Malcolm Owen
Apple's new MacBook Pro models with faster chips are expected on Monday, and are rumored to adopt MagSafe charging of some sort, a speedier Apple Silicon processor, and more.
Apple is expected to launch numerous products at Monday's "Unleashed" Apple Event, but the bulk of the presentation is anticipated to revolve around the MacBook Pro. With the potential launch of the 14-inch MacBook Pro alongside an updated 16-inch MacBook Pro, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman offered his predictions, as well as further details on what went into the creation of the new models.
In his "Power On" newsletter, Gurman reiterates previously-rumored features including new display resolutions and a mini LED screen. According to an anonymous source, the resolutions of 3,024 by 1,964 and 3,456 by 2,234 have surfaced in app analytics.
Powering the new models, the chip inside will use 10 CPU cores made up of eight high-performance cores and two high-efficiency cores to save power. A variation will be provided, with the new chip's GPU including either 16 cores or 32 cores.
The 8GB and 16GB options for RAM in the earlier 13-inch MacBook Pro release could gain extra options. According to the report 32GB and 64GB capacities have also apparently been tested. The existing 16-inch MacBook Pro has a 32GB RAM option, but not a 64GB model.
As for what the new chips will be called, it is unclear if Apple will go with an extra letter, such as "M1X" or "M1Z." Another possibility is "M1 Pro" and "M1 Max" with the latter found in App developers logs. It isn't clear if this is for the new MacBook Pro or for a future product, but given the timing of the entries, it seems likely to be for the new MacBook Pro.
Sunday's report says that the new MacBook Pro will see the "end of the Touch Bar." While Apple had "tested versions" with add-ons such as an SD card slot, HDMI, and USB-A, it seems unlikely that Apple will be including them in the new variations, the report also claims.
Lastly, MagSafe will be making an appearance in the new models, complete with "faster" charging speeds.
Previous Rumors
Apple's "Unleashed" special event, the second in successive months, is set to feature changes to the MacBook Pro lineup, with two models expected to be unveiled. The 16-inch MacBook Pro is rumored to be making the move over to Apple Silicon, while the 14-inch MacBook Pro will provide more screen space than the 13-inch model, while also offering the Apple-designed chip.
The new models are expected to use a new "M1X" chip, said previously reported on October 3 to be offered in two variants. While both will use a 10-core CPU and the Neural Engine, one version will have a 16-core GPU, while the other will be a 32-core version.
Earier rumors suggested that the new MacBook Pro would herald the return of MagSafe to the MacBook Pro line. In the same report, it was claimed that the Touch Bar that debuted in the 2016 MacBook Pro models would disappear.
Many rumors from multiple sources have said that Apple will incorporate mini LED-backlit displays, enabling high contrast levels and improved color representation on a par with OLED into the MacBook Pro. On October 12, an analyst specializing in displays claimed that mini LED was definitely on the way, along with a potential 120Hz refresh rate, up from the 60Hz current models support.
One October 16 leak claimed the infamous notch from the displays of the iPhone could reach the MacBook Pro lineup, with the FaceTime HD camera held inside a notch at the top of the display. However, at the same time, it was said that Face ID would not be used in the model, with Touch ID thought to be retained as the sole biometric security system in use.
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58 Comments
“I find your lack of Touch Bar disturbing…“
The only thing that was ever bad about it, was the first iteration without a dedicated ESC-key; the second version fixed that, and from then on, the Touch Bar was a clear winner.
The only other issue, which with Apple Silicon isn’t an issue anyway anymore, is that the Touch Bar wasn’t initialized during EFI booting, thus, if one did a Boot Camp boot into windows, and one needed to hit F1 to do a recovery boot before windows was fully up and the Touch Bar was configured by drivers, one was SOL, unless one had an external USB keyboard handy. But that’s really an edge case, and any crap keyboard for $10 would fix this, if really it ever was an issue. Apple Silicon won’t support Boot Camp anyway, so now even this issue is gone.
In short, Apple is rumored to abandon a great feature at the very moment when actually all issues with it would finally have been resolved. How dumb is that? 🤦🏻♂️
There is an error above discussing the 16" laptop. My 2019 16" MacBook Pro has 64GB of 2666 MHz DDR4 memory, a 8TB SSD and AMDC Radeon Pro 5500M (top video card when ordered) for just over $6,000. It has the 2.4 GHz 8-Core Intel Core i9 processor. Quite the machine in 2019.
I don’t believe the notch rumor. The iPhone notch doesn’t really bother me too much, although at first I hated the idea. But if the iPad Pro doesn’t have a notch, then why would the MacBook Pro have a notch? It just doesn’t make sense.
After having used the Macbook Pro with touch bar for 4 years, I can tell you that it's been basically useless for me. Even a hindrance. And I think most people feel the same. Otherwise why would Apple remove it?
The only thing I will miss about the touch bar is the spelling suggestions which were handy.