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2006 A Banner Year For Apple Portable Fans

2006 will be remembered it as a landmark year in the Mac portable world, rivaled only by 1991 when the first PowerBooks were introduced, 1998’s introduction of the G3 Series ‘Books (1997’s original PowerBook G3 being an obvious stopgap model), 1999’s iBook intro, 2001 which saw the debut of both the metal-skinned PowerBooks and the dual-USB iBook , and 2003 during which the aluminum PowerBook Family was unveiled.

This time last year, the Apple laptop line up was bracketed by a 1.33 GHz G4 iBook at the low and, and the 1.67 GHz 17-inch G4 PowerBook at the other end of the price and performance spectrum - both more than a bit long in the tooth, but still formidable machines.

Twelve months later, the Power PC laptops are all out of production, with the entire line (almost) replaced with a completely new generation of MacBook Pro and MacBook Intel powered notebooks, which have rekindled the fire under Apple portable sales.

First out of the blocks was the 1.83 GHz and 2.0 GHz Core Duo 15-inch MacBook Pro. Design form factor-wise, these first MacIntel portables obviously owe a great deal to their 15 inch PowerBook predecessors, as does the 17-inch MacBook Pro that came along in a April. An analogy with the original PowerBook G3 (3500 - "Kanga"), which was based on the 603e PowerBook 3400c, occurs, but the differences between the last generation PowerBooks and the first-gen MacBook Pros is much more substantial, notwithstanding the similarity in appearance. The PowerBook/ MacBook Pro cases are not identical or interchangeable, and the Internals are completely different. The MacBook Pro really is a new computer design that only resembles its PowerBook forbears in general appearance and and some features.

As with most revolutionary design changes in something as complex as a notebook computer, the “Revision A” MacBook Pros, especially the early 15-inch models, have not been with out “teething problems,” and folks who waited for the “Revision B” Core 2 Duo models have enjoyed a more highly refined and reliable user experience as well as better performance at substantially cooler running temperatures.

In May, the dual USB iBook, which had the longest production run in Apple portable history, that just over five years, was finally replaced by an unambiguously new from scratch “consumer” notebook - the MacBook, which is destined to be one of Apple’s most successful notebook designs ever.

With Core Duo power, the MacBooks didn’t lag much behind their MacBook Pro stablemates in performance (although their entailed GMA 950 integrated graphics do hobble them a bit compared to the pro models’ dedicated Graphics Processor Unit).

The MacBook also marked the return of Black ‘Books to Apple’s lineup, which had not been available since the PowerBook G3 Pismo was discontinued at the end of 2000, although you do have to pony up an extra two hundred dollars for the Darth Vader motif.

As with the MacBook Pro, the “Revision A” MacBook had its share of new model rough edges, including some of the same ones, like excessive heat generation and annoying “mooing” sounds, as well as case discoloration on some of the early white models, and a nasty “sudden shut down” issue that was eventually addressed by a firmware update.

Now, with both the MacBook and MacBook Pro, Revision B machines have been released, updated with Intel’s faster, cooler-running Core 2 Duo CPUs that seem so far to have licked most of the reliability issues. Personally, I would now be quite comfortably confident buying either a Core 2 Duo MacBook or MacBook Pro , although I’d would still be inclined to steer clear of the Core Duo models, despite very attractive prices is Apple is offering on Certified Refurbished units - as little as $799.00 for a 1.83 GHz MacBook.

With the Core 2 Duo revisions still quite fresh, I don’t anticipate another upgrade in these machines before Spring, 2007. The question is whether Apple will have a MacBook Pro with Intel’s “Santa Rosa” chip and “Robson” in a NAND/Flash hybrid technology ready for the customary April/May notebook refresh announcement.

“Robson,” which Intel first previewed in October, 2005, is the development code name for an integrated module that incorporates NAND flash memory as a ‘smart storage’ buffer between system RAM and the hard drive. The Robson memory storage subsystem plugs the performance gap between processor and HDD by acting as new layer of cache in the system memory/storage hierarchy.

Robson’s non-volatile flash memory can be used to provide storage for system boot files and other frequently-accessed system files, which could be read and written or rewritten when appropriate substantially faster than from the fastest notebook hard drives. This would facilitate, among other things, speedier bootup, shutdown, wake from sleep, potentially livelier application performance, extended battery life, and taa-daa! - less heat generation. Hybrid flash technology can of course be used in desktop computers as well, but its most profound advantages will be experienced in notebooks, where the hard drive could theoretically be kept spun down most of the time, resulting in decreased power consumption (Robson itself reportedly draws a minuscule 0.1 watt), less heat being generated, and a faster boot process.

Robson for spring is not out of the question if Intel’s projected release in Q1 2007 holds, but it’s also plausible that we will have to wait for fall for the MacBook Pro with Robson intro.

Also grist for speculation it is whether Apple will unveil something, perhaps as early as Macworld Expo, to fill the gap in its notebook lineup vacated by the 12-inch PowerBook, which went out of production last May. There is evidently substantial pent-up demand for a subcompact MacBook Pro, and rumors of such machines being under development are rampant.

But when the MacBook Pro mini, or whatever it’s to be called, ultimately materializes, don’t expect it to resemble the erstwhile 12-inch PowerBook in the same way that the 15 inch and 17-inch MacBook Pro form factors are revolutionary developments of their PowerBook predecessors. The 12-inch machine actually had more in common with the dual-USB iBook than with its larger metal-skinned stablemates engineering-wise, being built by Apple’s iBook subcontractor.

This time, I think we can safely assume that the small MacBook Pro will not be a derivative of the consumer notebook design (the MacBook his nearly as large and heavy as the former full-sized Titanium PowerBook), but a considerably smaller and lighter machine. Whether it will be a super-slim and light conventional laptop, or something more revolutionary, like a tablet computer hybrid of sorts, or even Apple’s first flash memory notebook, remains to be seen. As ever, the speculation is part of the fun, and it will be interesting to see what Apple has in store for us next.

Winding up this last The Road Warrior entry of 2006 with some site notes, the coming year will mark the ninth anniversary of this column. Where did the time go? If you are a regular The Road Warrior reader, then you are aware that we had a complete site redesign and relaunch in November. This wasn’t planned, but rather precipitated by an unexpected hard drive meltdown, which was the reason for our three weeks of downtime, but I think you will agree that being new MacOpinion site motif is a major improvement over the old site design, which was getting more than a bit dated, indeed back to before The Road Warrior debuted in 1998.

The downside is that we lost The Road Warrior Archive, but you can still access The Road Warrior Archive material to January 2006 by clicking here.

Thanks for reading, and especially to those who have submitted sometimes challenging questions and interesting comments to The Road Warrior MailBag. Wishing all a very Happy New Year, and I hope you will visit often in 2007.

*** cmoore@macopinion.com

Provisionally, you can access The Road Warrior Archive to Jan. 16, 2006 by clicking here.

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