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13-Inch Retina MacBook Pro Coming in October?
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Not necessarily. If the classic MBP 13" outsells the MBA 13" 2:1 and the MBA 13" sells about 1:1 to the hiDPI MBP 13" then it is the MBA that will likely die.
It would irrational for Apple to kill off the product that more customers wanted. Especially now that they (MBP 13" and MBA 13") are at the exact same price. This is a test as to what users prefer. If there are significant people who want the extra sockets and the DVD drive then it will live on.
A hiDPI MBP 13" is likely to be quite close to the MBA 13" on weight and size. (perhaps if they strip off 1.1lbs (-25%) , 3.4lbs versus the MBA's 2.9lbs ). It probably won't be tapered like the MBA 13" because it will need the extra battery capacity inside. But that's the catch 22. The MBA 13" can't compete with either the additional graphics and/or batteries that a slightly slimmed down MBP 13" would have that the hiDPI graphics demand.
The two with the fewest differences between them are the two slimmed down models. The could end up with the exact same side sockets and the major difference is that the hiDPI model has the much better screen and much better processor. The only marginally significant physical thing the MBA 13" would have is 0.5lbs lower weight advantage (-15%). That's about it. The major outstanding difference would be the price.
But the MBP 13" shares that same price advantage and is substantively more different and sells into to a larger user base.
In that context, I'm not sure why Apple would keep those two with "maximized thinness" models.
If it turns out the MBA 13" outsells the MBP 13" 2:1 (and both significantly outselling the hiDPI model ) then I could see the justification. Even more so if Apple can't strip off 25% of the weight. If they get more weight than that then it gets fuzzy again. However, even at 1:1 ratio with the MBA, the MBP 13" has advantages.
Apple thinks they are the transition. But if the customers vote with their pocketbooks that DVD and edge sockets are more valuable to them Apple will probably move along a longer transition. The MBA would go away first and then when Apple can make flash storage sizes bigger at more affordable prices, Thunderbolt docks/dongles get cheaper, 802.11ac takes wider spread hold, Intel delivers a one-Chip solution for CPU/GPU/I-Ohub (so maybe allows for discrete GPU), and the hiDPI gets cheaper .... then wipe the MBP 13".
As long as the hiDPI screen remain substantially more expensive it is really a battle between the MBA 13" and MBP 13" as to which one customers want more. I suspect it is going to be the MBP 13". Largely because the MBP 13" hiDPI model it going to snare more of the folks chasing Apple's 'future' than the reduced in price MBA 13" will.
I think the MBA has always had "too many" compromises. Apple is incrementally giving back on those. Two USB sockets , because one was not enough. Next will the the gratuitous taper to kill battery space just to snag some 0.11" edge number on one side. When it becomes battery space to support revolutionary new screen versus some "world's thinnest" title they lost years ago .... I think the taper will loose.
I get there is a power envelope and a "target" battery life of one work day. But couldn't a 13" MB-R have discreeet graphics installed but only enabled when actually needed as a GPU or to drive larger than stock displays? Or for specific apps where HD4000 graphics are inadequate? It might very well be in such situations it is okay to have it plugged in or to knowingly allow battery life to suffer.
On a similar theme, why couldn't the device have a LTE transceiver installed for similar occasional use?
Plenty of folks would also be quite willing to accept a thicker, heavier form factor for double the battery capacity if all these features are the offset.
802.11ac too.
Apple has the technical capacity right now to offer all those features designed to encourage folks to wean off Ethernet, Firewire, hard drives, optical drives and others.
I accept they are letting the streams cross by releasing Air like Pros concurrent with traditional Pro updates so if someone needs/wants an optical drive all you have to do is compromise and settle for lower speed I/O, no SSD option, lower resolution display. Oh wait, this is the ole crippleware to force updating customers to the new direction. But it is so overt now.
It is not actually necessary to compromise so much except to absolutely minimize entry price. So How about a MB-R "best" that has all these valuable features in a road warrior form factor? And don't split/cripple TB. Have 2 TB controllers so both are 20 gb/s.
Rocketman
On a similar theme, why couldn't the device have a LTE transceiver installed for similar occasional use?
Plenty of folks would also be quite willing to accept a thicker, heavier form factor for double the battery capacity if all these features are the offset.
802.11ac too.
Apple has the technical capacity right now to offer all those features designed to encourage folks to wean off Ethernet, Firewire, hard drives, optical drives and others.
