Should I wait to buy a MBP?

I was planning on buying a MBP this week, but I have seen some threads saying a new version is on the way?

Is it just internal upgrades or a design change as-well?

Sorry if this has been asked before

 

No one knows when the next version will be released. No one knows if there will be design changes.

There are rumors that the update may be in Spring. Or maybe summer. Or fall.

 

While no one knows for sure, it is very very likely there will be a design change this go round.

 

If I require a machine/mbp and if it would hurt my productivity by waiting for a newer release, then I would buy today. I have to tell myself to ignore any "buyers remorse" incase a newer model appears immediately or shortly after I buy a new computer.

If you already have a working solution using a current computer and if that can keep you productive until the next release, then I would wait.

Of course, if it is a radical design change then I have to wonder if they will have all the bugs worked out in the first release... so I would "try" to watch and wait to see how the new release is received before putting my money down.

But then again, if I must have a new machine in order to stay productive then I'd go ahead and purchase the current mbp.

 

Ivy Bridge is very possible, and that would be a nice incremental upgrade.

The big rumor, which I think is too early, is they will try to go Retina in the MacBook Pros. I could see this in the 13" and maybe 15" in another generation but now seems too soon.

Apple likely *wants* to go Retina in the 17" because they are currently the only laptop maker left with a 1920x1200 17" panel, and as such I'm sure they pay a premium on the stock. To go Retina would give them a convenient excuse to switch to 16:9, likely a 17.3" panel like everyone else just with a much higher resolution. That would require a total redesign to accommodate that panel.

 

What's with all of the high resolution and retina talk? Seriously, none of that happened until Apple released the iPhone 4. Now everything with a display, whether it comes from Apple or not, has to be some type of qHD this or retina that. People weren't that concerned with having such insanely high resolutions until Apple packed it into the iPhone 4. Now with the iPad 3 out of the way, the retina rumors keep hovering around Apple's cinema display, the iMac, MBA, and MBP line. Those rumors had been around for a while but now the attention has really shifted towards their computers since the iPad was the last remaining hot iDevice that had to be upgraded.

 

we used to get excited over 2048x1560 in the old r50p / t60 15" series thinkpads in 06/07

 

Sony has had HD in a 13 inch laptop for several years now.

I have a 15 inch Dell Inspiron 8500 with 1920x1200 resolution. Unfortunately it also comes with a Pentium 4 which makes it suitable for cooking breakfast.

I'd like 1920x1200 in a 15 inch MBP - that would get me to upgrade my 4+ years old 17 inch MBP. Quad resolution would work too.

 

Retina in a Mac won't work unless OSX 10.8 gets resolution independence like the iPads and iPhones.... or else everything will be super tiny.

 

iPhones and iPads don't really have (complete) resolution independence... they just have "HiDPI mode" that works with 2 specific resolutions. The rumor mill is suggesting that a similar method might be used with upcoming macbook pro models. It would make the implementation relatively easy if you just double the resolution in both directions for all screen sizes, turn on HiDPI mode so that everything is rendered like it is currently, and ignore the fact that images aren't being rendered at the same size on different laptops (which is already the case anyway).

People have always complained about not having enough resolution, they're just freaking out now that it's somewhere on the horizon.

 

It just seems like the tech enthusiasts and "nerds" were mainly the crowds always wanting higher resolution monitors. Now every tech site under the Sun keeps talking about retina this or high resolution that. To me, it just seems like they are trying to cash in on this craze that will eventually die down. I know high resolution displays have been around for a long time (I have an old 17" CRT monitor that has a higher resolution than my current HDTV yet the monitor was from 2001) but it seems like they are just now starting to get mainstream attention and it didn't really start until 2010 when the iPhone 4 came out.

Now everyone wants a "retina" display on everything whether it is really required or not.

 

It'll definitely die down once all the displays adopt high resolution panels, resolution independence becomes the norm, and resolution shifts towards the domain of solved problems.

Computers don't advertise "uses transistors instead of vacuum tubes" just because it's not relevant. Same thing with retina displays. It'll be interesting and a topic of discussion until it's no longer relevant.

The only downside of a retina display from a hardware perspective is an increase in energy consumption and cost, and those are precisely the types of issues which resolve themselves with time.

From a software perspective, there can be some complexity, which Apple has sort of side-stepped in their implementations so far, but this will also resolve itself with time.

 

Some of us would benefit in our professional work from higher-resolution displays. In software development, it's nice to be able to see more lines of code or display multiple software modules at the same time. It's also nice to be able to look at reference materials at the same time. I use a Windows desktop at home and office with three 20-24 inch monitors along with my 17 inch MacBook Pro.

I use a 17 inch MBP when remote but I'd love to get the weight and size down a few pounds and inches and a 15 inch would be quite nice. One of my co-workers has a Sony Vaio Z for working remotely and that's HD in 13 inches.

