[Review] 15-inch MacBook Pro (Late 2008)

[Mercellus]

So, my girlfriend and I went on vacation this weekend and decided that it would be fun to take the bus practically from one end of the province to the other. I'm a bit of a geek, so I wound up dragging my notebook with me, and sure enough I couldn't stand to go longer than an hour without opening it up. So, I decided to write a review of my MacBook Pro to kill the time, and now that I am home I thought I would post it here for all of you to read. Take it easy, it's my first review. ;)

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On October 14, 2008, Apple refreshed their line of portable notebooks, bringing a much needed overhaul especially to the design of the MacBook Pro, which has been using the same style casing as the PowerBook G4 which preceded it, and in the process upgraded many of the components inside of not only the MacBook Pro, but its little brother, the MacBook, and the MacBook Air as well.

The packaging was very well thought out in, cutting down on not only the amount of packaging materials used but on the size of the packaging as well, so that more units can be shipped in the same amount of space, reducing Apples overall carbon footprint.

If you have seen the previous generation MacBook Pro product packaging, you will know that the unit shipped in a large black box, and inside you would find the computer and the accessories buried between two large pieces of Styrofoam; while this approach protects the product inside, it isn?t the most environmentally friendly packaging (and Styrofoam is known to crumble and fall apart, and takes a long time to break down).

With the new packaging, the first thing you will notice when you open the box is that the packaging is very minimalist and clean. On the inside, there is a block of foam padding adhered to the top of the packaging, much like that found in the packaging for the MacBook Air and the iPhone as well. The MacBook Pro sits on top of a recyclable plastic tray, with a pull tab that allows you to easily remove the computer from the packaging. With the computer out of the way, you simply lift the plastic tray out of the box and you will be presented with the software media and user guides (?Everything Mac,? which is the user guide for the MacBook Pro, and ?Everything Else,? which has the warranty documentation, the power specifications, and the software installation discs).

If you are familiar with the earlier generation MacBook Pros, you will know how many pieces made up the overall case, including the top and bottom case assemblies. The process of upgrade the hard drive, clean the fans, or service the machine overall, it involved what seemed like to many as open heart surgery and involved practically disassembling the entire computer; and even then when the casing was reassembled there was a chance that the casing wouldn?t be put back in place, in the end there would usually be some gaps between the top and bottom casing, and there were a lot of screws involved (not only that, but there were different sizes, of both Phillips and Torx).

With the new MacBook Pro, Apple really stepped up to the plate and provided the most convenient enclosure to date. To access the hard drive or the battery, you simply press the release switch on the bottom of the computer and lift the cover off, inside you will find the battery (which has also been redesigned) and the hard drive, both of which have convenient pull tabs, no longer do you need to pry the hardware out of the casing.

Upgrading the memory is almost as easy; to do so you simply remove a few screws from the upper cover plate and remove the cover, where you will find the slots for the memory modules. You also gain access to the logic board, the fans, and other internal components (however, I would not recommend servicing these components yourself as it would void the AppleCare warranty, should you need any servicing done you should always contact AppleCare or an Apple Authorized Service Provider; although it will be useful to clean out the fans using a can of compressed air instead of paying a service technician to do the same thing.)

How did Apple come up with the new manufacturing process? Well, when they set out to create the MacBook Air they needed to create an enclosure that was not only light, but extremely thin, and it would not be feasible to use multiple layers of aluminum like in the MacBook Pro, and a thin layer of plastic would be brittle and easy to break. So, Apple created a new manufacturing process, which starts with a solid block of aluminum. With this process, the end product is one piece that is extremely rigid and solid, there?s less chance for failure.

What better than to bring this manufacturing process to the MacBook and the MacBook Pro, which brings the same rigidity and solid construction to the two most popular notebooks that Apple has to offer. The difference is quite noticeable compared to the previous generation MacBook Pro; you can pick up the new model with one hand at the edge and there is no flex or bend to the entire computer, it is very impressive.

The new MacBook and MacBook Pro both feature environmentally friendly materials, not only is aluminum extremely recyclable, but Apple now uses PVC-free plastics even with the internal cabling, brominate-free flame retardants and arsenic-free glass; the MacBook Pro also earned a rating of EPEAT Gold for 2008, which is very impressive. In a day and age where we need to be conscious about what is contained in the products that we use, Apple is taking some great strides and it makes me proud to use Apple products.

