Apple's 15-inch MacBook Pro, recently updated to current-generation Intel CPUs (just in time for the holiday shopping season), retains its position as a favorite premium laptop for power-users. But that long-awaited upgrade, introduced at an Apple press event in October 2013, happened just in time.
The high-end, high-price Retina Display versions of the previous MacBook Pro were stuck in an unusual position. While other systems, from budget laptops to premium hybrids, had all moved onto Intel's latest CPU platform, known as either the fourth-generation Core i-series or by the code name Haswell, the MacBook Pro used last year's processors, until now.
The first Mac systems to get Haswell were the 11- and 13-inch MacBook Air back in June 2013. The iMac all-in-one desktop followed. That left the more expensive MacBook Pro a generation behind its less expensive Air counterpart in CPU power and battery life. That's important because our Labs testing has shown that Haswell offers significant improvements to battery life in PC and Mac systems.
Note, however, that this CPU update applies only to the thinner MacBook Pro models with Retina Displays. Currently only the 13-inch version of the "classic" MacBook Pro is still for sale. The 15-inch version is presumably relegated to the same lonely afterlife as its long-gone 17-inch relative. For the sake of expediency, we'll now refer to the current 13-inch and 15-inch Retina Display models simply as the MacBook Pro.
Updated components and a lower price
The flagship MacBook Pro retains its very high screen resolution, which results in crisper text and clearer photos (2,560x1,600 pixels for the 13-inch model, 2,880x1,800 for the 15-inch model). Unlike some Windows PCs with higher-res screens, OS X is more interested in scaling your onscreen content to look its best (or what Apple thinks will look best), rather than giving you full unfettered access to that very, very high resolution. However, the tile interface view in Windows 8 does something similar with the handful of higher-res PCs now available.
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Like the recent MacBook Air and iMac updates, the new MacBook Pro models also feature 802.11ac Wi-Fi, faster PCIe solid-state drive (SSD) storage, and Thunderbolt 2 ports for data and video output.
We were pleasantly surprised when the 13-inch MacBook Air saw its starting price cut to $1,099 earlier this year. The MacBook Pro follows, with its prices going from $2,199 down to $1,999 for the 15-inch version (and from $1,499 for the 13-inch version down to $1,299). That's a break from traditional Apple pricing, where prices would remain the same generation over generation, with updated components adding value.
The 15-inch version defaults to 8GB RAM and a 256GB SSD (which Apple cheekily described as a "quarter terabyte"). Our review configuration of the 15-inch MacBook Pro is the step-up model (and it's a big step) for $2,599, with a faster 2.3GHZ Core i7, 16GB of RAM, a 512GB SSD, and the Nvidia GeForce 750M GPU.
In our hands-on testing, these new model looks and feels a lot like the previous generation, so if you bought one last year, there's no need to reach for your wallet. However, if you don't already own a Retina MacBook Pro, the promise of longer battery life, somewhat improved performance, faster Wi-Fi, and lower starting prices is enough to make this a significant overall update.
