Apple Macbook Pro 14 (2023) review

Finest Costs Right now: Apple MacBook Professional 14 (2023)

$1,449.00

The brand new M3 makes the Macbook Professional much more highly effective whereas supplying you with efficiency that lasts and lasts. However earlier than we get into the small print, it’s value speaking about Apple’s new Macbook Professional computer systems.

Costs for the 14-inch MacBook Professional begin at £1,699 and there are 5 SKUs to select from rising as much as £3,299 for the M3 Max mannequin examined right here. You should buy it from Apple in addition to retailers similar to BestBuy and Amazon within the US and John Lewis, Amazon and Currys within the UK.

Take a look at our round-up of the very best laptops for extra choices.

RIP touchbar – missed by nobody

Firstly, the 13-inch with touchbar appears to have fallen by the wayside. I’ll miss the shape issue, however the touchbar will likely be missed by few. As a substitute, it’s changed by the 14-inch Macbook Professional with the entry-level M3 chip. That laptop has two Thunderbolt/USB 4 ports as an alternative of three, which you get if you purchase a Macbook Professional with M3 Professional or Max.

The pc I’m testing now’s a Macbook Professional 14 with the M3 Max, with 2TB of storage and 64GB of reminiscence. And it’s black.

Apple had black Macbooks for some time in mid-2000, however they weren’t product of aluminium. This one has the identical design as those launched earlier this yr, and along with the black color, it’s completely attractive.

So there’s a excessive “need” issue on this unhealthy boy.

Petter Ahrnstedt

Vivid and sharp display screen

The display screen is, as earlier than, a Liquid Retina XDR show with a decision of 3024 x 1964, P3 color gamut, 1,000 cd/m² steady brightness throughout all the display screen, which may peak as much as 1,600 cd/m² for HDR content material. It additionally has a dynamic refresh price as much as 120Hz.

Or, in less complicated and fewer phrases, the display screen is superb, with a giant bump in brightness when wanted.

Apple’s touchpad beats all the pieces on Home windows

All Macbooks have been gifted with a improbable touchpad. Pc customers nonetheless caught within the Home windows swamp gained’t know what they’re lacking. It’s exact, responsive, and cozy to work with. The keyboard has an ideal stroke size and is, as normal, backlit and outfitted with a fingerprint reader.

Foundry

Identical goes for the working system; Mac OS Sonoma is basically good and has plenty of enjoyable options and a few not so good ones. Sure, we’re taking a look at you, Eyecatcher. One function that’s solely accessible on an M3-equipped Macbook is the flexibility to decide on whether or not to throttle again efficiency or run as regular when utilizing battery energy.

That is the M3

Apple’s new processor is the primary on this planet to make use of a 3-nanometre course of. Why is that this so necessary? Properly, the nearer two transistors are to one another, the shorter the gap they must journey from level A to level B. Shorter distance additionally means shorter time; it’s quicker. If the electrons additionally journey shorter distances, it additionally means much less resistance, which results in much less power consumption and fewer warmth technology.

Right here, Apple is method forward of the competitors. Even when the pc is doing heavy work, similar to rendering video, it doesn’t get scorching. The fan hardly ever kicks in. And it’s quick.

Set your phasers to decelerate

And right here it’s time to cease and geek out on comparisons with the M1 and M2 Professional. If we take a look at Apple’s personal {hardware} specs, the M3 Professional has 150Gbps of reminiscence bandwidth. The M1 and M2 Professional have 200Gbps. The M3 Max has “as much as” 400Gbps.

There may be additionally an M3 Max with 14-core CPU and 30-core GPU that has “solely” 300Gbps of reminiscence bandwidth, whereas the corresponding scaled-down M2 Max with 12-core CPU and 30-core GPU has 400Gbps of bandwidth.

Apple has additionally modified the variety of cores for the upper clocked M3 Professional chip in comparison with its predecessor. The M3 Professional with 12-core CPU has six efficiency cores (in comparison with eight efficiency cores on the 12-core M2 Professional) and 6 effectivity cores (in comparison with 4 effectivity cores on the 12-core M2 Professional), whereas the GPU has 18 cores (the equal M2 Professional has 19).

So what does all this imply? It’s arduous to say, particularly now that the M3 chip makes use of Dynamic Caching, a way the place the GPU is dynamically allotted the precise quantity of reminiscence wanted. The GPU has additionally acquired {hardware} assist for ray tracing. Who is aware of, possibly actual video games will likely be launched for the Mac quickly.

