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“When it comes to recording, I don’t want to be a technical person,” says Alex Kapranos, lead singer/guitarist for Franz Ferdinand. “The studio should be a creative place. So I like a system that is really straightforward, visually appealing, and simple.” He found that system, writing most of the songs for Tonight: Franz Ferdinand on his MacBook Pro using GarageBand and Logic Pro. The result? A sound “different from everything we’ve ever done before.”

“When it comes to recording, I don’t want to be a technical person,” says Alex Kapranos, lead singer/guitarist for Franz Ferdinand. “The studio should be a creative place. So I like a system that is really straightforward, visually appealing, and simple.” He found that system, writing most of the songs for Tonight: Franz Ferdinand on his MacBook Pro using GarageBand and Logic Pro. The result? A sound “different from everything we’ve ever done before.”

Saying it’s “primped and primed for Mac OS X Snow Leopard, Windows 7, and professionals of all stripes,” Tom Yager (inforworld.com) lavishes the new 15-inch MacBook Pro with praise. “A five-year machine, by design and track record,” the “newest, fastest 15-inch MacBook Pro is also the coolest (in temperature) and quietest notebook I’ve used.” It is, Yager concludes, “the best of the tier-one commercial notebooks, full stop.”

In his Computerworld review, Ken Mingis takes us through all the great features in the new 13-inch MacBook Pro. That includes faster processors, “a major improvement in battery life, an SD card slot, a FireWire 800 port, a better LED screen and, debuting in the entry-level version, Apple’s highly regarded backlit keyboard.” For Mingis, its light weight and small size also makes it “perfect for toting around in a backpack on campus or at work.”

Praising the “superb colour-accurate displays” found on the new MacBook Pro computers, Rob Galbraith (robgalbraith.com) indicates that the revamped lineup “offers the best displays for photographers we’ve ever seen from Apple.” Singling out the 13-inch MacBook Pro, he adds it “could well be the more enticing option,” a great choice “for Mac-based photographers wanting to pay less and carry less.”

For archaeologist Julie Schablitsky, the MacBook is a perfect storytelling tool. “The Mac is what I put my experiences and interpretations into,” she says. “It receives all of my thoughts, all of the stories that are given to me by the artifacts. I use it to turn those stories into visual representations that I can show people, the public, and academic colleagues. You can help people time travel with the Mac.”

“With its lower price, the return of FireWire (woo-hoo!), longer battery life, better looking display and a new built-in SD Card slot that you can boot from, the newest member of the MacBook Pro makes an impressive debut,” concludes James Galbraith (macworld.com) in his 4.5-mouse (out of 5) review of the new 13-inch MacBook Pro.

Its “fetching high-resolution screen and its portability make this an attractive notebook for professional designers,” reports Jonathan Rougeot (computershopper.com) of the new 17-inch MacBook Pro. In addition, Rougeot concludes, the new model’s “sleek design, impressive battery life, and reduced price will make this attractive even to less-demanding users who want a stylish laptop with a bit of muscle.”

How do the batteries in the new MacBook Pro laptops measure up? Walt Mossberg (ptech.allthingsd.com) wanted to know, so “using my own harsh battery test,” he assessed the performance of new 13- and 15-inch MacBook Pro models. “The results,” he reports, ”were excellent. These two new Apple laptops scored among the highest battery lives between charges of any laptop I have ever tested.”

You receive a Word document from a friend. And while you have Office for Mac on your MacBook, you’d rather open that document in Pages. Thanks to Mac OS X Leopard, you have a number of ways — right-clicking on the document, Get Info, and others — to temporarily change the application used to open it. But what if you always want Pages to open Word documents? Find out how in today’s tip.