The Apple Thread

Trooper · **Joined:** 4th Mar, 2010 **Posts:** 22270

Curiosity wrote:

SilentElk wrote:

Curiosity wrote:

SilentElk wrote:

New iPhone may be announced on 10th Sept.

Typically how long between announcement and availability?

Not very long at all, usually.

A week? A fortnight? A month?

Yes.

Trooper · **Joined:** 4th Mar, 2010 **Posts:** 22270

It has been as little as 10 days and as much as a month IIRC

myp · **Posted:** Tue Aug 13, 2013 9:58

Curiosity wrote:

SilentElk wrote:

Curiosity wrote:

SilentElk wrote:

New iPhone may be announced on 10th Sept.

Typically how long between announcement and availability?

Not very long at all, usually.

A week? A fortnight? A month?

Preorders are usually accepted the day after. It then depends how quickly they can make and ship them.

chinnyhill10 · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 15695

Just ordered this for the Mac Pro Tower as a boot drive as sick of the Velociraptor's noise and heat:

http://www.ebuyer.com/409851-samsung-500gb-840-series-ssd-mz-7td500bw

I had ordered the Crucial unit that has a better spec, but cancelled the order with Ebuyer* when I read on the Crucial forums that loads of Mac Pro owners were having issues with them and Crucial were basically saying "ah yes, we say it works with Apple's but you have a server there and these SSD's aren't meant for servers". Which is bollocks frankly. It's a Workstation not a server.

Apparently the new firmware's also mean TRIM isn't needed which was one of the reasons I went for the Rapter last year.

* Who were brilliant, stopped it leaving the warehouse and refunded the money really quickly.

throughsilver · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 6197

SilentElk wrote:

throughsilver wrote:

SilentElk wrote:

I only plan on keeping it three years

Blimey. I've had my MacBook for four years already, and I am going to pimp it a bit. Now that's pov-spec

Yes, but you can upgrade yours. I'm now on a cycle like with a phone or tablet. Keep for a number of years and then trade in for a newer model.

Huzzah!

Attachment:

Screen Shot 2013-08-20 at 17.47.17.png

kalmar · **Posted:** Wed Aug 21, 2013 9:23

Finally got a new iMac to replace my ancient first-generation Intel one with its increasingly knackered built in monitor. 12gigs of ram in the new one :nerd:

myp · **Posted:** Wed Aug 21, 2013 9:40

kalmar wrote:

Finally got a new iMac to replace my ancient first-generation Intel one with its increasingly knackered built in monitor. 12gigs of ram in the new one :nerd:

My Dad has one - they are awesome.

chinnyhill10 · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 15695

throughsilver wrote:

Attachment:

Screen Shot 2013-08-20 at 17.47.17.png

Competition eh?

Attachment:

mem.jpg

]

Think it has some 1GB sticks in there as I ordered it with the bare minimum back in 2008 when it was new due to Apple's ludicrous memory prices. Something I probably won't be able to escape this time.

Meanwhile I'm cloning my boot drive to the new SSD. Stay tuned.

Grim... · **Posted:** Wed Aug 21, 2013 14:13

Lulz 800MHz

chinnyhill10 · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 15695

Grim... wrote:

Lulz 800MHz

It is a 2008 model remember. Don't think I've ever had a computer that has lasted this long in terms of still being able to cut it. Although the Quadro helps with the video editing granted.

Boot time now 10 seconds and am running from the SSD. No TRIM enabled as various forums advise against it as the drive has its own garbage collection.

throughsilver · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 6197

chinnyhill10 wrote:

throughsilver wrote:

Attachment:

Screen Shot 2013-08-20 at 17.47.17.png

Competition eh?

Attachment:

mem.jpg

]

Not really, no. This apparently maxes out at 4GB, so it is what it is.

It's just nice to be able to run my OS smoothly again.

myp · **Posted:** Wed Aug 21, 2013 18:37

Do I win?

Attachment:

Screen Shot 2013-08-21 at 18.35.55.png

Probably not, as I don't have room to upgrade.

WTB · **Joined:** 27th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 14497

So... You'll be playing CS:GO on a Mac? I'm not sure I want to play with you any more.

myp · **Posted:** Wed Aug 21, 2013 19:49

WTB wrote:

So... You'll be playing CS:GO on a Mac? I'm not sure I want to play with you any more.

I may even play it native!

Trooper · **Joined:** 4th Mar, 2010 **Posts:** 22270

Hmmm.... wonder how much it would cost to go up to 16Gb these days?
Especially as OSX seems to be getting more and more infested with memory leaks as time goes on! The firewall was taking up 4GB alone the other day. Removing and resetting the plist seems to have cured that for now though.

Edit: £120 to go to 16Gb, Hmm....

chinnyhill10 · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 15695

SilentElk wrote:

Do I win?

Attachment:

Screen Shot 2013-08-21 at 18.35.55.png

Probably not, as I don't have room to upgrade.

My Macbook has 1600MHz with 8 gb in each slot.

The speed the Mac Pro now runs at with the SSD is astonishing. Also lack of noise from the VelociRaptor which is one of the noisiest HD's I've ever owned!

