Inspect a gadget: the new MacBook

Our technology editor Jasmine Gardner takes a look at Apple's brand new - and damned beautiful -MacBook
On display: the new MacBook in the demo room after the Apple event (Picture: AP Photo/Eric Risberg)
Jasmine Gardner12 March 2015

The hype: While everyone was getting over-excited about the Apple Watch on Monday, a really great product was being overlooked. For many, the MacBook will be far more useful than the Watch and it’s also damned beautiful. It’s super-thin and insanely light. It comes in gold (and silver and slate grey) and is built with an all-metal body. It’s the first time I’ve ever looked at a laptop and thought, “I want that — now.”

The use: To make this MacBook as good-looking as it is, Apple has done some pretty amazing things. First, it has made a new keyboard with keys that press more evenly and efficiently. It has reworked the touchpad so now it doesn’t really click, it just feels like it clicks using what Apple calls a “taptic engine”. This allows you to press anywhere on the trackpad, and when you press harder (using a “force click”) you can perform new functions, such as highlight a date in an email to add it to your calendar.

Then it has shrunk the internal electronics by an incredible 67 per cent. It has done away with the fan and filled all the remaining space with contoured batteries, meaning you now get 10 hours of constant video playback on the laptop (in other words, it lasts all day long without a charge). The result is a super-thin computer — just 13.1mm thick. And it weighs less than 1kg.

As Apple CEO Tim Cook said while holding it during Monday’s keynote, “Can you even see it? I can’t even feel it.”

Some have scathingly called it “anorexic”, and it is certainly in starvation mode when it comes to shunning ports in favour of looking good. It has just one outlet — a USB-C — which is a new industry standard port that will do absolutely everything including charging, USB data, HDMI for your TV, connecting to a monitor and video graphics.

It’s also symmetrical, so no more of that annoying game where you have to flip the cable round and round and round again trying to get it to fit. As tech site The Verge amusingly pointed out: for thunderbolt and lightning (Apple’s propriety cables for its laptops and its mobile devices) the USB-C is very, very frightening as it is likely to replace them altogether, eventually.

The stats: 12-inch retina (2304 x 1440 pixel) display; full-size keyboard; weight 900g; 13.1mm thick.

The particulars: £1,049-£1,299; apple.com/uk shipping from April 10.

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