Apple has released a refreshed lineup of MacBook Pro laptops with upgraded CPUs and memory, though overall, the boosts are very modest at best.
All 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina notebooks have 8GB of RAM, while the two 15-inch models have 16GB of RAM standard. On top of that, CPU clock speed is now 200MHz faster.
Here’s a breakdown of each Retina model as of today. The 13-inch MacBook Pros will get you Intel Core i5 dual-core processors, 8GB of RAM, and Intel Iris Graphics. The $1,299 and $1,499 versions each have CPUs clocked at 2.6GHz, while the $1,799 model’s processor runs at 2.8GHz. The $1,299 unit has a 128GB PCIe SSD, while the $1,499 and $1,799 models have 256GB and 512GB PCIe SSDs, respectively.
As for the 15-inch MacBook Pro with Retina notebooks, the $1,999 unit has an Intel Core i7 2.2GHz quad-core CPU, 16GB of RAM, a 256GB PCIe SSD, and Intel Iris Pro Graphics. The top of the line unit, which costs $2,499, has a Core i7 quad-core processor running at 2.5GHz, 16GB of RAM, a 512GB PCIe SSD, and Nvidia GeForce GT 750M graphics along with the Intel Iris Pro Graphics chip built into its CPU. The high-end 15-inch MacBook Pro cost $2,599 before this upgrade.
On the upgrade front, you can add a 1TB PCIe SSD to the $1,799, $1,999, and $2,499 models, along with a Core i7 CPU whose Turbo Boost clock tops out at 4GHz, though the latter item only applies to the 15-inch models. Also worth mentioning is the fact that the lone non-Retina MacBook Pro, a 13-incher, got its price reduced from $1,199 to $1,099; a slash of $100.
MacBook Pro upgrades were rumored yesterday after an image which was posted on a Chinese tech forum suggested that Apple would be releasing beefed up notebooks today.
Apple refuses to upgrade to Nvidia’s 800M line of graphics card, which have been available for months now, though we presume that it will add 800M GPUs to MacBook Pros as part of a larger update later this year. Intel is slated to release 5th-generation Broadwell CPUs later this year, and we strongly expect them to show up in the next big MacBook Pro upgrade cycle as well. On top of that, there’s the possible release of a 12-inch MacBook Air with Retina sometime this fall or winter, which has been rumored for months.
This is the second MacBook refresh this year. Apple released updated models of its MacBook Air back in late April.
You can order the upgraded MacBook Pros right now, which ship “within 24 hours.”
The absolutely absurd idea of putting a touchscreen display on a mouse isn't exactly new. Turtle Beach already did it with its Command Series MC7, which features a 2.25-inch control screen. But apparently, even that wasn't ridiculous enough for Arctic Fox Technologies. Its new Super Mouse looks like someone took the chunky old Atari ST mouse, slapped a touchscreen and scroll wheel on it, and called it an upgrade.
The result is a rather unusual-looking mouse that is now on Kickstarter, starting at $199. And as ridiculous as it looks, some of its features are genuinely intriguing.
Apple is less than a day away from launching its highly anticipated OLED MacBook Pro with a touch-sensitive screen. But it appears that the upgrade is going to cost a pretty penny. According to a report by Bloomberg, Apple is reportedly eyeing a starting price of $2,899 for the 14-inch MacBook Pro, while the 16-inch version could start at $3,399 in the US.
"At $2,899, the 14-inch model would mark the highest starting price for a new MacBook Pro model, surpassing the $2,799 Apple charged for a 17-inch version introduced in 2006," says the report. The report claims that Apple is targeting a minimum price hike of $400 for its upcoming redesigned 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models.
I've spent a good amount of time digging into the spec sheet of the new M6 MacBook Pro (14-inch), and for all intents and purposes, this is a classic Apple "chip and connectivity" refresh. It's not a full redesign. The chassis, Liquid Retina XDR panel, speakers, ports, and battery, all of them carry over unchanged.
However, the M6 brings more cores, stronger on-device AI, higher memory bandwidth on the larger configs, and modern wireless. Here’s the practical rundown of what actually improved, and whether those gains are worth your money.