I’ve had a new 15-inch MacBook Pro for about a day, and a 27-inch iMac is en route to my house as we speak. As such, I’m not currently in a position to post a “review” of either system. But I can tell you at least a few things about the surprisingly comprehensive Mac refresh that Apple dropped on us this week at this year’s Worldwide Developers Conference.
What follows is a list of collected minutiae about the half-dozen different Macs I got to handle. This list is gleaned from conversations with Apple as well as my own observations in the limited amount of time I’ve had to study the devices. Based on the questions I’ve gotten about the Macs so far, this should hopefully satisfy your curiosity while I crank away on more comprehensive reviews.
The MacBook Air
The MacBook Air is still around and Apple didn’t not update it on Monday, though you could be forgiven for missing the single sentence it merited during the keynote.
The only difference? The previous Broadwell-based 1.6GHz (2.7GHz Turbo) Core i5-5250U processor has been swapped for a 1.8GHz (2.9GHz Turbo) Core i5-5350U, an across-the-board clock speed increase of 200MHz (the upgrade option remains a 2.2GHz/3.1GHz Core i7-5650U). The architecture hasn’t changed and neither has anything else about the Air. Much as I’d like Apple to introduce an actually modern laptop at that $999 price, I suppose this is better than nothing.
The Pro just got refreshed in October before Kaby Lake CPUs were available, so really very little has changed other than those chips. Kaby Lake’s speed is mostly identical to Skylake’s at the same clock speed, but the Kaby CPUs in the 2017 Pros are 200 or 300MHz faster than the Skylake chips across the board.
Otherwise, most things are the same, including the displays and the size of the batteries. The keyboard feels the same, but there’s a minor visual difference: the Control and Option keys now include little symbols, not unlike the one that already exists on the Command key (the symbol on the option key also replaces the “alt” text). Those symbols correspond to the glyphs you’ll find listed as keyboard shortcuts in menus throughout macOS. Power users won’t need this, but as someone who came to the Mac a bit later and doesn’t have the Macintosh Classic keyboard layout burned into his brain, I appreciate it. (The MacBook and iMac keyboards get this change, too; I can’t confirm whether the Air does one way or the other, but I would assume not.)
The $1,299 version of the 13-inch MacBook Pro is a decent value and makes the machine easier to recommend in lieu of a MacBook Air, but Apple has saved that $200 by cutting the SSD’s capacity from 256GB to 128GB. Some users will be able to live with this change; others won’t. If you can’t, the $1,499 configuration still includes the 256GB SSD. Both configurations offer options for 16GB of RAM and a faster Core i7 CPU.
This $1,299 config also totally replaces the old 2015-era 13-inch Pro that Apple offered at this price point, dumping one more aging system from Apple’s lineup.
Finally, let’s talk about the dedicated GPUs in the 15-inch Pro. You may have noticed that these ship with Radeon Pro 500-series GPUs instead of the Radeon Pro 400-series GPUs in the 2016 Pros, but don’t be fooled—these are the same GPUs you got in October, rebadged by AMD. Based on the number of shaders and the amount of RAM, the Radeon Pro 555 is identical to the previous 455, and the 560 is identical to the previous 460.
The GPUs don’t change, but the default configurations do. The 455/555 is now the entry-level option in the $2,399 base model, replacing the significantly weaker Radeon Pro 450. The 460/560, previously available only as an upgrade for both configurations, is still a $100 upgrade for the $2,399 Pro, but now it’s the default option in the $2,799 Pro, replacing the 455/555. The maximum performance level will remain the same, but you get a little more GPU for your money.
Those external graphics docks
Aside from the refreshes, the most interesting announcement in the keynote for MacBook Pro owners is that Apple is going to begin officially supporting Thunderbolt 3 graphics docks in macOS. This comes after many years of stop-and-start, neither-explicitly-encouraged-nor-discouraged efforts by third parties to use the Thunderbolt interface for that purpose.
True to form, Apple didn’t want to dive too deeply into the details for support that’s still in beta (the docks need High Sierra to work). But here are the few facts we can tell you at the moment:
- The developer kit—which gives you a Sonnet external GPU box, an AMD Radeon RX 580 GPU, a Belkin USB-C to USB-A hub, and $100 off an HTC Vive—runs $599 and is available for purchase now, at least if you’re a registered developer with an active account.
- There’s nothing special about this box. Since all Thunderbolt 3 hardware are required to be certified for use with the interface anyway, pretty much any graphics dock that passes Thunderbolt 3 certification should work fine with High Sierra.
- GPU support is up in the air; it’s not clear whether macOS will effectively support “generic” GPUs as Windows does or if people will need to use specific Apple-blessed cards (as was often the case back in the days of the Mac Pro).
- Also unclear is whether the dock will allow for the use of Nvidia GPUs. The 2013 Macs were the last to include any Nvidia GPUs after years of hopping back and forth every year or two. This is a point of frustration for anyone who wants to run CUDA workloads or who just prefers Nvidia GPUs. Nvidia’s generic drivers can already enable its GPUs in Thunderbolt 3 docks on Macs, but obviously first-class official support would be preferable.
