Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Crappy timing =/. I'd buy a used 2015 mbp and plan to sell it when the new 6 core macbook pros come out. Probably won't take too much of a loss.

This is what I would do. You could take a chance on ebay (which does have great buyer protection if things go awry) or craigslist and maybe find a bargain. Use that machine until June or whenever the new ones come out, and then flip it without taking much of a financial hit.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RandomDSdevel
Are there any solid rumors/guesses when (and if) we might see a 120Hz ProMotion display in the MBPs? Most people seem to expect this year's new MBPs in the March - June timeframe which is about a year since the iPad Pros got their 120Hz displays, and the largest iPad Pro is "almost" 13" in terms of display size already, so is there any chance we might get this feature in the only "slightly" larger 13" and 15" MacBook Pro displays this year aswell?

Realistically I doubt it since I haven't heard anything about it yet, but are there any technical limitations to why Apple wouldn't/couldn't put this technology in the MacBook Pro line when ~12 months earlier they already had it perfectly working in iPad Screens just barely smaller? (And that's without accounting for the fact that many other high-end notebook manufacturers also move to 120Hz panels.) It seems like a minor upgrade in technical terms but a huge upgrade for usability.
 
I'm still running a 2009 MacBook Pro, with a battery lasting about 15 minutes, a screen that's pretty much broken (purple lines at white, green lines at black parts), a trackpad that's impossible to press on the right side, a broken SuperDrive and no official support for any OS after El Capitan. I'm thinking the 2018 model will be an upgrade worth getting. I'm not going to wait another possibly 2.5 years to get a fully working notebook which is capable of running current software, however nice these future upgrades might be.

But obviously, if you're on a newer machine than me and don't need the additional CPU power of Intel's 8th gen CPUs, then by all means, waiting might not be a bad choice.

If you can go nearly 10 years with the same notebook, I can probably take my MBP to 2025. Not to mention, these better built.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RandomDSdevel
Are there any solid rumors/guesses when (and if) we might see a 120Hz ProMotion display in the MBPs? Most people seem to expect this year's new MBPs in the March - June timeframe which is about a year since the iPad Pros got their 120Hz displays, and the largest iPad Pro is "almost" 13" in terms of display size already, so is there any chance we might get this feature in the only "slightly" larger 13" and 15" MacBook Pro displays this year aswell?

Realistically I doubt it since I haven't heard anything about it yet, but are there any technical limitations to why Apple wouldn't/couldn't put this technology in the MacBook Pro line when ~12 months earlier they already had it perfectly working in iPad Screens just barely smaller? (And that's without accounting for the fact that many other high-end notebook manufacturers also move to 120Hz panels.) It seems like a minor upgrade in technical terms but a huge upgrade for usability.

It's not easy on the mac side. The bigger iPad Pro've got only one resolution, 2732-by-2048, so ~5,5 million pixels at all. A 15 inch MacBook Pro has a 2880-by-1800 screen but you can scale it up to 3840-by-2400, which is 9,2 million pixels, and we haven't talked yet about an external 5K display (or two) with a resolution (unscaled) 5120-by-2880 which is another 14,7 million pixels.

Based on these, a ProMotion MacBook Pro must be able to drive more than 20 million pixels (5x iPad Pros) at 120 frames/second, all system animations, scrolls and tasks. It's insane, and even not a priority because we don't use Apple pencils on a Mac's screen.

So I think we will see ProMotion Macs after 2020, maybe a new iMac could be the first somewhere in 2020-21.
 
Last edited:
It's not easy on the mac side. The bigger iPad Pro've got only one resolution, 2732-by-2048, so ~5,5 million pixels at all. A 15 inch MacBook Pro has a 2880-by-1800 screen but you can scale it up to 3840-by-2400, which is 9,2 million pixels, and we haven't talked yet about an external 5K display (or two) with a resolution (unscaled) 5120-by-2880 which is another 14,7 million pixels.

Based on these, a pureMotion MacBook Pro must be able to drive more than 20 million pixels (5x iPad Pros) at 120 frames/second, all system animations, scrolls and tasks. It's insane, and even not a priority because we don't use Apple pencils on a Mac's screen.

