Apple's new MacBooks: What to expect today
With only hours to go before Apple (AAPL) unveils its new lineup of MacBooks, the rumor sites have been working overtime, trying to make sense of blurry spy photos and purloined price lists.
But on Tuesday morning, Daring Fireball's John Gruber — a blogger with particularly good sources in Cupertino — cut through the fog and offered some clarity.
According to Gruber's remarkably detailed report:
- The photo here of a MacBook Pro, which surfaced Monday night at Engadget, is the real deal. It shows a black keyboard encased in a single-piece, latch-free aluminum frame.
- There is no $800 or $899 MacBook, as widely rumored. The only Apple notebook computer that will retail for less than $1,000 is the old white 2.1 GHz MacBook, which is getting a price cut from $1,099 to $999.
- The new MacBook Pros come at two price points: $1,999 (2.4 GHz) and $2,499 (2.53 GHz)
- The new MacBooks look like 13-inch versions of the MacBook Pro and come in two configurations: $1,299 (2.0 GHz, 2 GB memory, 160 GB disk) and $1,499 (2.4 GHz, 2 GB memory, 250 GB disk)
- The new machines have no separate trackpad button. The glass trackpad is itself a button. "You just press and it clicks," writes Gruber. "Sounds odd, but I hear it's very cool in practice."
- The new machines are powered by Intel CPUs, but replace the Intel graphics chipsets with a new NVIDIA 9400M GPU (and, in the case of the MacBook Pro, a second NVIDIA 9600M GT). These chipsets can be used to drive an external monitor, including a new $899 24-inch Apple LED display that will also be introduced Tuesday.
- The MacBook Air remains largely unchanged, but with larger hard drives: a 120 GB disk in the low-end model, and a 128 GB solid-state drive in the high-end model.
"Keep your eyes peeled," warns Gruber, "for jackassery in post-event news coverage, much of which, I predict, will focus on the fact that none of these new machines sell for under $1299. The reality is that these new machines are all steps up, but the rumors that caught the most attention in the past week were the ones regarding $799 and $899 laptops. None of these “$800 new MacBook!” rumors came from anyone with any credibility, but that won’t stop some people from holding it against Apple that they didn’t pan out."
You can read Gruber's full report here. He offers no explanation for where he got his information, but given the tenor of his final comments we wouldn't be surprised if the specs were deliberately leaked to lower expectations that had gotten wildly out of control.
Apple is scheduled to unveil the new MacBook lineup at a special event on its Cupertino campus at 1 p.m. ET (10 a.m. PT).
Yes it's here! http://peekablog.net/2008/10/new-macbook-2008/
I was considering Lenovo and Apple before. But I brought Apple MacBook. I like it a lot. And I am glad I made this decision. By the way, open you eyes, Lenovo's PCs are actually more expensive than Apple's. Every company needs profit. That's what business is. Think about what you need and what you want before you made a choice. Pick the price you would like to pay for that, then chances are bigger that you won't regret later.
I like. Very much.
As someone has already noted, Apple make products that impress, or at least they try. That is why they are totally worth the extra money.
so with these new Mac's coming out, are we going to see a bigger drop in prices in the older models, or are they still going to over price them, even though there is bigger and better ones?
Dual GPUs in the MBP (9800M variant in an SLI configuration maybe)? I'm curious as to the rational for this. That isn't going to really help battery-life nor cooling… wouldn't a single 9800M-GTX be plenty?
Quote – ex ped: He’s taken seriously for his Apple sources, not for his familiarity with Sony and Lenova machines.
Philip – how familiar are you with Lenovo? I think Lenova is a dessert topping.
ex ped: Heh. That's a typo I think I'll let stand.
Market share is more important than profit margin in the long term. Is it better to sell 100 million MacBooks or 500 million MacBooks? In order to sell the 500 million MacBooks, you have to lower prices by $100-300 and you would still get a high profit margin with more loyal customers. What would be your business decision? Lowering prices is the best solution.
jt from ny ny:
Apple maintains a very high product standard, something that I would say most mac users understand. I am more than willing to pay a little extra for a product that works a lot better.
I don't get how Gruber's blog can be taken seriously. He didn't even know that there are notebooks with dual graphics ("hybrid", able to switch between integrated and discreet). Sony and more recently, Lenovo, have notebooks like these, and they are in the mainstream sector.
ex ped: He's taken seriously for his Apple sources, not for his familiarity with Sony and Lenova machines.
jt: OS X. Free support at your local Apple Store. Resale value. Free iLife. That's enough right there.
The main issue with Apple's Macbook is pricing. If Apple wants to compete with other laptop makers, they will have to lower prices under $1,000. Apple is making huge profit margins on its laptops. Competitors are selling laptops for under $500. What will make Apple Macbooks better than laptops to justify the high prices?
@Ed: The product transition was announced for last quarter. The only new products during that quarter were the updated iPods, so presumably it referred to that. (I suspect the increase in flash memory per dollar is what affected the margins most.)
@stustanton: The iPod was introduced shortly after 9/11 and I think it caught on quite nicely. I'm not sure the economic cycle affects the success of products very significantly.
I do agree that the lack of the rumored low-cost entry may affect the stock in the short-term. Philip Elmer-DeWitt's conjecture that John Gruber was given authorization to leak details to temper expectations sounds plausible to me.
For anyone expecting a tablet: That's the kind of thing they save for Macworld. It'll be announced in January, not released – if anything. No way we see a tablet today.
And the stock is going to get hit no matter what happens today. It'll take another hit in a week when the Christmas forecast doesn't meet expectations.
Would you spend out your newest and finest innovations and and evolutions in today's volatile market? What a moment in history to wast your best effort on. Revolutions catch on at the right moment, so if you want to make history, wait for your moment. This ain't it, exactly.
Let's not squander the product line on impossible-to-win moments; it only plays out once.
The single button on Apple laptops has been the best solution. It's easier to hit a single button than find the right one among two. And with two fingers on the pad you get a right-click, so there's nothing to complain about.
Gruber's speculation is as wild as any speculation. Kevin Rose said the iPhone would have two cameras. That said, a lot of leaked photos have turned out to be real, like the last two ipod nano versions.
Consumers are buying more laptops. A Macbook under $1,000 will be crucial for Apple to gain market share against laptop competitors. The new processors should help Macbook sales but many want to see something new with the mouse.
If this is all they have to offer the stock is going to get hit. Where is the big product transiton they were talking about, you know the one withe features at a price nobody else can match and all that hype, vfrom the last quarterly conference call. This stuff is barely evolutionary, let alone revolutionary. Surely they can't consider this innovation. Where is the big new product (ie the tablet that we all want)? Doesn't this all seem very dissappointing?
We all appreciate the high end standard of Maclintosh computer since it was born. Everyone use a Mac are either professional or crazy fanboy. Since Apple product combine both hardware and software design in one perfect system.