[SaadAli]

The 15" MacBook Pro with retina screen is the machine i am saving up for but i am getting a little impatient and thinking of just buying a second hand 2011 i7 quadcore 15" for almost half the price.

What do you reckon is the retina screen alone worth holding out and getting or should i just go for the 2011 model and in the process save about £800?

[Timbo21]

Why don't you go and have a look at an Apple Store, if you can?

I f you were buying just for the screen and don't do hi-res picture editing, or similar, then perhaps doesn't make sense. Many of us are unlikely to need the cpu power provided by them.

[Norman]

You also need to ask yourself what else you could buy with that spare £800. Fancy a new iPad 3 and still have cash left to burn? Food for thought!

[Matt_C]

Exactly what I thought - soon as I saw the Retina MBP I was all "wooo, want!" but then realised I do virtually nothing with photos (as far as editing goes) and very little with HD video editing (a few 720p video edits here and there, taken on iPhone) but nothing that warrants the retina display. Plus, the lack of optical drive (which I still use here and there - not a lot, but enough to make having an external optical drive a PITA). The weight ins't really a concern as mine spends 99% of it's time on a little table next to the sofa, but the thinness is an attractive point. But not and £800 point!!!

[Dave]

Originally Posted by Matt_C

Exactly what I thought - soon as I saw the Retina MBP I was all "wooo, want!" but then realised I do virtually nothing with photos (as far as editing goes) and very little with HD video editing (a few 720p video edits here and there, taken on iPhone) but nothing that warrants the retina display. Plus, the lack of optical drive (which I still use here and there - not a lot, but enough to make having an external optical drive a PITA). The weight ins't really a concern as mine spends 99% of it's time on a little table next to the sofa, but the thinness is an attractive point. But not and £800 point!!!

I just got the new base MBP, retina display would be lovely but the screens are great anyway so I doubt I'd use or need the extra. plus I can stick an SSD in at some point when the price drops.

[tdenson]

Originally Posted by Matt_C

Exactly what I thought - soon as I saw the Retina MBP I was all "wooo, want!" but then realised I do virtually nothing with photos (as far as editing goes) and very little with HD video editing (a few 720p video edits here and there, taken on iPhone) but nothing that warrants the retina display. Plus, the lack of optical drive (which I still use here and there - not a lot, but enough to make having an external optical drive a PITA). The weight ins't really a concern as mine spends 99% of it's time on a little table next to the sofa, but the thinness is an attractive point. But not and £800 point!!!

There's a lot more to it though than it's usefulness for video/photo editing etc. I've got the retina model and previously I nearly always worked with a second monitor attached, usually a 24" Apple cinema screen, but now I quite often don't bother as my laptop monitor is just so legible - in fact more legible than my 24" monitors. I certainly don't regret shelling out the extra

[SaadAli]

In two minds think I am going to wait till August maybe buy the MacBook Pro from 2011 and get a Air for portability.

[Darrenraymond]

Interesting guys. Im in deep discussion with myself at the moment about the new Retina model and its good to see some good critisim.

As you say Matt C, the thinness is very attractive and Im like, "I want to have the best possible display and have the wow factor" but like many, Im not going to be using it for photography/Video editing so is there any real point?

Im a bit of an Apple novice and this will be my first Mac and from the research ive done it seems apps will take some time to migrate over to the new resolution while the main things like web browsing, youtube etc will see no benefits from the Retina. Would i be correct is saying that??

That being said, I'd still like a 15" but could survive with the 13". I should be entitled to a bit of discount as im starting my degree in in october so should i go for the 13" i5 and up the RAM to 8gb or leave it at 4 and swap the HDD to a SSD? Would 128gb ssd be enough seeing im not planning on loading the laptop with half the stuff my main pc has, i.e, Music, Programs etc? A ssd would make it alot faster wouldn't it? Also, is there much difference between the i5 and i7. Is i7 a bit overkill again for general use, browsing and word processing??

