I received my new MacBook on Friday, so I’ve been swiftly copying everything I can onto it in the hope of moving lock-stock to it from my iMac G5 in the next few days. Some initial thoughts:

It’s built like a tank.

I managed to drop it this morning but despite a nasty deflection off a wooden desk it survived unscathed (the desk came off worse somehow - a big slice taken out of it).

The AirPort connection is erratic

This could be none of the MacBook’s fault, since my AirPort Express is very flaky, but it does tend to drop connections quite a lot. I haven’t had enough time yet to evaluate it on the office or university WiFi to verify this though.

The power system is extremely well designed

The battery itself is really very capacious - and the MagSafe adaptor is a decided improvement on the old Apple adaptor. Power management is also very good - including the very cool safe sleep (watch video demo) function.

The screen is a fingerprint magnet

I should also say that it looks fantastic in all conditions despite this - but I’m definitely going to have to get a proper cleaning cloth…

The iSight is streets ahead of the FireWire version

Perhaps because it’s so small - but having it built-in is so much more natural during conference use than an external camera. The resolution also seems better, though it’s probably just the same in fact.

It gets hot

Really quite hot! Not enough to burn you, but certainly a little uncomfortable for long periods on your lap. The obvious solution is to put it on a desk, but clearly this isn’t always possible. This isn’t really a design fault - I’d rather have a hot but quiet notebook than the noise of a small aircraft engine taking off every time I run something demanding. Interestingly, the battery doesn’t heat up at all, unlike our 12″ PowerBook G4.

It’s fast

Really very fast! Rosetta apps (ones written for PowerPC chips and so which run in a transparent emulation layer) aren’t noticeably slower, though I’ve been sticking to Universal Binaries wherever possible out of consistency.

The graphics chip could be better

It relies on Intel’s integrated graphics system, and so doesn’t have a dedicated graphics chip in the normal sense of the word. This is a bit of a shame, as my quick high definition video tests show. Playing 1080p24 clips from Apple’s HD movie trailers site (an activity which pushes my iMac G5 2Ghz over the edge) hardly even taxes the processor cores (about 20% CPU usage on each). But actually displaying twenty-four frames of 1920×1080 seems to cause the graphics system a bit of a problem. QuickTime Player reports that the full frame rate is being attained, but there’s a noticeable flicker. This could be a player/codec issue, so I’ll persist and see what I can find out.

However, 720p24 plays great. EyeTV footage looks fantastic in progressive scan mode too.

Overall, I’m really happy with the machine. I think it’s one of the best-value machines that Apple have ever made, and it will serve me well.