A 13 inch successor to the 12 inch MacBook Retina could replace the MacBook Air in 2017
In many ways, Apple has given consumers ample insight into its plans for future MacBooks, with the unveiling of the 12 inch MacBook Retina, a device whose baffling simplicity was the perfectly disguised testing platform.
Apple could have taken many different routes to introduce features like the butterfly keys mechanism, the Force Touch trackpad, the ultra-thin terraced battery, or support for the USB Type-C port, singularly, gradually, with each newer iteration of the MacBook Pro or even for a reboot of the MacBook Air. Instead, Apple chose to create a radically new MacBook, which integrates each one of these features.
Upon its unveiling, many industry watchers thought of the 12 inch MacBook Retina as a risky product, a bet on a laptop that, initially, very few really understood, especially in regard to the choice of integrating only one USB Type-C connector.
A tale of two MacBooks
The remarkable confidence that Apple put into this new MacBook, was only half the story. The full story is being told now, as we finally watch Apple unfolding its strategy for the future of the MacBook.
While word of a radical new redesign of the MacBook Pro continue to mount, very little is known about Apple’s plans for a successor to the 12 inch MacBook Retina. With that said, Apple has indeed zeroed in on the design elements that will represent the MacBook into the next decade, and those are, unmistakably those of the 12 inch MacBook.
Not surprisingly, thinness is one of them, but there is more, a veering off from the stark white of the days of old, for a range of very iOS-like options that include Gold, Rose Gold, Silver, and Space Grey, among the ones expected to make it into what some are speculating will be the next MacBook Retina, a 13 inch version of the 2015 MacBook Retina, set to fill the void of an outgoing and aging MacBook Air product line that is getting rather long in the tooth, not to mention the lack of Retina display, which is becoming rather glaring, considering that the Retina display is a feature that is found in every other current Apple product.
Taking rumors with a grain of salt, sometimes, it’s not enough. Rumors should be interpreted within their context, and some rumors tell more about the real story that we realized. By this token, it’s a good exercise to remember the rumors that preceded the 12 inch MacBook Retina, initially believed to be an updated MacBook Air. The media, as well as analysts, got the screen size right: 12 inches. Yet, just like now, a next generation MacBook Air may not be in the cards, as much as a new version of the 12 inch MacBook Retina may be.
Focus on graphic performance
There is also the question of Apple’s “sudden” interest in high-performance graphic chips, such as AMD Polaris, which may make it into the next MacBook Pro reboot. Apple has shown interest in VR applications, in the wake of Tim Cook’s comments on VR, as well as a number of VR-related patents files in recent years.
Future MacBooks are likely to feature more powerful GPUs than current models. With that said, Apple doesn’t typically introduce radically new hardware into older product lines, but rather settles for improved versions of current internals, as it has been proven, time and time again, since the introduction of Intel Iris, and HD Graphics chipsets, usually reserved for mid-range consumers, with the option of AMD Radeon chips for the more demanding MacBook Pro customers.
If experience has taught us anything, is that if Apple decides to introduce Polaris GPUs into MacBooks, the MacBook of choice will have to represent the future, not the past, by which token, a 13 inch 2017 MacBook Air rumor, easily translates into a 2017 13 inch MacBook Retina. While far from being an exact science, years of empirical evidence are hard to ignore, especially when it gives early insights into products like the iPad Pro, or the Apple Pencil.