---or---

Should i stick with the 15" as standard - 4gb ram, 500gb HDD 2.3 i-7 and still be totally gobsmacked by its performance???? With student discount, works out about £1250 which includes apple care.


Hope i didnt ramble on too much. Advice much appreciated!!!

Oh yea. Any sings of a 13" Retina model this year?? Im sure at some stage the retina will be as standard on the pro's??

[fat jez]

Having seen some of the photos from people using them in store, yes the screen detail is amazing, but the reflections in the screen are not. No AG model means no sale from me

[Darrenraymond]

Originally Posted by fat jez

Having seen some of the photos from people using them in store, yes the screen detail is amazing, but the reflections in the screen are not. No AG model means no sale from me

The reflection issue seems to be more apparent on the basic model where as it seems dramatically reduced on the newer Retina model. Ive only seen Youtube videos though to base my asumptions. Going to take a pop into PC World this week and see if i can give them a good check over!! I was at one stage very interested in the Alienware laptops but the glare from the screens on them seem near unusable in well lit environments. Plus the fact that there priced so close to Apple id be a fool not to go with Apple seeing im not a gamer!!

[fat jez]

These are the photos I've seen, taken in an Apple store by somebody who was forcing the laptop to use the native resolution.

MacRumors Forums - View Single Post - 2880x1800 at Apple Store

[Darrenraymond]

I see your point however I could live with that. Seems quite a well lit room and ive definitely seen worse!! Still alot of dosh to be splashing out on a screen that's not going to benefit certain folk. Looking forward to getting a look at the models myself this week!

[fat jez]

Originally Posted by Darrenraymond

I see your point however I could live with that. Seems quite a well lit room and ive definitely seen worse!! Still alot of dosh to be splashing out on a screen that's not going to benefit certain folk. Looking forward to getting a look at the models myself this week!

It's in an Apple store, so yes, well lit. I have the AG 1680x1050 model from last year, which I love the screen on, it's perfectly viewable in almost all conditions. I can only assume that the Retina display would have been impacted by an AG coating. I know Apple did state they had dramatically reduced the glare problems on Retina model.

[hutch]

Originally Posted by fat jez

These are the photos I've seen, taken in an Apple store by somebody who was forcing the laptop to use the native resolution.

MacRumors Forums - View Single Post - 2880x1800 at Apple Store

The screen looks incredible at native res, will be interesting to see if its useable.

[Timbo21]

Ive never thought of a laptop or computer as needing such a high quality display. From my TV or projector, yes.

Sure, it would be nice to see more resolution from my photos.

I think it would be a bonus if Apple could allow page sizes and to be customised, so they are not tiny when viewing in Native Resolution. You can obviously make dock size bigger in preferences. Would be good if they had a single control to emulate size of lower res, but still keeping the resolution.

[fat jez]

You have to run a 3rd party utility to use the native resolution. Otherwise you have a choice of how much scaling to use, e.g. 1920x1200

[tausifs]

Originally Posted by fat jez

You have to run a 3rd party utility to use the native resolution. Otherwise you have a choice of how much scaling to use, e.g. 1920x1200

What is the max useable res using non-3rd party/Apples own utility ?

And when you say 3rd party utility, do any currently exist and any example/name ? Can you still run Apple operating system with it ?

[hutch]

It's called SwitchResX and it doesn't affect anything, I've been using it to force 1080p through my amp on my Mac Mini for years.

[tausifs]

Originally Posted by hutch

It's called SwitchResX and it doesn't affect anything, I've been using it to force 1080p through my amp on my Mac Mini for years.

Thanks, so it allows the full 2880-by-1800-pixel resolution without any scaling, which is not natively supported

Compared to the max native support of 1440-by-900-pixel resolution. Therefore the SwitchResX program allows a 4 fold increase in definition.

