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MacBook Computer companies release their latest models with much fanfare and we all go ‘ho-hum’, as the look and feel of a new computer soon vapourises when we discover bugs, plus a host of software and drivers won’t work without expensive upgrades. This time Apple should have bought out the brass band and fireworks! “Hands-on” review by Kevin Poulter I t’s amazing to operate the new MacBook and find everything works, with only minor exceptions. Adding to its functionality, the new high brightness LED-lit screen is simply sensational. Everything that Apple promised five years ago – but users soon found to be limited, or even buggy – has come to fruition. The test of Apple’s new MacBook was not without some reservations. A quick demonstration in a busy store left the impression that the new MacBook screen is too widescreen in format, with a slightly clunky keyboard and the intelligent multipurpose trackpad is a buggy gimmick. . . especially as the salesperson couldn’t enlarge images with two fingers, as promoted. Wow – it works How wrong this preconception was! The widescreen format is amazing for viewing HD video, plus the best for word processing or graphic production. When using software (Apple calls it ‘applications’) the wide screen has room for tools on the side, leaving much more ‘acreage’ for viewing the document being created. The screen is beautiful, with the highest contrast, intensity, colour saturation and clarity; especially suited for those who don’t have 20/20 vision. Heck, any brighter and you’d need sunglasses! Sure, the brightness and saturation are adjustable, but few users will, as an excessively bright, colourful screen looks terrific. Click and hold on any folder like the Downloads folder, to open it to display the contents for selection. 12  Silicon Chip The MacBook’s keyboard soon proved to be most suited to wordsmiths, with the biggest surprise – how easily fingers glide over the new glass trackpad, instead of binding. Innovation brings its rewards It’s likely the MacBook and its software works so well as Apple is highly cashed-up with the proceeds of selling innovations, empowering a much higher R&D spend. Even before the new tablet computer was launched, Apple computers reached number two in the USA. Apple is now a US$50+ billion company. In the fourth quarter of 2009, Apple sold 21 million iPods, 8.7 million iPhones and 3.36 million Macs. Click and hold on the applications folder in the dock and all Applications and Utilities appear for selection. siliconchip.com.au 2010 First impressions are the cool, elegant design, then detail like the built-in microphone and camera, plus the power adaptor plug/socket, an innovative ‘magnetic lock connection’ (MagSafe). Until now, regular stressing of the power adaptor lead risked breaking the internal wires. Then the whole unit had to be discarded – about the same time the power adaptor was no longer available. area, and wow - the magnet grabs and connects perfectly every time. Further, the small 5-pin connector works either way around, with the lead facing or away from you. Once connected, if there’s a sudden strong tug on the lead, the MacBook won’t fly off the lap or stress the internal wires – rather the plug will break away. As a bonus, the LED on the connector changes from amber to green when charged. A powerful magnetic solution The power adaptor Apple’s ‘MagSafe’ solution is a dream to use. The powerful magnet connects the plug from some distance out, without a glance, in any light. Simply hold it in approximately the right The five contacts are tiny, almost microscopic, yet the power adapter is capable of delivering at least 3.7A. It’s likely that connecting with the mains power on will eventually burn You can swish through a display of viewing history, with a stroke of the trackpad. siliconchip.com.au these contacts. Further – after the user runs down the battery, when connecting to recharge, the adaptor becomes excessively hot. Keep your cool A few simple procedures will help the power adaptor last the life of the computer. The ideal is to run the MacBook on the power adaptor whenever practicable. When the battery is depleted, before connecting the power adaptor, turn the mains off and close the computer lid. Otherwise, the charger is supplying about 3.7A at 16.5V for charging – and running the computer. This simple procedure changes the sealed charger from becoming unacceptably hot, to comfortably cool. After In Apple’s Safari web browser, top sites can be displayed for selection. March 2010  13 The power cord is held in place magnetically, so if someone should trip over the cord, it disconnects and the MacBook stays put. third-party mic-headset combination for