Apple unveils the M4 Pro chip, making its debut in the new Mac Mini.

The week of Mac announcements chugs along, as Apple introduces the latest addition to its line of first-party silicon. The new M4 is debuting as an upgradeable option for the just-announced palm-size Mac Mini.
Apple unveils the M4 Pro chip, making its debut in the new Mac Mini.

The week of Mac announcements chugs along, as Apple introduces the latest addition to its line of first-party silicon. The new M4 is debuting as an upgradeable option for the just-announced palm-size Mac Mini.

The Pro follows the May release of the original M4. That chip bucked the standard Apple Silicon cycle by debuting on the new iPad Pro prior to its addition to the Mac line.

The new chip is the first Apple Silicon supporting Thunderbolt 5. Moreover, its speed is going to double up compared with the old model, from 120 GB/s to 273 GB/s. This means that there are five Thunderbolt 5 ports for the M4 Pro and Thunderbolt 4 ports for M4.

The M4 Pro is based on the second-gen 3-nanometer tech. Up to 14-core CPU, including 10 performance and four efficiency cores. 20 cores of GPU and a Neural Engine with 16. The base M4 up to 10 core, four performance and six efficiency, up to a 10-core GPU, 16-core Neural Engine

Apple claims that the CPU tops single-threaded performance tests. Meanwhile, the GPU doubles the speed of the system's ray-tracing engine. That's the latest in Apple's efforts to turn the Mac into a formidable gaming machine.

Apple says the new Neural Engine is up to twice as fast as in the last generation. That's going to become increasingly central to the Mac experience as the first wave of Apple Intelligence features hit general availability on Monday.

Notice the M4 Pro is an upsized product, going on sale at a very noticeable premium. The base new Mac Mini M4 will cost $599; going for the Pro configuration puts it at $1,399. Those both go on preorder Tuesday and ship on November 8.

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2024-10-30 18:15:28