[FireWire]

I'm in the market for a new laptop and I was set on the next revision of the MBP were they announced at WWDC. But the delay and the new MBA made me consider the new Haswell MBA as an alternative. My computer will be used as as desktop 99% of the time (hooked to a 23-24" monitor) so I don't care much about weight, size, battery life or retina display. But I still require a laptop for those occasional times I need it. I'm using it most of the time for normal stuff but I do occasionnal Photoshop editing (basic, small files) but regular iMovie editing (about 15 minutes movies, but several times a week). My 2007 iMac takes about 1 hour per 10 minutes and I want to cut that.

The Air seems interesting because you can put an i7 and the rest is similar to a MBP, besides the graphic card.

Am I missing something? Would I lose something by going with a MBA? It's almost a given the next MBP are going to be very similar to MBA (very thin, no optical drive, soldered RAM, SSD only, etc).

BTW, I noticed all laptops are limited to 8 GB, except for 15". Why is that? Is this 2010? I like to keep my computers for at 5-6 years and I fear 8 GB won't be enough in the near future. I'm already using most of my 6 GB..

[P]

It's hard to compare to an MBP that hasn't been released yet, but I suspect that even the 13" MBP will get quadcore CPUs. That and the display are the main differentiators.

You can't expand the RAM because there isn't space in the box for a slot. Why Apple limits it to 8 GB BTO is anyone's guess. That might be increased to 16 GB with the next MBP revision, but again, we'll have to wait and see for that.

[osiris24x]

Based on your iMovie usage, I'd go with a MacBook Pro. The extra GPU power will come in handy in your video editing and Mavericks should be even better at utilizing the GPU overall. Unless you really need portability, I'd go with a 15" model for RAM expandability (16GB). Due to a lack of an optical drive, the new 15's are light and thin.

[SierraDragon]

I recommend (for your stated usages) not considering any laptop that will not take 16 GB RAM. Pre-purchase check with OWC or Crucial to see what the box actually will take. Also check BareFeats.com for graphics performance because GPU differences can be a big deal. Unless the new integrated graphics are magic I would only pick discrete-graphics-chip boxes, because the last time I checked the integrated graphics were a huge detriment to images work like iMovie.

You might include used i7 MBPs in your consideration. My 2011 i7 MBP with SSD and 16 GB RAM still performs as state-of-the-art with Aperture+PS as far as I can tell. SSD is a must-have.

My 02 for images work.

-Allen

[Waragainstsleep]

If you want to keep it 5-6 years than 16GB is a must IMO. That only leaves you the MBP 15" models or the non retina 13".

[OreoCookie]

I'd wait for the Haswell upgrade. I expect that the 13" model will gain a 16 GB memory option then.

[shifuimam]

Originally Posted by FireWire 

BTW, I noticed all laptops are limited to 8 GB, except for 15". Why is that? Is this 2010? I like to keep my computers for at 5-6 years and I fear 8 GB won't be enough in the near future. I'm already using most of my 6 GB..

That would be because all the Retina models have soldered-on RAM with zero upgrade options post-purchase. My guess is that by limiting all the 13" and 11" models to 8GB, Apple's cleverly ensured that if you want 16GB, you'll shell out more money for the 15".

It's also another way to ensure forced obsolescence.

[Eug]

1. Dunno about the current Air, but the Pros have much nicer screens than the previous Airs.
2. The Air has a high pixel density (but not high enough to be Retina) which I find tiring to use with OS X.
3. The Air isn't as cheap as it seems, since it only ships with 4 GB RAM. Add $100 to get the real 8 GB price... with as mentioned no option to go to 16. I personally would go with 8 GB though since I don't do heavy lifting on my laptop, but for you I might suggest 16.
4. Even if you get an Air when the new Pro comes out, by that time the Air may be available refurb for cheaper than it is now.

Originally Posted by osiris24x 

Based on your iMovie usage, I'd go with a MacBook Pro. The extra GPU power will come in handy in your video editing and Mavericks should be even better at utilizing the GPU overall. Unless you really need portability, I'd go with a 15" model for RAM expandability (16GB). Due to a lack of an optical drive, the new 15's are light and thin.

I'm not convinced the new 13" Pro will get a different GPU than the Airs. I'm hopeful though.

As for the 15", I find it very unwieldy. Not on my purchase radar, personally. Even the 13" is a bit unwieldly in cramped quarters, like on the plane in regular economy class.

