Sorry I clicked the button and didn't realise this would post my question! I want to trade up from my 15 inch Windows laptop to an ultrabook but not sure if the ultrabooks are powerful enough, don't they use low-voltage chips that don't have the same performance as a normal CPU? I mainly do the usual Microsoft Office stuff but also work with a lot of Powerpoint presentations and PP can really hammer my current laptop when I'm creating a preso.
Not directly applicable, but I upgraded from a 2009 17" MacBook Pro to an 11" MacBook Air in September, having loved tiny laptops since I owned a 12" PowerBook back in '03-05.
I've found it actually better for just about everything (because, I suspect, of the SSD performance) with the sole exception being RAM capacity when editing images while also doing a bunch of other things (Flash video, tabs open, ten apps running). I'm very glad I upgraded, and wouldn't go back!
Ultrabooks are not desgined for major gaming or graphics work, but will be fine for virtually any regular office needs. I assume that the performance is similar to that of my MBA, which is very zippy and speedy - I've never wished that it had more power...
My 2c is same as for John and AM. I've cooked up a few PowerPoint presentations on my 13 inch MacBook Air – which has a Core i5 processor and 4GB of RAM so pretty much the same as you'd get in a Windows utrabook – and never found it wanting. The fan kicked in when I had a lot of hi-res images being inserted but that's about as 'stressed' as the system got, and anyway (1) once the images are all loaded you compress the PPT to resize images to suit; and (2) you shouldn't use images that are too large, as I discovered, PPT can chuck a wobbly and simply NOT load them... I'm talking about BIG images, so resize yours down to a few MB and things will be fine!
AlG
AlG
Member since 04 Nov 2010
Total posts 155
Is an 'ultrabook' powerful enough?
AlG
AlG
Member since 04 Nov 2010
Total posts 155
Sorry I clicked the button and didn't realise this would post my question! I want to trade up from my 15 inch Windows laptop to an ultrabook but not sure if the ultrabooks are powerful enough, don't they use low-voltage chips that don't have the same performance as a normal CPU? I mainly do the usual Microsoft Office stuff but also work with a lot of Powerpoint presentations and PP can really hammer my current laptop when I'm creating a preso.
John Walton
John Walton
Member since 03 Jan 2011
Total posts 86
Not directly applicable, but I upgraded from a 2009 17" MacBook Pro to an 11" MacBook Air in September, having loved tiny laptops since I owned a 12" PowerBook back in '03-05.
I've found it actually better for just about everything (because, I suspect, of the SSD performance) with the sole exception being RAM capacity when editing images while also doing a bunch of other things (Flash video, tabs open, ten apps running). I'm very glad I upgraded, and wouldn't go back!
am
am
Member since 15 Apr 2011
Total posts 216
Ultrabooks are not desgined for major gaming or graphics work, but will be fine for virtually any regular office needs. I assume that the performance is similar to that of my MBA, which is very zippy and speedy - I've never wished that it had more power...
David
David
Member since 24 Oct 2010
Total posts 1,016
My 2c is same as for John and AM. I've cooked up a few PowerPoint presentations on my 13 inch MacBook Air – which has a Core i5 processor and 4GB of RAM so pretty much the same as you'd get in a Windows utrabook – and never found it wanting. The fan kicked in when I had a lot of hi-res images being inserted but that's about as 'stressed' as the system got, and anyway (1) once the images are all loaded you compress the PPT to resize images to suit; and (2) you shouldn't use images that are too large, as I discovered, PPT can chuck a wobbly and simply NOT load them... I'm talking about BIG images, so resize yours down to a few MB and things will be fine!
AlG
AlG
Member since 04 Nov 2010
Total posts 155
Thanks for all your feedback guys!