Apple
Apple is preparing a new batch of Macs to launch “between late spring and summer.” Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports.
The most important of the three is the 15-inch MacBook Air, but a new Mac Pro refresh will complete the Mac’s transition from Intel’s CPUs and AMD’s GPUs to Apple silicon, and a new 13-inch MacBook Air could also be on the cards. . Apple is also said to be planning a new 24-inch iMac among the first Macs to use its next-generation M3 chip.
The 15-inch MacBook Air will be Apple’s new product category: a larger-screened laptop for less than the MacBook Pro. Apple’s consumer-focused laptops—from the old PowerPC iBook to the first Intel MacBooks to the current MacBook Air—all range from 11 to 13 inches. The 15- to 17-inch PowerBook and MacBook Pro models always required a step up in CPU and GPU power, which drove up the price; The cheapest MacBook Air starts at $999, while the cheapest 16-inch MacBook Pro costs $2,499.
People who want to fit more on the screen at once or want text and images to be larger so they’re easier to see.
Gurman’s report contained few details about the new 13-inch MacBook Air beyond its presence. It could be the new model with the M3 chip, although the M2 model was released in July, and the gap between the M1 and M2 Air is close to a year and a half. It could also be an M2-flavored update to the $999 MacBook Air, based on the M2 version of the 13-inch MacBook Pro.
But Gurman seems pretty sure the new iMac will include the M3, saying, “Apple has built the next iMac around the same timeline as the M3 chip.” This new iMac will be identical to the current M1 model, from the 24-inch screen to the available color options, but “some of its internal components” will be “relocated and redesigned.”
The new iMac is “in an advanced stage of development” and will launch in the second half of 2023. Those still waiting for a replacement for the beloved 27-inch iMac will have to wait; Gurman said Apple is working on an even bigger iMac, but the report only mentions a 24-inch model.
As for the Mac Pro, there are no new details other than a spring-summer release timeline. Apple has already missed the two-year transition deadline it set for the Apple Silicon Macs in 2020, but plans for the new Mac Pro have reportedly changed as development continues. It was originally supposed to have a unique super-high-end Apple silicon chip, but those plans have been scrapped, and Gurman says the version we’re likely to get will be based on the M1 Ultra followed by the M2 Ultra. On the Mac Studio desktop.
While the new Mac Pro is said to include user-upgradable storage, the tightly integrated design of Apple’s silicon chips minimizes the need for external graphics cards and upgradeable RAM. Apple may skip the M2 update for Mac Studio to give a better reason to have a new Mac Pro.
