Apple Event Live Blog: MacBook Pro and iMac Updated With New M3 Chip Family

[Sir_Macs_A_Lot]

After staying up a lot later than I normally would - what was the point in making this keynote happen later in the day/night? This could have been a 10AM keynote.

How early do you go to sleep? And is it so you can be first in line for the Denny's Grand Slam breakfast?

 

[JamieLannister]

Why are they comparing the M3 with the M1 and not the M2? Are they assuming that no one with an M2 will be keen to upgrade, and most likely people on M1s might take the bullet?

Based on my use case with my M1 Pro, I WILL NOT upgrade to any M3 PRO/MAX MBP lineups. There just isn't a huge incentive for me to do so. M4 Pro/MAX perhaps.

 

[mysticmanix]

Base M3 14 inch only gets 8GB RAM and also a thunderbolt port removed lmao

 

[KPOM]

I too felt that. They were begging!

I sense they want to drop Intel support as soon as possible.

 

[klasma]

Why does the lower end MBP top out at 24gb memory?

So that you buy the higher-end one.

 

[heath_durbin]

My thoughts. But a pre-order on a later date also seems possible.

Yes, it should not take anytime for the switch over, but it always does.

If you ask me it's pretty clear what's happening.

We are finally at the point where smartphone and computer can't be updated every year so they started to create "phases" for upgrading.

iphone 15? Look how cool it is compared to an iphone 11
macbook pro? Look how many things you get upgrading from an intel mac.

The point is, they're are not even trying to convince people that bought in the last couple of years, the events of this year were clearly for people with older devices.

Yes, they just want you to buy every 2-4 years.

 

[KPOM]

Base M3 14 inch only gets 8GB RAM and also a thunderbolt port removed lmao

It’s a replacement for the 13” MacBook Pro which had only 2 USB 4 ports as well.

 

[dan428]

Most of the talking parts had CGI backgrounds.

Edit: oops didn’t realize what it was responding to

 

[fathergll]

Based on my use case with my M1 Pro, I WILL NOT upgrade to any M3 PRO/MAX MBP lineups. There just isn't a huge incentive for me to do so. M4 Pro/MAX perhaps.

See you next Halloween!

 

[Tagbert]

Did you notice that it only has 5 performance cores?

There are M3 Pro versions with 5 perf cores and with 6 perf cores.

 

[aknabi]

Gotta love a VP of Hardware Engineering announcing new hardware doing a random break to shill some random TV show… I have a suspicion when she saw the script she was thinking “WTF?”

 

[KyNY]

14" MacBook "Pro" with 8GB RAM base model! lol

Same as my (almost) 9 year old MBP. Sad, really.

 

[Ghengis LeMond]

We’re only 30 mins in!

$600 to go from 512gb to 2TB SSD. I just paid $100 for a Samsung 990 2TB SSD last week. Tim Cook must paying over 7X NAND price right now. The SSDs better be faster than PCIe5.0 for these prices.

2 TB of that from Crucial will run you about $50. Just picked up WD black 7300MB/sec for $100 as well.

 

[Username-already-in-use]

14" MacBook "Pro" with 8GB RAM base model! lol

Bean counter Timmay is at it again!

And notice how they tried to talk to Intel MacBook holdouts multiple times throughout the presentation.

It’s aimed at the bean-counters in the corporate buyer market who want to bulk-buy MacBook Pro but also who don’t want to pay M3 Pro/Max money. This market previously bought the 13” MBP.

 

[JamieLannister]

Apple's problem isn't their hardware/software isn't any good. It's the fact they cannot sustain the growth they want at the margins they want if they don't trickle feed people bits and crumbs each year or else no one will upgrade because it's just too good right now. This gimping and snipping from base model is just reprehensible.

 

[Kylo83]

The extra brightness could just be a firmware update; why can’t the M1 Max MacBook Pro do it well it can with an app called vivid that’s adds hdr brightness to standard content, so it can be added using firmware update to older machines but Apple wants to use it as a feature

 

[Student of Life]

Wow they really did the 14 MacBook Pro wrong with just 8GB of ram. Thats scary.

 

[Tagbert]

The base 14" only includes 8 Gb of RAM. Since when does any Pro Laptop come with 8 Gb?

The 13” MBP has always started at 8GB. This base model replaces that but with a bigger screen and faster chips and larger SSD.

 

[bobdobalina]

“I just watched another Apple event that should have been an email”

"It's Tim. You up? M3 just dropped."

 

[DarthDon]

$600 to go from 512gb to 2TB SSD. I just paid $100 for a Samsung 990 2TB SSD last week. Tim Cook must paying over 7X NAND price right now. The SSDs better be faster than PCIe5.0 for these prices.

Yes - but look at the specs. I don't think your Samsung SSD (i have and love them as well) will handle read and write speeds like the apple chips. Internal SSD's with that speed cost far more than 100 bucks.

 

[Apple_Robert]

Did you notice that it only has 5 performance cores?

I thought it was 6 but, 5 or 6 doesn't really matter to me. I don't need to spend $4K on a Mac.

 

[TigerNike23]

How early do you go to sleep? And is it so you can be first in line for the Denny's Grand Slam breakfast?

That stuff used to be fire…

 

[canon-cinema-0r]

I've got a feeling they've confused Halloween with April's Fools. There are the usual things to complain about (display support, base memory), but nerfing the Pro chips is just on another level of unashamed.

 

[KPOM]

It's a spec bump months after M2. It's fine.

The base memory is now 18GB (not 16) on the M3 Pro and 36GB (not 32) on the M3 Max.

 

[lanomds1]

I'm still rocking my iMac Pro from 2017 and after watching this I kinda feel ike waiting another year is completely fine. They well tried to convince us Intel users to switch, but where is the 32inch iMac anyway? Also no FaceID for this machine is a joke. The M3 is a great chip though, but I'm happy with my iMac for now.