Apple just updated the MacBook Pro family with updated specs, pushing all 3 models onto the Intel Sandy Bridge processors.

Intel here, there everywhere.

There’s more of Intel in the new machines – namely ThunderBolt, which Apple claims to be 12 times faster than FireWire 800 and up to 20 times faster than USB 2.0. This new way of connectivity is a partnership between Intel and Apple. For all the models, the use of integrated Intel HD Graphics 3000 graphics chip to manage your graphics demand.

For the 15″ and 17″ model, there is also the AMD Radeon HD graphic chips which will plough through all your graphic needs. Apple has also upgraded the built-in camera where it can now make 720p HD calls.

All models come with a 7 hours battery claim, shorten from the previous 10 hours. A case of more realistic result through rigorous testing by Apple, or maybe the new Intel chips just need more juice?

Options, options, options

The 13″ MacBook Pro has the following options:

• Intel dual core Core i5 2.3GHz or 2.7GHz
• 4 or 8GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM
• 320-750GB Serial ATA @ 5400rpm or 128-512GB Solid State Drive

The 15″ MacBook Pro has the following options:

• Intel quad core Core i7 2.0GHz or 2.2GHz
• 4 or 8GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM
• 500-750 Serial ATA @ 5400rpm or 500 Serial ATA @ 7200rpm or 128-512GB Solid State Drive
• Glossy Widescreen Display (1,440-by-900-pixel) or Hi-Res Glossy Widescreen Display or Hi-Res Antiglare Widescreen Display (1,680-by-1,050-pixel)

The 17″ MacBook Pro has the following option:

• Intel quad core Core i7 2.2GHz or 2.3GHz
• 4 or 8GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM
• 750 Serial ATA @ 5400rpm or 500 Serial ATA @ 7200rpm or 128-512GB Solid State Drive
• Hi-Res Glossy Widescreen Display or Hi-Res Antiglare Widescreen Display (1,920-by-1,200-pixel)

Full specs available here

Prices

Prices start from S$1,648 for the 13″ 2.3 GHz up to S$3,398 for the 17″ 2.2GHz model and you can order your MacBook Pro from the Apple Online Store and you can get your’s within 7-10 business days.

A tad of bah in this upgrade

On first look, this round of upgrade for the MacBook Pro is just a refresh, nothing earth shattering. Maybe that’s why they didn’t hold an event to announce it.

For most of us, who wants to have the muscles to tackle your photography projects, and the occasional iMove short films, the 13″ 2.7GHz MBP sounds like the best value for money, starting at S$2,048. For less than the amount to get the entry 15″ MBP, you can have a pretty decent monitor to compensate for the lack of screen real estate.

To really know how bah this update is, we’ll have to see the benchmarking results of these new machines, real world test of the 7 hour battery claim and also the usefulness of ThunderBolt.

For now, we’ll save our energy and cash for the 2 March event. Will you be getting a new MacBook Pro?

Lest we forget, Apple is not just an iPhone company. There are still Macintosh machines which we love and want being designed and product there. Especially this coming weeks (or even days) when the long awaited refresh for the MacBook Pro family will arrive. MacBook Pro was last updated in April 2010 with the introduction of the Intel Core i5 and i7 processors into the 15 and 17-inch machines.

With Intel moving past their problems with their new Sandy Bridge processors, March seems like the earliest which the MacBook Pros will get its refresh. Rumored to be included in this is also a new way of connection between peripherals and components to the computer called Light Peak which was demonstrated by Intel back in 2009. Light Peak has shown to be faster than USB 3.0 and can deliver up to 10 gigabits in both direction.

Other signs that the MacBook Pro refresh is imminent is that Apple is delaying delivery of US purchases by 3 to 5 days, as compared to the usual 24 hours. Further to that, in Europe, some resellers are notified of sealed delivery coming in the next few days from Apple with strict instructions not to brake the seal before the stipulated date. Those who do so will have their reseller licenses revoked.

What it means for us here in Singapore?
If you are out looking for a MacBook or MacBook Pro – hold your horses. As most retailers here do not have a return-policy, if you have bought something now, chances are you can’t get the exchanged with the new machines, even if the price is the same.

