Why Apple’s Refreshed Mac Line-up Is Perfectly Harmonised, Powerfully Progressive
Apple used the WWDC 2023 stage to launch the 15-inch MacBook Air, the 2nd generation Mac Studio armed with the M2 Ultra chip, and the long-rumoured Mac Pro, also sporting the M2 Ultra chip.
At this year's WWDC, Apple managed to condense updates to its Mac products into a brisk 15-minute presentation. Despite the brevity, there was a sense of cohesion to the updates, making Apple's Mac offerings more understandable than they've been for years.
The spotlight was certainly on the grand unveiling of the Apple Vision Pro, but the Mac range was far from neglected. Apple used the stage to launch the 15-inch MacBook Air, the 2nd generation Mac Studio armed with the M2 Ultra chip, and the long-rumoured Mac Pro, also sporting the M2 Ultra chip. The upgraded Mac Pro was almost nonchalantly revealed, yet it signified the completion of a three-year transition to Apple Silicon for the Mac range, a year later than originally planned, due to the lack of an update for the Mac Pro in the last two years.
The new Mac Pro, now supporting the M2 Ultra chip, boasts an impressive 76 GPU cores and 24 CPU cores, accommodating up to 192GB of memory. In comparison to the 2019 model, its performance is threefold, and it features the power of seven built-in afterburner cards, which had to be purchased separately in the previous model. The Mac Pro also received updates to expand its capabilities, including six PCIE slots and eight thunderbolt ports. This brings it up to par with last year's Mac Studio, which had surpassed the Mac Pro in power with the M1 Ultra chipset.
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The Mac Pro's formidable power makes it an ideal choice for high-demand environments such as Disney's Industrial Light and Magic special effects studio, a major player in Hollywood movie CGI. For everyone else it will be overkill, but that is by design.
For those desiring something more compact without compromising on power, the new Mac Studio is an excellent option. Apple revealed that the production team of the iconic comedy show “Saturday Night Live” used the Mac Studio to produce the show.
The M2 Max versions of the Mac Studio are so powerful that they could be compared to the Mac Pros of the past for demanding users. Both the M2 Ultra Mac Studio and Mac Pro are now specialised tools, much like a bespoke sports car designed specifically for the race track.
For the mainstream user, the Mac Mini with the M2 and M2 Pro chips offers affordability, while those desiring portability have an array of options.
The M2 MacBook Air 13-inch has already established itself as the gold standard for portable notebooks. Apple has now introduced a 15-inch MacBook Air, the slimmest 15-inch notebook in the world, catering to those wanting the same portability with a larger screen. It makes the MacBook line up sound more cohesive as the base model is now the 2020 M1 MacBook Air, then comes the 13-inch M2 MacBook Air, followed by the new 15-inch model. For anything more compute intensive tasks there are the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models that have M2 Pro and M2 Max chipsets and a microLED display, loads of ports and also a much chunkier exoskeleton. Previously, anyone who wanted a larger screen needed to pay more for features that he/she didn't need while compromising on the form factor as the MacBook Pro models are heavy and thick to carry around.
Apple had already demonstrated its prowess with performance and battery life on these new Macs but had yet to make its mark in gaming. That changed when Hideo Kojima, the renowned game designer behind the Metal Gear Solid franchise, took to the stage. He pledged to bring future projects to Apple's platforms and announced the arrival of Death Stranding's director's cut edition on the Mac. This, coupled with Apple's new game porting tool for developers, will make these devices even more attractive as porting triple A titles from the PC or PlayStation would become much easier.
With the introduction of macOS Sonoma, websites can be converted into near-native web apps using Safari. Apple is promising an almost native app-like experience with websites getting their icon in the Mac dock and also a dedicated toolbar is generated and the web developer has to do no work to enable this. It is subtly that like this that will further elevate the utility of the Mac.
This is the most cohesive the Mac range has looked in years. However, Apple still needs to refresh the iMac, currently still running on the M1 chip from 2021. I anticipate an update, likely with the M3 chipset, later this year or early next year which would complete the cycle.
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