At today's Apple Event, the next generation of MacBooks was unveiled. But instead of adding to the MacBook Pro or Air family, the company went back to just "MacBook" for its rebooted lineup. As always, Apple wants to keep its laptops as thin as possible while still keeping them as powerful as possible, and the new MacBooks reflect that goal.
The MacBook is thinner and lighter than the MacBook Air, measuring 13.1 mm at its thickest point and weighing only two pounds. It has a 12-inch display with a thickness of 0.88 mm, and it features a resolution of 2304 x 1440. The keyboard received an internal upgrade in terms of more stable keycaps and individual LED backlighting for each key.
Users can now click anywhere on the new trackpad and adjust it to suit their clicking needs, and it also includes tactile feedback. A new gesture called "Force Click" has been added, too, which provides a shortcut to, for example, opening up the Maps app, creating a new event in the calendar, or looking at a preview of a file.
The MacBook sticks to Apple's unibody exterior and features a USB Type-C connector for power. (Did you catch that? The power jack is a USB Type-C port.) Thus, that one port will not only support power, but also USB 3.1, mini DisplayPort, VGA and HDMI. The smaller interior features a new logic board, which for its basic SKU includes an Intel Core M processor (up to 1.3 GHz, 2.9 GHz Turbo), Intel HD Graphics 5300, 8 GB of 1600 MHz LPDDR3 memory, and a PCIe-based 256 GB SSD.
For the first time in the company's laptop history the new MacBooks will be fanless. All the space left in the interior is saved for batteries, which Apple says provides all-day battery life.
Other features include a 480p FaceTime camera, stereo speakers, dual mics and a headphone jack.
So how much will this cost you? The basic package starts at $1,299, but you can upgrade the Core M processor and bump the SSD up to 512 GB, which puts the next-up model at $1,599. It comes in gold, silver and space gray and will be available on April 10.
With the new MacBooks, Apple continues to keep its head in the laptop game. The features certainly are impressive, but those who are on a budget might be hesitant to buy one. Nevertheless, it's a new contender in the market, and we'll see how it stacks up in performance against the competition.
Follow Rexly Peñaflorida II @Heirdeux. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.
