Apple’s big week continues as the company dropped a slew of new products on Tuesday.
The big release? A the new MacBook Pro with new and powerful Apple chipsets, i M5 Pro and M5 Max.
I MacBook Pro with M5 chip it came out in October, so the release of the M5 Pro and M5 Max was long overdue based on Apple’s previous release cycles with its in-house Silicon chipset. Mashable gave the MacBook Pro M5 a stellar review, and these long-awaited MacBook Pros with the M5 Pro and M5 Max are basically more powerful versions of that device for professional users with advanced computing needs.
MacBooks are getting more and more expensive
Before getting into the specs, the first thing we should mention is that Apple has dramatically increased the prices of the MacBook Pro across the board. We’re not just talking about the new MacBook Pro with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips that are more expensive than their predecessors with the same silicon. Today, Apple has successfully increased the initial price of the MacBook Pro M5 released in October.
The 14-inch MacBook Pro M5 previously had a starting price of $1,599. Apple raised the price by $100, bringing the new starting price to $1,699. Thankfully, Apple isn’t asking consumers to simply pay more for the same device. Apple has eliminated the 512GB storage option, making 1TB of storage the new base model. So, while Apple fans have to pay $100 more for the MacBook Pro, they now get double the storage.
Now, as for the new members of the MacBook Pro family, the 14-inch M5 Pro starts at $2,199, which is $200 more than its predecessor M4 Pro, and comes with a 15-core CPU and a 16-core GPU. The 16-inch M5 Pro starts at $2,699, which is also $200 more than its predecessor the M4 Pro, and comes with an 18-core CPU and a 20-core GPU. Both the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro M5 Pros come with 24GB of RAM and 1TB of storage in their base models.
Mashable Light Speed
So far the most expensive models are the most powerful MacBook Pros with the M5 Max chipset. The 14-inch MacBook Pro M5 Max starts at $3,599, and the 16-inch M5 Max starts at $3,899. Both base models come with an 18-core CPU and 32-core GPU and include 36GB of RAM and 2TB of storage.
MacBook Pro M5 Pro and M5 Max: Specifications and performance improvements
Credit: Apple
According to Apple, the new MacBook Pro M5 Pro and M5 Max together provide four times the AI performance compared to the equivalent M4 chipsets and up to eight times the AI performance compared to the M1 chips, the first Apple Silicon chipset, which came out in 2020.
The new MacBook Pros also include Apple’s wireless networking chip called N1, which brings improved performance and reliability of wireless connections through Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.
Apple says the new MacBook Pros also boast twice as fast SSD performance and up to 24 hours of battery life.
Now, in terms of direct upgrades to the M5 Pro and M5 Max, users will see significant performance improvements in AI processing, video editing, 3D modeling, gaming, and more.
Apple says the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros with the M5 Pro will see:
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Up to 7.8x faster AI graphics performance compared to MacBook Pro with M1 Pro and up to 3.7x faster than MacBook Pro with M4 Pro.
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Up to 6.9x faster LLM processing compared to MacBook Pro with M1 Pro and up to 3.9x faster than MacBook Pro with M4 Pro.
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Up to 5.2x faster 3D rendering in Maxon Redshift compared to MacBook Pro with M1 Pro and up to 1.4x faster than MacBook Pro with M4 Pro.
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Up to 1.6x faster gaming performance with ray tracing for games like Cyberpunk 2077: Ultimate Edition compared to MacBook Pro with M4 Pro.
As for the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros with the M5 Max chip, Apple says users will see:
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Up to 8x faster AI generation performance compared to MacBook Pro with M1 Max and up to 3.8x faster than MacBook Pro with M4 Max.
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Up to 6.7x faster LLM processing compared to MacBook Pro with M1 Max and up to 4x faster than MacBook Pro with M4 Max.
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Up to 5.4x faster video results rendering performance in Blackmagic DaVinci Resolve Studio compared to MacBook Pro with M1 Max and up to 3x faster than MacBook Pro with M4 Max.
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Up to 3.5x faster AI performance for video enhancement in Topaz video compared to MacBook Pro with M4 Max.
Along with Tuesday’s MacBook Pro announcements, Apple also unveiled a new MacBook Air with an M5 chipset and a new Apple Studio display.
