|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
| Apple announces MacBook Pro with Retina Display, more |
| Monday, June 11, 2012 | by Rob Galbraith |
|
At the company's Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco, Apple unveiled a new MacBook Pro with Retina Display, added USB 3.0 plus made other improvements to the rest of its laptop lineup and showed off the upcoming OS X Mountain Lion operating system for Mac and iOS 6 for iOS devices. Also introduced today was a new Airport Express wireless router and the iPad Smart Case, a new accessory that covers both the front and back of Apple's tablet.
Billed as the lightest pro notebook that Apple has ever produced, the
new 4.46-pound MacBook Pro with Retina Display features an ultra-high resolution 2880 by 1800 pixel,
15.4-inch, LED-backlit IPS-technology screen whose front cover glass is said to be much less reflective than previous Apple laptops with
glossy displays.
|
|
|
Pixels Aplenty: MacBook Pro with Retina Display. Click to
enlarge (Photo courtesy Apple) |
Aperture, Final Cut Pro X, iMovie, iPhoto, Safari and other Apple
software will be able to take advantage of the high-resolution display,
as will Adobe Photoshop.
The new model can be outfitted with a quad-core Intel i7 processor running at up
to 2.7GHz, up to 16GB RAM and up to 768GB of flash storage. It has an SD/SDHC/SDXC
slot plus 2 x USB 3.0, HDMI, 2 x Thunderbolt and a
headphone port. It supports 802.11n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.0. Battery
life is rated at 7 hours. The power connection is MagSafe 2 (utilizing a thinner
connector than existing MagSafe adapters). Graphics are courtesy of a GeForce GT 650M.
The MacBook Pro with Retina Display will start at US$2199 in the U.S.
Adapters that enable FireWire 800 and Gigabit Ethernet to be connected
to Thunderbolt have also been introduced (the computer does not
otherwise have FireWire or Ethernet ports).
Revised MacBook Air models featuring dual-core Intel i7 processors running at up to 2GHz, up to 8GB of RAM and 512GB of flash storage, promised 60% faster graphics plus USB 3.0 have also been unveiled.
The 13 and 15 inch MacBook Pros are also seeing a refresh that includes the addition of USB 3.0 and other improvements. The MacBook Pro 17-inch has been discontinued.
Apple also showed off OS X Mountain Lion, the next major iteration of its Mac operating system. It's to ship in July as a Mac App Store download for US$19.99 (or the approximate equivalent in other currencies). New features highlighted today include voice dictation in any application and broader social media integration.
The operating system for Apple's mobile devices will also soon be updated with improvements to Siri voice recognition and dictation, Facebook integration, the ability to share pictures in your Photo Stream, a revamped Maps app and more.
Apple also introduced a new Airport Express wireless router and iPad Smart Case.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