I accept they are letting the streams cross by releasing Air like Pros concurrent with traditional Pro updates so if someone needs/wants an optical drive all you have to do is compromise and settle for lower speed I/O, no SSD option, lower resolution display. Oh wait, this is the ole crippleware to force updating customers to the new direction. But it is so overt now.
It is not actually necessary to compromise so much except to absolutely minimize entry price. So How about a MB-R "best" that has all these valuable features in a road warrior form factor? And don't split/cripple TB. Have 2 TB controllers so both are 20 gb/s.
Rocketman
Warning : Off Topic Post
ipad 2 --> the new ipad
mac book pro --> mackbook pro with retina display
seems like apple has taken a turn with its product naming, giving them a phrase-y feel.
ipad 2 --> the new ipad
mac book pro --> mackbook pro with retina display
seems like apple has taken a turn with its product naming, giving them a phrase-y feel.
Really can't wait for the 11" retina
I've had almost every size Mac notebook (literally every size except 15"). The only one that was unusable at its screen resolution was the 11" MBA I had last year -- the screen was beautiful and easy to see but too many applications just don't render correctly on that small of a vertical screen resolution. It's really frustrating to see most of your window with the buttons just barely visible at the bottom of the screen. My eyes are almost 40 years old, and I had no problem reading text or using the 11" screen all day long apart from the resolution issues.
11" was also the handiest form factor -- the difference in weight and size was just enough to make it incredibly handier to pick up with one hand to use on the sofa or to just grab and toss in a bag than the 13" MBA. Unless you've owned both sizes you really can't appreciate how much lighter and handier the 11" is than the already light and handy 13". I'm now on my second 13" MBA due to the little bit better vertical resolution making the screen actually usable. An 11" screen with retina would be 100% perfect for me and a very large percentage of the users really hope that one is released soon! Unfortunately for Apple, once they have an 11" MBA with a backlit screen and a half terra of SSD they won't be getting me to update every 10-14 months! Holding out for awhile longer, I've only got 6 months on this one.
I've had almost every size Mac notebook (literally every size except 15"). The only one that was unusable at its screen resolution was the 11" MBA I had last year -- the screen was beautiful and easy to see but too many applications just don't render correctly on that small of a vertical screen resolution. It's really frustrating to see most of your window with the buttons just barely visible at the bottom of the screen. My eyes are almost 40 years old, and I had no problem reading text or using the 11" screen all day long apart from the resolution issues.
11" was also the handiest form factor -- the difference in weight and size was just enough to make it incredibly handier to pick up with one hand to use on the sofa or to just grab and toss in a bag than the 13" MBA. Unless you've owned both sizes you really can't appreciate how much lighter and handier the 11" is than the already light and handy 13". I'm now on my second 13" MBA due to the little bit better vertical resolution making the screen actually usable. An 11" screen with retina would be 100% perfect for me and a very large percentage of the users really hope that one is released soon! Unfortunately for Apple, once they have an 11" MBA with a backlit screen and a half terra of SSD they won't be getting me to update every 10-14 months! Holding out for awhile longer, I've only got 6 months on this one.
I knew someone would bring that up. I think this site is good, as I did my signature because I was once moderated unfairly once which had something to do with my sig. So, it's just like saying "don't moderate me unfairly for this"
Run your game at 1280x800. It'll use 4 pixels to display 1, thus it won't look like total crap (it won't be blurry because you're not using the native resolution). Tell you me you had thought of that, please.
Obviously you have not been reading up on the HD 4000! It will barely run new games at 720P (and usually less) at 30 FPS. http://www.notebookcheck.net/Intel-HD-Graphics-4000-Benchmarked.73567.0.html
To top it off, these games are Windows with Direct X, take a few minutes to read through, say the Diablo 3 forums, the Open GL version on Mac runs much worse. To take it one step further, the older 9 series cards you are referencing for comparison have dedicated VRAM, integrated graphics must share RAM from the system (which is significantly slower). Usually the dedicated GPU's have ~512mb (again of their own VRAM), I know with the Sandy Bridge HD 3000, it was allowed a measly 384MB.
I am not saying it can't handle three high resolution main displays for general desktop use, but saying it will function for anything GPU intensive at even 720P, let alone the Retna resolution, is sort of a joke.
Such a shame I can't afford to wait for a new laptop till October. If it was released alongside with the 15" next-gen, I'd have been sold already, but now I'll probably have to go for the 13" Air, as the crappy resolution is the only thing that keeps me from buying a 13" Pro.
