Apple Updates Retina MacBook Pro with New Processors, Drops Pricing on 13-Inch Models and High-End MacBook Air

Make what you will of it. $200 price change is nice. But the best value still is the 15inch macbook retina. Even at 2199. Only because if you take the 13inch and upgrade it to 15inch specs, its more expensive than the baseline 15in.

I bought the 15inch retina last july and i have not looked back. Haswell would be nice but right now, it is the best computer I have ever used. The screen is just amazing and I'm never going back. EVER!!!

Bah, and I bought mine just recently through macmall. I can't even complain to apple! It's a $500 delta.

nolegirl01 said:

ah man.... hasn't even been a year since I bought my 15'' rMBP and they are already updating/dropping price....not cool

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it's a .1 upgrade in the CPU, nothing you would ever notice


and I don't Haswell is coming out till fall anyway

Good move on Apple's part, finally acknowledging that RAM and flash storage's prices have been dropping like rocks in the general market. It really wasn't right that you can get 512 GB flash storage for less than $400 and they were charging an extra $400 for an additional 128 GB storage in both the retinas and the Airs.

Wicked1 said:

Still expensive if you ask me, they need to move the Base 13" MBP to $999, then put the 13 rMBP where the base13 and upper 13 MBP are now, then they will sell, just too much money for Retina as they are now. It will be interesting to see now that they dropped the price slightly if they sell, I would not buy one until they are $1200 and $1500 even then I think it still worries people about the cost verse the feature of retina.

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I think $1499 is a good price point. After all, the MacBook Air sells well, and these models aren't much more than the Air after today's price drop. The 2.6GHz i7 in the $1699 rMBP now is indisputably faster than the 2.0GHz i7 in the upgraded Air (it was muddier between the 2.0GHz i7 and 2.5GHz i5 with the slight edge to the i7). Now the choice is between a $1599 13" MBA with 8GB/256GB and a $1699 13" rMBP with a 2.6GHz i5, a significantly better screen, a 2nd Thunderbolt port, and an HDMI port, albeit one that weighs 0.6 lbs more, but actually has a smaller footprint. That's worth $100 to me.

wed96101 said:

You seem to be outside typical 14 day return/rebate window. How did you manage to get it return? I bought mine on January 19th.

I wish I could do the same thing. Thanks!

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I just called and was polite and they said they would make an exception

Aluminum213 said:

it's a .1 upgrade in the CPU, nothing you would ever notice


and I don't Haswell is coming out till fall anyway

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That's true...but it is also $200 cheaper oh well....it is what it is, I'm still happy with my rMBP...

just to put into perspective this Laptop is as fast as a 6core Mac Pro!!

HVDynamo said:

Macbook pro's don't support the fusion drive. You are just getting a 750GB hard drive.

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Apple doesn't sell it with Fusion drive, but you can upgrade it yourself. Requires removing the optical drive though.

Anyone however think it's sort of ridiculous to give a "Pro" machine 128 GB in storage? Yes it's SSD and thus faster/better and all that, but to me a "Pro" machine should be able to run many hardcore programs and have some room for storage on the hard drive. This isn't like a little Macbook Air where presumably you have another beefier computer. This is supposed to be a desktop replacement. I think a rmbp should start, like the 15", with 256 GB of storage, which is enough space to run plenty of heavy duty programs AND to have the media files right on your computer.

Dammit Cubs said:

Make what you will of it. $200 price change is nice. But the best value still is the 15inch macbook retina. Even at 2199. Only because if you take the 13inch and upgrade it to 15inch specs, its more expensive than the baseline 15in.

I bought the 15inch retina last july and i have not looked back. Haswell would be nice but right now, it is the best computer I have ever used. The screen is just amazing and I'm never going back. EVER!!!

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Hi, is 15inch rMBP using nvidia even for basic os animations? or is it using that intel piece of crap? /i mean, 13icnher can get under 20fps with system animations, does it happen with 15incher?)

skaertus said:

The sell-out of Surface Pro is still a mystery. Nobody really knows if the sell-out was due to to high demand or low offer. But the "sell-out marketing" is playing nicely, though.

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Just saying: Apple products are never "sold out". Apple sometimes has long delivery times, but it is never "sold out". Does the Surface Pro not have production lines that are running all week, producing a predictable number of new product to sell week after week, which then allows you to predict delivery time?