Foundry

The M3 Max, examined right here, has 14 CPU cores divided into 12 efficiency and 4 effectivity cores with the upper reminiscence bandwidth of 400Gbps. It has 40 GPU cores and a 16-core Neural Engine.

It additionally has {hardware} accelerated assist for quite a lot of video codecs similar to H.264, Hevc, ProRes, and Prores Uncooked.

That’s it, how briskly is it?!

Properly, it’s quick.

As normal, we ran varied benchmark packages, which confirmed some actually fascinating outcomes. In response to Geekbench, the M3 Max is nearly as quick as Intel’s Core i9-13900KS, a power-hungry processor present in very desktop computer systems. The M3 Max sits in a laptop computer that weighs simply over 1.6kg.

M3 Max will get 21,158 factors within the multi-core check and three,061 within the single core. Intel Core i9-13900KS bought 21,712 and three,094 factors respectively. That’s a extremely good consequence from a laptop computer!

For enjoyable, I filmed a forty five second video clip in 4K Prores Uncooked format and downloaded it into Last Minimize Professional and exported it to mp4.

To make it extra enjoyable, I did the very same factor on a Macbook Professional 14 with an M1 Professional chip.

The Macbook Professional with the M1 Professional, which can’t be accused of being a sluggish laptop, did it in 51 seconds. The M3 Max ploughed via it in 30 seconds. That’s lots quicker. The variety of 4K clips it will probably course of concurrently is in double digits.

I wager it’s simply as insanely quick for many who use Premier, Xcode, Cinema 4D or Blender. When you create music, you don’t have to fret about your laptop breaking down after a number of hundred tracks in Logic or Professional Instruments. All advised, the M3 Max is round 40% quicker than the M2 Max in lots of functions, approaching the territory of the M2 Extremely.

Battery life delivers

However probably the most outstanding factor is that this laptop is simply as quick whether or not it’s plugged in or not. There are actually quicker Home windows laptops in tow which might be outfitted with Nvidia’s newest graphics card, however they’ve a battery lifetime of lower than an hour and are cumbersome and heavy.

Foundry

The Macbook Professional 14 is a smooth laptop that weighs simply 1.6kg, with a battery lifetime of as much as 18 hours that allows you to run heavy functions even when the facility twine is at house. And it’s value emphasising once more that it’s quick. Actually quick, even.

Must you purchase the Apple MacBook Professional 14 (2023)?

When Apple left the anchor on the foot that Intel had turn into, they may begin operating their very own race. They usually’ve finished simply that! The third technology of processors from Apple is an insanely quick processor with improved graphics efficiency whereas sustaining power effectivity.

The flagship mannequin might not be a pc for the common individual, however for many who know they’ll save hours because of improved efficiency.

And for you (and me) who need, however don’t want, the most recent: Properly, a black Macbook Professional is pretty much as good wanting because it will get!

This evaluate initially appeared on MacWorld Sweden.

Specs

Product title: Apple Macbook Professional 14 M2 Max
Examined: November 2023
Producer: Apple
Processor : Apple M3 Max, 14 cores
Graphics: Apple M3 Max graphics 40 cores
Reminiscence: 64 GB, lpddr5 (assist for as much as 128 GB)
Storage: 2TB SSD
Show: 16″ Liquid Retina XR, 3,456 x 2,234 pixels
Webcam: 1080p
Connections: 3 thunderbolt 4, hdmi, SDXC reminiscence card reader, 3.5mm jack.
Wi-fi: Wifi 6e, bluetooth 5.3
Working system: Mac OS Sonoma
Different: Fingerprint scanner
Battery: 72.4 Wh, as much as 18 hours of operation
Measurement: 31.26 x 22.12 x 1.55 cm
Weight: 1.62 kg
Beneficial worth: Examined mannequin: 58,745

Efficiency

(M2 Max in brackets)

Cinebench R23 Double Core: 21,038 factors (14,608 factors)
CinebenchR23, CPU Single Core: 1,858 factors (1,615 factors)
Geekbench 5, CPU: 21,158 factors (15,103 factors)
Geekbench 5, CPU Single Core: 3,061 factors (1,969 factors)
Geekbench 5, graphics (OpenCL): 92,200 factors (70,823)
Geekbench 5, graphics (Metallic) : 155,344(85,337)
Disk, learn (5 GB ): 5,342 MB/s
Disk, write (5 GB ): 6,804 MB/s