The new Retina MacBook Pro is out and the Retina display has people talking. Like the iPhone 4 and iPad 3 before it, now the MacBook Pro has an upgraded display as well. This display elevates the laptop to a level it’s never reached before. You can’t say it looks like a high definition television – because it’s better than that. The resolution on the new Retina laptops is a whopping 2880 x 1800 pixels. That’s a total of 5.18 million pixels jammed into a 15.4 inch screen.
Hardware
There are two new models available in 2012. There is the $2199 version which has a 2.3GHz quad-core processor with 8GB of RAM. If you want 16 gigs of RAM, add $200. What is important to note is that you can’t upgrade your RAM after you make your purchase. The other model available costs $2799 and this one has a 2.6GHz quad-core processor with 8GB of RAM. The RAM on this one can also be upgraded to 16GB for an additional $200.
Battery Life
As you would expect, the retina display hogs a lot of power. But the good thing is that the built-in battery has also received a power upgrade. The new battery is rated at 95 watt hours, an improvement over the 77.5 watt hours on the regular MacBook Pro. Just what does that translate into? About the same battery life regardless of which MacBook you have, which is about 7 hours.
Size And Weight
The new Retina MacBook Pro looks almost identical to the regular MacBook Pro. The aluminum body design has not changed. But what has changed is the thickness of the laptop. The new Retina one is just 0.71 inches thick, which is considerably thinner than the nearly one inch thick non-Retina laptop. As far as weight is concerned, the Retina MacBook Pro actually weighs a pound less than the regular MacBook Pro, at 4.46 pounds.
What’s Missing
In order to make the new Retina MacBook Pro lighter and thinner and accommodate for a larger battery, several features had to be sacrificed. Among what’s missing is an ethernet port, firewire port and the SuperDrive.
Conclusion
One look at the screen and you’ll fall in love with it. You won’t ever want to use a laptop that doesn’t look as good as this one does. What else can you really ask for?Apple’s Retina MacBook Pro is thin, lightweight, powerful and gorgeous all at the same time. Are there any downsides to it? As is often the case with Apple products, it’s the high price tag.
For the everyday user who browses the internet, checks their Facebook and email account, the new Retina MacBook Pro is too much for them. This powerful machine is built to handle the most rigorous gaming and high end video editing programs around. At nearly $3,000, purchasing this laptop is going to set you back quite a bit. So much so that you probably shouldn’t buy another laptop for years. But after years of every day use, laptops get scratched, dented, there are dead pixels and the keys begin to wear down. So before you plunk down three grand on this laptop, make sure you’re going to keep it for a while.