Apple MacBook Pro MC374LL/A 13.3-Inch Laptop Reviews
Other products by Apple Computer Ratting 4.5 Out of 5.0 Special Offer Total New 19 Total Use 14
Amazon.com Product Description
Carved from a single block of aluminum, the MacBook Pro is a true engineering achievement. Its patented unibody enclosure is the product of precise machining. The new energy-efficient architecture in the MacBook Pro, gives you dramatically longer battery life. On a single charge, the battery in the new 13-inch MacBook Pro lasts up to 10 hours, and you’ll get up to 1000 full charge and discharge cycles — that’s nearly three times the lifespan of typical notebook batteries. MacBook Pro gives you more options for high-performance graphics, starting with the new NVIDIA GeForce 320M integrated graphics processor in the 13-inch model. It’s up to 80 percent faster than the previous generation and is even more energy-efficient for everyday tasks like writing email and surfing the web. Every MacBook Pro has a pristine LED-backlit display with wide-angle viewing and a color gamut usually seen only on a desktop display. So whether you’re watching a movie or making one, you’ve got the perfect canvas. The ultrathin, seamless glass enclosure makes the display strong and durable. And because it’s power efficient and free of mercury and arsenic, this display is greener than ever. The 13-Inch MacBook Pro has advanced Intel Core 2 Duo processors. It also comes standard with a large hard drive offering up to 250 or 320GB of storage capacity, so there’s plenty of room for your photo libraries, video projects, and files. And of course all MacBook Pros come standard with Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard Operating System and iLife.
Combining advanced NVIDIA integrated graphics technology along with an Intel Core 2 Duo processor, the 13-inch Apple MacBook Pro is faster than ever and will keep you working longer away from power cords with an enhanced battery life of up to 10 hours of battery life. As with previous models, the new MacBook Pro features a precision unibody enclosure crafted from a single block of aluminum, creating a thin and light mobile computing workhorse (less than 1 inch thin and just 4.5 pounds) that’s also highly durable. And it includes a 13.3-inch, LED-backlit glass display (instead of an LCD panel) as well as a glass trackpad that doesn’t include a button (for larger tracking area) that features Apple’s Multi-Touch technology.
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With 4 GB of memory and a 250 GB hard drive now standard, this is the most powerful 13-inch MacBook Pro yet. It also comes pre-loaded with Apple’s Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard operating system–an operating system custom-designed for the advanced technology inside–and it also comes with the iLife ’09 suite of applications, including iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand, and iTunes. Specification Highlights
What’s in the Box |
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Key Features
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A New Standard for Performance and Portability
The new 13-inch MacBook Pro features advanced NVIDIA integrated graphics technology along with a faster Intel Core 2 Duo processor. That makes for the ultimate combination of performance, portability, and battery life–up to 10 hours–without adding an ounce to the slimmest, lightest MacBook Pro.
With the 1066 MHz frontside bus and 3 MB of shared L2 cache of the Intel Core 2 Duo processor, all your applications will run faster and more efficiently than you thought possible. The 13-inch MacBook Pro also features the new NVIDIA GeForce 320M integrated graphics processor with 48 processing cores–three times as many as before. This results in a huge difference when using 3D games and graphics-intensive applications. And when you’re not, you’ll benefit from a new energy-efficient architecture that uses up to 40 percent less power for everyday tasks like writing email and surfing the web.
Unibody Design
Traditionally, notebooks are made from multiple parts. With the MacBook Pro all of those parts with just one part–the breakthrough unibody enclosure. Every MacBook Pro starts its life as a single block of aluminum, which is precisely machined into the basic unibody design. Another pass and the unibody takes shape. Another, and the integrated keyboard emerges. When you pick up a new MacBook Pro, you immediately notice the entire enclosure is thinner and lighter. And it feels strong and durable–perfect for life inside (and outside) your briefcase or backpack.
LED-Backlit Display
LCD displays typically use cold cathode fluorescent lamps, or CCFLs, to create light and project a picture onto a screen, and this creates two problems–the lamps require more space and they take more time to warm up to full brightness. The MacBook Pro uses LED backlight technology to create the same amount of brightness in less space. And unlike fluorescent lamps, an LED backlight reaches maximum brightness instantly. Finally, a new, smaller iSight camera is concealed behind the display for quick access to video chats and snapping pics for uploading to social networks.
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Additionally, conventional CCFL displays use mercury to create a backlight and arsenic to prevent irregularities in the glass. The LED-backlit display on the MacBook Pro, on the other hand, is both mercury- and arsenic-free. LED backlight technology also conserves energy: This display requires up to 30 percent less power than a CCFL display.
Buttonless Multi-Touch Trackpad
With no button on the durable glass trackpad, there’s more room to track and click–left, right, center, and everywhere in between. Without a separate button, the spacious trackpad gives your hands plenty of room to move on the large, silky glass surface. It also incorporates Multi-Touch gestures–including swipe, pinch, rotate, and four-finger swipe–and even more natural inertial scrolling–an intuitive way to scroll through large photo libraries, lengthy documents and long web sites. If you’re coming from a right-click world, you can right-click with two fingers or configure a right-click area on the trackpad.