Apple also decided to make a few other changes to the MacBook Pro, which have a few users up in arms. One of these changes involve the screen, previous models offered both matte and glossy options; the new model only offers glossy, however it isn?t the traditional glossy coating that you?ve seen on the previous generation products. Instead, the glossy coating on the MacBook Pro is one sheet of glass, exactly like what is used on the iMac, and it looks very impressive.

Some have complained about the glossy display and that the reflections can be very distracting, but in all honestly I haven?t encountered any situations where the glossy screen is distracting to my work (I have used this computer in different lighting conditions in a bedroom, a kitchen, a living room, on a bus driving down the highway, and at my workplace where practically the entire ceiling is composed of nothing but fluorescent tubes). I usually have the brightness set to 3 bars above being off and it?s fine, in brightly lit areas where the sunlight may reflect off the screen I find that having the screen set to one half brightness is good; I haven?t been met with any situation that requires that I have the screen set to full brightness, which is so bright that it is almost blinding.

One reason why Apple chose glass on the display of the new model MacBook and MacBook Pro is the ability to add some structural rigidity to the display itself, meaning it is extremely solid; even when applying pressure to the back of the display there is absolutely no distortion to the image displayed on the panel.

During the announcement of the new MacBook Pro, it was mentioned that the new screen makes colors ?pop," and I have to agree, colors are very rich and blacks are very deep, my previous MacBook Pro had a matte screen and I don?t miss it at all.

Another change in the MacBook Pro is that the FireWire 400 port has been removed, leaving only one FireWire 800 port. I don?t use FireWire at all (all of my devices, including an external hard drive, a camera, and a camcorder, are all using USB 2.0), so this doesn?t bother me at all. For those of you who need FireWire 400, you can simply buy a FW800-to-FW400 conversion cable.

On the 13-inch Aluminum MacBook, there is no FireWire port at all, which leads me to believe that Apple will be phasing it out within the next year or two. Previously, you could use the Migration Assistant with a FireWire cable to migrate from one Mac to another, however with FireWire missing from the MacBook and only FireWire 800 present on the MacBook Pro, Apple has made a change to the Migration Assistant so that you can use an Ethernet cable to move your data. One thing that you won?t be able to do without FireWire though is booting the computer in Target Disk Mode which is a bit of a downfall, but it?s not like you?re going to use that feature every day.

The keyboard backlighting is much improved over previous MacBook Pro models, with less light leakage and better illumination of the actual letters on the keyboard. One change that has been inspired by the MacBook Air is the use of a plastic keyboard where the keys are actually embossed into the computer enclosure (this is commonly referred to as the ?chicklet? or ?pill? style) with a black background and white letter color scheme, which provides a lot better contrast compared to the silver keyboard on previous models; in my opinion this keyboard is a lot easier to type on compared to my older MacBook Pro, as my fingers used to ?catch? on the corners of the keys and it felt as if the keys were going to pop off, whereas with the new model my fingers glide across the keys with ease.

In February of 2008, when Apple updated the MacBook Pros, they introduced multi-touch gestures to the trackpad, simplifying things like page navigation in Safari and other common tasks. With the latest model, this has been upgraded to include four-finger gestures, which allows you to use Expos? to show all windows or show the desktop (this saves quite a bit of time), you can pinch to zoom in on documents and web pages, and you can rotate entire pages or pictures, all with the trackpad. It?s very sleek and impressive.

Besides the updated gestures, Apple has also decided to remove the dedicated trackpad button, instead the trackpad is now one entire touch sensitive button, and it?s made out of glass (it doesn?t look like it, but it really is). The response from the trackpad is very precise and your finger will glide across it with ease, and if you?ve used a Mac before you?ll have no problems getting used to not having a button to click; when I first set up the computer, I clicked on the trackpad just like I did with my old MacBook Pro without even noticing the difference of there being no button.

Now, across the entire MacBook lineup, Apple have decided to use the NVIDIA GeForce 9400M chipset, which also includes an integrated graphics solution that uses 256MB of the installed DDR3 memory, and overall the chipset is very impressive with a high level of performance and stability. This lowers the gap between the three MacBook products as far as performance.

