Apple of course showed off a fair bit of the machines internals during the keynote in order to promote all of the innovations included inside, but iFixit's teardown still provides an interesting hands-on look at the internals.
Unsurprisingly, the Retina MacBook Pro is not designed to be user-accessible, with the slim form factor requiring a number of proprietary components that are designed and assembled for maximum space efficiency rather than upgradeability and repairability. This has resulted in iFixit dubbing the machine "the least repairable laptop we’ve taken apart".
Taking a number of cues from the MacBook Air, the new MacBook Pro uses RAM soldered directly onto the logic board, as well as custom solid-state drives that include a new connector incompatible with existing third-party drives on the market.
Front of Retina MacBook Pro logic board with CPU (orange), NVIDIA graphics (red), and RAM (green)
Apple has even taken to gluing the large battery into the body of the Retina MacBook Pro, with iFixit ultimately giving up on trying to remove it for fear of puncturing a battery cell. The glued-in battery pack also covers the trackpad cable, making it nearly inaccessible and susceptible to damage if users attempt to remove the battery.
Otherwise, the internals of the Retina MacBook Pro are fairly straightforward, with a large and densely-packed logic board with left-side ports integrated, a separate I/O board for the right-side ports, the asymmetric fan touted by Apple, and custom speaker assemblies.
Monday December 16, 2024 8:55 am PST by Tim Hardwick
Apple released iOS 18.2 in the second week of December, bringing the second round of Apple Intelligence features to iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 models. This update brings several major advancements to Apple's AI integration, including completely new image generation tools and a range of Visual Intelligence-based enhancements. Apple has added a handful of new non-AI related feature controls as...
Wednesday December 18, 2024 11:39 am PST by Juli Clover
Apple is no longer planning to launch a hardware subscription service that would let customers "subscribe" to get a new iPhone each year, reports Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.
Gurman first shared rumors about Apple's work on a hardware subscription service back in 2022, and at the time, he said that Apple wanted to develop a simple system that would allow customers to pay a monthly fee to gain...
Monday December 16, 2024 4:17 pm PST by Juli Clover
Blackmagic today announced that its URSA Cine Immersive camera is now available for pre-order, with deliveries set to start late in the first quarter of 2025. Blackmagic says that this is the world's first commercial camera system designed to capture 3D content for the Vision Pro.
The URSA Cine Immersive camera was first introduced in June, but it has not been available for purchase until...
Apple launched the controversial "trashcan" Mac Pro eleven years ago today, introducing one of its most criticized designs that persisted through a period of widespread discontentment with the Mac lineup.
The redesign took the Mac Pro in an entirely new direction, spearheaded by a polished aluminum cylindrical design that became unofficially dubbed the "trashcan" in the Mac community. All of ...
Friday December 20, 2024 2:22 pm PST by Juli Clover
It's looking like 2025 is going to be an important year for Apple, with the company planning to revamp the iPhone, push further into smart home products, and improve Apple Intelligence. There are tons of new products rumored for 2025, including new iPhones, M4 Macs, a smart home command center, and much more.
We've highlighted the top five Apple products that will have the biggest impact in...
Tuesday December 17, 2024 9:02 am PST by Joe Rossignol
The current Apple TV 4K was released more than two years ago, so the streaming device is becoming due for a hardware upgrade soon. Fortunately, it was recently rumored that a new Apple TV will launch at some point next year.
Below, we recap rumors about the next-generation Apple TV.
Bloomberg's Mark Gurman last week reported that Apple has been working on its own combined Wi-Fi and...
Contrary to recent reports, the iPhone 17 Pro will not feature a horizontal camera layout, according to the leaker known as "Instant Digital."
In a new post on Weibo, the leaker said that a source has confirmed that while the appearance of the back of the iPhone 17 Pro has indeed changed, the layout of the three cameras is "still triangular," rather than the "horizontal bar spread on the...
Wednesday December 18, 2024 10:05 am PST by Juli Clover
Elevation Lab today announced the launch of TimeCapsule, an innovative and simple solution for increasing the battery life of Apple's AirTag.
Priced at $20, TimeCapsule is an AirTag enclosure that houses two AA batteries that offer 14x more battery capacity than the CR2032 battery that the AirTag runs on. It works by attaching the AirTag's upper housing to the built-in custom contact in the...
I would have at least liked the ram and 'ssd' to be upgradable. Those are the only things I upgrade anyway. As the previous poster noted, it sure makes Applecare more justifiable.
