Apple Announces Redesigned MacBook Pros with MagSafe, Additional Ports, Mini-LED Display, upgraded M1 Chips, and Notch

Apple unveils during its “Unleashed” event two long-awaited redesigns for its Macbook Pro lineup, with upgrades and additions all-across the board such as the new M1 Pro and ‌M1‌ Max chips, mini-LED display with ProMotion, the much-awaited return of the HDMI port, SDXC card reader, and MagSafe, and a 1080p webcam.

The New MacBook Pros also had a bump in the screen size and thickness with 14.2-inch and 16.2-inch display sizes, with the thickness of the 14.2-inch being 15.5mm, and the 16.2-inch 16.8mm thick.

The 14.2-inch MacBook Pro will weigh 3.5 pounds, and the 16.2-inch model 4.7 pounds.

Image source: Apple

One of the most anticipated features of the new MacBook Pros are the return of the HDMI port along with the SDXC card reader, and the MagSafe charger, which were removed from the most recent redesign of MacBooks, when Apple decided to only use USB Type-Cs for their laptops starting with the single-port MacBook 2015 release.

Apart from the SD card reader, HDMI port, and MagSafe, the New MacBook Pros will also feature three thunderbolt 4 ports, one on the right, two on the left; and a headphone jack.

Image source: Apple

The keyboard also bids goodbye to the touch bar, as Apple opted to feature a full-height function key row in place for the highly controversial touch strip. The entire keyboard along with its bed is now black.

The MacBook Pro features significantly reduced bezels at 3.5mm thickness, with a notch out of the top of the display similar to iPhones. The webcam now offers a new 1080p resolution with an improved image signal processor, wider aperture, and a larger image sensor.

The display is now a a mini-LED Liquid Retina XDR display, which is also a ProMotion display with a refresh rate of 120Hz. The new screen now offers a max brightness of 1,600 nits, a sustained brightness of 1,000 nits, and a million to one contrast ratio.

The new MacBook Pros also feature studio-quality mics, with speakers supporting Spatial Audio. The 16-inch model features a six-speaker system.

Both MacBook Pro now support both MagSafe and Thunderbolt charging, with MagSafe giving the new laptops up to 50 percent charge in 30 minutes.

The 14.2-inch model offers up to 17 hours of video playback, while the 16.2-inch model offers a 21-hour video playback battery life.

Upgraded M1 chips are also found in the new laptops. Apple’s The ‌M1‌ Pro chip is a scaled-up, more powerful variant of the ‌M1‌ chip, which features an 8 or 10-core CPU, 16-core GPU, and a more robust Media Engine, more Thunderbolt controllers, support for up to 32GB of unified memory, and more.

The ‌M1‌ Max chip features the same 10-core CPU as the ‌M1‌ Pro, but includes a 24-core or 32-core GPU with support for up to 64GB of unified memory.

Both MacBook Pros are available in Silver and Space Gray. (GFB)