Skype, it was annoying to find the built-in microphone and speakers worked better! The sound is good, considering the tiny reproducers. There’s no evidence of the speakers’ location, however they appear to be behind the almost hidden air-vents. Speaking of air-vents, the MacBook remains cool enough to use on your lap for hours, with a fan so silent, it’s impossible to hear. Earlier ‘piano-finish’ iBooks soon became hot and were at risk of sliding off your knees but the new MacBook has a rubberised base, to both insulate you from heat and as an anti-slip base. Power to go about ten minutes, even though not fully charged, it’s OK to resume using the computer. The Dock A collection of icons is displayed at the bottom of the screen or can be moved to the left or right side, to provide quick access to applications, documents and folders. The contents of folders in the Dock are called ’stacks’, displayed by a click and hold on the folder. The most useful of many features of the Dock is quick access to any open or closed applications. Also, when many windows are open and covering the desktop, the Dock will show any application’s open documents. Simply scroll along the dock’s icons, click and hold on the application and voila! the desktop is suddenly uncluttered, only displaying the icons for documents open in the selected application. Wired for sound The inbuilt microphone works so well, on purchasing an expensive The Mac’s built-in lithium-polymer battery lasts up to seven hours on a single charge, apparently a ‘best-case’ rating. However the freedom to work for five hours or more with no recharge is awesome. Thanks to its advanced battery chemistry and charging technology, the MacBook battery can be recharged up to 1000 times, lasting nearly three times the lifespan of other notebook batteries. I break the rules and leave the power pack charging all the time, with no major disadvantages. You are not alone When the MacBook is launched for the first time, a setup assistant appears, asking a few simple questions, to get the new Mac started in minutes. Already armed with some information the MacBook needed, like the ISP connections and with Apple’s Airport Wireless on, it was amazing how few windows of questions opened before it was all systems go! Starting anew One of the setup questions came with an offer – connect an Ethernet cable now to transfer all the data in your old computer. No thank you! Changing to a new computer is the perfect opportunity to start afresh, without the ‘baggage’ that is clogging the old computer. This strategy made the transition incredibly easy and worked perfectly. Knowing that upgrades to some expensive software like Photoshop would dent the pocket by over $1,000, and that too much software eventually slows a computer, I kept the old computer for this work, also saving considerable effort getting them to run. Not just a trackpad MacBook’s Trackpad not only recognises the number of fingers you are placing on it for different functions, it also knows the direction they are moving – like the iPhone. This remarkable technology is best demonstrated with images, so we have shown these below. Functions include rotate, scroll and much more. One of the coolest is enlarge. When viewing an image or some windows, they can be enlarged by moving two fingers apart or as I discovered, by touching the trackpad with two hands and moving the fingers apart. This is brilliant for a closer look at some images, especially if your vision is not 20/20. Now my desktop is permanently enlarged for super-easy viewing at any distance. Sometimes the advanced Trackpad functions are a bit sluggish or quite resistive though. Hopefully a software upgrade soon will improve their reliability. Innovation for everyone Built-in VoiceOver screen-reading technology enables people who are blind or have low vision to control their computer using key commands or gestures on a Multi-Touch trackpad. Mac OS X also offers out-of-the-box support for over 40 Braille displays. In addition, preferences settings help vision-impaired, from highly enlarged text to realistically reading web or The trackpad knows if you have one, two or more fingers touching it, plus the direction of travel and acts accordingly... 