We’ll be able to get more details on this as High Sierra develops and gets closer to shipping.
The best news about the 2017 version of the MacBook is that it gets the second-generation version of Apple’s butterfly-switch keyboard, the one from the newer MacBook Pros. This keyboard has the same amount of physical travel as the original from the 2015 and 2016 MacBooks, but the newer switches give the impression of greater travel. It still feels flat compared to keyboards from older Pros or the Air, but it’s undeniably more comfortable than before—going back to the old butterfly keyboard from the new one is really hard to do.
As for the CPUs, while Kaby Lake only increases base clock speeds by 100MHz across the board, Turbo Boost clock speeds are up by a lot. Going from the previous-generation m3-6Y30 to the m3-7Y32 bumps you from 2.2GHz all the way to 3.0GHz, while the higher-end i5 and i7 upgrades each increase boost clock speeds by 500MHz. The MacBook still doesn’t have a cooling fan, so those processors can probably only sustain those higher speeds for a limited amount of time. But for small, “bursty” tasks and general system responsiveness, the extra power ought to make a noticeable difference.
The 16GB RAM upgrade option is also a welcome improvement, though it’s still 1866MHz DDR3. Unfortunately, the much beefier MacBook Pros can’t go higher than 16GB, but seeing the additional RAM come to the low end is nice.
One thing that doesn’t change is the 2304×1440 screen, which doesn’t get any brighter and still lacks the “wide color” DCI-P3 color gamut support that Apple introduced in the iPhone, iPad, and other Macs in the last year or two.
The iMac Pro is Apple’s latest prestige desktop, but the good-old, regular-old iMacs are still going to be its biggest sellers by volume. A year and a half has passed since the last time these things got an update, and there are a bunch of little changes to appreciate.
First, you get two Thunderbolt 3/USB-C ports in every model (thankfully, no other ports are removed; you just get Thunderbolt 3 where you used to get Thunderbolt 2). Every iMac supports one 5K external display or two 4K external displays. Unfortunately, if you want to drive two 5K external displays à la the 15-inch MacBook Pros, you’ll need to spring for the iMac Pro.
As for the rest of the changes, the 4K iMacs benefit the most. They jump two processor architectures, from Broadwell to Kaby Lake (Skylake CPUs with the Iris Pro GPUs Apple used in the 2015 4K iMacs didn’t exist at the time). So, unlike the rest of the Mac lineup, you’re actually going to see benefits from clock speed boosts and major architectural improvements. The return of midrange, dedicated GPUs to the 21.5-inch Macs is also welcome; the 27-inch still gets the best GPU options, but that has always been the case.
Another welcome change is that, according to Apple, the RAM in the 4K models is no longer soldered to the motherboard. The RAM is still not what Apple considers to be “user accessible,” but if an authorized service provider goes to the trouble of opening your iMac up, they’ll find two DDR4 SO-DIMM slots that can take up to 32GB of memory.
The 27-inch models change less dramatically. Once again, the Kaby Lake transition bumps base and boost clocks by around 200MHz across the line, which is nothing to sneeze at but also nothing to write home about (these CPUs are mostly in the 3 to 4GHz range, so we’re talking about a boost of less than 10 percent in all cases).
RAM is still user-upgradeable via the small hatch in the back, which gives access to four DDR4 SO-DIMM slots, and all the new GPU options look like decent performance bumps—you step up from the “Tonga” to the “Polaris” architecture, you get a whole bunch more stream processors in all configurations, and most configurations also double your graphics RAM (where you got 2GB you usually get 4GB, and where you got 4GB you now get 8GB).
Last but not least, the new version of the Magic Keyboard includes a number pad, finally replacing the old wired keyboard that Apple would still sell you if you wanted it. Apple says this keyboard has the same battery as the standard Magic Keyboard, despite its larger size; it still charges via Lightning, it can still pair with Macs automatically via Lightning, and, when plugged in via Lightning, it still works as a wired keyboard, eliminating latency if that’s something you’re concerned about.
AppleCare+ comes to the Mac
Let’s end by talking warranty. For the last few years, the “AppleCare” plans that have protected the Mac have differed from the “AppleCare+” plans for iPhones and iPads in a couple of ways. Standard AppleCare boosted Mac warranties from one to three years, while AppleCare+ only extended warranties from one to two years but also included up to two flat-rate repairs for accidental damage (the price varies by device and by damage type, but typically doesn’t exceed $99). AppleCare could also be purchased and added to your Mac as long as it was within its one-year standard warranty period, while AppleCare+ could only be purchased within the first 60 days of ownership.
Now, there’s also a version of AppleCare+ for the Mac that brings both good and bad changes. On the good side, you still get three years of coverage, and you now get accidental damage coverage, too (a $99 flat fee covers “screen or external enclosure damage,” while $299 takes care of “other damage”). On the bad side, you now have to decide if you want the extra coverage within 60 days of your purchase.
Source: https://arstechnica.com/apple/2017/06/mac-minutiae-how-to-tell-all-the-new-imacs-and-macbooks-from-the-old-ones/
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