The MacBook Pro that I chose has a 2.4 GHz processor (specifically, it is an Intel Core 2 Duo P8600, which has 3MB of L2 cache, a 1066 MHz front-side bus, and uses 25W of power), 2 GB of DDR3 1066 MHz memory, a 250 GB 5,400-rpm hard drive, and in addition to the GeForce 9400M integrated graphics processor, the MacBook Pro also includes a discrete GeForce 9600M GT, this model ships with 256MB of GDDR4 video memory for added performance.

There are several reasons why I chose this model, primarily it provides all the speed and storage that I require; a few extra megahertz and more L2 cache wouldn?t be very noticeable for the tasks that I perform and the extra 2 GB of DDR3 memory would be overkill. Also, this model is more power efficient as it uses a 25W TDP processor whereas the 2.53GHz and 2.8GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processors have a power usage of 35W.

One of the reasons why I bought my previous generation MacBook Pro was because of the discrete graphics processor that it provided (GeForce 8600M GT), however I find that even the GeForce 9400M in this new model is more than adequate for most tasks and performs quite well. I really haven?t found a need to use the GeForce 9600M GT as the applications that I use don?t really use it to its fullest potential, and I don?t play any games or use Boot Camp.

The 250 gigabyte hard drive is more than enough for my use. Two of the biggest storage uses on my computer would be my photo library and my music library (~ 2.7 GB in JPEGs in the iPhoto Library and 9.07 GB of AAC files in iTunes respectively). I did decide to reinstall Mac OS X about a week after I received the computer simply to remove the unneeded languages (as I didn?t feel like using unsupported tools like Monolingual or Xslimmer to remove them), so with all of my data in place I am using about 34 GB of the 232.57 GB that is available when the disk is formatted (don?t you just love it that hard drive manufacturers still get away with using incorrect terminology and twisting numbers?)

As far as battery life, I find that it is very good and it matches the expectations that Apple have set out in their marketing material. When using the GeForce 9400M integrated graphics processor and standard energy saver settings with Bluetooth and Airport (Wi-Fi) turned on while performing some web browsing, writing e-mails and instant messaging with iChat, along with some light graphic editing in Pixelmator and writing code in TextMate or documents in iWork ?08 with the screen brightness set to one half, the battery lasts for around 5 hours and 15 minutes, and when watching movies, the battery lasts for about 3 hours and 45 minutes, enough to watch two full-length feature films. While using the GeForce 9600M GT discrete graphics processor, the battery lasts for around 4 hours and 50 minutes performing common tasks and 3 hours and 10 minutes when watching movies, respectively.

Apple have also improved the internal layout of components and the amount of heat that is produced by these components has also been reduced. With the previous model MacBook Pro, the bottom of the computer would become quite hot, especially when using the computer on your lap; this isn?t a problem with the latest MacBook Pro especially when using the integrated graphics processor. The bottom of the unit does become slightly warm when using the discrete graphics processor, but it comes nowhere near to the amount of heat that the previous models used to produce.

These models no longer come with any trial software at all, neither pre-installed from the factory or on the installation media which is an excellent touch because you don?t need to reinstall the operating system when you pull the computer out of the box just to remove the trial software. Previously, I?d find myself reinstalling the software on any Mac when setting it up out of the box to fully remove the trial software that was installed (for example, Office for Mac 2004 and Aperture). This makes it a lot easier to get up and running.

In conclusion, the MacBook Pro (Late 2008) overall is an excellent product that performs well right when you take it out of the box and is one of the best tools you will ever own, I absolutely love it and I can sUnboxing Photos!s to come.

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Unboxing Photos!

Workstation Photos

Edited December 5, 2008 by Mercellus

[Rudy]

good review (was a bit of a long read but still good :))

[Mercellus]

good review (was a bit of a long read but still good :))

Thanks! I was bored, that's actually the second revision of it (the first one didn't make much sense at all, it was too scattered). I'm hoping to do more reviews in the future though so I guess I have to start somewhere!

[NienorGT]

Nice! I wish that I would have money to get a MacBook Pro, but I think I will still be very happy with my MacBook.

[Dance.]

No pictures :( ?

[Unto Darkness]

There is no leakage of light from the keyboard? All the pictures I saw had a horrendous amount of leakage at the borders. Maybe you could post a picture of this?

