The 17-Inch Macbook Pro: Is it Worth Converting For?

While Apple’s public relations renaissance may be nearing its end, the Cupertino-based technology company’s new laptop lineup certainly leaves a lasting impression. The ultra-popular Macbook Pro series has seen a significant internal upgrade for 2010, now boasting improved processors, greater amounts of RAM and larger hard drives.

This is in addition to the system’s already impressive design and durability. Built out of aluminium and designed to survive all but a nuclear attack, the new Macbook Pro range has been called the most physically solid laptop lineup of the last decade. It’s a selling point that’s pushing many PC users to consider a simultaneous upgrade and conversion. But is it really worth it?

Apple’s flagship laptop is the Macbook Pro 17 – a seventeen-inch multimedia laptop more at home in a creative suite than a crowded office. It’s hugely powerful, sleek and stylish, and priced closer to a high-end piece of professional technology than a consumer-focused laptop. Apple have chosen to revamp the laptop for 2010, adding a 512MB nVidia graphics card and quad-core processor as standard.

With a price tag of almost £1,700 these features are more of an expectation than a welcome bonus, though the Macbook Pro 17 still offers immense value. Performance is stunning – a combination of the powerful quad-core Intel processor and Apple’s highly optimized OS X Snow Leopard. The 17-inch model ships with 4GB of RAM as standard, a figure which can be extended to 8GB with an inexpensive memory upgrade.

But alongside the Macbook Pro 17′s intimidating processing power and flexible memory, the system displays several short-sighted exclusions and strange choices. Apple’s standard Superdrive is included – a combination DVD and CD rewriter – yet we feel the 17-inch media laptop would be more comfortable sporting a full Blu-ray disc drive.

The nVidia graphics card is also a mixed bag. Despite empowering media users and transforming the Macbook Pro into a more gamer-focused machine, there’s no simple way to disable the graphics card and operate on the motherboard’s built-in graphics unit. The built-in battery is powerful enough to make long haul flights and journeys manageable, though allowing users to switch the display card off could add hours onto the system’s mobile longevity.

We feel that the Macbook Pro 17 has succeeded in all the categories which Apple are renowned for, while at the same time falling guilty to some basic software and control faux pas. A beautiful piece of hardware, the 17-inch Macbook Pro would be significantly improved by a greater degree of user control and software options.

But we also have no qualms in recommending the latest Macbook Pro, especially as an all-in-one multimedia centre. It’s expensive – unreasonably expensive for many users – but it just doesn’t matter to us. While the lack of a Blu-ray drive and a limited selection of user control options make the Macbook Pro 17 a difficult choice for techies, we’re certain that this is the best non-Windows laptop available today.

Related posts: