Maybe "the" reason for you, but not everyone. For instance, my reason for getting the MBP is the 15 inch screen. If I could have a MacBook Air-like machine with a 15 inch screen, I'd seriously consider it.
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Waiting for the 2018 MBP
- Thread starter benface
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Maybe "the" reason for you, but not everyone. For instance, my reason for getting the MBP is the 15 inch screen. If I could have a MacBook Air-like machine with a 15 inch screen, I'd seriously consider it.
I wrote "the reason to get a MacBook Pro".
I do agree however that a 14" or 15" MacBook would be a great product for some users.
They waited until WWDC even for the spec updates this year, I agree tho that hardware is rare at WWDC and was super rare for Apple to have updated all those products at WWDC (iPad Pro, Mac’s and so on). If they don’t hold a April or March event in 2018 then I’m guessing WWDC or an October event.
Could it be that Apple hold an April or March event in 2018 and update a few things like the Mac’s and maybe release the delayed HomePod? Apple have simply said early 2018 for it but it depends how early they mean.
The situation this year was a little different though. First, they updated the MBPs in October 2016, which would have made a very narrow time frame for the next update if they put it out in march.
Second, the improvements of the 7th gen chips over the 6th gen chips were tiny, so it didn't really matter if the competition used the newer CPUs while Apple kept selling notebooks with the older CPUs – this time, it's different, with more than 40% performance increase in many workloads.
Third, a March event is relatively likely. Apple had a march press conference in 2011, 2012, 2015 and 2016, just to mention a few.
Fourth, there are more products Apple most likely wants to announce around this timeframe, like their new wireless charging mat, the HomePod (again), possibly a lower end iPhone SE successor and maybe also a new Mac Mini and Mac Pro.
Sure, they could just dump it all into WWDC, but for the MacBook Pro line-up, I feel that the competition is hard to ignore, with notebooks which are - in some cases - almost twice as fast as Apple's own offerings.
I think March too, as it makes a lot of sense. Will see what happens at CES etc.
Does anyone know [guestimate] here what dGPU would go into the new MBP 15", as I dont recall seeing many rumours on this. Hopefully it is a decent improvement on the current offering [something to compete with the 1060 in the Surface Book 2 would be nice].
I doubt they'll be able to match a GTX 1060. Even the lower TDP Max-Q variant of that GPU needs around 70W, or double the amount of the Radeon Pro 560 in the 15" MacBook Pro. Microsoft makes this extra headroom by using 15W CPUs (as opposed to the 45W CPUs in the 15" MBP), but I'd guess Apple rather puts in six core 45W H-series CPUs and a lower power GPU since that makes more sense in a lot of applications (and since eGPUs are available now). Even the GTX 1050 needs 70W of power (there's no Max-Q variant of that card).
The only card NVidia offers which fits the thermal design limits is the MX150, which is slower than the Radeon Pro Apple currently uses. So my best guess is they'll use a new, custom designed chip, probably based on AMDs Vega architecture. Having said that, Vega is not much more efficient than Polaris, so I would not expect performance comparable to a GTX 1060.
That was the answer I was expecting tbh. I agree a 6 core and egpu would be a great solution but not exactly portable.
In a lot of ways though I tend to think MS made the right decision on the lower wattage CPU and better GPU for a more balanced powerful system - it would be my preference for a MBP, but very unlikely.
I really was hoping it could be by early March. But what also concerns me if it was, this would be starting from zero all again. The 2017 updates are pretty well oiled by now. Would be purchasing this for my brother of course, but with obvious improvements such as DDR4 coming and faster quad core, might as well take the risk with more bang for my buck; and promised keyboard improvements.
I'm hoping we will see new iMac's next year they are due a design change. If there is a March event it will probably be HomePod, wireless charging mat and maybe MacBook Pro's, the MacBook may also be updated
OR they could choose to hold an October event where they update all the Mac's (iMac, MacBook Pro's and the MacBook) The Mac Pro might get an announcement but it's more likely that it will be 2019 for release.
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A 2018 would just build on the refinements the 2017 model introduced over the 2016 redesign. So there is even less chance of issues with that update so its a safer buy in many ways.
Anyone expecting a complete redesign will be very disappointed.
I don’t think there will be a redesign of the MacBook Pro (that happened in 2016) but I do think we are due one for the iMac.
Maybe iMac will be redesigned. But I doubt it. They would make the redesign on iMac Pro if they intended to do so. I highly doubt Apple would sell a 5000$ iMac Pro with old design, and a new redesigned iMac.
True, i wonder when we will see a redesign for the iMac, the 2018 MacBook Pro’s will be interesting the rumours on a 6 core sound good
Very much agree as the iMac Pro is Apple's flagship product until the next Mac Pro is released.
