What you need to know
- Apple has just unveiled the stunning new MacBook Pro.
- It features a return of MagSafe and HDMI.
- It also has brand new Apple silicon.
Apple has just announced its stunning new mini-LED MacBook Pro in 14 and 16-inch sizes, featuring all-new Apple silicon.
Apple's new MacBook Pro features an all-new design that brings back MagSafe charging and HDMI connectivity. It comes in two sizes, 14 and 16 inches. The new design improves thermals by moving 50% more air, yet weighs just 4.7 pounds (16-inch).
The Touch Bar is gone, replaced by function keys. Below, there's a new Force Touch Trackpad.
The new MacBook Pro is all about connectivity, returning the HDMI port, Thunderbolt 4 USB-C ports and an SD card reader. It also has a 3.5mm headphone jack, and MagSafe charging, although you can still charge through USB-C.
The new MacBook can support up to 4 displays on the 16-inch model, but the new display is no slouch. It has a 120Hz ProMotion Liquid Retina XDR display, 24% thinner bezels, and more pixels than ever before. That's the same technology used in Apple's M1 iPad Pro (2021), and is good for 1000 nits of brightness, or 1600 nits at its peak. And yes, the new MacBook Pro has a notch.
The new MacBook has a 1080p FaceTime camera with a larger image sensor for 2x low light performance, and spicy computational video for sharper images and better quality video. Apple says it's the best camera system ever put in a MacBook.
The Pro's new microphones can capture studio quality audio with a 60% lower soundfloor, and it has 6 speakers, including two new tweeters that are two times larger. The subwoofers offer 80% more bass and support for Spatial Audio on both the 14-inch and 16-inch models.
Thanks to the amazing new Apple silicon chips, the M1 Pro and M1 Max, you can get speeds of up to 2x faster than the best i9 MacBook. The new M1 Pro is 2.5x faster than the M1, and the M1 Max is up to four times faster.
The new MacBook Pro can support up to 64GB of Unified memory, and 16 or 32 graphics cores. The new MacBooks can edit up to 30 streams of 4K ProRes video in Final Cut, or up to 7 streams of 8K video. SSDs offer up to 7.4GB/s up read speeds. In other words, the new MacBooks are very fast.
Battery life is also improved, with 2x longer performance in Lightroom Classic, and 4x more in Xcode. The 14-inch model can deliver 17 hours of video playback, and the 16-inch is good for 21 hours. The new Macbook Pro also features fast charging, giving you 50% charge in just 30 minutes. It's also made from 100% recycled aluminum.
All of this performance comes at a price, however. The new 14-inch MacBook Pro starts at $1,999, whilst the 16-inch is $2,499. They're available in both silver and space grey, and can be pre-ordered from today, October 18. They'll be ready for release next week and Apple will keep selling the 13-inch MacBook Pro with M1 and MacBook Air with M1, replacing them as Apple's new best MacBooks.
