I’ve had a 15” PowerBook G4 for about 3 years now, its served me well but it was proving just too slow to run Aperture and Photoshop, something I was increasingly using it for as I started getting more and more into (digital) photography.
I could no longer resist the MacBook Pro’s following Apple’s recent updates to 2.4GHz cores and machines capable of taking 4GB of RAM. So, I popped into the Apple store and picked up a shiny new 17” MacBook Pro. I know I’ve mentioned that I’d never dream of carrying around such a behemoth and that I was looking forward to see whether rumours around an ultra-compact MacBook Pro materialised, but, I’m absolutely smitten.
Performance wise, it absolutely leaves the old G4 for dead. Loading Aperture takes a split-second (no kidding), compared to a good 20/30 seconds on the G4. Editing images was more of a slog, requiring a good deal of patience to make adjustments, wait for the rendering, tweak it back, wait for the rendering. It’s almost instant now. Plus, with the 17” screen I can fit everything on the screen I need, and that’s without going for the HD option (that was a little too extreme).
The machine is a little larger than the 15”, but, not hugely and, it feels around the same weight as the old G4! The screen is large, sharp, and way brighter than the G4. Smitten I say.
Finally, I also got Parallels running so I can do .NET work on it also (and on a large display). What really impressed me was how you can just tell it to go with an express install and it runs through an unattended install for you, no need to sit and wait for it all to happen, away you go.
To complete it all off, I also bought an Apple Airport Extreme so my 320GB LaCie external drive I’d been using for the odd backup is now shared over the network and I no longer have to keep it attached. Backing up to the vault from Aperture works exactly as if it were directly attached. Sweet. It’s a little slower, but so much more convenient. And, should I need more storage, just stick another drive onto a USB hub and away you go.
Just love it all when it works together!