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Long-Lasting Battery
The new energy-efficient architecture in every MacBook Pro, along with automatic graphics switching, gives you dramatically longer battery life. On a single charge, the battery in the new 13-inch MacBook Pro lasts up to 10 hours. And you’ll get up to 1000 full charge and discharge cycles–that’s nearly three times the lifespan of typical notebook batteries. Advanced chemistry and Adaptive Charging allow the battery to maintain charging capabilities longer and determine the optimal way to charge the battery’s cells. Because the battery lasts up to five years, MacBook Pro uses just one battery in the same time a typical notebook uses three. That makes for less waste. And that, in turn, makes for one environmentally friendly battery.
Environmental Considerations
Apple has worked hard to eliminate many of the toxins that are a common part of computer manufacturing. Apple engineers removed the majority of brominated flame retardants (BFRs) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) from circuit boards, internal cables, connectors, insulators, adhesives, and more in the MacBook Pro.
Because Apple makes both the hardware and the software for the MacBook, they’re designed to work together to produce a smarter product that uses less electricity. For instance, to reduce energy consumption, the hard drive spins down automatically when inactive. MacBook Air also decides which processor–CPU or GPU–is best suited to efficiently perform a task. The LED-backlit display in the MacBook Pro is another feature that plays an important part in conserving energy, consuming 30 percent less power than conventional LCD displays. And the display is designed to dim when you enter a darkened room.
The MacBook Pro meets the stringent low power requirements set by the EPA, giving it ENERGY STAR qualification. ENERGY STAR 5.0 sets significantly higher efficiency limits for power supplies and aggressive limits for the computer’s typical annual power consumption.
Also, every MacBook Pro model has earned the highest rating of EPEAT Gold. The Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool, or EPEAT, evaluates the environmental impact of a product based on how recyclable it is, how much energy it uses, and how it’s designed and manufactured.
Pre-Loaded with Mac OS X Snow Leopard and iLife ’09
Every Mac comes with Mac OS X Snow Leopard, the world’s most advanced operating system, and iLife, Apple’s innovative suite of applications for managing photos, making movies and creating and learning to play music. Snow Leopard builds on a decade of OS X innovation and success with hundreds of refinements, new core technologies and out of the box support for Microsoft Exchange. iLife features iPhoto, to easily organize and manage photos; iMovie with powerful easy-to-use new features such as Precision Editor, video stabilization and advanced drag and drop; and GarageBand which introduces a whole new way to help you learn to play piano and guitar.Installed software
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Technical Details
- 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
- 250 GB Hard Drive, 8x DVD/CD SuperDrive, 4GB DDR3 RAM
- 13.3 inch LED-backlit display, 1280-by-800 resolution
- NVIDIA GeForce 320M graphics processor with 256 MB of shared memory
- Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard Operating System
See more technical details
“Good but can be better” 2010-10-18
By Master91 (Planet Earth)
The MBP is a solid laptop, yet there are a few issues which prevent it from getting a solid rating
- The Core 2 Duo processor is the biggest complaint. It’s late 2010 and a Core 2 Duo processor should not be in a laptop sold at this price. The Core 2 Duo works fine, but its old and everyone else has a Core iX processor.
- The integrated NVIDIA graphics card is good, but once again Apple could have opted for a DX11 card or something like that.
- The 250 GB of hard drive space is not a lot and the 5400 rpm sometimes will slow down if you are performing heavier tasks on it
Hopefully Apple will address all of these issues at this week’s Back to Mac event, and I can switch mines in for the newer ones 
Now the good about the laptop
- The laptop feels really solid. From the moment you first pull it out of the box to everyday usage, it feels really solid. It’s not like the HP junk where the plastic is falling apart. The MBP is on par with the Asus gaming laptops for really well built design
- This laptop is really lightweight. It’s awesome. Really good for on the go
- Really good battery life. The 10 hour is BS, but on OS X, I get about 8 hours of usage, and in Windows 7 on Boot Camp I get about 6 hours of battery life. This is really good
- The backlit keyboard on this thing is awesome. Not too many laptops have backlit keyboards. But the backlights are really useful at night, especially for us college students who are always up at night
- Even though I listed my complaints above, the laptop still performs really well. Whether you are in OS X or in Windows 7 on Boot Camp, you get pretty good performance. Don’t expect this thing to play Crysis on MAX settngs, but I was able to get pretty decent gameplay on Left 4 Dead 2
This laptop overall is a really good buy. I would try to look around for a seller on Amazon who might be selling it cheaper, but even the Amazon price is really good, since there is no tax. This current model is almost at the end of its life cycle, so if you are thinking of buying it, but can wait, wait at least till the October 20 event to see what little Stevie will introduce. Overall, the laptop is a pretty decent offering!
