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|---|---|---|
 Donald Trump | ||
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Apple's redone MacBook is another winner
— -- Apple's plastic white MacBook computer has been the most-popular-selling Macintosh to date. So it's hardly a surprise that Apple plans to keep right on offering the notebook, now for $100 less at $999.
But MacBooks are climbing in status. Last week, Apple unveiled two redesigned versions, including the $1,599 model I'm testing. (The other fetches $1,299.)
Spending the extra loot buys you a bold new metal design with a glossy backlit widescreen LED display, spacious buttonless trackpad and souped-up Nvidia graphics for gamers. You get extra memory and storage, too. But Apple giveth and taketh away. The company removed the FireWire port that connects some camcorders and other devices. That's a deal-breaker for some people.
In many ways, these posh computers resemble smaller-screen versions of their even more expensive cousin, the MacBook Pro. Indeed, MacBooks and Pro models are similarly crafted from a single slab of aluminum through a new manufacturing process called "unibody construction." That makes them thinner, lighter and, according to Apple, more durable.
The MacBook I've been testing certainly feels sturdy. It's less than an inch thick and weighs 4.5 pounds, compared with 5 pounds for its plastic predecessor. Apple is also trumpeting the machine's toxic-material-free eco-friendliness.
But Apple risks ticking off users who rely on FireWire. Like many people, I still have a FireWire camcorder, not to mention an external FireWire hard drive. Apple may want to drive customers to the FireWire-capable MacBook Pro — models that start at $1,999 — which are certainly better equipped for video editing.
The company also figures many of the folks who would do a lot of video editing own newer camcorders that more likely use USB rather than FireWire. Apple isn't generous there, either: There are just two USB ports on the new MacBooks.
You can still get FireWire on the entry-level plastic MacBook, but it doesn't have the muscle for heavy-duty video editing.
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