I would love to retire my 12" PowerBook G4, but until I get some new freelance jobs rolling in, I don't see it happening anytime soon. But, for the sake of writing this article, lets just say tomorrow I had to go out and buy a new machine. A couple months ago it would have been a no-brainer, I would have walked in to an Apple store and out with a MacBook Pro. Now it's not that simple.
Both the MacBook and MacBook Pro models were recently updated. Both now sport the unibody enclosures milled from a single block of aluminum (no more white plastic for the MacBook that fades to a dingy yellow over time). Both have large glass Multi-Touch trackpads. Both have LED-backlit glossy displays (no option for matte). They really look exactly the same, except for the size, of course.
As for power, I could pretty much custom order a MacBook to be pretty close to a Pro. Except for the processor speed (MacBook tops out at 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo) and graphics processor (NVIDIA GeForce 9400M graphics processor compared to the NVIDIA GeForce 9400M graphics processor which the higher-end Pro comes with). As you can see from the chart, I'd also save around $600, which would make adding one of the new 24-inch displays very tempting. Another bonus would be the size. Sure, going with the MBP you'd benefit from having a bigger display (about 2-inches), but the MacBook is a full pound lighter. A pound doesn't sound like much, but if you travel a lot (which I don't, so I don't know why I'm bringing it up) it does make a difference.
After all that rambling, you'd probably think it would be an easy decision for me, right? Well, not so fast. There was another update to the MacBook, one that makes me think twice. They decided to do away with FireWire port in the MacBook and kept it in the Pro. Firewire is a serial bus interface standard for high-speed communications, frequently used by personal computers, as well as in digital audio, digital video, automotive, and aeronautics applications. It makes it easy and fast to transfer high quality video from your camcorder to your computer.
As of right now, I don't do much with video and when I do, it's normally from my Flip camcorder which gets transferred via USB (no FireWire needed). So no, right now it's not that big of an issue, but what about down the road? I've been working a lot more on video projects at my full-time job and it seems like more and more clients are requesting video for there sites. So it's tough to go with the MacBook knowing that you might need the option of a FireWire port down the road. Luckily, I'm not going to get a new laptop tomorrow so I still have time to think about which to choose.
