Apple :: Does The Macbook Pro Support 5.1 Speaker Systems
Jul 27, 2009
I was looking at buying the Logitech z5500 speakers which are 5.1 surround sound and I was planning to use them with my soon to arrive 15 inch macbook pro. My only concern is whether the macbook pro actually supports 5.1 or do i need to buy some kind of an external sound card? in which case I will look for different speakers.
I have a Blackbook 2.4, with 2gb of ram. Right now I don't have the stock ram, my friend took it when he sold it to me, there's some random mis-matched slow 2x1GB sticks of stuff in there, I can buy a 4GB stick (800MHz) off of another buddy soon for 100 kuai ($14), I was wondering, I know OSX will only take 4GB or whatever, and that the book wont support more than 4GB, but will ONE slot support, and fully utilize the 4GB stick?
I only need this computer for another month before I buy a new MBP, so I don't want to spend any actual money on Ram, I'm doing semi-ok with 2gb.
After seeing how awesome the Education discount is, I've decided I will definitely go after a MacBook Pro 17 if I can get this shoddy Acer returned. What attracts me is the thinness, design, keyboard, screen, weight and basically everything except the price. Everything about it screams quality, even the notorious glossy screen which I kinda like.
I have some questions about the MacBook Pros and Mac OSX in general.
1. Is the 8 Hour Battery Life for real? I know that this is some "revolutionary" new thing, but honestly I can't believe something with a WUXGA screen could go for so long.
2. Does Aluminum scratch easily? How about fingerprints?
3. (Applies to all MacBook Pros) Does the hinge of the lid creak or wobble when opening or closing the laptop?
4. Is Leopard 32 bit or 64 bit? Or is it default 64 bit? I can't see any mention of that in the configuration page.
5. How about driver support? I have a Razer Copperhead, Piranha and am ordering a Mamba and it would be a shame if they were not compatible with the OS.
6. Does Parallels or VMWare lag at all when running XP? Or is it the same experience, with no slow down? How about Boot Camp?
I ordered a sony fw laptop from sonystyle, and was wondering on the quality of the speakers, as I have heard mixed reviews about them. My sister has a unibody macbook and I was wondering if anyone has experience of the sound quality of these laptops comparitively. As the macbook is the only laptop I could really compare the fw's sound to as I have not heard any others.
So basically is the sound better, equal or worse than the unibody macbook's? when listening to music, watching films.
The right speaker in my notebook is louder then the left one is. The only way to compensate for the problem is to lower the "balance" in the sound properties for the right speaker (I have it all the way down to 70 if you can believe that!) Now my audio sounds even between the left and right speaker. I think it's ashame that seems to be the only fix for the problem. Not sure if this is a driver issue or a hardware issue.
NVidia installs audio drivers to the computer when installing the video drivers (which I still don't understand why...I thought NVidia was a graphics company?) Then I install the IDT drivers/software afterwards. HP has verified that this is correct so everything on my end is up to date...minus of course offical drivers for the 320M video card that everyone is still waiting on!
I've been listening to a bunch of podcasts on my laptop lately and realized that the right hand side speaker is MUCH louder than my than the left speaker, in fact if I lower the balance on the right speaker to 0% and left to 100% it's not half as loud as the right at 100%. Is this normal? If not is there a fix for this?
Also when typing, if I press the Caps lock key too fast the cursor disappears and my typing is interrupted anyone know is up with that?
While watching a DVD last night in OSX, I noticed a buzzing sound in the right speaker when I was above 70% of the volume.. At half the volume, I don't hear the buzzing noise. It's kind if annoying especially when you're watching long movies. Anyone else have this problem?
Oh yeah, and my CPU temperature went up to 90C. Is watching a DVD that cpu intensive?
To start I should remind everyone that i'm not a mac user. I have never owned a mac or used OSX properly before today. As such, my opinions should be taken as coming from someone who has much knowledge and experience as far as PC's are concerned, but who is a total mac n00b.
First Impressions
When I first walked over to the Macbooks I was quite taken aback. The build quality is out of this world. In fact, I immediately walked over to the latest PC laptops to compare and immediately thought "manufacturing FAIL". Really, the Macbooks are italian sports cars, and PC's are 30 year old farm tractors to use the typical "car analogy".
The Macbook
I really only had any interest in the Macbook when I first went to the Apple stand, but came away with the intention of buying a MacBook Pro. Let me explain:
The MacBook's build quality is awesome. It's solid, no creaking plastic or flexable build, completely and utterly solid. Awesome.............
I have been speculating over this prospect giving the direction that Apple took with the starting price of the 24" iMac (upgrade everything else and downgrade the VRAM).
I mean, this is something I would like to see, but I wonder if it is a smart move on Apple's part given how much they make off the current MBP's with the so called Apple Tax.
And, if they made this move, one has to wonder if it still would be considered a Pro.
This is going to be my very first Mac. I'm really excited about it, but I don't know which one I should go for... I narrowed it down to these two models. Which one should I go for and why?
I bought a black macbook this summer and every night when I'm in bed trying to do work I can barely see which keys is which. Obviously this wouldn't be a cheap fix but is there a way or is it possible to install the new light up keys of the new macbooks onto a pre-remodel macbook?
I downloaded this updated for my unibody Macbook Pro, and I think it's pretty vital. However, it gave me this error when I tried to install it: "You cannot install Macbook, Macbook Pro software update on this volume. This update requires Mac OS X 10.5.5 or newer." Now don't tell me that I have selected the wrong partition to install the update, or that I need to update my OS to 10.5.5 because I already have 10.5.6 and I chose the Macintosh HD partition to install the update.
