Apple’s March Event: proof they’ve still got it.

| 9th March 2015 | Articles | No Comments

Having spent half an hour in an Apple Store today trying to recover my bricked late-2011 Macbook Pro (the one where you could actually upgrade components yourself ’cause they weren’t soldered in place), I was reminded by one of the ever so helpful ‘Apple Genius’ guys that I should be watching out for some interesting announcements this evening from the guys over in Cupertino.

I knew to expect the Apple Watch was finally going to have some light shed on it, but I definitely did not expect this from Tim Cook and his band of extremely clever design gurus:

The new Macbook... wait, what?!

Forgive me, but I’m going to have to focus on this for the article. (Sorry smartwatch fans, but I think we can all agree this is far more interesting and cool.)

Having owned one of the last ‘MacBook’ branded laptops a fair while back, without an ‘Air’ or ‘Pro’ in front of it, I was intrigued to see exactly where this new MacBook slotted in within Apple’s portable computer range. What are Apple trying to push here (according to the stats and quotes on the product page)?

    13.1mm THIN
    2lb. LIGHT
    12-inch RETINA DISPLAY
    2304×1440 RESOLUTION
    16:10 ASPECT RATIO
    UP TO 9hrs BATTERY LIFE* (*But not really, hence the asterisk.)
    “A full-size keyboard. In a fraction of the space.”
    “Retina re-envisioned.”
    “The trackpad, pushed even further with Force Touch.”
    “Fully equipped for a wireless world.”
    “Quietly astonishing.”
    “All-day battery life. All-new design.

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Let’s try and break down what this means in terms of what you’re getting for your… $1299.

So, to start with, we have a laptop that is both thinner and lighter than the MacBook Air (stealing the tagline of “the world’s thinnest notebook”, from their own product, nice job Tim), with near enough the same “all-day” battery life; which really makes you question why this is here is a new range, and not just a replacement MacBook Air? Let’s continue…

We’ve got a 16:10, 2304×1440, 12 inch “re-invisioned” retina display. With a 178° viewing angle, and a respectable 226 DPI, this is easily powerable with Intel mobile graphics – more on that later – and definitely going to bring the ‘consumer’ end of Apple’s notebooks in line with the ‘professional’ end, and even their own tablets which have been miles ahead of the Air for quite some time now.

Then things get slightly more interesting, and I start having to ask questions: full-size keyboard on a 12 inch laptop… how? What are you implying by “quietly astonishing”? How is this any more equipped for a “wireless world” than any other of your portable products!? WHAT THE HECK IS “FORCE TOUCH”!? (Is it bad that I wanted that to be some kind of Star Wars-like technology?)

Let’s answer all that with some screenshots.

If that isn’t innovation, Apple critics out there, I don’t know what they can do to try please you anymore.

It’s clear this is a drastically different laptop to either the Air or Pro, and honestly, I can see why it’s a whole new product range. You just need to compare the tech specs of all three different MacBook lines to see the distinctions:

The Pro is designed for power, with ample connectivity, Iris Pro/GeForce graphics and i5/i7 processors. The Air is designed for your everyday laptop user, with average connectivity and reasonably powerful i5/i7 processors with integrated graphics.

The MacBook however, seems to fit most closely in PC terms, with Chromebooks – and even then it has a heck of a lot more going for it innovation wise. It’s designed for you to be able to work with apps offline like you would on most laptops, but ultimately it wants to be a machine used extensively with the web. Its ultra low power Core M processor isn’t really much of a performer, even by Air’s fairly mediocre standards. It’s something very different to anything out there right now… so it’s hard for me to say how it’ll do once released… but one thing I want to leave you to dwell on is this: is it really worth the same amount of money as the base level MacBook Pro, or more money than any of the standard MacBook Air configs? Time will tell.

For all the info from today’s keynote, including the new MacBook and Apple Watch details, check out http://www.apple.com/live/2015-mar-event/ for more in depth marketing spiel.

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