Those hoping for a retina display MacBook at this year's WWDC are in luck -- Apple's taken the wrapper off its 'next generation' MacBook Pro, packing a display with a stonkingly high resolution and a shockingly thin frame.
It's out today and starts at £1,799, with the price rising if you opt for more memory and storage.
The 15.4-inch next-generation MacBook Pro has a display with a 2,800x1,800-pixel resolution, making for a pixel density of 220 pixels per inch. I haven't had the chance to go eyes-on yet, but Apple says that individual pixels can't be discerned when you're looking at this display from a normal distance.
Glare reduction is on board too, which should help this machine fight annoying reflections.
The body is a mere 18mm thick, making this machine very nearly as slim as the MacBook Air. Unlike the Air, however, the new MacBook Pro is flat, rather than sporting a wedge shape.
It weighs a little over 2kg, which is impressively light for a 15-inch laptop, and should make this machine a decent choice if you lug your tech around with you all day.
It's not quite as portable as the Air, but this Mac packs a lot more power than Apple's ultra-slim option.
Up to 2.7GHz quad-core Intel Core i7 processors are in play, backed by up to 16GB of RAM, which is a lot of memory. A tonne of flash storage is on board too -- you can get up to 768GB of flash storage, and graphics are handled by Nvidia GeForce GT 650M 1GB.
There are a lot of ports here too, including some Apple's shied away from in the past. Expect HDMI, two Thunderbolt ports and USB 3.0 connectivity. Oh, there's an SD card slot too.
Impressive stuff -- I'm keen to get my mitts on Apple's latest effort to see how powerful it really is. Are you keen? Say so in the comments or on our Facebook wall.
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Comments 14
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anonymous 11 June, 2012 19:26
This is funny. It should read 'Apple brings out new super high def displays across the board... still can't fix shoddy OGL drivers'.
Any dev thats ever worked in 3D, or gamer thats tried playing reasonably demanding Mac games knows that Apple can't write graphics drivers to save its life, in fact the drivers would be faster if they were ported from FOSS Linux drivers.
On another point, it will be interesting to see how they deal with heat. The last MBP's only heat outlet was the screen hinge, and despite the cries that 'the MBP case was an aluminium heat sink' it only succeded in making the rest of the parts hot, leading to lost of hard crashes from overheating when working on my FCP projects. I went back to my home TV's 2010 Mac mini (Core2Duo) to render because the i5 MBP couldn't actually carry out the job without overheating.
With a 650M (remember that's GT not GTX) we may have more of the same, especially seeing as Radeons generally run cooler than equivalent Geforces. I pray for a real cooling solution.
anonymous 11 June, 2012 20:14
shame it'll cost £1799 in the uk though!
anonymous 11 June, 2012 20:29
i know there are shipping costs etc. but can apple really justify a £500 price difference for the UK???
anonymous 11 June, 2012 20:32
£400 even - its a bit rediculous
billfred 11 June, 2012 20:44
Almost! If I still had my student discount and if it had an "anti-glare" option!
anonymous 11 June, 2012 21:13
So its expensive, overheating, doesn't play hi end games, doesn't do 3d well but on the bright side its an Apple product .... still fools are gonna pay for it....ohh well nothing ground breaking there....
billfred 11 June, 2012 22:06
I think your fullstop key is broken. Oh and 3D is still rubbish. My MBP does get very hot but still hasn't crashed from overheating evening with HD video editing and converting.
anonymous 11 June, 2012 22:35
OH MY GOD.
I can only say OH MY GOD.
anonymous 12 June, 2012 00:36
This fool bought his, delivery scheduled around two weeks from now. :-)
Ruffus Stone 12 June, 2012 01:24
$2199 (approx. £1420) in US
£1799 in UK
Most of that difference is made up by the 20% VAT levied in the UK (£284).
The remainder of the difference will be mostly taken up by the local purchase taxes levied in the USA, but not included in the list price (as it varies from state to state).
The UK and US prices are therefore very similar.
JasonX 12 June, 2012 09:14
i'm not an Apple fan in any way but that is one stunner of a laptop! That slim profile is just beautiful and the specification seems pretty damn amazing...until you see the price :\ and £1799 is for the base model if i'm not mistaken (stoopid UK taxes really do hike up the price!)? You could get a hell of a lot more bang for your buck with other systems.
Although in my personal opinion i've always thought that the keyboard deck looked very bland and dated...always felt like it needed a little bit more something to make it look nicer.
I've never owned a MB so never known heat or drivers were an issue...haven't seen many reviews mention it..but it'll be interesting to see how this guys handles those issues (pictures on other websites show some vents at the bottom of the laptop)
anonymous 12 June, 2012 11:13
Now since 'retina displays' are found on macs, its only a matter of time until the other companies release high res screens, so to see the price difference between macs and pc's will be interesting, also about the spec differences for the price. Btw the screen on the xperia ray is very similar to the mac pros with similar ppi, although it is high res, if u have great eye sight like me then you can tell individual pixels, and at times the pictures look a little bit grainy because of it. Retina display my @$£.
anonymous 12 June, 2012 12:07
Great laptop but the price is extreme. I think it looks like Apple is trying to massively increase their margins as they have got a dominant position in the market now. Those that are desperate for a retina display laptop should wait for the next refresh in autumn, as they are likely to bring out a 13 inch retina display version macbook pro slightly cheaper at £1599 (sarcasm).
anonymous 12 June, 2012 21:44
Cnet, I think you need to replace your keyboards, £1799, hilarious.