But if you are a budget, then with the upcoming refresh, the current crop of Core i5/i7 models will be available at a lower price at the Apple Online Store refurbished section – they are actually some which are available now.

The MacBook Pro family was recently updated to bring more power and battery to these mobile workstations.

Apple® today updated the MacBook® Pro line with faster processors, powerful next-generation NVIDIA graphics and even longer battery life. The popular 13-inch MacBook Pro features the new NVIDIA GeForce 320M graphics processor for up to 80 percent faster graphics and a groundbreaking 10-hour built-in battery.* The new 15-inch and 17-inch MacBook Pro models feature Intel Core i5 and i7 processors and Apple’s new automatic graphics switching technology that toggles seamlessly between powerful NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M and energy efficient Intel HD Graphics processors.

*Testing conducted by Apple in March 2010 using preproduction 2.66 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo-based 13-inch MacBook Pro units with NVIDIA GeForce 320M and production 2.53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo-based 13-inch MacBook Pro units with NVIDIA GeForce 9400M.

Read more →

If you are looking out for a good deal to get a Mac or iPod this festive season and wish we had a Black Friday or Cyber Monday to get those discounts, look no further then the Refurbished section at the Apple Store.

The refurbished are pre-owned products that were returned and had underwent stringent checks and replacements of faulty parts, thoroughly cleaned, inspected and repackaged for sale – with large discounts. They all come with a one-year limited warranty and are eligible for AppleCare Protection for extended warranty.

The products available varies depending on availability but usually you can find MacBook Air, MacBook Pro , iMacs and various members of the iPod family. The discounts you get can range from 15% up to 51% – but in this case that is for an older generation of MacBook Air.

So don’t wait – the offers are ever changing, depending on availability! Check out the Apple Store’s Refurbished Mac and Refurbished iPods and get your Macs or iPods at a discounts.

As reported in AppleInsider (must be amaze how they pick up such changes), if you have bought a MacBook Pro 15-inch or 17-inch between May 2007 and Sep 2008, before the Unibody MacBook Pros, that uses NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics processors, you are covered for three years from the date of purchase should there be any problems arising from the graphic chip.

Those visiting Apple’s support page for the video corruption and failure issues suffered by this portable generation have noticed that Apple has quietly added an extra year to its coverage, giving owners of the affected MacBook Pros free replacements as late as September 2011 depending on the date of purchase.

I have one of the listed machine but thankfully, my screen is still working fine and hopefully need not have to send in for replacement.

It has been coming for a while but Apple released new updates across the whole Mac Desktop family, starting from the smallest Mac mini to the powerful Mac Pro. In between there are updates to the iMac, Airport Extreme Base Station, Time Capsule and also a new Apple Keyboard.

Faster. Greener. Still mini.

The “star buy” (for me at least) must be the new Mac mini – coming in at a low S$988. Sporting new 2.0GHz (upgradable to 2.26GHz) Core 2 Duo processor, DDR3 SDRAM from 1GB to 4GB (BTO), SATA HD ranging from 120GB to 320GB and the new NVIDIA GeForce 9400M that first appeared in the new iMacs. As shown in the rumor photo, the Mac mini comes with 5 USB 2 ports, 1 Firewire 800 port, Mini DisplayPort and mini-DVI output to support up to two external displays.

The Mac mini is definitely good for families looking for an entry level Mac suitable not just for its computing features, but also as a good media centre beside your new LCD TV. Definitely something I’m looking at for my new house even though there are much lost opportunities to make Mac mini a kick ass computer for your TV.

The newer and cheaper iMac

The updated iMac is now available in 4 basic configurations – ranging from S$1,948 for a 20-inch model right up to S$3,488 for a 24-inch 3.06GHz model. As it is, the entry iMac is more than sufficient for most users who wants to have a machine fast enough to handle most basic requirements to do photo and video editing, productivity work and non-productivity work like surfing and social networking.

The premium model boast the highest speed available across all Macs – a whopping 3.06GHz quick. With its beautiful 24-inch screen and the powerful NVIDIA GeForece GT 130 (or ATI Radeon HD 4850) with 512MB GDDR3 memory, this is more than sufficient for professionals to do their creative work without having to purchase the workhouse Mac Pro.

