On 18th of October at its “Unleashed” event Apple released its most awaited product of the year the Apple silicon based MacBook Pro. The new MacBook Pro series comes with bigger so-called up versions of the M1 SoC which the company calls M1 Pro and the top of the line M1 Max. The notebook is available in 14-inch and 16-inch display variants and will be the biggest update to the MacBook in the past couple of years where Apple almost messed up the Pro workflow.
The new M1 Pro and M1 Max are beefed up versions of the already excellent M1 and do allow upto 10-core CPU and 32-Core GPU with upto 64 GB of unified memory.
New Silicon
The Cupertino giant revealed the plan to transition from Intel to its own custom in-house silicon in 2020. The M1 which was Apple’s first custom SoC in a Mac was ARM based hence provided huge performance improvements while still consuming a lot less power.
Today the iPhone maker announced the M1 Pro and the M1 Max which are further supposed to increase performance using more high performance cores.
The M1 Pro as well as M1 Max have a total of 10 CPU cores of which 2 are high-efficiency and 2 high 8 high-performance. Both the SoCs have a 16 core neural engine. And while M1 Pro has a maximum of 16 core GPU with 32 GB of unified memory, the M1 Max has 32 Core GPU and upto 64GB of unified memory.
The marketing charts and numbers given by Apple show that the M1 Pro and M1 Max show upto 1.7 times more power while still using upto 70% less power. The M1 Pro’s GPU is 2 times faster than the M1 while the M1 Max is 4 times faster than the M1 in GPU performance.
Display
The MacBook Pro 2021 has a completely new display panel now with a notch for the camera and thinner bezels. The Display itself if a MiniLED panel giving out a 1000 nits of full screen brightness, 1600 nits of peak brightness and 10,00,000:1 contrast ratio. The display now also supports Apple’s ProMotion or adaptive refresh rate with upto 120Hz. The notch at the top of the screen hosts a new 1080p FaceTime camera but despite the massive size lacks other sensors required for FaceID.
The display supports the complete P3 wide colour gamut, HDR, and XDR output.
Ports
In 2016 Apple gave the MacBook Pro a major redesign making the device thin light and portable and in the process got rid of a lot of very important ports. This time around Apple went back and brought back the HDMI port and the SD card slot along with three USB-C thunderbolt 4 ports. Bringing a relief to the professionals as they no longer have to carry around weird dongles for basic functionality.
Apple has also brought back the MagSafe magnetic connecter for charging the device. However users can still use the USB-C port for charging the device similar to current devices.
A Lot More
Connectivity options on the MacBook Pro include Bluetooth v5.0 and WiFi 6. The User can also connect upto 3 Pro Display XDR and a 4K TV simultaneously to the M1 Max based devices and 2 Pro Display XDRs and a 4k TV to the M1 Pro
The 14” model now provides a 17 hour battery life while the 16” model boasts a massive 21 hour battery life. The company also claims that the device now uses a newer thermal system that can move upto 50% more air even at lower fan speeds.
New speaker system on these MacBook Pro models include 6 speakers of which 2 are tweeters while other 4 are force-cancelling woofers.
Apple claims that using its new M1 Max chip, pros can edit up to 30 streams of 4K ProRes video or up to seven streams of 8K ProRes video in Final Cut Pro — more streams than on a 28-core Mac Pro with Afterburner.
Both M1 Pro and M1 are also paired with a 16-core Neural Engine that helps enhance machine learning capabilities on the new MacBook Pro models. As per some numbers shared publicly, the built-in Neural Engine delivers up to 8.7 times faster object tracking performance in Final Cut Pro with M1 Pro and up to 11.5 times faster with M1 Max. There is also up to 2.6 times faster performance when selecting subjects in images in Adobe Photoshop.
The MacBook Pro 2021 will come preinstalled with the MacOS Monterey and the OS will also be available to older devices running the MacOS BigSur. The MacBook Pro with the M1 Pro and M1 Max are true Pro machines and do provide the power needed by the creative professionals claims Apple.
Pricing
The pricing for the 14-inch Apple MacBook Pro (2021) starts at Rs. 1,94,900 and is also available for education at Rs. 1,75,410. The 16-inch Apple MacBook Pro (2021) model starts at Rs. 2,15,910 for education and Rs. 2,39,900 for regular customers.
In the US, the 14-inch Apple MacBook Pro (2021) starts at $1,999 (roughly Rs. 1,50,400), while the 16-inch version is priced at $2,499 (roughly Rs. 1,88,100).
Get Top Deals on MacBooks and Accessories.
MacBook Pro 2020 8GB RAM 256GB SSD
MacBook Pro 2020 8GB Ram 512GB SSD