Originally Posted by shifuimam 

That would be because all the Retina models have soldered-on RAM with zero upgrade options post-purchase. My guess is that by limiting all the 13" and 11" models to 8GB, Apple's cleverly ensured that if you want 16GB, you'll shell out more money for the 15".

True, the current Retina 13" has no 16 GB option, but I'd guess that will change with the new Pros. Or at least I'm hopeful.

[P]

The leaked Geekbench results have the new 13" MBP showing up with U-series low power CPU with Iris 5100 graphics. Really hope they're wrong.

[freediverx01]

Since this will be primarily a desktop machine, with only ocassional portable use, and you're going to do a bit of video editing, I'd rule out the Air, unless you're aiming for the lowest cost option. The Air is rather underpowered, although Haswell's updated graphics are a big improvement over its predecessors. It's main features are the thin light design and long battery life - neither of which are key for desktop use.

From here it depends on your budget and willingness to wait...

Haswell upgrades to the Macbook Pro line will be nice, and are likely just a few months away. This will make the biggest difference on the 13" models since they lack dedicated graphics and Haswell greatly improves the integrated graphics performance (as well as battery life). The 8GB limit on RAM is an issue though, in the long term.

Alternately, the current 15" models all have dedicated graphics and higher RAM options. Bear in mind that the RAM may be impossible to upgrade so getting stuck with 8GB now will shorten its useful lifespan and in 3 years 16GB will be the norm.

The retina models come with an SSD drive which is crazy fast, but that comes at a premium price. Also, you might not appreciate it's retina display and thinner lighter design so much since you'll be using it as a desktop with external monitors mostly.

[Waragainstsleep]

A lot will depend on the likelihood that the video footage you are editing will get an upgrade during the lifespan of the new Mac. Any current model should be a hefty improvement over a 2007 iMac, but you'll need to aim higher if your cameras are likely to get switched up to 1080P or 4K in the next couple of years. You didn't say what the footage is currently.

[P]

Originally Posted by P 

You can't expand the RAM because there isn't space in the box for a slot. Why Apple limits it to 8 GB BTO is anyone's guess. That might be increased to 16 GB with the next MBP revision, but again, we'll have to wait and see for that.

Just reading a review of the new MBA. It turns out that there is another reason you can't expand the RAM - they don't use regular DDR3 (or DDR3L) RAM at all. They use something called LPDDR3, which is the kind normally used in smartphones, to save even more energy. Part of the reason behind that insane 12 hour battery life.

[shifuimam]

I'd wonder what the performance benchmarks are on LPDDR3 compared to regular DDR3.

I suspect it's not going to be as fast for real work on a computer. There's got to be a reason why it's so much lower power...

[Spheric Harlot]

Hmm.

Mobile DDR - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Products using LPDDR3 include the 2013 Macbook Air, Nexus 10 and Samsung Galaxy S4(GT-I9500).[7] LPDDR3 went mainstream in 2013, running at 800 MHz DDR (1600 MT/s), offering bandwidth comparable to PC3-12800 notebook memory in 2011 (12.8 GB/s of bandwidth).[8] However, even though it offers the same memory bandwidth as notebook memory from 2011, notebook PC systems still operated at even greater bandwidth by utilizing dual channel memory, effectively doubling the bandwidth in as ideal senario.[9] The data rate can be doubled just as normal systems, so the datarate is comparable as the original DDR3, but spending less energy.

[P]

Originally Posted by shifuimam 

I'd wonder what the performance benchmarks are on LPDDR3 compared to regular DDR3.

I suspect it's not going to be as fast for real work on a computer. There's got to be a reason why it's so much lower power...

It's the exact same bandwidth according to Anand, who usually knows about these things. It's more expensive and most likely it's a little harder to make it run at high clockspeeds, but 1600 MHz is fast enough. Apple decided to keep the performance constant with the last model and focus on battery life instead of going to 1866 MHz (or higher) DDR3L. Just check the benchmarks . The new MBA beats a 3GHz Nehalem Xeon - a 2009 MP - on singlethreaded Cinebench.

In fact, 1600 MHz is more than fast enough. I remember a test from back when Lynnfield (the chip in the first quadcore iMac) launched. Lynnfield was a quadcore chip with a base clock of 2.8 GHz, and memory peaking at 1333 MHz. There was some discussion on whether two memory channels was enough (remember that the predecessor Bloomfield at three channels) and Intel responded by saying that you had to have three cores running flat out to saturate the bus as it was. The new MBA only has two cores and a much lower clockspeed. Even if you count things like AVX2 and other IPC improvements, a mere low-voltage dualcore shouldn't come anywhere near saturating the bus.

