Apple’s New MacBook Pros – LED Backlighting

AppleGizmodo talked to Apple and received some very interesting information in regards to Apple’s new Santa Rosa-based MacBook Pros. Now the MacBook Pros are not something we’d normally talk about, since they are have 15 and 17-inch displays, but the following was too interesting not to mention:

How much battery life does the LED Backlighting save?

30 minutes to an hour vs. the older models. (Including savings from Santa Rosa, so there’s no way to distinguish the improvements individually.)

Is there a full brightness warmup?
No, its…instantly at full brightness, unlike traditional LCDs.

What is the comparison in brightness, color range?
Identical to the previous generation.

Granted, they can’t distinguish improvements in energy efficiency over the previous generation since they also moved to Santa Rosa at the same time they added LED backlighting, but those are interesting numbers considering they are using full-speed Intel Core 2 Duos. Small laptops shipping with LED-backlit displays on the Santa Rosa platform, and using ultra-low voltage Core 2 Duos should see a nice increase in battery life.