Macbook Air and Photoshop

Question

Level 1

1 points

Macbook Air and Photoshop

I work with Photoshop a lot, handling images up to 5000 pixels with many layers in my iBook G4 14' 933Mhz, 1Gb RAM, albeit slowly at filters and some tools. Since my wife wants a notebook, I'll pass Zappa (my faithful iBook) to her and buy a new one for me.

I considered the Macbook, but i frankly hated the plastic enclosure as the iBook made me fed up of it. Also, there are reports of broken top cases after a while and i want to buy a laptop to last a minimum of 5 years.

Then there's the Macbook Pro, but they're expensive and really big and I want something really portable and easy to get on my hands quickly.

Hence, the Air. After trying one for a couple of hours i fell in love with it: it's small, light, sturdy, with a great screen and a keyboard with backlight. The thing is: how good is it at Photoshop? Will the core shutdown problems make it unusable for me, even after the latest patch from Apple? And how fast will it be for someone used to the old G4 processor?

iBook G4, Mac OS X (10.5.4)

Posted on Aug 31, 2008 1:54 PM

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Answer 1

Aug 31, 2008 5:12 PM in response to Pixelboxer

i used it several times with Photoshop and had on a few occasion core shutdown. I wouldn't recommend MacBook Air for a photoshop user.

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Answer 2

Aug 31, 2008 10:26 PM in response to Pixelboxer

If your Macbook Air won't suffer under the Core-Shutdown issue u will have a lot of fun with it. I used photoshop on mine several time and I'm also using Aperture to organize my pictures. I owned a Macbook Pro 2.5 GHz (08) before and the performance difference is there but I can still work really well on my Air. I think the upgrade from a G4 Powerbook will bring you some speed improvements while doing work in Photoshop.

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Answer 3

dkwhite

Level 1

50 points

Aug 31, 2008 11:11 PM in response to Pixelboxer

I just have to wonder if the screen real-estate will be ok for you. Wouldn't you rather have the MBP's 17 inch screen?

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Answer 4

Sep 3, 2008 5:07 AM in response to Pixelboxer

I got the MBA to use in the field and when traveling. I use Photoshop to review RAW images, determine if they are reasonably close to what I want and to determine if I can improve them on my next shot. However the screen size would inhibit me from using the MBA for final editing and printing of shots. CS3 has worked fine for me so far - no slow down or cooling problems.

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Answer 5

Sep 5, 2008 2:22 PM in response to dancogan1

I use Photoshop on my MBA regularly and have had zero problems with it (other than how slow it is compared to all the other macbooks and desktops). I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it as a second computer -- I don't think I could live with the MBA alone.

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Answer 6

Pixelboxer Author

Level 1

1 points

Sep 10, 2008 1:05 PM in response to Pixelboxer

Thanks all for the responses. I decided to bite the bullet and buy an iMac since the extra horsepower and the bigger screen are more handy. I'll sure miss the mobility, but it was more of a convenience than a necessity. Also, the Macbook Air's incredibly small hard disk and its lack of ethernet (and the absence of the usb ethernet adapter on the store) were a deal breaker to me.

Oh, well. Maybe next time. Thanks again.

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