Though 2023 has been a comparatively quiet 12 months for Apple’s MacBooks, a brand new provide chain report affords a glimmer of hope that this may change within the type of new 14-inch and 16-inch MacBooks Professional anticipated to land by the top of 2023.
For causes we’ll get into shortly, this one is greatest taken with a larger-than-usual dose of salt. Nevertheless, DigiTimes means that Apple may be getting ready to refresh its top-end MacBook Professional fashions with brighter and extra power-efficient mini-LED shows within the upcoming weeks.
Nevertheless, in keeping with the report’s sources, Apple isn’t planning to let the brand new mini-LED shows get any brighter than they already are; as a substitute, the power for extra luminance interprets to decrease energy consumption. Briefly, Apple plans to run the shows on the similar brightness whereas utilizing much less energy.
Apple is anticipated to ship new fashions of 14- and 16-inch MacBook Professional units within the fourth quarter of 2023 with miniLED backlighting that may enhance the show brightness by 10% in comparison with the first-generation specs, the sources stated.
DigiTimes
Oddly, the report focuses solely on the show enhancements, which means that little else is within the pipeline for these new MacBooks.
That’s not stunning since Apple solely launched the present M2 Professional/Max configurations in January, and whereas Apple may need its M3 chip able to go this 12 months, it appears a bit too quickly for an M3 Professional/Max combo. By comparability, the M1 Professional/Max got here out almost a 12 months after the M1 debuted, and the M2 Professional/Max landed with the present MacBooks Professional in January, six months after it appeared within the mid-2022 MacBook Air.
Whereas there have been some experiences that an M3 iMac may make an look this month, the jury remains to be out even on that one. The 24-inch iMac, which launched in early 2021 with an M1 chip, is overdue for an replace, nevertheless it’s additionally lengthy been anticipated to skip the M2 and go straight to the M3.
Nevertheless, the rumor mill has been fairly quiet about Apple’s M3 Mac updates in current months, with the one stable report coming from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, who revealed that an M3 Mac mini and M3 Max MacBook Professional are being examined however aren’t anticipated to see a launch till mid-2024, a timeline that’s additionally corroborated by analyst Ming-Chi Kuo.
Nonetheless, there are hints that not less than one new Mac is coming very quickly; it’s simply extremely unlikely that it is going to be a MacBook Professional — not less than not one of many higher-end fashions. Earlier this week, MacRumors found that Apple is planning to start accepting new Mac trade-ins someday this month, which is a transfer that usually precedes the discharge of a brand new Mac. The identical factor occurred in June when Apple started taking trade-ins of its 2021 Mac Studio and 2022 M2 MacBooks simply earlier than unveiling the M2 Mac Studio and 15-inch MacBook Air.
This leaves us with the likelihood that we may see not less than one M3-powered Mac present up quickly. Whereas the brand new 24-inch iMac looks as if the likeliest candidate, because it’s been over two years because it was final refreshed, it’s additionally attainable this may very well be the 13-inch MacBook Professional or perhaps a 13-inch MacBook Air.
Whereas we’ve heard nothing about an October Apple occasion, this isn’t strictly a prerequisite for launching a brand new Mac. Apple usually broadcasts new Macs with mere spec bumps through press releases fairly than standalone occasions, because it did with the present 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Professional, which had been finally simply M2 Professional/Max updates to the redesigned variations that Apple confirmed off two years in the past. There’s no indication {that a} new iMac, MacBook Air, or 13-inch MacBook Professional will supply something considerably new past the M3 chip, so if a number of of those present up this fall, anticipate it to be a a lot quieter affair.
[The information provided in this article has NOT been confirmed by Apple and may be speculation. Provided details may not be factual. Take all rumors, tech or otherwise, with a grain of salt.]