So I think we will see PureMotion Macs after 2020, maybe a new iMac could be the first somewhere in 2020-21.
PureMotion?
 
Dear Mac Enthusiasts-

If you don't become IOS enthusiasts, your future will be nothing but disappointment. People need to realize that the future is iOS and tablets. If it seems like apple doesn't care about the MacBook, its because they don't! Get an iPad pro already. Every common task is nicer from browsing to creating documents to consuming media. We will need to keep our macs around for another 10 years before this change is complete, but the nice thing is that macs will last that long. I'm a hardware developer so it is going to be a while with my CAD and vendor supplied IDEs, but remember that barely 5 years ago everything was windows-only and now almost universally they support windows, osx, and linux. With processor speeds not even achieving 5% improvement year over year, a 2027 MacBook will not even be twice as fast as a 2017. Get an iPad pro, you will like it.

Was thinking hard about switching, but so many shortcuts and stuff, app, Photoshop, etc. missing, iPad Pro seems to be nowhere to claim to be a laptop replacement.

I am more than willing to listen to your counter-arguments though and get convinced!
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: domsodidavid
It's not easy on the mac side. The bigger iPad Pro've got only one resolution, 2732-by-2048, so ~5,5 million pixels at all. A 15 inch MacBook Pro has a 2880-by-1800 screen but you can scale it up to 3840-by-2400, which is 9,2 million pixels, and we haven't talked yet about an external 5K display (or two) with a resolution (unscaled) 5120-by-2880 which is another 14,7 million pixels.

Based on these, a pureMotion MacBook Pro must be able to drive more than 20 million pixels (5x iPad Pros) at 120 frames/second, all system animations, scrolls and tasks. It's insane, and even not a priority because we don't use Apple pencils on a Mac's screen.

So I think we will see PureMotion Macs after 2020, maybe a new iMac could be the first somewhere in 2020-21.

It doesn't necessary have to drive any screen at 120hz other than itself. And external monitors have to support this refresh rate also.

I think that the limitation right now is the power consumption. If they'll go with hexa-core cpus and vega GPUs, then there is a little room left for anything else, considering they want to stay within 10 hour battery life range.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RandomDSdevel
Are there any solid rumors/guesses when (and if) we might see a 120Hz ProMotion display in the MBPs? Most people seem to expect this year's new MBPs in the March - June timeframe which is about a year since the iPad Pros got their 120Hz displays, and the largest iPad Pro is "almost" 13" in terms of display size already, so is there any chance we might get this feature in the only "slightly" larger 13" and 15" MacBook Pro displays this year aswell?

Realistically I doubt it since I haven't heard anything about it yet, but are there any technical limitations to why Apple wouldn't/couldn't put this technology in the MacBook Pro line when ~12 months earlier they already had it perfectly working in iPad Screens just barely smaller? (And that's without accounting for the fact that many other high-end notebook manufacturers also move to 120Hz panels.) It seems like a minor upgrade in technical terms but a huge upgrade for usability.

Agreed 2018 MBP Features.
1. 120Hz Promotion Display (unlikely long shot)
2. New TouchBar maybe thicker 2 Rows powered by Low Power Apple CHip.
3. Face ID (long shot)
4. CoffeeLake 6 Core i7 option (it’s a must buy year)
5. DDR4 RAM Coffee Lake Chipset does not support DDR3
6. New Black Chasis color option (probably with highest end 6 Core i7)
7. Return of the Glowing Apple Logo with RGB color change option.
8. New Lithium Polymer battery made by LG bigger battery
9. Improved Apple butterfly keyboard not as loud clicks.
10. Enhances Long Range 4 Antenna for 802.11ac Wave 2, the newest and standardized version.

This new gadget should keep me happy until 2019 and the OLED 120hz IPad Pro.
 
Agreed 2018 MBP Features.
1. 120Hz Promotion Display (unlikely long shot)
2. New TouchBar maybe thicker 2 Rows powered by Low Power Apple CHip.
3. Face ID (long shot)
4. CoffeeLake 6 Core i7 option (it’s a must buy year)
5. DDR4 RAM Coffee Lake Chipset does not support DDR3
6. New Black Chasis color option (probably with highest end 6 Core i7)
7. Return of the Glowing Apple Logo with RGB color change option.
8. New Lithium Polymer battery made by LG bigger battery
9. Improved Apple butterfly keyboard not as loud clicks.
10. Enhances Long Range 4 Antenna for 802.11ac Wave 2, the newest and standardized version.