Yes they are fast but it's now the point where if you want a 512gb 10k drive, an SSD is within reach.

WTB · **Joined:** 27th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 14497

Trooper · **Joined:** 4th Mar, 2010 **Posts:** 22270

Olympics was last year dude.

myp · **Posted:** Wed Aug 21, 2013 20:44

WTB wrote:

GB!

Maybe he means a gillibit.

BikNorton · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 10078

chinnyhill10 wrote:

No TRIM enabled as various forums advise against it as the drive has its own garbage collection.

the OS doing TRIM advising allows drive firmware to garbage collect, otherwise it doesn't know blocks are free again. unless they've started adding filesystem parsers to ssd firmware, which would be quite heroic over-engineering. Though I suppose as apple were tardy adding TRIM to OSX at least that format would be beneficial.

But TRIM isn't going to *hurt* whatever other smarts the drive has.

WTB · **Joined:** 27th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 14497

Trooper wrote:

Olympics was last year dude.

A fair weather supporter, eh?

Doctor Glyndwr · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 32619

BikNorton wrote:

unless they've started adding filesystem parsers to ssd firmware, which would be quite heroic over-engineering.

Lots of drives do just that, but only for NTFS. So OS-level TRIM support remains very important on OS X.

chinnyhill10 · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 15695

Doctor Glyndwr wrote:

BikNorton wrote:

unless they've started adding filesystem parsers to ssd firmware, which would be quite heroic over-engineering.

Lots of drives do just that, but only for NTFS. So OS-level TRIM support remains very important on OS X.

There's a lot of conflicting advice knocking around on this with some people saying that enabling TRIM fouls up garbage collection.

chinnyhill10 · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 15695

If you are going to use TRIM enabler, be warned the UI is terrible. I assumed mine had frozen or wasn't working as I couldn't drag the iPhone style slider with my mouse pointer to enable it.

Turns out you have to click in a vague position near the "on" switch for it to enable like some awful Visual Basic program written by a student. Nice work lads.

TRIM now working after a couple of reboots. Don't think I'll be bunging him 10 dollars for it though until he can sort out the UI issues.

BikNorton · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 10078

Doctor Glyndwr wrote:

BikNorton wrote:

unless they've started adding filesystem parsers to ssd firmware, which would be quite heroic over-engineering.

Lots of drives do just that, but only for NTFS. So OS-level TRIM support remains very important on OS X.

Madness!

chinnyhill10 wrote:

There's a lot of conflicting advice knocking around on this with some people saying that enabling TRIM fouls up garbage collection.

Do they have any evidence to back this up? If there are tools to poke about drive stats I'd be interesting in looking at mine.

chinnyhill10 · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 15695

BikNorton wrote:

Doctor Glyndwr wrote:

BikNorton wrote:

unless they've started adding filesystem parsers to ssd firmware, which would be quite heroic over-engineering.

Lots of drives do just that, but only for NTFS. So OS-level TRIM support remains very important on OS X.

Madness!

chinnyhill10 wrote:

There's a lot of conflicting advice knocking around on this with some people saying that enabling TRIM fouls up garbage collection.

Do they have any evidence to back this up? If there are tools to poke about drive stats I'd be interesting in looking at mine.

Try these:

Quote:

I just spoke to a local apple specialist and he stated that I do not need trim on my MacBook Pro as the only reason apple use trim is for utilising the new fusion drives. He said I need not worry about it as my new Samsung 840 pro will have garbage disposal already built in.

Not sure if that is correct but I may just leave it disabled as I have heard a lot of negativity regarding Trim Enabler?

Quote:

If you have an OWC SSD, though, you don’t need TRIM. The SandForce controller in our SSDs takes care of this “garbage collection” as well as performs various other tasks that keep your drive running at optimal speed, without the drop-off that you see with other brands. Especially note page two of this performance testing expert’s report where he feels so strongly about TRIM’s inefficiency that he calls call it “half-baked”…and that’s the kid friendly version of the phrase.

In fact, enabling TRIM could actually hurt the performance and reliability of your OWC SSD, rather than help it. As OWC customer Scott Gosling recently said in an email to us,

“I used the trim enabler 1.1 initially, then realized that your self maintenance was far superior to using TRIM so I disabled it. It made a huge difference in terms of reliability.”

Our in-house testing has also shown that the TRIM Enabler hack has proven to be unreliable. So bottom line, we highly recommend not using TRIM when using OWC SSDs; all you need is what’s already inside.

BikNorton · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 10078

Oh right, TRIM is a third-party hack on OSX? Did you buy a Mac-specific drive version? I noticed Sandisk do a special firmware for theirs (on the Extreme at least). Maybe they added HFS+ smarts, or whatever OSX uses these days. Without filesystem-specific knowledge there's just no way automated garbage collection can work (because a filesystem updates a proprietary table to show what's free and isn't, so how can the firmware know if it can't read that information). SSD firmware is way more intelligent than I thought!

BikNorton · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 10078

Saying that, I'm not sure I'd fully commit to believing "random user on the internet" or "random Apple employee talking about another company's products".

Trooper · **Joined:** 4th Mar, 2010 **Posts:** 22270

The 15" Retina Pro is here!