[shifuimam]

Why aren't more machines using LPDDR3? It's lower-power, so it's better for laptops...is it just that it's not available in higher capacities yet? Is it more expensive to implement?

[P]

The LPDDR3 specification is only a year old, and Haswell is the first Intel chip that supports LPDDR3 - even the earlier Atoms only supported LPDDR2 - so it might very well be that all the coming Ultrabooks will have it. LPDDR3 appears to be more expensive than DDR3L, though, and many PC OEMs are crazy about cost. We'll see.

[shifuimam]

That makes more sense, then.

Is there a swappable form factor for LPDDR3 yet? I really, really, really don't want a real computer with RAM that can't be upgraded....

[P]

There is something called "VLP" and "Blade VLP" which seems to be a sort of LP-DIMM. It's not something you can just pick up at Newegg, though

I hate to tell you, but the future is soldered. DDR4 will still have DIMMs, but only one unit per channel instead of two - meaning that you can replace DIMMs, but you can't add. AMD is looking at using GDDR5 RAM as a bridge, and there are no DIMMs for that either. The "Crystalwell" on-package cache is the first step towards moving RAM onto the CPU itself, which is where it will end up eventually.

[shifuimam]

Well, that blows.

I suppose it was inevitable, in the name of smaller + faster.

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by shifuimam 

Well, that blows.

I suppose it was inevitable, in the name of smaller + faster.

Broadwell CPUs (the successor to Haswell) will only come soldered onto a motherboard, too. This is where the future is going, and Apple is just ahead of the curve.

[shifuimam]

Oh, good. So now, if you want to make a minor upgrade to your machine, you'll just toss the whole thing in the garbage and buy a new one. That seems environmentally-friendly.

I'm bummed. Computer hardware is so much fun...

[P]

It is almost impossible to upgrade the CPU to more than one year newer, and it has been for a good long while. Bloomfield, Lynnfield, Sandy bridge and Haswell all introduced new sockets that were completely incompatible. Before that, there was some hope in that they all used LGA775 for a long time, but usually the VRM spec changed or the old chipsets didn't support it, so you couldn't upgrade anyway. All this does is that it reduces flexibility for the OEMs, who can no longer mix and match. Maybe Intel has dusted off those old plans with software-upgradeable CPUs, or maybe they just don't care.

Anyway: The successor to Broadwell, Sky Lake, seems to have socketed versions again. For how long remains to be seen.

[Waragainstsleep]

Apple was shipping MacBook Airs with only 2GB of RAM up until June last year. Assuming they stick to their habit of 5 years of support, OS X is going to have to be usable on 2GB for a long time yet.

I know the pros on here will (rightly or wrongly) lust after 1TB of RAM if or when they can have it, but is it possible we have hit something of a plateau for consumer RAM needs?

[OreoCookie]

We've also hit a plateau of CPU performance, and this year's Haswell upgrade to the MacBook Air line is the perfect embodiment of that: Apple has tuned the CPU so as to have the exact same performance as last year's line (plus/minus a few percent depending on the workload), but almost doubling battery life. And they did it, because they think (IMHO correctly) that most users will care more about all-day battery life than a 20 % increase in performance.

[P]

Yes, we have hit a plateau in both CPU and RAM. I thought that a working 64-bit Windows would release the brakes on that and start pushing RAM requirements up again, but all it did was increase from 4GB to 8GB in most builds. As for CPUs... Nehalem was the last big advancement that really filled a need. Lynnfield brought that to the desktop and Sandy Bridge let the laptops and slower desktops join in. After that, it's been GPU boosts and better battery life.

[OreoCookie]

If it weren't for my hobby in photography, I'd probably be perfectly happy with a Core 2 Duo-class machine and 4~8 GB RAM.

[ghporter]

I am concerned that Apple is going this way with "thinner is always better," especially with the MBP lines with Retina displays. What I have yet to see with any of the newer machines is how they deal with daily bumps and shakes, how they survive those 3" drops and bumps in your book bag when the guy sitting behind you accidentally kicks them, and so on. My trusty 2006-vintage Core Duo MBP has survived even MY handling of it, with a 30" drop (the lid doesn't pop up by itself anymore, but otherwise no issues) and various dings, rubs and bumps it's received over the years. How will a 15" Retina MBP that's thinner than the legal pad binder I take to meetings deal with all of that stuff? I shudder to think what an Air will do after even a little bit of that kind of handling.

