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— Show Notes: —
Hoopla
Stuck between a rock and a hard place
It’s been 4 years since the last substantial update to the MacBook Pro. The exact reasons why Apple decided to neglect their pro equipment, and why they still have not updated the Mac Pro or the iMac are known only to Apple, but it seems reasonable to assume that if Mac’s were still their main profit generator that this would not have happened. The iPhone is updated like clockwork at the same time every year.
Apple calls it “the most powerful MacBook Pro ever,” and the 13-inch model features a 2.9 GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 processor with Turbo Boost speeds.
- up to 3.3 GHz, 8GB of memory and 256GB of flash storage.
- The 15-inch version has a 2.6 GHz quad-core Intel Core i7 processor with Turbo Boost speeds up to 3.5 GHz
- 16GB of memory and 256GB of flash storage.
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Both computers reach “up to 2.3 times the graphics performance” of the previous generation.
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Each edition includes SSDs with sequential read speeds over 3GBps, and the ability to drive a 5K display through a single Thunderbolt 3 ports
The level of pushback from the MacBook Pro event is staggering. I sure hope someone at Apple who can make a difference is paying attention.
— Steven Frank (@stevenf) October 31, 2016
Wow 16GB cap? https://t.co/LIo3IhkIqw that’s really tough on the #MacBookPro @ChrisLAS
— Michael Dominick (@dominucco) October 29, 2016
• Why is it limited to 16GB of RAM? Supporting more RAM would just require a bigger battery, so instead of making it thinner, they could have included 32GB of RAM and kept it the same width as the previous model
Although this is technically true, there is a seemingly little-known legal obstacle to this. The Federal Aviation Administration has capped the maximum allowable size of laptop batteries on flights to 100 watt-hours. That explains why Apple’s pro model contains _precisely_a 99.5 watt-hour battery. Making a thicker laptop would not allow them to increase the size of the battery due to these regulations.
- Apple’s new Intel driven MacBook Pros have a secondary ARM processor that runs Touch ID and security
Apple’s new 13″ and 15″ MacBook Pro models come equipped with a Touch Bar — that bar and the accompanying Touch ID sensor are powered by both the Intel processor at the core of the laptop and an Apple designed T1 chip. That T1 is the same chip that is inside the S2 in the new Series 2 Apple Watch.
The T1 consists of the processor in the Apple Watch’s S2 and the Secure Enclave.