New MacBooks Get Faster Chips, Thunderbolt Port

Apple's new MacBook Pros gained faster chips and a new connectivity standard. Image courtesy Apple.

Apple on Thursday refreshed the MacBook family with faster processors, more-powerful graphic cards and, most notably, a new connection port called Thunderbolt.

Ranging from 13 to 17 inches in screen size, the notebooks ship with the brand-new Thunderbolt connectivity standard that Apple co-developed with Intel.

Thunderbolt can transfer up to 10 Gbps, which is theoretically 12 times faster than the previous FireWire 800 connectivity standard. This is usually where you’d connect an external accessory such as a hard drive.

Apple has historically been nimble with pushing new connectivity standards. Apple created the FireWire connectivity standard before it became widely adopted in the PC industry.

The updated 13-inch MacBook Pros include Intel’s newer Core i5 and Core i7 chips, which were previously codenamed Sandy Bridge. Meanwhile, the 15- and 17-inch notebooks get quad-core Core i7 chips.

For anyone who cares, the MacBooks have updated graphic cards: the 13-inchers get the Intel HD Graphics 3000 chip; the 15- and 17-inchers have the AMD Radeon HD processor with up to 1GB of memory.

All the MacBook Pros have a reported battery life of 7 hours, according to Apple ? lower than the previous generation, which got up to 10 hours battery life. This is presumably due to the speedier chips and graphic cards.

The MacBook Pros range from $1,200 to $2,500 and are available today at Apple retail stores or Apple.com.

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