Brand new MacBook Pro breaks all records!

The most powerful MacBook Pro ever: The new MacBook Pro has been improved on many fronts.

Do you want the best laptop that Apple has in the house? Then the MacBook Pro series is your department. These are the showpieces of what Apple can pack into a laptop. So when Apple says they’ve made the best MacBook Pro ever with the new MacBook Pro announced tonight, you can expect some big numbers.

MacBook Pro 2021

Let’s name some numbers. First, there will be two versions. One with a screen diagonal of 16 inches (16.2 to be exact) and a smaller 14 inches (14.2 inches) that will take the place of the 13 inches.

frame

The aluminum frame is thinner and lighter than ever. The screen is extremely thin: when closed, the laptop is only 16.8 mm thin. The MacBook Pro has become lighter: 2 kg (16 inches) or just 1.5 kg (14 inches).

Touch bar gone!

There is also a few new things on the housing. The Touch Bar is gone! As announced this afternoon, the Touchbar disappears and you get ‘traditional’ Function keys at the top of the keyboard again. This is because Apple puts the Magic Keyboard in the MacBook Pro almost one-to-one.

Ports

In terms of ports, there is good news. No more fiddling with adapters if you want to connect a screen: the new MacBook Pro has an HDMI port again. You also get 3 USB-C (Thunderbolt) inputs, a ‘headphone jack’ and a magnetic MagSafe charger port. Worth mentioning: you can also charge the MacBook Pro with a USB-C charger in one of the Thunderbolt connections. A final opening is for an SD card.

Fewer bezels, more notch

The screen is a mix of good news and bad news. The screen diagonal is larger than ever: 16.2 inches (or 14.2 inches with the smaller version). The resolution has been increased enormously: there is a 3024×1969 maximum resolution for the 14 inch and 3456×2224 for the 16 inch. The gain in screen size is mainly due to smaller bezels: 24 percent more screen has been gained and the top bezel is 60 percent smaller. There is a drawback. To house the camera neatly, the bezels were too small. So the MacBook Pro comes with a notch in the screen, like the iPhones since the OLED models. Admittedly, on a Mac it does less damage, but it still looks a little less nice.

Screen

By the way, the screen is a Liquid Retina XDR screen with MiniLED technology, which we know from the iPad. That makes the screen extremely thin. Apple has put ProMotion technology in the new MacBook Pro. That’s their way of saying that extremely smooth 120Hz refresh rate is now also available. ProMotion also chooses when that 120Hz might be a bit overkill and to save battery, it sometimes switches to less good refresh rates. You can also turn it off if you find it annoying.

Sound

The microphone and camera have both been improved to work even better than ever before. An audio system with six speakers and noise canceling ensures ‘Pro-quality speakers’ and there is 80 percent more bass, or at least such a better experience.

CPU and GPU

We’re going to talk about the new M1 Pro and M1 Max chips in a bit, but for now you should know that the GPU runs up to four times faster than outgoing models and the CPU is four times faster by default. All this without costing you extra battery: When watching a razor-sharp video, the MacBook Pro (16-inch) has about 21 hours of battery life, which is about 7 hours more than outgoing MacBooks. Recharging goes to 50 percent with the MagSafe charger in about 30 minutes. It is not known how it is with charging for the Thunderbolt ports.

M1 Pro and M1 Max

It was already new that Apple gave the iPads and Macs its own chip called M1. To set the New MacBook Pro apart, there is now the M1 Pro chip for the new MacBook. Everything that makes the M1 chip so good, only improved. According to Apple, you have a much faster chip than a non-Pro model. Is this the best chip ever? No definitely not. Because Apple immediately throws in another one: the M1 Max. This one is even more extreme and powerful than the M1 Pro. In terms of numbers, it is all very technical and difficult to understand, but the two new chips are much more powerful than the M1 and also much more powerful than quadcore or octacore chips from other brands. The most powerful octacore that Apple could find is about as powerful as the M1 Max, but Apple is far below that in terms of consumption in watts. In short: not necessarily the most powerful on the market, but extremely efficient.

What it means for users: Apple has optimized all of its proprietary apps for the MacBook Pro to be better and more comprehensive than ever. A number of developers have already started working with it and are positive about it. Of course, otherwise they wouldn’t have put it in the Keynote. But it means that “pro apps” like photo or video editing programs and audio mixing programs work better than ever.

The M1 Pro and M1 Max chips debut in the new MacBook Pro. They’re so efficient that the MacBook Pro’s internal cooling is almost unnecessary. When it is needed, it works 50 percent better than the previous model. Other examples of how powerful the M1 Max chip is: you can connect three Pro displays and a 4K TV to your MacBook Pro with M1 Max chip and it will just keep running at high speed.

Prices

The MacBook Pro is not going to be cheap: the new Apple MacBook starts from 2,249 euros. Then you have the 14 inch that is only available with the M1 Pro. It starts with 512 GB of storage, 16 GB of RAM, an octa-core CPU and 14-core GPU. You can upgrade this to a 10-core CPU and 16-core GPU along with 1 TB of storage. That goes 2,749 euros cost.

The 16-inch with the M1 Pro is only available with 16 GB RAM, 10-core CPU and 16-core GPU, so you have to choose between 512 GB and 1 TB. The 512 GB costs 2,749 euros and the 1 TB 2,979 euros. The M1 Max is only available in the most expensive 16 inches, paired with a 10-core CPU and a 32-core GPU, in addition to 32GB of RAM and 1TB of storage. This is the price stunner with 3,849 euros.

All too expensive? The ‘old’ MacBook Pro with the M1 chip is also still available. It is only available with a 13-inch screen and an 8-core CPU and GPU. The only choice is 256 GB or 512 GB storage. These are offered for 1,449 and 1,679 euros respectively.

The new MacBook Pro line-up can be ordered from today, delivery should start next week.