Poisonivy326 said:

Anyone however think it's sort of ridiculous to give a "Pro" machine 128 GB in storage? Yes it's SSD and thus faster/better and all that, but to me a "Pro" machine should be able to run many hardcore programs and have some room for storage on the hard drive. This isn't like a little Macbook Air where presumably you have another beefier computer. This is supposed to be a desktop replacement. I think a rmbp should start, like the 15", with 256 GB of storage, which is enough space to run plenty of heavy duty programs AND to have the media files right on your computer.

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Strange enough, my professional Mac has right now just 50 GB used, while my personal Mac has a 1TB hard drive which is half full.

8GB ram is not enough, I have that in my three year old machine and it's not enough. I want 32GB in a notebook already damnit.

nolegirl01 said:

That's true...but it is also $200 cheaper oh well....it is what it is, I'm still happy with my rMBP...

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the 15" rMBP didn't change in price, only 13" dropped $200

I'm suddenly much more interested in getting a 13" rMBP instead of a 11" MBA

EDIT: Unless they somehow manage to get a retina display into the MBA without more than halving it's battery life.

These rMBP's are much, much cheaper in Australia!

Blue Sun said:

These rMBP's are much, much cheaper in Australia!

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How do you work that out? The rMBP is AS 1649 = over $1700 USD. Even with tax, (which you don't always pay in the US depending on how you buy) the US price is still lower.

So does this mean there will be no announcement in Spring?

Was thinknig about buying a mac but was going to wait until spring for the typical apple "update"

is this "THE" update? or will there be another, more significant (redesign, haswell, etc) update in spring?

enfanteribl said:

How do you work that out? The rMBP is AS 1649 = over $1700 USD. Even with tax, (which you don't always pay in the US depending on how you buy) the US price is still lower.

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They are now cheaper than what they were in Australia, but they're still expensive compared to the US.

minuteman said:

Was thinknig about buying a mac but was going to wait until spring for the typical apple "update"

is this "THE" update? or will there be another, more significant (redesign, haswell, etc) update in spring?

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This is a mid-cycle refresh, much like what Apple did in November 2011, except that it was accompanied by a change in pricing structure. Mobile Haswell chips are still scheduled to come out in the summer, and I expect we'll see another refresh in July.

SSD - how low will it go by this summer?

Been waiting to switch my perfectly fine 2009 13" MBP to a 13" MBA for the portability benefit, but I want to retain a 500 gb HD. SSD upgrade price has been holding me back. Now I think I think the price is just about low enough for me to bite.

2ghz, 8gb ram, 512gb SSD = $1899

How much lower (if any) do you think price will get for this configuration after assumed June 2013 updates?

Still not fast enough to support the 13" Retina screen. I wouldn't think about biting until Haswell.

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bsbeamer said:

will be interesting to see these benchmark tests...

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Not really unless you think these are new top secret Intel cpus made only for Apple.

Edu pricing for memory increased

Did anyone notice the edu pricing on the rMBP memory was raised from $180 to $200 going from the standard 8GB to 16GB. Not that big of a deal I guess but I found it odd since they lowered the price on the NAND I would think the memory would of gone down as well.

Also this may have already been asked and answered in this thread but I have yet to see the question:

Is this newest version of the i7 chip merely the same as prior version with a higher chip speed or is there anything else that is significantly different?

Cheers!

duffer6 said:

Is this newest version of the i7 chip merely the same as prior version with a higher chip speed or is there anything else that is significantly different?

Cheers!

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I believe it is simply a higher speed version.

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JaySoul said:

So nobody was buying them...

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Well, some of us bought them, but evidently not enough of us.

On a side note. I wonder if they saw a significant increase in sales during the Best Buy promotion earlier this month. Since Best Buy, MacMall, Amazon, and Mac Connection had similar promotions, it's a good guess that this was coordinated, and perhaps a dry run to test these particular price points.

wschutz said:

Apple's end is a fact. Regardless of the cost of the parts... innovation is something that Apple did in the past (and more than innovation it should be named as challenging the competitors by including technologies from others in their devices), and now is just a manufacturer of laptops and phones.
Its competition has taken over, and the revolution is over. Now it is time to share the market with the competitors who actually compete on both technology and price, the latter being something Apple still thinks is not worth fighting for (but we'll see how that changes as sales get hurt over time

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Sure.

"Perhaps the most striking statistic is that, compared to the entire world population in 2012, estimated at 7.07 billion people, Apple's 120 million store visitors equates to 1.69 percent of the world population -- a noticeable and discernible percentage in the total. It's staggering to think that Apple draws such significant foot traffic."