So I'm definitely getting a 13" Macbook or Macbook Pro. Apple has some great prices on refurbs so that's probably the route I'll be going however I'm having trouble discerning the difference between the 13" Aluminum Unibody standard macbook and the 13" Unibody Macbook Pro. From what I've read they both have the upgraded screen, they're obviously both unibody, both have the large button-less trackpad, and both have the 9400m. They even have the same dimensions and the only difference I can see between the images is a slightly different case bevel (also the firewire and sd card ports, both are useless to me).
Unfortunately, none of the Apple stores or BestBuys in the area have a non-pro unibody 13" Macbook for me to actually handle and compare. So, basically, what makes the pro version with the slower cpu and smaller hard drive at the same price point worth it?
If I make an image of my hdd from my white macbook with disk utility onto a hard drive I take out of a unibody macbook pro will it work and boot properly?
I will do this by taking the 250gb hdd out of the unibody macbook pro and putting it into a sata external usb hdd enclosure, then making an image of my current 120gb white macbook and writing the image onto the 250gb. After, I plan to put the 250gb hdd back into the macbook pro and boot it up normally as if everything from my white macbook was just copied onto the macbook pro.
Just reset my wireless router, it's asking whether the wireless card I've supports WPA2 or not? Does the airport card in MBA 1st generation support this? Can someone please clarify?
I just bought Mirror's Edge and I've installed it, but when I go to enable PhysX the game tells me that hardware acceleration is not supported by my system. I thought this card supported PhysX? For reference I tried using both the stock Apple boot camp drivers and the new official beta 179.28 from Nvidia.
I think my XP partition is acting up a bit and I'm due for an reinstall. Wondering what some NBRers experiences have been installing Win7 on a Unibody MBP rev A. Will it find all of my hardware without a problem? Any performance bumps over XP? General thoughts?
I work with Japanese language and need to use the East Asian language support that Windows provides. Is there anything similar in OS X? This is a really important think to me. by support, I don't just mean the fonts, but the whole keyboard + IME - writing characters and their recognition. All this is part of Windows East Asian support and works great for me.
I know that the modded INFs from laptopvideo2go have supported this, but the latest beta drivers released today from nVidia actually support the 9400M out of the box.
These drivers support the screen brightness controls (I had probs with this using the modded drivers) AND more importantly I can now use an external monitor and resume from sleep mode. The Apple drivers would not resume after the video card turned the external monitor off.
I bought a new Mac just yesterday (my first time to switch from PC) believing that the East Asian Support in Macs will be equally if not better in OS X than Windows (given that Japan is a huge market for Macs and also that you can even order a Japanese keyboard when purchasing your computer). To my horror, however, I am now realizing that there's a feature where Windows outpeforms OS X, or what OS Xi is totally lacking;
IME Pad - i.e. in Windows when you switch to Japanese language keyboard you have an option to use your mouse to draw a kanji you are not familiar with (don't know its reading). You'll get a lit of options and can find thus a kanji extremely fast - no need for radical or stoke look-up. I've heard that OS X doesn't have this function - at least not 10.5. If that's true this would be a major drawback!
the only solution to this would be to use an internet interface such as this: Handwritten kanji search at sljfaq.org But this is way too cumbersome and requires internet access. how to use Japanese on Macs can respond.
She has a white macbook with leopard I think, and has a separate partition in which she has boot camp, she uses specialized software that can only run in windows (doesnt run in vm). She got a new macbook air but wants to keep everything intact.
Do programs like duper clone drives with all files intact, including partitions? Keep in mind that the windows side is more important, installation of this software can only be done remotely from Russia, so it's a bit of a hassle if we screw up, we have to contact IT at a specific time and get them to do it.
Would I have to take the drive of the macbook air out? Or can i just clone to an external hard drive and then move that to the mba hard drive, in target disc mode or something.
I really love the black color of MB404, but is it good? does it crack easily?(is it plastic?)
Hows screen quality?
What do you think? which one should i buy?
I really wanted to buy Alu one before i hear about slanted keys and loose battery covers(i know %99 of them don't have that, but it's hard to risk when there's no way to fix it in here), because there's no Mac center in my country and i'm SO picky.
I'm looking at purchasing another Dell laptop, but more basic than my current Latitude E6500. I had a Inspiron 15 perfectly configured, except for the operating system.
Apparently, Windows 7 Home Premium is the only available choice for an operating system (with or without a Belkin easy transfer cable). I was first shopping through SMB.
When I called them, they said I'd need to purchase through Home & Home Office to get Ultimate. However, after checking there, I see it's not listed as an option through them, either.
I went back an checked on Latitudes, thinking that it should be offered there, as Latitudes are more of a business-class model. At least through SMB, apparently Ultimate isn't offered on the E5400 or the E5500 - only the E6400 and E6500?
I have a xps m1710 the graphics card has failed and has been replaced last week. This failed after 2 days!
Dell have repalced fans x2 CPU Heatsink and nv7950gtx already.
they now need to change graphics card again, LCD and Base plastics.
have requested replacment system like others and this has been refused i have appealed this all the way to CEO office and they state the new policy is no replacement systems, no refunds and i have to wait.
The most glaring omission for OpenCL is for desktops with ATI GPUs, namely the HD 2400XT, HD 2600Pro, HD2600XT, and HD3870. Now it's not like these GPUs can't support GPGPU operation since they already do so in Windows under ATI's own CTM and Brook+ language.
ATI's OpenCL drivers for Windows should be available soon, they were promised for H1, and if it turns out the HD2xxx and HD3xxx series is capable of supporting OpenCL but only in Windows and not OS X it'd be very disappointing. Somehow I don't think Apple envisions iMac users having to use Boot Camp to use OpenCL accelerated apps.............