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    Coming together? Next-gen MacBook Pro said to resemble MacBook Air

    By Trevor Mogg | Digital Trends – Sat, Feb 11, 2012

    Is the MacBook Pro slowly morphing into the MacBook Air? If the latest reports are to be believed, it certainly looks like things are heading that way.

    According to Apple Insider’s unnamed source, the next iteration of the Cupertino company’s MacBook Pro line-up will be radically different from the current design, featuring ultra-thin unibody casing. As with the Air, this would mean the absence of an optical disk drive, a loss which may upset some users.

    The new design would also incorporate flash-memory solid state drives and better battery life. As with the Air and Intel’s new Ultrabook class of computers, it’s believed the next-generation MacBook Pro laptop will come with instant-on capability, enabling it to boot up in a matter of seconds.

    Apple Insider said it believes the overhaul of the MacBook Pro will be prioritized, with the higher-volume 15-inch model being rolled out first and the 17-inch model following soon after.

    As for a launch date, a report late last year suggested Apple was planning to unveil a new ultra-thin laptop in the spring of this year, though at the time it wasn’t clear if it was going to be a new Air design or a radical overhaul of the MacBook Pro. Judging by today’s news, it could well be the latter.

    It’s certainly an interesting idea that the next-generation MacBook Pro could look very much like the MacBook Air. What would you say the chances are of Apple, in the not-too-distant future, merging the Pro and the Air to create one single model? Thin, portable and powerful, such a device could well leave competing computer companies with a big problem on their hands.

    This article was originally posted on Digital Trends

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    8 comments

    • A Yahoo! User  •  3 mths ago
      Apple is losing its market shares to professional video producers because it's dumbing down its products, but at the same time gaining shares to stupid lazy consumers who like shiny things with big buttons.
      • MM
        MM 3 mths ago
        I disagree. Apple is going in the right direction. DVDs soon will be history. It's all about streaming and flash storage.
        Selling to "stupid lazy consumers who like shiny things with big buttons is much more profitable than developing "new" technology to impress a dozen video producers.
        Personally, I haven't used my optical drive in months. I don't see the need for it. And when I need to use it, I have a portable USB drive.
      • Max
        Max 3 mths ago
        Final Cut Pro X for example? lol
      • Nickster
        Nickster 3 mths ago
        Apple screwed over every professional Final Cut Pro user when they released a version which broke the workflow and took the old version off the shelves!
    • John
      John  •  3 mths ago
      -- this would mean the absence of an optical disk drive,
      -- a loss which may upset some users.

      To get a dvd player is the reason to buy a macbook pro.
      • Daniel
        Daniel 3 mths ago
        Discrete GPUs and faster CPUs is the reason to buy a MBP. If you want a portable Apple DVD player, buy a MacBook; save a bundle.
    • retspooL
      retspooL  •  Los Angeles, California  •  3 mths ago
      Until it's official i wont believe, iPhone 4.S remember?
    • O.G. - Oscar the Grouch
      O.G. - Oscar the Grouch  •  3 mths ago
      the macbook air was just ahead of it's time when it first came out
      • Max
        Max 3 mths ago
        Not really...it was horrible. It didn't offer flash storage so it was slowwwww.
      • O.G. - Oscar the Grouch
        O.G. - Oscar the Grouch 3 mths ago
        the idea in general doofus
    • Gronk
      Gronk  •  3 mths ago
      Sure makes sense as the components allow. I don't mind carrying a lightweight external optical for when I need one. I use it to rip CDs, watch/rip DVDs, and once in a blue moon burn files, since most backup to external and NAS/RAID. Love my MBPro, but when I haul that, a Mini and an iPad as I often do on trips it makes for a full pack.
    • Daniel
      Daniel  •  Pleasanton, California  •  3 mths ago
      The Macbook Air has already proven that removing the optical drive is not a design breaker for most users. The first thing I did with the i7 MBP was replace the optical drive with a second HDD for a SSD/boot/app drive and 2nd HDD for file storage set up. The optical drive (in an external housing) is only used for DVD movies and the rare CD; neither is essential.
      For professional users, of greater importance will be the CPU and discrete GPU options. The current i7 quad MBP already runs quite hot. My main concern would be heat management in such a thin chassis, which could conceivably be accomplished by using underclocked or lower spec (slower) CPUs and GPUs in the worse case scenario. Neither is preferable in a professional content creation machine.
      • Mudi Foxx
        Mudi Foxx 3 mths ago
        Not a design breaker for most users? Based on what market experience?
        It's a tiny subset of a small subset of overall notebook sales.
      • Daniel
        Daniel 3 mths ago
        Probably not as tiny as you think.
        An informal Huffington Post shows that 38.65% would take the MB Air over the MBP (51.32%) with the remaining 10.04% for PC.
        People said the same thing ("design breaker") when Apple stopped shipping computers with 3.5" floppy drives and again when they first started shipping the MB Air.
        The CPU and GPU clock speeds/cores/stream processors remain far more important for professional laptops.
    • Robert
      Robert  •  3 mths ago
      No DVD drive not a smart move.
    • Sporky McCrackin
      Sporky McCrackin  •  3 mths ago
      I'm willing to sacrafice the DVD drive for portability. Besides, a 16 gig flash drive will hold more stuff and it costs a lot less.
     Post a comment
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