Yup, still optical, and no fw on the macbook beginner. I'd say stick with the macbook pro
Pro only, Dinny, and 13" is the way to go size-wise. In this case, moar is too much.![]()
The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom; for we never know what is enough until we know what is more than enough. ~ William Blake
the new iMac sure is pretty, but i like my old 20" C2D machine just fine. that new mouse, on the other hand, will be mine as soon as i see good reviews.
"They aren't musicians as much as... ear rapists."
--Sarah Silverman
Yeah - dropping FW on some mac models was a mistake. That's why when I was looking at getting the 13" macbook with lighted keyboard in January I felt that I had to spring for the extra $400 to get the 15" Macbook Pro with firewire. But I hate that if I forget to bring a FW 800 > 400 cable with me or I can't use it.
I also hate that they dropped expresscard from the 15" Macbook Pro. Mine was the last version to have the card slot, and I was always hoping that someone like Apogee would make a nice 24/96 or 24/192 DAC amp for the card slot. But now that only the 17" Macbook Pro have it I wonder if express card will be dead for mac soon.
express card is a mishmash of a standard anyway, cards are rarely universally compatible, they're flakey, and few people support them.
In looking more closely at the new macbook, it appears it's also lost the optical input. There's now 1 port, a combined optical out, headphone out, analog in. It's possible you can also do digital in, but they don't talk about that on the specs page.
Digital in -- what would you use that for, that most of us wouldn't upgrade to an external a/d? Well, unless it's already digitized.
I remain,DC
WT
Show me your -itis.
Dirty Laundry Will Out.
:-Peter, aka :-Dusty :-Chalk
the digital in is specifically useful if you have an A/D...or want to dump data from an external digital recorder without a computer interface. It's probably sufficiently weird most people wouldn't need one tho.
Apple seems slow to understand its potential in the music server market.
- Member of a more hard-core headphone group
d-_-b
Well, I was discussing the macbook, not the mini. The mini is still a rockin' music server.
If you've ever visited an Apple store you may find this interesting...
Well, you have to give them credit for the innovative "Guru Bar" concept.
Right but they hide the spiffy aluminum in cheesey white plastic
That sunburn looks painful...