To anyone who uses the program and views hi res photos on the RMPro ie. 6 megapixels or more from a quality compact or DSLR camera : is there a night and day difference in image quality with vs. without using SwitchResX at 2880-by-1800-pixel resolution without any scaling ?

(I know the maths would suggest "4x better" image quality but am interested to hear subjective accounts of how significant the difference is, as very good quality upscaling may offset a lot of the difference.)

[fat jez]

Originally Posted by tausifs

Compared to the max native support of 1440-by-900-pixel resolution. Therefore the SwitchResX program allows a 4 fold increase in definition.

1440x900 is not native, native is a one to one pixel mapping between physical pixels and the resolution set in the OS. Even 1440x900 seems to go through the OSX scaling process, even though logic tells us it should be a case of allocating 4 physical pixels for each software one.

You have the options of 1920x1200 and 1680x1050 and 1440x900, which are all scaled to the 2880x1800 resolution (plus some lower ones as well). All of this comes at the price of having to process the scaling from the non-native lower resolutions to the native 2880x1800, leading people to complain of lag in day to day use (which apparently is not a problem in the forthcoming Mountain Lion).

[tausifs]

OK so is it possible to compare hi res images at 1920x1200, to using Switchresx at the full 2880-by-1800-pixel resolution-without-any-scaling ?

(If that makes sense )

[Darrenraymond]

Might hold out to see what the pricing on the 13" Retina is going to be (If rumors are true)

AppleByte: New iPod Nano and MacBook Pro 13-inch Retina? Yes, please! - YouTube

[fat jez]

Originally Posted by tausifs

OK so is it possible to compare hi res images at 1920x1200, to using Switchresx at the full 2880-by-1800-pixel resolution-without-any-scaling ?

(If that makes sense )

Makes perfect sense. Sadly I don't have any examples to show you!

[dejongj]

Originally Posted by Timbo21

Ive never thought of a laptop or computer as needing such a high quality display. From my TV or projector, yes.

Sure, it would be nice to see more resolution from my photos.

I think it would be a bonus if Apple could allow page sizes and to be customised, so they are not tiny when viewing in Native Resolution. You can obviously make dock size bigger in preferences. Would be good if they had a single control to emulate size of lower res, but still keeping the resolution.

My very old dell Inspiron 9100 15.4 had a great 1920x1200 screen. To my eyes very legible.

However what you are describing is mynunderstanding of exactly what apple has done. I thought that when you use a retina aware application like Aperture the UI elements are in a hidpi mode so bigger in size, but the photo viewing part of the screen is running in native resolution. So it effectively gets mixed on the screen.

[nigelbb]

Originally Posted by dejongj

My very old dell Inspiron 9100 15.4 had a great 1920x1200 screen. To my eyes very legible.

I have a Dell Precision M60 that also has a 15.4" 1920x1200 screen & it is very usable. I even had it running OS X before I got fed up with mucking around with Hackintoshes.

[stoplis]

Originally Posted by dejongj

My very old dell Inspiron 9100 15.4 had a great 1920x1200 screen. To my eyes very legible.

However what you are describing is mynunderstanding of exactly what apple has done. I thought that when you use a retina aware application like Aperture the UI elements are in a hidpi mode so bigger in size, but the photo viewing part of the screen is running in native resolution. So it effectively gets mixed on the screen.

Correct, in an app like Aperture the UI elements are rendered at a 1400x900 'size', With 4x the pixel density (makes them look really crisp). The photos are rendered at full native res, so at 100% zoom 1 photo pixel will be 1 screen pixel.
This is how all retina enabled apps will work. So in iMovie/Final Cut you can view a full 1080p 1:1 pixel video preview whilst editing video.
The whole idea is to give the maximum quality to the elements you see on the screen, whilst keeping the UI a useable, comfortable size. Think of it as the iPhone 3G(S) to the iPhone 4(S) (or iPad(2) to the new iPad(3)), nothing got smaller on the screen, the screen quality just got better.