The new iMacs are also equipped with the new Apple Keyboard which is without the Numeric Keypad, giving you back more space on your desktop. This is packed with two USB 2 ports on the side giving you a maximum of 6 USB 2 ports. It is also has a FireWire 800 port, iSight, Mini DisplayPort to allow you to connect to the new Apple LED Cinema Displays. Whether removing the Numeric Keypad to save space will sit well with users, we will have to wait and see.

Beauty outside, Beast inside

Last but not least, is the Mac Pro – the powerful workhorse used by those who requires raw power. The new Mac Pro is running the new Intel Quad-Core Xeon “Nehalem” Processors … what a mouthful. Even though numerically the processors seem “slower” than those for the iMac, each being Quad-Core, means you get twice the processing power in one chip. For a low price of S$3,988 you get one 2.66GHz (upgradable to 2.93GHz) Quad-Core processor, 640GB hard drive and 3GB of RAM, upgradable to 8GB in total.

If you seriously new more processing horses, you can opt for the 8-core Mac Pro that starts from S$5,288. You get two 2.26GHz Quad-Core (upgradable to two 2.93GHz processor), 6GB of memory with the option to upsize all the way to 32GB of memory. The graphics option is mind blogging too – from one NVIDIA GeForce GT 120 with 512MB up to 4, yes you read that correct, 4 NVIDIA GeForce GT 120 graphics chip.

As the beauty of the Mac Pro is its expandability, with 4 SATA Drive Bay, you can get up to 4 TBs of HD space. That is ALOT of HD space. With its new internal redesign, getting access to these bays and slots makes it easy for one to upgrade the Mac Pro yourself.

However, for all the money you spend on the Mac Pro, it doesn’t come with an AirPort Extreme Wi-Fi card – a S$78 option. Weird.

Basically the Mac Pro is something you’d want to have if you are filming and editing a Hollywood blockbuster – one that can give you much raw processing power.

Just for the fun of it. You can built-to-order, a Mac Pro with two 30″ Apple Cinema HD Display and the bestest of the bestest options for a nice total of S$29,120.71. Do let me know if you are considering that option.

Also mentioned in the beginning, the AirPort Extreme Base Station (S$268) and the Time Capsule (S$448, basically an AirPort Extreme Base Station with storage) were also updated. Now it has simultaneous dual-band Wi-Fi – 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands – that will allow better usage of the wireless bandwidth for devices that can tap the higher band but not neglecting the slower devices.

There is also an option to have a separate network for your guest that can only be accessed with a password for your visitors so that they can tap onto the Internet but with no access to your own network. Apple sure make us friendly and generous people. Too bad the Time Capsule were not updated with the higher 1.5TB capacity hard drives.

There is also a new feature that allows you to remotely access your Time Capsule or external Harddisk connected to the Airport Extreme via Internet when you access it with MobileMe.

“Say you’re traveling and you need a file on your Time Capsule back at home. If you’re a MobileMe member using a Mac with Mac OS X Leopard, no problem,” Apple says. “You can now access all the files on your Time Capsule drive over the Internet. Simply register your Time Capsule with your MobileMe account, and its drive appears in the Finder sidebar of your Mac just like any other attached drive. It’s like having your own personal file server wherever you go.”

Read more at the AppleInsider

Slimmer and smaller keyboards

Bucking the trends of having keyboards with more keys and more functions, Apple’s new Keyboard is much more compact as it removed the Numeric Keypad from itself. It comes with two USB 2.0 ports on the sides for you to attached a mouse and can be used for plugging your iPhone or your external storage device. It is available at S$78.

Buried beneath these updates to the Mac Desktops, Apple also slipped in updates to the 15″ MacBook Pro with new 2.66GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processors, upgradable to 2.93GHz.

All in all, these updates across the whole Mac product line will benefit everyone, from students, to families to professionals who wants a machine that give them maximum value for every buck they spend.

I for one, is looking forward to getting a new Airport Extreme to replace my DLink router and the Mac mini to replace my now obsolete QuickSilver PowerMac that served me well since 2000.

Will you be getting any new Macs soon?