Are the new MacBook Pro M1 Pro / Max a game-changer, as Apple says? Part of the press answered this question the day before their release. As these handpicked media have only had the machines for a few days, some prefer to talk about“Impressions” than full test. It must be said that there are many new things to inspect and that the autonomy is monstrous …
Outside, everything changes for the better
No more thinness and over-simplification, the 14 “or 16” MacBook Pro take on thickness, weight and ports! The design of these new machines reminds the most expert of the PowerBook G4. Accustomed to the 2020 MacBook Air, Brian Heater of TechCrunch finds that the difference in weight is significant with the MacBook Pro 14 “(1.29 kg against 1.6 kg). Those who want lightness at all costs know more than ever which machine to go.
The return of the HDMI port, the SD card reader and the MagSafe port is unanimously welcomed. “A snap of that magnetic cable transported me to the mid-2010s. There is even an LED on the cable to indicate the state of charge”, says Jason Snell Six Colors. Only Nilay Patel from The Verge regrets that the SD reader (UHS-II, when there is UHS-III) and the HDMI port (2.0, whereas 2.1 does better) are not of the very latest generation.
The abandonment of the Touch Bar in favor of classic (and full-size) function keys is also viewed favorably by all testers. Generally speaking, the keyboard “Works and it works well, right down to the inverted T arrows. Apple did well to stick to the classics ”, says Jason Snell. Just Nilay Patel, again he worries that this entirely black keyboard gets dirty more quickly.
The screen of the new MacBook Pro is judged ” unbelievable “ by several testers. And when that’s not the word ” unbelievable “ who is employed is ” awesome “. It combines both a mini-LED panel (the technology introduced in the iPad Pro 12.9 “2021) for vivid rendering and a 120Hz refresh rate for superior smoothness. Jason Snell notes that it will likely take some time before all apps fire. started with ProMotion, some of which are already smoother, but others not yet.
And that famous notch then? There are those who instantly forget it and those who don’t forget it… at the beginning. “Initially, you can’t help but see [cette encoche] spill over onto your screen. But after a few hours or a few days, it blends into the background and you forget it ”, writes Dan Ackerman of CNET.
In this notch, there is a 1080p webcam, the best ever integrated by Apple in one of its laptops. A part of the journalists remain nevertheless on their hunger whereas the iPads have webcams a cut above and the function Centered frame recently.
The speakers make a strong impression. These are outright the best ever on a laptop for Todd Haselton from CNBC : “They have great bass and can fill an entire room with sound. They also support spatial audio, […] which gives the impression that the sound is coming from everywhere. “
Inside too, everything changes for the better
If the exterior of the 2021 MacBook Pro wows the press, what about the interior? On Geekbench’s CPU test, the M1 Max chip (10-core CPU) does not do better than the M1 on one core, but it pulverizes it in multi-core, with a score of 11,715 points against 7,545. Jason Snell takes an interesting point of comparison: “The MacBook Pro [M1 Max] upgrade my iMac Pro [8 cœurs] in all tests except one. “
For example, the compilation of an application in Xcode takes only 18 seconds with the MacBook Pro 14 “, against 30 seconds with the MacBook Air M1 and 36 with the iMac Pro. Let us specify that it is an inflated machine which was provided by Apple to the testers: M1 Max with 32-core GPU and 64 GB of RAM. The performance of the M1 Pro, limited to a 16-core GPU, will be a tone below in the graphics area.
However, whether we are talking about the M1 Pro or the M1 Max, the performance does not disappoint. “We expected significant leaps in performance, but we did not expect some truly monstrous gains”, summarize the experts ofAnandTech, which deliver as usual a detailed technical analysis. And to add:
[En matière de CPU], these chips are not only capable of outperforming any other laptop, but they also rival the best desktop processors. You have to look for hardware from the server domain to get ahead of the M1 Max. It becomes absurd.
On the GPU side, the M1 Pro is twice as fast as the M1, and the M1 Max four times faster, schematically AnandTech. Perfect machines for playing, then? This would be forgetting that macOS is still poorly supplied with video games and that the Apple Silicon architecture even cuts off compatibility with Windows x86. But this power is useful for all applications taking advantage of graphics acceleration.
And that’s not to mention the Neural Engine, dedicated to machine learning tasks, and ProRes accelerators. Thanks to these, 01net was able to run seven 8K streams (8192×4320 pixels, in Apple ProRes 422, at 30 fps) without slowing down. What is more incredible is that this firepower most often operates in silence. The aluminum underside gets hot, but you have to really push the machine to its limits to hear the fans, says TechCrunch.
You almost forget that MacBook Pros are laptops, and that would be a shame, because they also shine on the go. TechCrunch measured 17h30 of Apple TV + video playback autonomy with the 14 “model. 01net for its part timed the 16 “at 5:18 pm in versatile use and 1:22 pm in video playback. To top it off, the MagSafe cable allows you to recharge the computer by about 50% in just 30 minutes.
To conclude temporarily
Bring out the party favors and streamers, the new MacBook Pros are seemingly fulfilling their contract, and doing it very well. “This combination of raw power, unique acceleration and sheer fuel efficiency is simply not found elsewhere.”, concludes AnandTech.
These MacBook Pros are not cheap, notes Jason Snell, but that’s okay, because it’s part of the lessons Apple has learned over the past five years:
MacBook Pros are tools for business users, and they need to be designed with their needs in mind. Whether you are a photographer, videographer, developer or just do any other job that requires significant computing power, your computer has finally arrived.
To read all the tests, the MacBook Pros seem unsurpassable… until the next Mac Apple Silicon.
We will in turn test the 2021 MacBook Pros as soon as they are received tomorrow. Do not hesitate to ask us your questions in the comments.