Coming from a troubled Nvidia 8600M GT let MacBook Pro – I say that I was very skeptical about buying another Apple laptop with nVidia. However, I decided one weekend nearest Apple retail store to visit and verify the newly released models. My decision was mainly influenced by lower prices and the battery life has increased.

After some discussion about purchasing the old model for the same price or get the last we have the latest mid-end $ 1,999 model with fixed two GPUs. As usual, I received a very good resale price for my old MacBook Pro and AppleCare had.

This generation is an improvement over the previous generation, unless you happen to use Express Card 15 “model. In our case we never used the card after attempting Express card eSATA does not work very good use. And we have a few SD cards that we face, we can easily use.

Thus, the specific improvements over its predecessor -
1) Battery life – I was very unlikely that the battery is more than four hours, but the maximum was pleasantly surprised to find that surfing / type e-mail and occasional CNN / Youtube Videos will get 6 + hours was fairly simple.

2) Prices – Without doubt, the most reasonable prices of laptops Apple ever had. If you do not need the dual GPU use the $ 1,699 model that comes with a respectable 2.53 GHz, 4GB RAM and a 9400M GPU very capable of winning.

3) Operating temperature – I have my share of phones (Apple and non-Apple) and I must say it’s the coolest – it is never too hot and I can use it on my lap all the time – including video encoding with handbrake application is not too hot. But when I put on the 9600M GPU it is even hotter in regular use. It is also very quiet – fans can get up, but I never notice.

Initially there was much indignation on the decommissioning of Apple in the Serial ATA interface speed (used to transfer data to and from the hard drive) to 1.5 Gbps, but Apple quickly recovered from the velocities up to 3 Gb / s – but I think not notice any difference with the hard disk 5400 rpm.

On the screen – it is beautiful and the colors are vivid. I had the chance of a color profile calibrated with even more beautiful. However I found the display to reflect much smaller, but I’m almost always come out with a matte screen, so I say it’s a matter of habit.

Apple’s use of the Mini DisplayPort is ahead of its time – not support multiple screens and if I had $ 30 DVI to buy – not a big problem, but Apple should at least start the consolidation of the adapter with the Pro machines. In addition, another USB port instead of the SD card slot is very welcome – people can use the SD card slot for SD cards only, but a USB port may be used for SD cards and other peripherals.

That said, this generation is a very nice overall improvement – the battery life big enough to convince upgrade.

[Edited to add some results after] the frequent use

After using it for a few months, I think a handful of moderately irritating things about this laptop -

1) The positioning of the USB ports – two USB ports on one side of the laptop and they are too closely placed to simultaneously use both. For example, I found I could not attach my USB SanDisk and other things at the same time. And I do not Irregular / Unusual Equipment. They should return to ports on both sides or at least put a little more outside.

2) The lid of the laptop is loose – it was familiar, but I never thought it would be boring. I do not routinely use the laptop in bed, but when I hate him.

3) The advertising Apple RAM (4GB) is not quite suitable for use – is 3.75GB. So you lose 256MB of RAM for dual GPU.