14  Silicon Chip siliconchip.com.au typed pages – very close to a ‘real’ person narrating. The voice in VoiceOver called Alex, utilises advanced Apple technologies to deliver natural intonation in English even at extraordinarily fast speaking rates. While most text-to-speech (TTS) systems analyse and synthesise text one sentence at a time, Mac OS X analyses a full paragraph to decipher the context more accurately. In addition, Alex more closely matches the nuances of human speech, to more easily understand longer text in books, articles, and news stories. Power of UNIX, Simplicity of the Mac Mac OS X is renowned for its simplicity, reliability, and ease of use. So when it came to designing Snow Leopard, Apple engineers were briefed with a goal: to make a great thing even better. They searched for areas to refine, further simplify, and speed up. In many cases, they elevated great to amazing. Recently the performance of graphics processing units (GPUs) has grown exponentially, measured in gigaflops. Today’s fastest GPUs are capable of over one teraflop, as much as the room-size ASCI RED supercomputer of just 12 years ago. The advanced technologies in the operating system take full advantage of the 64-bit, multi-core processors and GPUs to deliver the greatest possible performance. With a fast 2.26GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, MacBook breezes through everyday tasks such as emailing, web browsing, and working with documents, spreadsheets and presentations. Better still, MacBook comes standard with 2GB of memory (with support for up to 4GB), so you can run multiple applications smoothly and efficiently. Software – applications are the key Apple’s innovation and quality are excellent but PCs have led in one area – price. Until now. When you consider the quality and ease of use, MacBook is the best choice – but add all the pre-loaded software into the equation, then price is no longer a barrier to a fun, easy to use computer. The MacBooks sell for a similar price, $1,299, almost everywhere. Even though legally they cannot enforce it, siliconchip.com.au Technical Specifications: Processor: 2.26GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor with 3MB on-chip shared L2 cache running 1:1 with processor speed, 1066MHz frontside bus Memory: 2GB (two 1GB SO-DIMMs) of 1066MHz DDR3 SDRAM; two SO-DIMM slots support up to 4GB Communications: Built-in AirPort Extreme Wi-Fi wireless networking, Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR (Enhanced Data Rate) wireless, 10/100/1000BASE-T Gigabit Ethernet. Screen: 13.3-inch (diagonal) LED-backlit glossy widescreen display with millions of colours Graphics/video support: NVIDIA GeForce 9400M graphics processor with 256MB of DDR3 SDRAM shared with main memory. Extended desktop and video mirroring: Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display and up to 2560 by 1600 pixels on an external display, both at millions of colours Built-in iSight camera Video output options: DVI output using Mini DisplayPort to DVI Adapter VGA output using Mini DisplayPort to VGA Adapter Dual-link DVI output using Mini DisplayPort to Dual-Link DVI Adapter supports 30-inch Apple Cinema HD Display (optional) Input: Multi-Touch trackpad for precise cursor control; supports two-finger scrolling, pinch, rotate, swipe, three-finger swipe, four-finger swipe, tap, double-tap and drag capabilities Audio: Built-in stereo speakers Built-in omnidirectional microphone Combined optical digital output/headphone out (user-selectable analog audio line in) Audio in/out: Ports: Gigabit Ethernet port Mini DisplayPort Two USB 2.0 ports (up to 480 Mbps) Kensington lock slot Storage: 250GB 5400RPM Serial ATA hard disk drive; optional 320GB or 500GB 5400-rpm drive 8x slot-loading SuperDrive (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW) Battery and power: Built-in 60-watt-hour lithium-polymer battery 60W MagSafe power adapter with cable management Mains voltage: 100V to 240V AC Installed software: Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard (includes Time Machine, Quick Look, Spaces, Spotlight, Dashboard, Mail, iChat, Safari, Address Book, QuickTime, iCal, DVD Player, Photo Booth, Front Row, Xcode Developer Tools), iLife (includes iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand, iWeb, iDVD) Physical: Height 2.7cm, Width 33cm, Depth 23.2cm Weight 2100g March 2010  15 We liked: • • • • • • • • • • • Super-fast, even old applications work at warp-speed The elegance of the Mac design The screen – super-bright, saturated and clear Turning the Mac on all angles does not cause the hard-drive to make protest noises The silence Almost total lack of viruses Encrypted mode The magnetic power supply connector – breaks away if stressed 7-hour battery – may be a little optimistic, but is outstanding Runs cool on your lap for hours Front Row - shows superb HD movie trailers apparently Apple “encourages” the same price through all stores and dealers, by not offering huge discounts to the larger outlets. Ready to go Out of the box, Mac comes with iLife, enabling users to make movies, do all manner of music work and make websites, without buying new applications. If you communicate with PCs, the MacBook can open and view plus save Microsoft Word. The Apple