This new gadget should keep me happy until 2019 and the OLED 120hz IPad Pro.

I'm afraid none of your hopes might come true, except the six-core CPU.

Also, Apple will most likely continue to use LPDDR3 as opposed to DDR4 RAM, as LPDDR4 is still not supported by Intel's chips.
 
Was thinking hard about switching, but so many shortcuts and stuff, app, Photoshop, etc. missing, iPad Pro seems to be nowhere to claim to be a laptop replacement.

I am more than willing to listen to your counter-arguments though and get convinced!

You can see my history here is nonstop disappointment and crying about lack of progress (regress!) on the mac. I am a power user among power users. I am a freelance engineer, I tell my clients that I make electricity do anything. That means I make anything happen. Android app, iOS app, hardware layout design, pic assembly project, kinetis C project, web backends for IOT, etc- I don't care I'll take the work if its an interesting project. I need to use any buggy proprietary IDE and my clients don't want any excuse about me not having the right computer hardware. I use a MacBook pro and lean heavily on parallels for some of these vendor IDEs. Ultimately though I prefer to work in bash with command line gdb.

So why would someone like me use the iPad pro? It is because out of all this work I do, very little of it is spent actually coding. Most of my time is spent looking at PDFs, generating documents, or communicating over slack or email. Probably 80% of my time is spent not coding. That means at least 80% of my work can be on the iPad. But its more because I can ssh into my MacBook or my headless linux box. My headless linux is invisible except for a usb hub which I can plug in debuggers and other helluh expensive legacy usb tools, and operate them from the iPad. This is also where I can do any number crunching and no fans have to spin up and my legs don't have to get brunt! I still need my MacBook because there is no other way to run eclipse or Xcode. As for these usb tools, I am already starting to see new tools come out that support an app connected wifi model. This is the future, all your devices will have wifi and be app connected. The iPad will never be able to edit videos but it will be able to interface to a purpose built computer that actually does the editing and its fans can spin up and it can get as hot as it wants sitting in some closet. This is the future folks, accept it and help build it! There is money to make creating these new things!

As soon as eclipse and Xcode support iPad things are going to end VERY quickly for osx/windows. There will be a day in the next 10 years when osx itself becomes EOL.
 
Just went to test all Mac laptops at the shop, surprisingly the Macbook Air is still the nicest to use.

Boy are these Macbook Pro 2017 keyboard keys loud.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RandomDSdevel
Is it worth waiting 2018 Macbook Pro or i just buy the newest 15" with radeon Pro 560? This year trend is with egpu anyway. Is the new coffee lake cpu(if it is updated) will make a huge impact?
 
Is it worth waiting 2018 Macbook Pro or i just buy the newest 15" with radeon Pro 560? This year trend is with egpu anyway. Is the new coffee lake cpu(if it is updated) will make a huge impact?

It depends if you need it now? if you do then buy now if not then do what a lot of us are doing and wait to see what Apple announce this year.
 
It depends if you need it now? if you do then buy now if not then do what a lot of us are doing and wait to see what Apple announce this year.

I think 6cores cpu on macbook pro could be release this year. So probably it is worth the wait. I don't need it now. I still hang with surface book 1st gen, which is still fine..
 
I think 6cores cpu on macbook pro could be release this year. So probably it is worth the wait. I don't need it now. I still hang with surface book 1st gen, which is still fine..

6 cores on a MacBook Pro would be great, even quad cores on the 13" would be great. We will have to see what happens, if rumours are true about there being a 13" MacBook added to the line up i wonder what those specs will be as i might be temped with that if they are better than current 12" MacBook.

I've never used a Surface Book or even a Surface i'm not a Window's fan at all.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RandomDSdevel
Also, Apple will most likely continue to use LPDDR3 as opposed to DDR4 RAM, as LPDDR4 is still not supported by Intel's chips.