[wankey]

This was a well written but a slightly biased review. You seem to agree with everything Apple has done... which I find very odd.

No Firewire 400? Huge problem for me. My iPod is firewire 400 but my external harddrive is 800. On my current MBP I can plug in both at the same time. With the new one, not only do I have to lug an external adapter with me but I can only plug in one at a time.

No matte screen? Another huge problem. Glossy screens are good for video and 3D rendering... as for graphics design or any sort of design they are moot.

I don't understand how you are not having problems with the screen as I am having problems with it even at the Apple store. I have used my friend's macbook pro (late 2008) for a while and I just couldn't stand the glare and reflection (mostly of my face) wherever I go. Another huge problem for the new macbooks is if you tilt the base any higher than 45degrees, the screen collapses down. I nearly dropped the new MBP when that happened. Try it, open your MBP, tilt the MBP to abouy 60-90 degrees, your screen will fall down. This is a huge issue for in bed users like me (I like to type and chat late at night in bed...so sue me :D)

Magnet isn't strong enough for the latch. I feel that the magnet isn't strong enough for the latch to have that extra closed feeling. Probably just a personal issue but I like the button on my early 08 macbook pro.

On a side note, light leakage from the keyboard is perfectly fine. It defines the keys.. so you can easily see where you are typing. I don't know why people are flustered about this.

Not to say that your review is bad or anything but this is a pro laptop, and it seems that they're marketing it towards no pro users. What do you do on this computer if I may ask?

And as for the heat, have you tried running a game or 3D simulation software to see how how it usually gets? My early 08 Macbook pro is nice and cool surfing the internet / typing / coding but once you boot up Warcraft 3 it gets to 80 degrees... (this is when i turn the fan to 6000RPM and watch it go back down to 50)

My perfect laptop upgrade would be (in a few years, my early 08 has lots of life in it still):

Macbook pro Unibody design

1920x1200 15.4 Matte Screen

4gigs of DDR3 1066mhz ram

500 gb HD or 256 gb SSD

All the ports of the MBP early 08 design

Blu ray super drive

2.66ghz Core i7 with Montevina platform

nVidia GTX290m graphics chip with a 9400m chipset

10.6 Snow Leopard preinstalled

Edited November 17, 2008 by wankey

[Mercellus]

No Firewire 400? Huge problem for me. My iPod is firewire 400 but my external harddrive is 800. On my current MBP I can plug in both at the same time. With the new one, not only do I have to lug an external adapter with me but I can only plug in one at a time.

Like I said, I don't use FireWire, and I don't have any FireWire devices, everything that I own uses USB 2.0 - from my iPhone, my iPod, my external hard drive, my camera and camcorder, etc.

No matte screen? Another huge problem. Glossy screens are good for video and 3D rendering... as for graphics design or any sort of design they are moot.

I had a matte screen previously, and quite honestly I find that the color is a lot better than on the previous MacBook Pro.

I don't understand how you are not having problems with the screen as I am having problems with it even at the Apple store. I have used my friend's macbook pro (late 2008) for a while and I just couldn't stand the glare and reflection (mostly of my face) wherever I go.

Again, to my eyes the screen looks perfectly fine, there's a reflection but that happens with any glossy screen, it's not overpowering on the MacBook Pro like it is on other notebooks.

Another huge problem for the new macbooks is if you tilt the base any higher than 45degrees, the screen collapses down. I nearly dropped the new MBP when that happened. Try it, open your MBP, tilt the MBP to abouy 60-90 degrees, your screen will fall down. This is a huge issue for in bed users like me (I like to type and chat late at night in bed...so sue me :D)

I use my MacBook Pro either on a desk, a table, or on my lap when I am sitting in the proper position, I don't have the notebook tilted at all at any time.

Magnet isn't strong enough for the latch. I feel that the magnet isn't strong enough for the latch to have that extra closed feeling. Probably just a personal issue but I like the button on my early 08 macbook pro.

The 17" MacBook Pro had a similar issue where the hinge had some trouble holding the display up without any movement, it's probably because of the glass adding a slight bit of weight to the display.

On a side note, light leakage from the keyboard is perfectly fine. It defines the keys.. so you can easily see where you are typing. I don't know why people are flustered about this.