image application ‘Preview’ is exciting too. Open almost any image graphics format including Photoshop, then adjust colour, tint, size, sharpness and re-save in a choice of many formats, like JPEG, gif and PDF. This simple application works so well, so fast, so easy, I’ve stopped opening Photoshop for basic image manipulation, like resizing and a quick tweak of colours. PDF is native Apple has an incredibly useful feature – the ability to save almost every document in PDF. It’s not as an add-on software, rather it’s built into every ‘print’ menu. Page layouts or web pages can be saved as a PDF for perfect viewing with full layout and clickable web links. So others see the layout and fonts, identical to the original document – even if the PC user doesn’t have the fonts in the original document. This is also brilliant for saving copies of business documents and purchases, like eBay, in the format seen on screen at the time. Won’t break the bank Add the Apple iWork software suite for just $129 and the MacBook can do all but the most heavyweight assignments. Included in iWork are three 16  Silicon Chip • The software supplied out of the box and pre-loaded • The Dock – software and documents easily accessed along the bottom of screen • The piano-finish, with a rubberised base, to stop slipping off Not so much: • The DVD SuperDrive is about .5mm too narrow, so some DVDs clatter a little • A VGA-to-mini-socket adaptor must be bought for a second screen or projector • WMV needs a download (Mac’s native software is Quicktime) • The instruction manual is lacking for new Mac users, though a menu in the top of the screen accesses ‘Help’ applications – ‘Pages’ for brilliant page layouts and brochures, (not unlike InDesign, Quark or PageMaker), ‘Numbers’ for graphs and number-crunching plus tables and finally ‘Keynote,’ a layout for presentations, so graphicfeatured it makes ‘PowerPoint’ look boring. Templates enable documents like Invoices, with automatic GST calculations and brochures to be customised in minutes. Talk to PCs To extend communication with PCs, a native version of Microsoft Office Suite is available for Mac OS X with a Mac-friendly interface to create documents in Word, PowerPoint and Excel, so you can easily share documents with friends and colleagues. Would all PC users benefit from the transition to Apple? No, in the real world, students and some business people may have best interchange and training with their peers by being on the same platform. Apple has made enormous efforts to bridge this gap however, making sometimes unpopular changes to ensure PC users are able to make the transition much easier. A survey at a leading Melbourne University found that Apple users are 17% more productive (quicker) than those on PCs. This alone is a good reason to consider Apple. With Snow Leopard, Mac has out-ofthe-box support for Microsoft Exchange Server 2007, something even Windows PCs don’t have. So you can use your Mac — with all the features and applications you love — at home plus at work and have all your messages, meetings, and contacts in one place. More fun – securely! If you are ready to move from PCs, then consider Apple, for ease of use, creativity, platform stability and almost zero viruses. Mac OS X doesn’t get PC viruses. Moreover, with virtually no effort on your part, Mac OS X protects itself from other malicious applications. Every Mac has a secure configuration, so Apple intimated Macs don’t need antivirus software. Nevertheless, having no protection still has some risk, especially if you are exchanging documents with PC users. In that event the Mac may have no problem with a virus but unprotected, can be a ‘carrier’ so its worth having protection. In addition, a Firewall can be set up, to avoid nasties like phishing. Security is further improved by Apple’s inbuilt FileVault, which encrypts or scrambles the data in the home folder so that unauthorised users, applications, or utilities can’t access your data. It does need to be turned on though, so some will miss this useful feature. Outstanding connectivity Using a HP printer on the MacBook for the first time was amazing. Instead of searching the web for drivers, after attaching the printer’s USB lead, a window appeared, asking ‘would you like to connect to the HP2750?’ In just a minute or two, the Mac had invisibly searched for the latest driver, downloaded it and a print menu appeared. When reviewing the MacBook, it was constantly a surprise to find new and old functionality working so well. The MacBook has not crashed once and it’s simply the most exciting computer I’ve ever used. PC users be aware - try out a MacBook and you may be hooked! Apple is ready for a new slogan: ‘MacBook – it just works. . . SC siliconchip.com.au