The best 13in and 15in laptops on the planet – a fact that’s more than reflected in the price.
Neophobia – the fear of the new, or the fear of change – is an increasingly common affliction among Apple fans. The company is infamous for gleefully tossing past-it tech on the scrap heap, often long before many users have had the chance to properly say goodbye. First, Apple came for your serial port, then your parallel port, and in 2016 it took your phone’s headphone socket, too. Now, the new MacBook Pro family has come for your Function keys and USB ports.
If you want old-school Function keys, then you can still get your fix with the “entry-level” 13in MacBook Pro (£1,449). If you want a MacBook Pro with the all-new Touch Bar, however, you’ll need to find at least another £300. And if you also have your heart set on upgraded SSDs and top-flight processors, then trust me: the new MacBook Pro family is going to cost you big time.
Drinking in the Bar
The Touch Bar is a thin strip of OLED touchscreen that sits directly above the keyboard. What appears on the Touch Bar is programmable and – importantly – context-sensitive, so different “keys” can appear in different applications. For example, Safari displays a set of “keys” representing your open tabs, allowing you to quickly flip between them. Play a YouTube video and a progress bar pops up, allowing you to quickly jump back and forth with a tap or drag of a finger. It’s quite ingenious.
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