Apple products receive an overwhelming response worldwide; and so do Apple MacBooks. These are overpriced yet still combined with MacOS and powerful hardware, MacBooks justify their price. Same is the case with the Apple 13-inch MacBook Pro – with TouchBar.
The new Apple MacBook might look a bit different to you when you compare it with the make-over Apple did to MacBooks back there in 2016. The MacBook Pro stands out to be very thin, thus making it portable; its thickness (or rather the thinness) measures half an inch. Even while being so thin, it still houses the latest Thunderbolt 3 port – though with some caveats.
The laptop doesn’t have an HDMI, USB or any other SD card port, therefore you might be finding it a hassle to carry around adapters. On the contrary, you probably won’t be needing this cables in the future, since it is understood that technology is soon going to be all about Thunderbolt 3. Thus, it can be said, the Apple has always been the one to lead from the front when it comes to adopting new and better technology. (It even gave away its TouchID feature, replacing it the Face Recognizing FaceID for its iPhone X.) Though this isn’t the only caveat, but if you go for some specific MacBook versions, you might even find the function keys replaced with a slim OLED Display.
The MacBook Pro 2016 came with a ‘TouchBar’ which garnered a lot of attraction, leading to a high number of MacBook sales. Sooner or later, we will be finding this ‘TouchBar’ on the lower end Apple MacBooks too. Though, it might be in a different form in the sense that Apple might end up introducing a totally TouchScreen keyboard using an OLED screen.
The main purpose of the MacBook is to appear classy packed with moderate yet powerful specs, and that this year’s MacBook also does best. Although the future MacBooks might be spill-proof and crumb resistant, this year’s MacBook is simple yet elegant at the same time. On the other hand, it is sadly still not ass affordable like the Apple 13-inch MacBook using a Retina Display. Still, it caters largely towards the professional community, which can’t compromise towards quality and thus opt for MacBooks.
Design
Hats off to Apple’s Design team for making the MacBook look majestic. The design remains the same, nevertheless, yet still looks modern. You can either buy the MacBook in silver color or space gray. Sorry, but we are all hoping to see one in Rose-Gold someday. Courtesy lightweight Aluminum for the whole body, the laptop is as light as possible. Although the screen is a 13-inch, it is a perfect fit for an 11-inch frame, with even larger bezels than the XPS 13.
Audio
This probably is the thinnest MacBook ever and is even more than thin than XPS 13, although the surface laptop appears to be thinner. Just beneath the hinge, you would find the fan outlets for the heat sink. This makes it possible for the speakers to be top-firing stereo ones. This leads to a much better audio quality for our audiophiles. You must be thinking now that with air flow beneath the hinges, there might be heat issues, but trust us Apple MacBooks don’t generate much heat in the first place, especially this one.
Keyboard
Another reason why the laptop ended up so thin was that Apple opted for its very own 2nd generation butterfly mechanism. The key travel remains the same as it has been for previous models, although the tactile feel of typing has become much better. Since the travel is short, it was wise of Apple to make keys large enough to be clicked easily.
Although, those who review Keyboards could object to Apple’s decisions to couple the arrow keys so close to each other. Also, the escape key is on the TouchBar rather than the keyboard, though it shouldn’t be an issue once you get used to it.
TrackPad
The Trackpad has sized up a bit a year ago, and thus this move received favorable reactions. Courtesy strong palm rejection, you can easily perform multi-touch gestures. Without even moving your palm you can quickly browse to wherever you want, since there is enough space for your thumb to select, and your fingers to move around.
The Force Touch feature which was removed from the Apple Macbooks is now finally back again. This makes the vibration motors vibrate which are found underneath the glass tracking surface. This really feels nice to some, as if you are using an actual mouse with better control.
TouchBar and TouchID
The TouchBar is perhaps the much-needed revolution Apple gave to Macbooks in 2016. It can easily adapt to whatever you are doing, for instance, it can offer built-in spelling check. While you are typing words, how matter how fast you are, the TouchBar shall provide you with some suggestions. It almost seems that this is a crossover between Apple’s iPhone Autosuggest and Apple MacBook.
Like on an iPhone (other than an iPhone X), you can now unlock your MacBook Pro through TouchID too.
Battery Life
All these features do have an impact on the battery life, as the battery just lasted for six hours and thirty-seven minutes through in which a 1080p video was being run on 50 percent screen brightness, with only Wi-Fi on. This may be attributed to the TouchBar since the same MacBook Pro without the Touchbar ran for another hour. Though, you shouldn’t be affected by this, since the battery seems to last out enough for a workday, and even more, if you just use it casually.
Price
The MacBook Pro without the touch bar is available for a price tag of $1,299 (£1,249, AU$1,899), and also has just 128 GB SSD, which might not be enough to fulfill your storage requirements. If you want to get the Touchbar along with the latest TouchID, then you would need at least $1,799, so maybe you should wait for the new MacBook, since the base model new MacBook would surely be cheaper than this. On the contrary, this model shall have 4 Thunderbolt 3 ports instead of the 2 on the base model.
Not only does but for the higher price, you would also be getting a processor clock-speed upgrade from 2.3 GHz to 3.1 GHz.
The ball is in your court now, since you have to choose what seems to be the best for you.