Eric Ravenscraft
Apple has rolled out a refresh on the MacBook Pro line of laptops, bringing quieter keyboards and 8th-generation Intel processors. If you’ve been waiting to buy one, now’s the best time to buy.
Back in April, Intel released its 8th-generation Intel processors, dubbed “Coffee Lake,” but Apple has held off on making use of the new tech in its MacBook Pro lineup. Until now. Previous MacBook Pro models used the Kaby Lake processors that first came out in 2016. That’s not terrible, but if you bought a MacBook Pro yesterday, you’d be getting a processor that’s two years old, which is a tough pill to swallow when you’re shelling out a bunch of money for a high-end laptop.
The upgraded processor isn’t available for every MacBook Pro, though. You’ll need to opt for the Touch Bar-enabled models, which start at $1,799. The base 13″ model comes with 8GB of RAM, a 256GB SSD, and a 2.3GHz quad-core Core i5 Coffee Lake processor. If you’d rather go for the 15″ display, the laptop starts at $2,399 for 16GB of RAM, a 256GB SSD, and a 2.2GHz 6-core Core i7 Coffee Lake processor. However, you can also upgrade the RAM, processor, embedded graphics card, and built-in storage, if you’ve got the cash and want a little more power.
There’s more to this refresh than just a spec boost. Apple claims that the keyboards on the new MacBook Pros are much quieter than they were before. Curiously, Apple is not addressing the complaints about previous keyboards. Some users claimed that, since the keys are very shallow, and the keyboard itself is difficult to repair, even a light amount of dust or dirt can cause the keyboard to fail or work improperly. Apple declined to say whether the new refresh included a fix for this, instead claiming that only a few laptops are affected by the problem at all. Nevertheless, the company has a repair program in place for users who are affected. We’ll have to wait and see if the new model suffers the same failure rate.
Finally, the newest MacBook Pros will be the first to feature always-listening “Hey Siri” functionality. While you’ve been able to talk to your laptop for a while, you’ll now be able to do it without ever touching your laptop at all.
You can order the new MacBook Pro models from Apple.com right now.
