Apple offers faster 7200rpm drives and SSDs as optional upgrades at the time purchase.Īpple switched from NVIDIA to AMD graphics. It has a 500GB hard drive that unfortunately runs at the slower 5400rpm. The MacBook Pro 15″ has 4GB of DDR3 RAM in 2-2GB sticks, upgradable to 8GB from Apple or up to 16GB if you do it yourself. The MacBook Pro we have in for review has the “slower” 2.0GHz quad-core The new Sandy Bridge processor integrates graphics into the same piece of silicon as the processor, resulting in greater power efficiency and speed. The early 2011 MacBook Pro 15″ model comes with either a 2.0 or 2.2GHz quad-core 2nd Gen Intel Core i7 processor. Nor is there a clumsy clasp to manipulate: when you close the clamshell, it stays shut with the help of magnets.Apple MacBook Pro 15' Review (Early 2011) MacBook Pro 15″ (early 2011) Quick Specs: Any other notebook will tip backwards, but the MacBook Pro stays put. Try it for yourself at a Mac dealer: just place the MacBook Pro on a desk and lift open the lid with one hand. It is encased in a single piece of seamless aluminium, so as well as not collecting dust in the cracks it doesn’t have, it doesn’t creak or squeak when you pick it up, open and close it, balance it on your knees and so on.Īt nearly 3kg, it’s hardly the lightest notebook in the world but it is perfectly weighted. It’s only with your face smarting that you realise what a beautiful feat of engineering the MacBook Pro is. Bendy plastic case, standard WXGA screen, power supply transformer weighs a ton - now THAT’S a standard notebook.īack in the office, I lift open the MacBook Pro 17in case and. So I took another peek at the colourful new HP Pavilion notebook I’d bought as my daughter’s going-to-uni present. Quad core as standard: Apple's 17in MacBook Pro

Apple macbook pro 2011 review