Apple refreshes MacBook Pros with battery and graphics boost

Apple has refreshed its MacBook Pro line-up, bringing the laptops up to date by including Intel's latest processors, better battery life and enhanced graphics capabilities.

The 13-, 15- and 17-inch laptops feature a new multitouch trackpad that supports inertial scrolling. Also found on the iPhone and other smartphones, this feature lets the user scroll at different speeds that depend on the power of their flicking action.

Apple claims battery life of between 8-10 hours for the various models, with replacement batteries costing £99 or £139, including VAT.

The new 13-inch MacBook Pro uses Nvidia's 48-core GeForce 320M graphics processor. Apple said this helps give the laptop 80 percent faster graphics than the previous model, which used Nvidia's 9400M GPU.

The notebook has a 13.3-inch, widescreen, 1,280x800-pixel display.

There are two versions of the 13-inch notebook: one with a 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo processor and a 250GB hard drive for £999; and one with a 2.66GHz Core 2 Duo and 320GB hard drive for £1,249. Both versions come with 4GB of RAM and 10 hours of battery life.

The 15-inch MacBook Pro has a resolution of 1,440x900 pixels, although an optional high-resolution 1,680x1,050-pixel display is also available.

Apple has put integrated Intel HD graphics and Nvidia GeForce GT 330M discrete graphics, with 256MB of VRAM, into the 15-inch MacBook Pro. The laptop offers automatic switching between the two graphics types. Apple said it is using its own technology for this, suggesting that the company is not using Nvidia's Optimus technology.

There are three versions of the 15-inch MacBook Pro: a 2.4GHz Core i5 version with a 320GB hard drive for £1,499; a 2.53GHz Core i5 version with a 500GB hard drive for £1,649; and a 2.66GHz Core i7 version with a 500GB hard drive for £1,799. All feature 4GB of RAM.

The 17-inch MacBook Pro features similar graphics processing capabilities to the 15-inch version. It has a higher resolution of 1,920x1,200 pixels.

Like the mid-size MacBook Pro, the 17-inch version offers 8-9 hours of battery life. It comes in only one off-the-shelf version, which has a 2.53GHz Core i5 processor and a 500GB hard drive for £1,899. A 2.66GHz Core i7 processor can be installed as built-to-order option.