Q-6
The iMac Pro isn’t a flagship product it’s catering to the 1% of people who need that much power.
Then we're dealing with the iPhone
Let's put it this way iMac Pro is the one Mac Apple can make some noise on, that's actually designed to be a "Pro" tool, not just a moniker slapped on to make consumers feel better about their purchase...Apple needs professional's to endorse and evangelise it's products, hence the importance of the iMac Pro to Apple, as you said it's just 1% of the audience, equally there's a bigger game at hand.
Q-6
They could, but I think you underestimate the importance of the 8th generation Intel Core CPUs. This is nothing like the updates the past five or so years, not even close. These chips are in a new dimension performance-wise, making the MacBook Pros suitable to a whole new world of users. And Apple's engineers know this just as well as all the enthusiasts out there.
I don't think they want to stay behind, giving the competition a full 13 month lead on this. I mean they are already behind, with the competition releasing notebooks with the new chips for months. Obviously Apple is waiting for the higher powered chips (alongside maybe 15W chips with GT3e iGPUs), but these will probably be available in two months, making spring the perfect timing for an upgrade. And why should this be unlikely? Apple introduced new MacBook Pros in WWDC 2012, followed by an update in February 2013. That's not too long ago for a spring release.
You may very well be right, in a way i hope you are because i'm due an upgrade from my 2011 MacBook Pro, if there is no redesign of the iMac i might go all in on a new 2018 MacBook Pro, i want to edit in Final Cut Pro X but my 2011 MacBook Pro won't have it, at least not when trying to add effects and so on. If the 2018 has the rumoured 6 cores in the 15" then it could be very useful to me for editing reasons.
If they do hold a March event, i wonder if they will also update all the other Mac's like the iMac, 12" MacBook and even drop the price on the MacBook Pro's?
I wouldn't put too much hope into getting a redesigned iMac before the end of 2018. With the exception of colour, the iMac Pro is the same design - so Apple won't want their flagship iMac looking out of date so soon. I'd say October 2018 at the very earliest for any chance of a redesign there, but my money is on 2019 with spec bumps only next year.
I think the MacBook may see some changes, one possibility would be an introduction of a slightly larger model in the 14" range. Combined with a price drop across the MacBook line-up, it would allow Apple to remove the MacBook Air from the line-up. There's not been much noise about this product this year though so this is only my speculation.
MacBook Pro: I think we'll see spec bumps only, and by all accounts above, some of these will be pretty significant performance boosts. There was some talk of Apple introducing a new entry level non-Touch 15" in the current body design which I think is still a possibility as it allows them to ditch the 2015 model they've been holding onto. I'd like to think we'd see a small price drop too, $1-200 off the current prices would go along way to making these more considerably affordable in Europe right now but I'm not holding by breath - especially if they do introduce new a non-touch 15" as that will most likely have a price in the $1500-2000 range, giving the line-up a more affordable entry price - probably at the expense of poorer graphics too.
Seems like quite some people here estimate a MacBook Pro tech bump in March / April.
Very curious to see announcements on 8th gen CPU's from Intel at CES, which could strengthen the likability of a spring release.
Next to a CPU / GPU bump I would love to see an extra USB C port and improvement on the keyboard problems. It's getting time for me to upgrade my good old Mid-2012 model however I was quite surprised about the raised prices for the entry level models since 2012 (Europe)
Very curious to see announcements on 8th gen CPU's from Intel at CES, which could strengthen the likability of a spring release.
Next to a CPU / GPU bump I would love to see an extra USB C port and improvement on the keyboard problems. It's getting time for me to upgrade my good old Mid-2012 model however I was quite surprised about the raised prices for the entry level models since 2012 (Europe)
I'm a bit interested in a MBP as well. Luckily I'm not in a hurry. I refuse to buy Anything with the current keyboard. Too many stuck keys on my 2015 MBP and 2016 MB.
I haven't gotten any stuck keys on my 2016 MBP, but I do get a lot of missed keystrokes still. Definitely room for improvement.
Also looking forward to a possible MBP with Face-ID.
Also looking forward to a possible MBP with Face-ID.
On your 2015? I haven’t heard of this being the case before. Do you mean 2015 MacBook and 2016 MacBook Pro? Other than that I’m in agreement, for the amount of money they want a ticking time bomb of a keyboard isn’t good enough, especially when it’s an entire topcase job to replace it
Is there any chance they'll make the TB optional on the high end machines? I'd consider returning my computer and waiting for that.
I still maintain something like that can't be an optional feature, and they'll have to go all in or remove it completely. Programming and maintaining the functionality in 3rd party apps for a small subset of macs, and then creating a version without that functionality for the rest will mean software developers never going the extra mile to come up with the features that will make it what apple want it to be.