Pros
- Thin, rounded design
- Great new keyboard
- Only Apple laptop with anti-glare option
- Large trackpad with numerous multi-touch gesture choices
- Longer battery life than predecessor
Cons
- Trackpad button can be hard to press
- No video adapters or Apple Remote in the box
- Battery is no longer user-replaceable
At A Glance
Apple filled in the last piece of the unibody puzzle, introducing this new MacBook Pro at the January 2009 Macworld Expo. It sports the same enclosure as the 15-inch laptops introduced in the fall of 2008. The chief feature in this new 17-inch system is a new battery that uses custom-shaped cells. That should give the machine a battery of eight hours using integrated graphics, according to Apple. The downside? The battery is not removable. Other changes include a faster processor (2.66GHz) and the removal of the FireWire 400 port (though FireWire 800 remains).
Manufacturer’s Description
The battery in the 17-inch MacBook Pro lasts up to 8 hours on a single charge and can be recharged up to 1000 times compared with only 200 to 300 times for typical notebooks.
The Specs
| Pricing | |
|---|---|
| Part Number | MB604LLA |
| UPC Code | 885909241613 |
| Processor | |
| Processor type | Intel Core 2 Duo Mobile |
| Processor speed | 2660.0 MHz |
| Cache size | 6.0 KB |
| Bus speed | 1066.0 MHz |
| Memory | |
| Memory type | DDR3 |
| Memory max | 8.0 GB |
| Display | |
| Display size | 17.0 inches |
| Display type | Glossy LCD with LED Backlight |
| Aspect ratio | 16:10 |
| Resolution | 1920 x 1200 pixels |
| Graphics | |
| Primary Graphics Chipset | NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT |
| Storage | |
| Other storage | Express Card 34 |
| Battery | |
| Vendor Rated Battery life | 8.0 hours |
| Ports and Connections | |
| Available Interfaces | Bluetooth |
| Express Card 34 or ExpressCard/34 | 1 |
| Slots | Express Card 34 |
| Green | |
| Energy Star compliant | 1.0 |
| Dimensions | |
| Width | 15.47 inches |
| Depth | 10.51 inches |
| Height | 0.98 inches |
| Weight | 6.6 pounds |
| Optical Drive | |
| Included Drives | DVD+-RW DL |
| Included Software | |
| Operating System | Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard) |
| Other Features | |
| Devices | Built-In Webcam |
| Input devices |
|
| Warranty | |
| Warranty information | 1 Year Limited Warranty |
Performance
| Macworld Labs | |
|---|---|
| Quake 4 | 72.4fps fps |
| Photoshop CS3 | 0:56 min |
| Cinema 4D XL 10.5 | 0:48 min |
| Tested Configuration | OS X 10.5.6 with 4GB of RAM |
| Speedmark 5 Score | 224 |
| Compressor | 1:42 |
| iMovie HD6 | 0:46 |
| iTunes 7.7 | 0:59 |
