[X4U] Macbook Pro

[Stroller]

On 13 May 2007, at 01:28, Robert MacLeay wrote:
> ...
> -- the extra 1 GB of RAM and the
> more-capable video card -- are worth paying for.  In the Intel  
> world, 1 GB
> is simply not enough for more than surfing the web and writing  
> letters.

Not to criticise your post, but it _should_ be enough.

Try a fresh install of Windows XP on a (say) 1.6ghz Pentium 4 with  
512meg of RAM and it will feel snappy as heck. It will open lots of  
windows and you'll be able to switch between them near-instantly.

I'm sure that Intel Macs are more RAM-hungry than PPCs, and can only  
conjecture that OS X isn't well optimised for them yet.

> My greatest criticism of Apple is that, with the exception of the  
> Mac Pro,
> nothing now shipping has the RAM capacity to handle the needs of  
> whatever
> operating system I expect we will be running 3+ years in the  
> future.  When
> one considers not only how the minimum RAM requirements for the Mac  
> OS have
> increased over the last 20 years, but how the expandability (ratio of
> minimum requirement to maximum installable) has shrunk...

In the past speed improvements on older hardware have been seen on  
each OS X release. Try upgrading from 10.2 to 10.3 to 10.4 on a  
800mhz iBook. Hopefully we'll see the same thing with 10.5 & 10.6  
running on our current Intels.

Stroller.