“Nice Laptop for getting work done” 2010-10-15
By Carol Johnson
This is a nice change from the struggling PC that I had become previously addicted to. MY PC would freeze playing my videos the mac played right through them and I edited a little video in imovie just fine. I am pleased and really liking it so far. I will probably upgrade the 4gb memory in a few months when 8gb drops a little in price. Right now 8Gb memory is up there like several hunderd bucks. I notice on sites some folks are complaining that macbooks dont have hi def and really why would apple put hi def into they’re laptops when they own the itunes store and sell movies to download. And most of the time with new blus you get a free digital copy so why would you want to bother caring around the extra discs. I’m gonna let my PS3 stick to playing Blus on my big screen, whats the point in high def on a small screen?. . It was tough to decide between this and a best buy selection that had asus laptops in abundance, the reviews werent great for the vaio thats around the same price. I have used Macs in the past but never owned one. I have to say this is probably my 4th laptop in about 7 years. And all I have to say to apple is WOW this thing is built like a brick house. The one piece is really cool it feels so rugged. I was psyched when everything seem to work okay, including the wireless, right out of the box.
“Back to Mac” 2010-10-14
By Christopher Carrington
This computer brought me back to mac. It is so easy to work on and is very fast. I couldn’t be happier. Get one, you will be very happy.
“my first apple laptop” 2010-10-14
By Mark (San Francisco, CA)
Love this laptop more than any of my windows laptops. I like how you just open it and it instantly turns on (when in suspend mode) and just close it and it goes into suspend mode. The 2.4 gighertz core 2 duo is plenty fast for me. I do with it had a larger harddrive though than the 250gig. The battery is phenomenal but no where near the 10 hours Apple claims but easily gets 6 hours at full brightness. the keyboard works great and the backlight are wonderful. The aluminum chassis is gorgeous. Definiately recommend this over the Macbook Air (cheaper, more harddrive space, DVD burner, twice the battery) and still very thin.
“The Best Ultraportable My Geek Son Can Find” 2010-10-11
By cyharriscat
Oh boy oh boy, it is an awesome laptop. I bought two other Macs for my mother whose account I am borrowing for this review and my father, who has a sister that got the old White MacBook this MacBook Pro replaces. I waited out both the unibody regular MacBooks in the aluminum chassis and the first generation MB990LL/A MacBook Pro and I am so glad I did. Three significant advantages (including one huge one) made the 2010 MC374LL/A the choice: audio out through the Mini-DisplayPort when hooked up through HDMI, with a compatible adapter; inertial scrolling, the better specs being the huge one. I mean, for me, this combines the right CPU speed with the right memory amount out of the box, plus the extra 90GB of HD space allow for a decent Windows 7 Boot Camp partition in the future (although I really don’t want to over-stress my aluminum and glass unibody miracle. I had to use a student loan to get it, but Momma and Daddy say my intense, going to be realized somehow desire to pay my student loans off will build my credit once the process is completed (which unless a freak accident happens and I die or the world comes to an end, it will be completed gosh darn it) and since that much is known, the MacBook Pro, just like the 2.8GHz Core 2 Duo now 4GB RAM 320GB HD ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro 256MB dedicated graphics 8x slot-loading 24-inch Early 2008 iMac, is so worth it.
And I am considering, should we stay on AT&T, buying an iPhone 3GS 8GB model and paying for the 2-year contract up front if I can get the bulk of the money together between now and next Christmas (this Christmas we have to buy AppleCare for the MacBook Pro…)
I had 68k and PowerPC Macs before my 2.8GHz iMac, and I thought the whole Intel thing was stupid. Unfortunately, college required Internet capable Macs or exponentially more expensive Sun workstations one, so I bought Intel Macs and while I don’t like their copyright protection any more than I did before I bought them, I must admit that I was wrong about how the amount of things they could do could make them so “frigging” HANDY!
Oh well, I may not have switched from PC like some people, but I had to admit (however grudgingly) that Intel Macs aren’t totally useless (we started out on an Apple IIe; upgraded to a IIgs, transitioned to a Performa 6116CD; upgraded to a 6400, transitioned to a slot-loading iMac G3, upgraded to a Quicksilver 2001 Power Macintosh G4, transitioned to an iMac 2.8GHz, bought the Quicksilver and iMac portable extensions in a clamshell iBook G3 and a nearly brand-new MacBook Pro 13.3-inch Spring 2010 (the focus of my review) and bought tons of other used Macs in between, so we’re nowhere near recent switchers. We do have to have PCs for a couple of things (primarily as labor-saving devices for the Intel Macs), but we get most everything done on our Macs. [We still don't like the new Apple though, we prefer the less ready-to-obsolete the non-new-tech beleaguered Apple of the 90's, but that's our personal preference.])
Oh, and I am displeased that the MacBook Pro MC374LL/A didn’t get CNET Editor’s Choice kudos like the MB990LL/A predecessor model did. That still steams me.
Hope this helps and have a great day!