interface, reminding users that “Apple has not qualified or offered these drives for Mac notebooks and their use is unsupported.”
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