Talkback
E-mail
Printer Friendly
Reprints
The keyboard is springy, and the keys are firmly fastened; there's no hint of a clatter when you sweep your fingers across the keys. Apple successfully redesigned the trackpad to eliminate feedback from palms rested on either side. Past users of Mac widescreen notebooks have complained about the display hinge. Apple addressed that issue definitively. The display holds firm at any angle, even when you give your machine a good forward and back shake. I will note, however, that the display doesn't tip back as far as previous Mac notebooks.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
New and improved
I had bad luck with the build quality of two MacBook Pro models before this one, primarily related to the keyboard, the trackpad,
and the battery. The preceding MacBook Pro, Apple's first Core 2 Duo model, was most un-Apple-like in its construction, arriving
with problems and showing extraordinary signs of wear after no more hardship or usage than this MacBook Pro has endured. Even the battery died an early death. I'm pleased to report that the MacBook Pro that Apple is selling now is built right, and Apple replaced users' faulty batteries
for free.
Apple doesn't talk about the things it changes from model to model, but I'm an ergonomics wonk, and this keyboard is a massive improvement over the Core 2 Duo MacBook Pro that I evaluated prior to this. The feather touch action is gone; Santa Rosa MacBook Pro's keys need a good whack to make contact. Even after a few months, I occasionally skip characters for not hitting the key hard enough. But that's a trade-off I'm willing to make in exchange for rattling keys that pop off.
The MacBook Pro's keyboard backlighting is ideal, illuminating only the legends and not the rest of the key or the key bed. You realize the ergonomic necessity of a backlit keyboard once you have it (imagine your cell phone without it), and I've seen no other notebook or add-on keyboard that gets it right. The key legends won't wear off with use because they're not printed on the key. They go through the key.
Top speed
No one on the planet can feel a 200MHz difference in CPU clocked at over 2GHz, so I wasn't floored by the goose from 2.2GHz
to 2.4GHz when I upgraded to the Santa Rosa MacBook Pro. What I did feel, and quite dramatically, is a drop in performance
for the loss of 1GB of RAM. I forget sometimes that the best way to speed up a machine is to add RAM, and the best way to
slow it down is to take it away. The standard 2GB is sufficient, and many Mac users are accustomed to running with a quarter
of that. If you want more RAM, configure it into your purchase. Otherwise, you'll end up throwing away one of the two standard
1GB SO-DIMMs to make room for a 2GB replacement.