It's quite nice.

myp · **Posted:** Wed Aug 28, 2013 16:23

Trooper wrote:

The 15" Retina Pro is here!

It's quite nice.

Understatement of the year.

Zio · **Joined:** 31st Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 6093

I've been issued a 4-year old MacBook as my temporary computer in my new job. I can't keep it as it technically belongs to a corporate customer - it's one of their spares. All the other engineers have the latest MacBooks - but obviously Apple have now discontinued the whole line. I'm wondering if I can convince my boss that my full-time laptop should therefore be a MacBook Air... and how long it would take me to get lynched by the other engineers if he actually agreed to it.

throughsilver · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 6197

It's like that Sweet 16 programme...

DavPaz · **Joined:** 27th Jun, 2008 **Posts:** 38464

This just came in for the Big Boss of the uni:

Attachment:

2013-09-13 08.33.30.jpg

It's top of the line:
13-inch MacBook Air
1.7GHz i7
8GB RAM
512GB SSD

It's a bit nice

myp · **Posted:** Fri Sep 13, 2013 8:41

Almost as nice as my MBP.

markg · **Joined:** 30th Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 16560

And I'll bet all he needs to do is read emails and shit. Whilst everyone doing jobs where they could actually use it are stuck with some five year old piece of crap.

DavPaz · **Joined:** 27th Jun, 2008 **Posts:** 38464

markg wrote:

And I'll bet all he needs to do is read emails and shit. Whilst everyone doing jobs where they could actually use it are stuck with some five year old piece of crap.

DING! Take a prize.

myp · **Posted:** Fri Sep 13, 2013 8:45

He needs the portability because he's always out and about doing big deals for the university. A bigger laptop would stifle him.

Leave him alone.

DavPaz · **Joined:** 27th Jun, 2008 **Posts:** 38464

To be fair to the Big Man, he is paying for it himself

ApplePieOfDestiny · **Joined:** 17th Dec, 2008 **Posts:** 8293

DavPaz wrote:

This just came in for the Big Boss of the uni:

Attachment:

2013-09-13 08.33.30.jpg

It's top of the line:
13-inch MacBook Air
1.7GHz i7
8GB RAM
512GB SSD

It's a bit nice

The ratio of Trackpad area:keyboard area upsets me.

Grim... · **Posted:** Fri Sep 13, 2013 9:27

ApplePieOfDestiny wrote:

DavPaz wrote:

This just came in for the Big Boss of the uni:

Attachment:

2013-09-13 08.33.30.jpg

It's top of the line:
13-inch MacBook Air
1.7GHz i7
8GB RAM
512GB SSD

It's a bit nice

The ratio of Trackpad area:keyboard area upsets me.

That's what I was thinking, but maybe the photo makes the proportions look odd.

DavPaz · **Joined:** 27th Jun, 2008 **Posts:** 38464

Slightly, but it is a very large track pad. Physically identical to the old model though

DavPaz · **Joined:** 27th Jun, 2008 **Posts:** 38464

Apart from a new power connector and thunderbolt port.

Natch

myp · **Posted:** Fri Sep 13, 2013 9:46

I love having a large trackpad, but it's proportionally smaller on my 15".

ApplePieOfDestiny · **Joined:** 17th Dec, 2008 **Posts:** 8293

DavPaz wrote:

Slightly, but it is a very large track pad. Physically identical to the old model though

Did he order it so that he could use it around your head?

Zio · **Joined:** 31st Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 6093

It's one of them Magic Trackpad thingies that responds to multi-touch gestures though, so it needs to be fairly big for that.

Plus it's partially masking the totally colossal internal battery that lets them get the 12 hours of battery life they're reporting on those. Seriously, about one third maximum of the internal space is taken up by logic board, RAM and SSD - the rest of it is all battery.

DavPaz · **Joined:** 27th Jun, 2008 **Posts:** 38464

I've been staring at the Migration Assistant for an hour now. They could've put a game of Pong or sumfink in it.

Zio · **Joined:** 31st Mar, 2008 **Posts:** 6093

Heh, that's the sort of thing we start at 5:25pm on an evening and come back to the following day.

Grim... · **Posted:** Fri Sep 13, 2013 10:41

DavPaz wrote:

I've been staring at the Migration Assistant for an hour now. They could've put a game of Pong or sumfink in it.

One of our big reporting engines lets you play snake if it's calculating for more than a minute.

Global scoreboard, too

JBR · **Joined:** 2nd Jun, 2008 **Posts:** 3214

I have picked up a new Macbook air 11" because I've been missing a laptop and then spotted that the prices in Japan, where I am now, are reasonable - and that's against the HE discount I would get in the UK. Base spec, £600, and it is a lovely little thing. I like it very much.

myp · **Posted:** Fri Sep 13, 2013 11:45

JBR wrote:

I have picked up a new Macbook air 11" because I've been missing a laptop and then spotted that the prices in Japan, where I am now, are reasonable - and that's against the HE discount I would get in the UK. Base spec, £600, and it is a lovely little thing. I like it very much.

I see you're still taunting me with that trophy.

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The Apple Thread
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