I still believe it was an outright mistake to not have a 17" MBP... Hopefully one will come along later. If not I'm simply not buying anythingless and will getalong fine with a 17" other quality brand. I am hoping for a MBPthough... I do like the interconnectivity of 
stuff.
stuff.It will eventually just be 11" Air, 13" Air, 13" Pro, 15" Pro. The Macbook Pro will just be the Retina Display models.
I don't think we'll see Retina displays come to the Air line for a couple of years. They're Apple's new entry level consumer notebooks so they want to keep prices down (in fact they dropped prices by $100 for some models with the last update).
Also the non-tapered form factor gives the MBP room for more battery than the Air.
So going forward, the Pro will offer vs. the Air:
- Retina display
- Quad core processor
- Discrete graphics
- Twice as much RAM capacity
- HDMI
- SDXC card slot
- Audio line out
- Dual microphones
This assumes of course, that the forthcoming 13" Retina Pro has all of these same features that the 15" one does (I think it is a pretty safe bet, though I could also see the HDMI port being omitted from the 13").
Formerly the Pro offered vs. the Air:
- Faster processor
- Discrete graphics
- Twice as much RAM capacity
- SDXC card slot
- Optical drive
- Firewire port
- Ethernet port
- Audio line out
- Kennsington lock slot
I may have missed some minor items on those lists.
I expect the legacy Pro models will soon disappear, perhaps with the introduction of the new Retina 13" Pro, or perhaps after the possible introduction of a future 15" Air.
I also think that, eventually, the Airs will get Retina displays as well. I wonder what resolution a 11" retina display would have? Perhaps 2048x1280.
- Retina display
- Quad core processor
- Discrete graphics
- Twice as much RAM capacity
- HDMI
- SDXC card slot
- Audio line out
- Dual microphones
This assumes of course, that the forthcoming 13" Retina Pro has all of these same features that the 15" one does (I think it is a pretty safe bet, though I could also see the HDMI port being omitted from the 13").
Formerly the Pro offered vs. the Air:
- Faster processor
- Discrete graphics
- Twice as much RAM capacity
- SDXC card slot
- Optical drive
- Firewire port
- Ethernet port
- Audio line out
- Kennsington lock slot
I may have missed some minor items on those lists.
I expect the legacy Pro models will soon disappear, perhaps with the introduction of the new Retina 13" Pro, or perhaps after the possible introduction of a future 15" Air.
I also think that, eventually, the Airs will get Retina displays as well. I wonder what resolution a 11" retina display would have? Perhaps 2048x1280.
I still believe it was an outright mistake to not have a 17" MBP... Hopefully one will come along later. If not I'm simply not buying anythingless and will getalong fine with a 17" other quality brand. I am hoping for a MBPthough... I do like the interconnectivity of
And I also believe the WWDC was a serious failure... Only a slightly soupedup MBAir is what this is to me and possibly to alot of other people given the stock continually dumping since the WWDC. If they had a "one more thing"... The world would have lost it's mind with happiness. Such a HUGE opportunity just simply wasted. I am getting a little woried about Apple. iPad kills the iPhone, MBAir kills MBP, this is going to get pretty bad if not already starting, and I soo wish it were not the case. And why BTW is there hardly ever nothing here about Apple Stock? It's a FAR bigger story than most of the pointless conjecture.
I CAN NOT F#$%ING WAIT TO GET A 13" RETINA MACBOOK PROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
I personally really need Firewire, but with the thunderbolt ports and affordable adapters, it's a non-issue. Connect all the Firewire devices to thunderbolt 1 (you can daisy-chain them) and external display to thunderbolt 2. When you're doing something really network intensive where WIFI just doesn't cut it, unplug the firewire stuff and insert the ethernet adapter. If you max out a gigabit Ethernet connection, the i/o is pretty busy anyway.
Optical drives are really legacy at this point. USB drives from LG are fairly cheap and plug and play, also muuuuuuch faster than anything built into a Mac (except maybe the Mac Pro).
My 13" MBP is 3 years old now, getting a bit slow for iPhoto, Lion is unbearably slow on it (I'm back on Snow Leopard), Final Cut 4 was fine, Final Cut X is barely usable, fans are annoyingly loud for any audio work. A 13" Macbook Air might just be what I want but I wanna see how the retina 13" MBP turns out.
I guess my concern regards only the Intel integrated graphics supporting that beautiful Retina Display...
What games ? 3D intensive games ? I bet the older MBP 13" had the same problem with its Intel HD 3000 then, so what was lost ? And if that is the case, the 320M MacBook Pro couldn't run those games either...
