Timeframe: Leopard and Other Refreshes

I'm planning on purchasing a notebook, most likely a MBP in December, but I wanted to see what people's opinion are of possible upcoming product refreshes. I know you should really buy when you need it, but I still want to get the whole picture to make sure I'm not missing anything important.

First, what's the chance of Apple releasing Leopard at Macworld in the 2nd week of January. It would certainly be a very effective way to upstage Microsoft, although that may also be a reason to not do it to avoid direct competition for media spots. iPhone or more likely iTV could also debut in January so that may also postpone a Leopard launch. What is Apple's new model guarantee anyways? 1 week, 3 weeks? If it's 3 weeks, I may wait till the end of December to purchase so that anything launched at Macworld can be covered.

There's also been reports that Apple is targetting a introduction of Blu-ray drives for February. Given the cost, it'll probably only be in the top 17" MBP, Mac Pro, and 24" iMac, but it's still something to think about. It might cause a price cascade for the other models too.

The other 2 major items that I know about are Santa Rosa and DX10 GPUs. The first mobile DX10 GPUs will probably launch late Q1 and Santa Rosa in early Q2, so most notebook manufacturers will probably just wait for Q2 to refresh both at the same time. Likely Apple will be doing a full redesign of the MBP at this time. The combination of DX10 GPUs, Santa Rosa, and a new MBp design does make waiting very tempting. Sadly it is probably too long for me. There is a good chance that Apple will be getting their product out first, like how the original MBP was one of the first notebooks to launch with the Core Duo and X1600. Still assuming delays, availability, and early quality issues, even an early Q2 launch would probably mean a summer purchase or 6 months from now.

If anyone has firmer information on Apple's plans that would be appreciated.

 

Leopard will not be out until the end of Q1, so about March, as I understand it. As for a Blu-Ray, I think the only way that would happen is if it were an option, not standard on any of the computers, so pricing would be unaffected. Also, remember that there is no such thing as DirectX in for Apple. Now I understand what you are driving at, but it will be a little while before we see DirectX10 laptop cards and even longer before Apple bothers to drop them in. DirectX only exists if you use Boot Camp, which is a small minority.

 

Leopard in the end of March. Then I guess it might not be worthwhile waiting that long.

As for DX10, I will be using Boot Camp, although mostly XP for now until they get Vista stable and optimized so DX10 might not be a big concern.

In terms of Santa Rosa, Intel is introducing Robson flash cache and that's supposed to be coupled with Vista, labeled SuperFetch I believe. Do you know if Leopard will also have support for Robson cache and hybrid hard drives which also require OS support to use the flash? I would imagine that since Apple uses the Intel platform now, they might as well tailor the OS to take advantage of all it's features.

 

I do not know if Leopard will support hybrid drives in that fashion, that is a good question. I would consider waiting for DX10 if you can hold out because it will be a big performance boost, but it really depends on how much you game.

 

DX10 will not matter one bit. the x1600 is not dx10 compatable.
So you won't need vista.

Just in case that confuses you, the only reason to really upgrade to Vista is for DX10 games. XP cannot use DX10, but of course, will still allow you to play games that have DX10 extensions. However, only new video cards have the ability to use the DX10 extensions.