 

> The only downside of a retina display from a hardware perspective is an
> increase in energy consumption and cost, and those are precisely the
> types of issues which resolve themselves with time.

Ivy Bridge integrated graphics supports 4096x4096 resolution so hopefully quad-res can run with pretty good battery life. It should get better over time with further process shrinks unless they crank up the performance but hopefully performance will be selectable in the future.

 

I really meant the display technology itself, but you are correct and that is another contributing factor.

 

any of you given thought to the all the rumors and speculation stating they will thin out the 15" and possibly the 17" like the air the memory will be soldered and how about the storage drive that might even be soldered on as well as the lack of ports, this will force people to even go deeper in there pockets due to the lack of "user upgradable parts " in these new thinner devices, which is going backwards imo.

I just made a move and got a great deal on a refurb 13" i5 and got a opti bay with it to move the existing 500GB drive and put a M4 128GB ssd in its place, if this is not possible in the next upcoming refreshes, I hate to say it but this would be my last apple laptop purchase.

 

No one knows if the rumors will pan out for the next revision, but in the long run I would venture to guess that all of those things will happen. Port count will decrease as wireless standards become the norm. Storage is already just chips on a board for the macbook air, this will almost certainly translate over to the macbook pro eventually.

If you're not able to tolerate those types of changes in the future, then you almost certainly won't be able to purchase future apple laptops. I agree with that.

 

I am in the market for a MBP but cant even consider shifting down to crap resolution offerings from apple giving that all my Dell laptops to date enjoyed 1920*1080 screen resolution.

I hope such resolutions will be available in their next release

To the OP ....If I were you I would hold out for the next release (which should probably be no longer than 6 months) if you can still continue using your current rig.

It looks that there are a lot of expectations on the next MBP so I for one am quite willing to play the waiting game co I am not ready to to spend so much money on something that will heavily depreciate within the year .....

css_jay99

 

If only those expectations had any correlation with reality, I might agree. As it stands, I would just refer you to the "buy it when you need it" mentality.

 

I can wait like 3 months until I need to purchase a notebook...Hopefully the new models will be out by then..
All these rumors about the new line being thinner than the MBA's..I doubt that

 

You have to take each rumor with a grain of salt as only a very small percentage of them happen to be true (and most are at the last minute right before an Apple announcement). The rumors have been wrong a countless number of times. If they were right, the iPad would have been released in 2007, an iPod touch with a hard drive in 2006, the 3G iPod touch would of had a camera, the 7G iPod nano would of had a camera, the iPad released in 2007 would have actually been a convertible MBP with stylus input, people would now be using a 4.5" iPhone 5 instead of the iPhone 4S, the iPad 3 actually would have been released in December and have the name of "iPad HD" and be for business/enterprise customers, and I can keep going on.

Most rumor mills tend to release a bunch of crap in the hopes that one of their statements actually sticks. I wouldn't be surprised if most of the rumors released are just conjecture made by one of the sites just to bring in more advertising clicks. Want to find out more information about a 15" MBA? Do a Google search and their site is at the top. You can also enjoy some more Google ads while browsing their site and a nice Flash video ad smack dab in the center of the article from a "super secret inside 100% accurate source."

3 months may or may not be enough time. However, if you are going to wait that long and nothing has come out by then, you might as well wait a little longer until something actually happens. Nobody knows for sure and Apple is an extremely hard company to predict. There were times when Steve Jobs would actually change things at the last minute just to throw everyone off. I don't know if Tim Cook would ever do that but it gives you a little taste of Apple's history.

 

If you actually need it in 3 months, then you won't be able to wait longer. Just buy it when you need it. If you don't actually need it in 3 months, then wait longer if you want. Still buy it when you need it.

 

Seconded. Given the difficulties in predicting the specs of Apple's new machines, waiting for a specific feature will likely leave you frustrated after the new models have appeared.

Also, it depends on how long you think you'll have to make do with your new machine. My MacBooks rarely last longer than about a year and a half or so - mainly due to my motor skills, the line of work I'm in and feckleness. Three months is a relative long time in that case.

 

Incremental updates are almost guaranteed to happen between now and end of June. Updated chassis? That is THE big question...

 

I think the current MBP 15 with the 1680X1050 display is for practical purposes equivalent resolution to your Dell's 1080p. Then again, it costs over 50% more, but that won't change when the next line of MacBook Pros come out. One more factor I consider very important is that the MBP 15 (and 17, though curiously not the 13) hi-res display can be ordered in matte. It truly amazes me that people can tolerate the glare and reflections from glossy displays, particularly in computers they paid a great deal for in part due to their otherwise exceptional displays, like both the MBP 15 hi res, MBP17 and Dell XPS-15 L502X, whose B-RGLED 15.6" display is widely praised as the finest consumer LCD display available. I'm sure the colors just explode on the screen - in a dark room, lol!