Apple's new MacBook Pro is a paradigm shift for creatives
With the power of Apple's M1 Pro and Max chips – alongside an ultra-luxe redesign – the latest MacBook Pro delivers on its immense promise Robert Leedham It's not often that Apple does a mea culpa. Remember, this is the company whose response to the iPhone 4's signal issues was to tell people 'don't hold it that way'? So it's easy enough to look at the all-new MacBook Pro, see all the stuff that's been rolled back from its 2016 redesign and for that to be the story here. The scale and abruptness of this U-turn happens so rarely that if you do care about having an SD card slot or an honest to god escape key in your Cupertino-made laptop then that probably is cause for celebration.
If you are going to break out the party poppers and turn Kool & The Gang up to 11 for the return of an HDMI port then just wait until you see the rest of this creation. Having used the 14-inch MacBook Pro for the past fortnight it really is ludicrously impressive. The latest incarnation of arguably Apple's most creative machine is a crowd-pleaser, for sure, but it also redefines what you can expect from this kind of computer.
A dream screen
At first glance, the MacBook Pro doesn't look particularly revolutionary. It looks like a MacBook Pro. A little more angular, a little bit bulkier but anyone who has seen one of these laptops before will be familiar with the general aesthetic. The form is important here. The function though? That's what this computer is really about.
As much as Apple loves to tout the A-list talent who all use a MacBook to make their art, the day-to-day reality of that process isn't quite so glamorous. That's why people really cared when Apple fixed the MacBook Pro's much-maligned butterfly keyboard a few years ago and it's why a lot of the headlines surrounding this device have focused on the decision to bring back function keys at the expense of the adaptive Touch Bar of old. Was that touch-sensitive OLED strip deserving of all the opprobrium it kicked up? Probably not, but it also turned out to be less useful on a day-to-day basis than the timeworn alternative.
As important as these revitalised foundations are to the new Pro, they're not exactly exciting. The real 'wow factor' here comes via a screen and speaker combination that's as good as any we've used in a laptop this or any other year. That's down to the introduction of Apple's Liquid Retina XDR display tech, which uses a cutting edge mini-LED panel to deliver more dazzling colours, startling contrast and pin-sharp clarity. Available in either a 14-inch or 16-inch variant, it's an absolute stunner to behold. Even by the imperious standards seen in past Apple kit.
If you're the type to use your laptop for absolutely everything – including kicking back with a late-night episode of Squid Game – then this new Pro is here to enable that behaviour. More realistically, it's also a viable option for stuff like colour grading when you're away from a proper monitor. For those who prize that kind of accuracy, there's simply no better alternative. As with the iPhone, there's a notch tucked away at the top of its screen that houses a very respectable 1080p webcam but no Face ID. Instead, you've got a speedy and slightly more convenient Touch ID fingerprint scanner incorporated into the keyboard itself. Just lay your digit down and you're all logged in, it's supremely slick.
Just as no one is buying this MacBook for its ability to make them look good on a Zoom call – even if you absolutely will cut a sharper visage than your colleagues – the same applies to its speaker setup. Seeing as this laptop is in the business of going all-in on everything, its audio skills are absurdly impressive. Whether you're vibing to the new Sufjan Stevens record or glued to The Harder They Fall, there's a depth and fidelity to the sound that goes above and beyond what you'd expect. To the extent that there were a few occasions when we ended up using these speakers instead of our proper one-box setup at home out of sheer laziness.
M1 Max is a kingmaker
As much as all these sublime accoutrements do a lot to elevate the MacBook Pro well above 'workhorse' status, they are also window dressing around the truly major upgrade here: the arrival of Apple's M1 Pro and M1 Max chips. Not yet familiar with the M1 story and its truly seismic significance? Last year Apple decided to ditch the Intel-made chips that used to power its laptops in favour of its own creation. It was a big gamble that pitted potentially dramatic gains in power and battery life against what could have been a rocky transition for app developers and MacBook users alike. As it turned out, the initial M1-powered MacBook Air, MacBook Pro and iMac all benefited from the upside of this switch up while suffering from very few drawbacks.
Now Apple has forged two new and significantly more powerful versions of the M1 for its most demanding computers. At the risk of oversimplifying things, the M1 Pro is basically for YouTube upstarts and GarageBand obsessives grinding to become the next big thing while the M1 Max is here for the full-timers who've already made it to mass consumption. Both the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros are available with either chipset and your choice will also dictate the amount of memory and storage you have to play with.
Chances are if you're serious enough about your art to be tempted by a new MacBook Pro then you'll know which variant makes the most sense for you, but we tend to think that an M1 Pro model is going to suit most users just fine. Especially since prices start at £1,899.00 for the entry-level 14-inch Pro and scale right up to £3,299.00 for the top tier 16-inch option. Whatever laptop you end up opting for, the sheer power at play here is transformational for video editors, studio bods, designers and programmers.
Clearly, we find ourselves in the far more noble profession than any of those industries, but the early reports from MacBook Pro power users are extremely positive. Especially since these devices offer the same performance whether they're plugged in or being used on the go. A year on from the introduction of M1, many developers big and small have also had the time to create native versions of their apps for the new chip architecture instead of settling for them running via the less efficient form of emulation. As for the tests that we've run ourselves? The performance across intensive apps such as Logic Pro, Premiere Pro and Final Cut Pro is seriously slick.
Mac to the future
Such is the transformative nature of the new MacBook Pro and its accompanying chipsets, it's easy to get lost in the specifics of its performance, the pristine nature of its display or simply the fact that MagSafe has made a glorious return to help recharge these things. What's most impressive is how all of this stuff hangs together in a product that's as desirable as it is functional. Or to put things another way, this is the Rolex Explorer II of laptops. Even if you don't climb Everest with it in tow, the fact is that you absolutely could.
On a broader level, it's going to be fun to see how this laptop shapes the computing landscape over the next few years. You get the feeling that a lot of former Mac loyalists who'd turned 'Windows curious' will come back into the fold after seeing Apple run the board with even their most trenchant demands. As for those who are actually tasked with making a machine that can take on the Pro? They're stuck with Intel's significantly less impressive chips for power and few new tricks beyond the introduction of 5G connectivity and the odd OLED display. None of which is insurmountable in the long run, but it does feel like a significant advantage has been erased. Especially since it was so obvious that Apple was headed in this direction.
The 2016 MacBook Pro was by no means a disaster but it was a little harder to love than what came before. In the years that followed those nagging flaws have been steadily eradicated. To the extent that 2019's Intel-powered MacBook Pro was easily one of the very best laptops available. With the power of both an upgraded M1 and this lovingly industrial redesign, Apple has taken its computing ambitions to a whole new level. Everyone else is playing catch up now.
From £1,899. At apple.com
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