As promised, Apple has begun shipping its followup to the PowerBook notebook, the MacBook Pro, this month. But to the surprise of many, it's faster than was initially announced:
All models of the new MacBook Pro will ship with faster Intel Core Duo processors than previously announced, delivering even greater performance at no additional cost. The $2,499 model now includes a 2.0 GHz Intel Core Duo processor, up from the previously announced 1.83 GHz, and will begin shipping this week. The $1,999 model now includes a 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo processor, up from the previously announced 1.67 GHz, and will begin shipping next week. In addition, customers may now upgrade to a 2.16 GHz Intel Core Duo processor as a build-to-order option on the Apple Online Store.
So what's going on? We think that between the announcements and the shipping is that Intel has certified the chips, which all come off a production line, to run and work at the faster speeds. The reality is that all chips come off production lines capable of running faster than the number on the label (hence overclocking) but that they aren't guaranteed by the maker to do so without some very hefty testing. Run them too fast, and your overclocking can turn into overcooking, which (as they say) adversely affects the user experience.
But it certainly makes a pleasant change for people to get more than they bargained for. (Remember 1999, when Apple had to ship slower G4s because Motorola couldn't produce enough 500MHz G4 chips? Ah, 500MHz - now that was a speed.) Now we await the eager owners' Xbench reports on how quickly the machines work - and how quickly, or slowly, the battery runs down, since battery life has been a topic on which Apple has been uncharacteristically silent with the MacBook Pros.