Coffee Lake architecture does not support DDR3 anymore, only DDR4 now. Google around. The difference in voltage between LP ram and non-LP is 0.15v which is not that significant and can be neglected by adjusting the battery size. Apple yet to introduce the layered battery design for Macbook Pro models like they did for 12" Macbook two years ago. Which will allow them to increase the battery size.
 
Coffee Lake architecture does not support DDR3 anymore, only DDR4 now. Google around. The difference in voltage between LP ram and non-LP is 0.15v which is not that significant and can be neglected by adjusting the battery size. Apple yet to introduce the layered battery design for Macbook Pro models like they did for 12" Macbook two years ago. Which will allow them to increase the battery size.

I'm not "googling around", I'm reading the official specs on Intel's website, and obviously they do support LPDDR3.

LPDDR3 uses about 90% less standby energy and 30% less energy when reading or writing data compared to DDR4, so it is indeed a significant difference.

https://ark.intel.com/products/124967/Intel-Core-i5-8250U-Processor-6M-Cache-up-to-3_40-GHz
 
6 cores on a MacBook Pro would be great, even quad cores on the 13" would be great. We will have to see what happens, if rumours are true about there being a 13" MacBook added to the line up i wonder what those specs will be as i might be temped with that if they are better than current 12" MacBook.

I've never used a Surface Book or even a Surface i'm not a Window's fan at all.

Quad core on a 13" is what I'm hoping for! I do fear that the thermals will be too much alongside a strong igpu though at the current node size. Might end up doing way too much throttling until we get to 10nm.
 
Join the queue here. My 2014 MBP is still in excellent condition, however since last year I have picked up several data infrastructure projects, 8GB is limiting if not frustrating, I am forced to use desktop (32GB), with last project I found my development VM cluster floating around 24GB..

So 16GB is not going to cut it, I can only wait until WWDC 2018 otherwise I will have to purchase a DELL XPS. I need the mobility to work between client sites.
 
Last edited:
6 cores on a MacBook Pro would be great, even quad cores on the 13" would be great. We will have to see what happens, if rumours are true about there being a 13" MacBook added to the line up i wonder what those specs will be as i might be temped with that if they are better than current 12" MacBook.

I've never used a Surface Book or even a Surface i'm not a Window's fan at all.

I may change my tune A Quad Core i3 8th Gen Cofffe Lake And keep the budget happy. Might be the move in 2018. #gladiwaited
 
But that's a Kaby Lake Refresh, not a Coffee Lake.

Yes, and that's the kind of chip Apple will use on the next refresh. The only Coffee Lake parts released so far are desktop chips, and these never supported LPDDR RAM, so why should they now? If the first Coffee Lake mobile CPUs will still not support LPDDR4, they sure as hell will support LPDDR3.
 
Yes, and that's the kind of chip Apple will use on the next refresh. The only Coffee Lake parts released so far are desktop chips, and these never supported LPDDR RAM, so why should they now? If the first Coffee Lake mobile CPUs will still not support LPDDR4, they sure as hell will support LPDDR3.

Come on. This is pure nonensess. Intel has not released all of their chips yet.

Why would say stuff like this?
 
  • Like
Reactions: RandomDSdevel
Come on. This is pure nonensess. Intel has not released all of their chips yet.

Why would say stuff like this?

I don't get what you mean. These 15W Kaby Lake R chips are absolutely the kind of chips Apple will use for the next MacBook Pro update. Maybe Intel will release a version of those chips with a GT3e iGPU, but the CPU parts for the nTB 13" MBP are going to be pretty similar to these.

Sure, Intel didn't release their 28W and 45W chips yet, but why should we expect them to ditch support for LPDDR3 RAM support with these chips and only support DDR4? Intel historically supported similar RAM types within a product category in a given generation. That's what the discussion with Basic75 was about, if you read the thread.
 
Hi guys! I'm thinking of getting a new 13" MPB.. i don't really need the greatest and latest but clearly if the 2018 model is comming out in a month or two I'd rather wait, given how expensive these things have become.


Since you are all so much better informed than I am are you expecting the new model out in Q1? Will it be a revolutionary new concept?



Thank you in advance!
 
  • Like
Reactions: RandomDSdevel
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.