Apple has officially announced the revamped 14 and 16-inch MacBook Pros, both with a choice of M2 Pro or M2 Max chipsets.
After what has been months of will they/won’t they speculation that started with an early 2023 release window, followed by a potential delay to later in the year, Apple has just updated its website with the big news we all wanted to see.
The more things change, the more they stay the same
The most obvious thing to notice on first sight is that absolutely nothing has changed in terms of the utilitarian aesthetic. The same essential ports are still present, you’re still getting that same larger half-eaten fruit logo emblazoned on the lid, and that same amazing keyboard and touchpad is still here.
Also here is the same 14.2 and 16.2-inch Liquid Retina XDR displays — packing a 3024 x 1964 and 3456 x 2234-pixel resolutions respectively, alongside that same 120Hz refresh rate.
The big differences are going to be what you find under the hood, and yes it’s exactly what you expected. M2 Pro and M2 Max have broken cover in these new systems.
The Pro features a 10- or 12-core CPU with up to eight high-performance and four high-efficiency cores for up to 20 percent greater performance over M1 Pro. On the other hand, the Max pushes this even further with a larger GPU with up to 38 cores and a 30% increase in performance over M1 Max.
Alongside this as well, just as we saw with the M2 MacBook Air and MacBook Pro, the bandwidth for RAM has increased too, which means you can spec this with up to a massive 96GB of memory.
Two other key updates include a bump to Wi-Fi 6E for 6GHz support and a HDMI port that supports up to 4K 240Hz.
Outlook
So, this was the minor spec bump that rumors suggested. We’ll save our full thoughts for a proper hands-on review, but it’s fair to say we’re rather excited to see how big the gains are here compared to the previous generation.
Prices have, fortunately, remained the same with a starting cost of $1,999. But we do now have the new super spec of 96GB, which will set you back an eyewatering $6,499. Is that a price creative pros are willing to pay? Depending on the workload demands, quite possibly.
The leaks reported earlier today and yesterday fall in line with the launch schedule we’re seeing, with pre-orders available starting today and orders shipping for January 24.
