Apple appears to be highly confident with its first Apple Silicon chip. Apart from powering the entry-level MacBook Air and the Mac Mini, the Cupertino company has also introduced its refreshed MacBook Pro 13 powered by the new ARM-based Apple M1 chip.
The new Apple M1-powered MacBook Pro 13 replaces the old 2 Thunderbolt port base model that’s powered by an older 8th gen Core i5 processor. At the time of writing, Apple is still offering the 4-port MacBook Pro 13 with Intel’s 10-gen Core i5 and i7 processor.
Similar to the updated MacBook Air, the Pro 13 comes with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of SSD storage which can be configured with up to 16GB RAM and up to 2TB of storage. The new MacBook 13 Pro still comes with an active cooling system which should provide better performance during heavy loads compared to the fanless MacBook Air.
The rest of the hardware remains unchanged and it still retains the 13.3″ Retina display that does 2560×1600 pixels resolution with a max brightness of 500 nits. It still has a stereo speaker setup along with a studio-quality 3-mic array with directional beamforming.
The laptop still gets the backlit Magic Keyboard with a touch bar and also included is the Touch ID sensor for instant unlocking. With Apple Silicon and optimisation of macOS BigSur, it promises to offer greater responsiveness with better CPU performance of up to 2.8X and improved graphics of up to 5x when compared to its Intel-based predecessor.
The biggest highlight is its battery life which is said to be the longest ever on a Mac. On a full charge, the same 58.2WHr cell is rated to push 17 hours of wireless web usage and up to 20 hours of movie playback via Apple TV. That’s 2x longer video playback than the previous model.
In terms of connectivity, the Pro 13 still gets two Thunderbolt ports on the left that supports USB 4. For faster wireless connectivity, it is also upgraded to 802.11ax WiFi 6. In addition, Apple is still including a power adapter that pushes 61W via USB-C.
At the moment, there’s no availability details yet for Malaysia. However, it is priced from RM5,599 for the 8GB RAM + 256GB SSD model and RM6,399 for the 8GB RAM + 512GB SSD combo. The student and education pricing starts from RM5,169.
