Google’s new laptop has touch screen with more pixels than Retina. Will Apple release touchscreen MacBook?
Apple decreased the prices of its MacBook Pro with Retina display models, while also offering them a processor upgrade, just as Google introduced its new Chromebook Pixel touchscreen laptop.
On 13 February, Apple reduced £200 off the cost of its 13in MacBook Pro with Retina display. Costs now start at £1,249 with 128GB of flash memory, and £1,449 with a new 2.6GHz Intel i5 processor and a 256GB SSD. Although prices for the 15in Retina model still begin at £1,799, it now has a 2.4GHz quad-core processor, while the £2,299 MacBook includes a new 2.7GHz quad-core processor and 16GB of storage, (a build to order option that formerly cost £2,698). The selling price of the 13in MacBook Air with 256GB of flash has also been cut, and will now set you back £1,199.
These changes came just ahead of the introduction of Google’s touchscreen Chromebook Pixel, which has much more pixels than Apple’s Retina display.
Google’s laptop is available in two versions: 4G LTE, $1,449; and Wi-Fi, $1,299 (£1,049 in the UK). That is pretty great given the cost of Apple’s MacBook Pro with Retina display, and the fact it functions 128GB of flash in comparison to Google’s 32GB SSD.
Apple’s decision to cut down the price of its laptop computers sparked rumours that the Retina MacBook Pro has been marketing poorly, leading some to anticipate a low usage for the Chromebook Pixel.
However, Citibank analyst Glen Yeung has expected that touchscreen PCs are a risk to the iPad, and that we will see “limited innovation” in tablets, while there will be “increasing innovation in PCs.
He predicts an “increasing presence of touch-based, ultra thin, all-day notebooks at enhancing price points” will “create competition for 10in tablets not fully expected by the market.”
MacBook touch
A recently released Apple patent application hints that the company could be focusing on a touchscreen MacBook, despite Steve Jobs’ declare that putting a touchscreen on a Mac would be “ergonomically terrible.”
He was not the only one to dismiss the tablet-laptop combination. Last year, Apple Chief executive officer Tim Cook created the phrase “toaster-fridge” when he in comparison Microsoft’s ideas for Windows 8, which runs on pcs, notebooks, netbooks and tablet PCs, with the idea of including a toaster and a refrigerator.
“Anything can be forced to meet, but the problem is that the items are about trade-offs. You begin to make trade-offs to the point where what you have left at the end of the day does not please anyone,” he suggested. “You can converge a toaster and refrigerator, but you know, those techniques are probably not going to be satisfying to the user.”
Apple’s patent filing clearly states that the advanced ‘Integrated Touch’ In-Cell screen, currently found in the iPhone 5, could be used in the MacBook Pro, MacBook Air and iMac.
Meanwhile, individual reports have recommended Apple is planning to release a Retina MacBook Air later this year. Japanese site Macotakara states the revamp will be revealed in the third one fourth of 2013, with parts planned to start delivery in quarter two.