That won't stop Apple from putting in a retina display, that's not even starting to be an excuse. The GPU can power a desktop just fine. Apple doesn't care about gaming.
And now I see there is no ethernet port... Just downright STUPID imo... I'm NOT buying a MBP for a long time now assuredly, no 17" AND no ethernet?? Forget it!! But what is worse this will most certainly screw MBP sales... Does Apple really believe WiFi is THAT ubiquitous? What the F are they on??? This makes me so angry as a shareholder with over a $Million in flipping AAPL. No frigging wonder it's been selling off so hard since WWDC... EPIC FAIL. DAMN!!!
Personally I'd rather have a 13" for work hooked up to a Apple monitor.
If they had the same specs, I'd go for the 13"
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WWDC has nothing to do with the stock...get real.
It's called the Euro Crisis that is making the stock market go down right now.
Apple will be rising shortly because of the iPhone 5 coming in the next few months.
iPad kills the iPhone..wtf are you smoking?
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They can support it. Also, the 13" MBPro would have a Nvidia 650Chip.
And if they use the same method as on the MBPR, you could switch the resolution up to 1680 x 1050.
What's interesting is that if you compare the 15" MBP and 15" MBPR prices, and choose the same amount of RAM and the same hard drive, the MBPR is actually a lot cheaper. You just can't buy it with a cheap spinning hard drive like the 15" MBP (which is a shame really). Now personally I would want an affordable MacBook with a 1 TB drive, and that's just impossible with SSD. Not sure what Apple will do.
WWDC is a week long event full of sessions for 5000 MacOS X and iOS developers to learn about the latest technologies. As far as I know it is a complete success. What you are referring to is the rather unimportant side show where Apple has introduced a few new products; others will be introduced at different times. And that unimportant side show wasn't a failure either; I think you are quite alone with your opinion.
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Very little chance if Apple keeps the same goals exhibited in the 15" model. There are a couple of competing factors even though the HDD and ODD are gone.
1. They will shrink the volume of the case. So some of that HDD, ODD space savings disappears into nothingness. It gets thrown overboard. It is traded off for weight savings.
[ Back in the day the PowerBook 12" was a bit thicker than the rest of the Powerbooks. I doubt the current Apple is going to pass up the weight savings though and stick with the 0.9" 13" size. Besides it gives them an excuse to dump ports like Ethernet because they are "too thick". LOL. ]
2. The hiDPI screen and increased backlights require a substantial watt storage increase. So bigger batteries. Again this will eat into the HDD, ODD space savings.
3. Apple is likely to allocate the same amount of memory to the 13 hiDPI model as they do the 15" model. So horizontal surface space for 8GB of memory (and doubled up density chips for 16GB at the top end). If going to solder the memory to the motherboard it should have more than the minimalistic amount the MBA's have. However, this takes up almost twice the amount of space the current so-DIMM slots do.
Not a volume killer per se but it certainly is a motherboard surface area killer. Again, area savings from dropping the HDD and ODD eaten up.
4. The SSD cards in the new MBP 15 hiDPI are larger to allow for higher upper bounds on storage. Since have tossed the HDD, the box gets better traction if taking a smaller hit on storage space losses. They need a SSD with capacities closer to a "normal" 2.5 SSD.
A much smaller hit on space increase but a bit more.
5. A discrete GPU needs VRAM. so not only need space for the GPU by also space for what are likely 4 VRAM chips. On the high end 15 hiDPI model there is RAM on both sides of the motherboard (to get to 8/16) and the VRAM is squeezed onto the bottom approximately beneath the GPU.
6. Finally even if want to claw out space for the GPU and VRAM it would likely need a second fan unit to expel the additional heat. That is a another volume space problem and have already eaten up alot of case volume and motherboard area.
The question at this point though is if the RAM, Battery , and case shrinkage haven't killed this off. If look at the MBA 13" motherboard pictures or MBP 13" motherboard pictures there no huge empty gaps.
Theory behind modifying the MBP 13" to put in a GPU usually involved dumping the ODD to increase the motherboard size (to fit the GPU+VRAM) and using a portion of the remaining ODD space to the new components. There would be a bit more left over to increase the battery to power the new components.
If Apple kept the case the same size 0.9" (or maybe 0.8" ) , was willing to cap RAM at 8GB (like the MBA instead of the MBP hiDPI), and shrink the battery life under 7 hours ( maybe 5-6 ) then it could be possible to squeeze a GPU+VRAM+Fan in. However, do you really want to tag a laptop that tops out at 8GB and back-slides a couple hours in battery life as a "MacBookPro"?
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