Rant over...

[Spheric Harlot]

Lighter also means less force when dropped.

It's why the iPhone 5, for example, is *less* likely to break than its predecessors, despite being larger.

Originally Posted by Waragainstsleep 

I know the pros on here will (rightly or wrongly) lust after 1TB of RAM if or when they can have it, but is it possible we have hit something of a plateau for consumer RAM needs?

Why can't Apple merge the RAM and Hard Drive together? That way you can get all the bytes you'll need for either permanent or temporary storage. Maybe fusion-RAM (fAM)?

Think about it. I have a 128 GB flash hard drive, and I still have 50 GB spare, just sitting there, doing nothing. I wish I could use some of that in addition to my RAM.

[Spheric Harlot]

Flash is to RAM as hard drives are to Flash drives.

And also, virtual memory is exactly what you suggest. It has been in use for quite some decades now.

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by And.reg 

Why can't Apple merge the RAM and Hard Drive together? That way you can get all the bytes you'll need for either permanent or temporary storage. Maybe fusion-RAM (fAM)?

Think about it. I have a 128 GB flash hard drive, and I still have 50 GB spare, just sitting there, doing nothing. I wish I could use some of that in addition to my RAM.

The answer it simple: compared to RAM, SSDs are dog slow. Compared to L3 cache, RAM is painfully slow. Compared to L1 cache, L3 cache is very slow. If your CPU had to store everything on your SSD, I doubt you could even use OS X or iOS on it.

There is a reason computer systems have hierarchical storage since forever: every stage hits a different performance/capacity target. The biggest Haswell CPUs will add a L4 cache (which also doubles as video RAM) to alleviate bandwidth pressure (since it has a capable, integrated GPU).

[P]

I had a better version of this somewhere, but the basic idea holds:

https://gist.github.com/hellerbarde/2843375

Basically take the latency (the delay between asking for data and it arrives) for a number of common operations and multiply with 1 billion so the numbers are easier to relate to. Comments from me in []

Code:
Magnitudes:

Minute:

L1 cache reference                  0.5 s         One heart beat (0.5 s) [L1 is the fastest memory in a CPU, basically as fast as storage can be]
Branch mispredict                   5 s           Yawn [branch mispredict is when the program does something unexpected and the CPU has to react]
L2 cache reference                  7 s           Long yawn [L2 cache is slightly faster memory, but see below for a comment on this]
Mutex lock/unlock                   25 s          Making a coffee [A mutex lock/unlock is what has to happen before and after every operation a multithreaded program does on shared data - basically the cost of being multithreaded]
Hour:

Main memory reference               100 s         Brushing your teeth [this is just getting the smallest amount of data possible from main memory - a few bytes, usually]
Compress 1K bytes with Zippy        50 min        One episode of a TV show (including ad breaks)
Day:

Send 2K bytes over 1 Gbps network   5.5 hr        From lunch to end of work day [send them out, not wait for information that they arrived]
Week

SSD random read                     1.7 days      A normal weekend [again, only reading the smallest possible chunk of data]
Read 1 MB sequentially from memory  2.9 days      A long weekend 
Round trip within same datacenter   5.8 days      A medium vacation [send data over the network and get a response back]
Read 1 MB sequentially from SSD    11.6 days      Waiting for almost 2 weeks for a delivery
Year

Disk seek                           16.5 weeks    A semester in university [this is finding data from a regular HDD - but not sending it anywhere]
Read 1 MB sequentially from disk    7.8 months    Almost producing a new human being [sending that data once you've found it]
The above 2 together                1 year
Decade

Send packet CA->Netherlands->CA     4.8 years     Average time it takes to complete a bachelor's degree

Designing a storage hierarchy is a never-ending problem, because every time you add a new level, access from all levels below takes even longer. Even this list is old by now - in a modern Intel CPU, the L1 is slower, there is a new smallish L2 at about twice L1 latency, and the old L2 has become an L3 at slightly higher latency. We would all like to unify the entire stack from L1 on down, so that it was all automatic what goes where, but that remains beyond us. For now, we have to manage our storage - move things from SSD to HDD to network and back up again, including loading it to memory. From memory up it's automatic (from the user's perspective). Fusion drive arguably unifies all local storage again, so we're back to three levels: memory, storage, network. There are solutions like Google's Chrome OS which attempts to unify the last two - I'm sure we will see more of that. Unifying memory and storage is probably the hardest part.