MacRumors Buyer's Guide: Know when to buy your Mac

surprised to see this on HackerNews. I run macrumors, and have plans to try to improve on this in the near future. Right now it runs the same as it has for years, which is based on a running historical average with links to recent rumors. (I know this will sound strange for anyone who follows the site, but I'll finally be quitting my day-job at the end of this month, which will give me a lot more time to work on this and other projects)

- I think the iPod predictions are a little off right now, I think they probably are not going to be updated until September, so not sure if it qualifies as an "updates soon"

- Intel transition didn't really change much, except we have a better idea what processors are coming for the next refresh

I think that for those using PowerBooks, the ideal time to upgrade to a MacBook or MPB will be after the next refresh. The current MBP processor uses 34W, and the new Montevina refresh will use about 29W. The next refresh after that is going to be Nehalem in Q2 2009, which is going to be use between 35-45W, probably at least 40 for the version that will go into the MPB. So the new Montevina chips seem to be striking the best balance between speed and battery life. The 22nm Sandy Bridge refresh will fix the power consumption problems, but that doesn't come out until 2011. Since realistically no one still using a PowerBook will wait until 2011 to buy a new one, it seems like the optimal time to upgrade is going to be in late August or whenever the new ones come out.

It would be great to have this kind of historic information on all consumer electronics.

It's nice to buy a fridge on the cheap because it's last year's model.

Brilliant guide, thanks. I need an MP3 player right now, so this is real helpful.

(OT: Anyone know the closest thing to an iPod with WMA support?)

Gotta think Apple's relationship with Intel will change some of these release cycles. Great resource though.

A similar site is mactactic.com