Report: New MacBook Pro Models Arriving This Year With MagSafe, Successor To M1

According to a report by Bloomberg, Apple plans to release new versions of its MacBook Pro laptops “around the middle of the year,” and those machines will feature speed and display improvements, as well as a return of the. MagSafe charging design seen in MacBook computers several generations ago.

Citing “a person with knowledge of the plans,” the Bloomberg story claims that Apple’s 13-inch MacBook Pro will get a 14-inch successor, just as the 15-inch MacBook Pro became a 16-inch model when the frame of the screen has been reduced. to allow more screen space in a frame of similar size.

The 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros are slated for mid-year and will incorporate Apple’s custom silicon. The company first launched its own silicon with the M1 chip included in the November updates to the low-end 13-inch MacBook Pros, MacBook Air, and Mac mini. The new machines described today would have a successor to Apple’s M1 chip with more processor cores and “improved graphics”.

While the overall design of the laptops isn’t supposed to be significantly different from current models (beyond the screen size of the smaller MacBook Pro), there is one major design change that fans of Mac before the Touch Bar and USB-C overhaul introduced a few years ago: the return of the MagSafe charger.

Mac laptops once had charging cables that slipped easily into their ports, thanks to magnets, and were intended to gracefully disconnect without tugging on the laptop if someone pulled on the cord or tripped over it. Over the past few years, the company has purged this feature from its lineup, but it introduced related technology using the same name into its iPhone 12 lineup last year.

According to the report, the MagSafe connector on newer MacBook Pro models will be similar in shape to the MagSafe connectors on older Macs. It will also allow laptops to charge faster than before. The report notes, however, that computers will still have multiple USB-C ports.

The new MacBook Pros would also have brighter screens with better contrast. This report doesn’t explain how exactly Apple will achieve it, but recent supply chain rumors and analysts predict that Apple will incorporate mini LED displays into its next machines, which would likely deliver this result.

The Bloomberg source also says that Apple has tested versions of the laptops without the Touch Bar, which was introduced to the lineup a few years ago. The Touch Bar is a stripe-shaped touchscreen at the top of the keyboard that replaces function keys with virtual versions of those keys or other application-specific functions.

While many apps support the Touch Bar, some power users have complained that the Touch Bar isn’t always as convenient as the physical keys.

Finally, the report ends with a footnote stating that Apple also plans to update the MacBook Air with a new design, but it won’t happen as soon as the MacBook Pro updates. It doesn’t describe any details about the MacBook Air redesign.