There is some light around the actual keys themselves but it's not nearly as bad as what it was on earlier generations, I agree with you that it does indeed define the keys.

Not to say that your review is bad or anything but this is a pro laptop, and it seems that they're marketing it towards no pro users. What do you do on this computer if I may ask?

Programming, graphics design, some 3D design work, web browsing & email, instant messaging, listening to music, watching movies, editing videos in iMovie and editing photos in iPhoto (soon going to pick up a copy of Aperture and take things to the next level).

And as for the heat, have you tried running a game or 3D simulation software to see how how it usually gets? My early 08 Macbook pro is nice and cool surfing the internet / typing / coding but once you boot up Warcraft 3 it gets to 80 degrees... (this is when i turn the fan to 6000RPM and watch it go back down to 50)

My previous MacBook Pro got really hot as soon as you did anything with it, including simple coding in a text editor, and it was if you were using a portable egg cooker when using any other graphics intensive program or using the iTunes visualizer; this doesn't happen at all with the new MacBook Pro.

The late 2008 MacBook Pro isn't for everyone, keep in mind that when purchasing a computer you should always look at your specific needs before making any decisions. For most though, I think this new model is more than adequate. Thanks for your comments, I appreciate it! :)

Also, to those wanting pictures, I'll upload them in a little bit.

[SMELTN]

great review Mercellus.. Makes me want a macbook more and more

[Dysphoria]

Nice review.

Thanks!

[Unto Darkness]

My perfect laptop upgrade would be (in a few years, my early 08 has lots of life in it still):

Macbook pro Unibody design

1920x1200 15.4 Matte Screen

4gigs of DDR3 1066mhz ram

500 gb HD or 256 gb SSD

All the ports of the MBP early 08 design

Blu ray super drive

2.66ghz Core i7 with Montevina platform

nVidia GTX290m graphics chip with a 9400m chipset

10.6 Snow Leopard preinstalled

You sure you don't need a nuclear missile with that? :whistle:

Seriously though, all those options would make the notebook more expensive then it already is, increases it weight, size and heat output, totally ruining the entire idea of a Macbook.

But yes, there is nothing wrong in craving for it in dream world.

[wankey]

Well most of it is easily doable. 500 gig HDD is already on the market (in a few year probably will drop price to current 250gigs) bluray super drive is already doable. The 2.66ghz core i7 mobile we'll have to see just how good it is. More ports on the MBP? I'm sure Apple will find a way to do this. But as things are going right now, everything is moving to Usb so I wouldn't mind some more USB 3.0 ports...

Snow Leopard will be available soon. The GTX290m GPU is coming out next year along with a 9400m refresh.

A 1920x1200 15.4 matte screen has been around for ages (circa 2005) so I dunno why they don't put it in their MBPs...

Good things are coming to laptops!

[Si_]

I really want one of these. Shame having just got a car it isn't going to happen any time soon. Maybe the next refresh

[Mercellus]

A 1920x1200 15.4 matte screen has been around for ages (circa 2005) so I dunno why they don't put it in their MBPs...

Personally I don't think I would want to use a 1920x1200 resolution on a 15.4" display again, I've tried this once and even after spending close to a month trying to get used to it I found that it strained my eyes too much and I would have to be practically glued to the display to see anything, and when watching standard definition DVD movies any closer than half way across the room you could clearly see distortion and pixelation. Once we have some resolution independence this may all change, but for now, 1440x900 is pretty good.

[Rudy]

Personally I don't think I would want to use a 1920x1200 resolution on a 15.4" display again, I've tried this once and even after spending close to a month trying to get used to it I found that it strained my eyes too much and I would have to be practically glued to the display to see anything, and when watching standard definition DVD movies any closer than half way across the room you could clearly see distortion and pixelation. Once we have some resolution independence this may all change, but for now, 1440x900 is pretty good.

I would personally be all over it...... that's the only thing I don't like about my macbook pro

[Ricardo Gil]

A 1920x1200 15.4 matte screen has been around for ages (circa 2005) so I dunno why they don't put it in their MBPs...

Some of us have to read on it. Without a microscope.

[User6060]

anyone with a new (late 2008) MBP could you please tell me if the firewire chipset is made by TI (Texas Instruments) or Agere. I think you can check by doing a command + v or command + s during startup....i hope to god its still the TI chipset or else no musician would invest in a mac

[Edrick Smith]

Just so you know Firewire isn't being phased out and you won't see it disappear from MacBook Pros in the future. On the consumer level FireWire isn't as popular as most users aren't transferring lots of data over long periods of time. So USB 2.0 is just fine for that, however on the pro level such as the film industry we use firewire for lots of stuff. Where we need fast transfer rates over a long period of time instead of just a burst that USB can do. The MacBook Pro and Mac Pro are Pro-Grade products used by professionals where as the MacBook is only used by individuals and some business cases where they don't need something high end.

[Mercellus]

anyone with a new (late 2008) MBP could you please tell me if the firewire chipset is made by TI (Texas Instruments) or Agere. I think you can check by doing a command + v or command + s during startup....i hope to god its still the TI chipset or else no musician would invest in a mac

Just checking through the Console and it looks like it's utilizing an Agere/Lucent FireWire chip, however I believe the previous model (Early 2008) used this chipset as well.

[Rudy]

Just so you know Firewire isn't being phased out and you won't see it disappear from MacBook Pros in the future. On the consumer level FireWire isn't as popular as most users aren't transferring lots of data over long periods of time. So USB 2.0 is just fine for that, however on the pro level such as the film industry we use firewire for lots of stuff. Where we need fast transfer rates over a long period of time instead of just a burst that USB can do. The MacBook Pro and Mac Pro are Pro-Grade products used by professionals where as the MacBook is only used by individuals and some business cases where they don't need something high end.

with USB3 coming I wouldn't be surprised to see firewire phased out unfortunately. It was better than USB2 but since it hasn't been updated in so long....

[Edrick Smith]

with USB3 coming I wouldn't be surprised to see firewire phased out unfortunately. It was better than USB2 but since it hasn't been updated in so long....

What are the specs of USB 3 compared to FireWire 800? I just don't see Apple phasing out Firewire atleast not as soon as next year when the film industry is such a big player in buying their products. All the cameras we use <except the film cameras of course> have Firewire.

[Rudy]

What are the specs of USB 3 compared to FireWire 800? I just don't see Apple phasing out Firewire atleast not as soon as next year when the film industry is such a big player in buying their products. All the cameras we use <except the film cameras of course> have Firewire.

Directly from Wikipedia

USB 3.0

On September 18, 2007, Pat Gelsinger demonstrated USB 3.0 at the Intel Developer Forum. The USB 3.0 Promoter Group announced on November 17, 2008 that version 1.0 of the specification has been completed and is transitioned to the USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), the managing body of USB specifications. This move effectively opens the spec to hardware developers for implementation in future products. The technology will provide a maximum bandwidth of 5.0 Gb/s (625 MB/s), and with the possibility for an optical interconnection.

USB 3.0 will remain backwards compatible with USB 2.0 as far as the Type A connector is concerned. While USB 2.0 is based on uni-directional data flow with negotiated directional bus transitions, USB 3.0 supports simultaneous bi-directional data flows through the use of dual-simplex four-wire differential signal wiring as compared to half-duplex two wire differential wiring in USB 2.0. Other interesting innovations in USB 3.0 include new power management features that support idle, sleep and suspend states.^[29] The two new differential pairs make the cable about as thick as an Ethernet cable and provide full-duplex transfers.^[30]

According to electronicdesign.com cables will be limited to 3 m at full speed. The technology is similar to PCI Express 2.0 (5-Gbit/s). It uses 8B10B encoding, linear feedback shift register (LFSR) scrambling for data, spread spectrum. It forces receivers to use low frequency periodic signaling (LFPS), dynamic equalization, and training sequences to ensure fast signal locking.^{[citation needed]}

USB 3.0, which will be called USB SuperSpeed in commercial devices, is expected to be available in commercial controllers in the second half of 2009. Consumer products are expected to become available in 2010.^[31]

[Wannes]

There is no leakage of light from the keyboard? All the pictures I saw had a horrendous amount of leakage at the borders. Maybe you could post a picture of this?

There is ... a lot. :(

[crazzyyfool]

There is ... a lot. :(

Light leakage from where, actually around the keys not just through the letters/numbers? Light it meant to be emitted from the sides of the keys.

[Wannes]

Around the keys. At least, that's what I experience...