Apple announced today that under the hood of the MacBook Pros from here on out will be Core2 Duo processors, starting at the 2.16GHz that topped off the Core Duo lineup and coming in at the top with 2.33GHz, the fastest Core2 Duo processors on the market today. A pleasant surprise right before the holidays, the new Core2 Duo MacBook pros will be shipping in the next week or so, making a rather fitting potential holiday gift for many would be new MacBook Pro owners who have likely been waiting for an announcement just like this before buying their new notebook computers.

Another interesting tidbit about the new notebooks is the return of the Firewire 800 port, markedly missing from the previous generation of MacBook Pros. Apple may just have heard the complaints of Firewire fans who bemoaned the loss of the high-speed data transfer port, and just as well they managed to fit the Firewire controller back on the motherboard without having to expand the size or power requirements of the notebook.

At the same time, would-be MacBook owners will have to wait a bit longer for their upgrades; it seems Apple left the consumer-end notebook out of the announcement today, and will likely not recieve a similar upgrade this year. At the same time though, this makes the difference between the professional line of Apple notebooks and the consumer line of Apple notebooks all that more distinct, and it might be the extra oomph needed to push a few more professionals over the edge. Still, this makes for a non-trivial revision of the notebook line for Apple, as the Core2 Duos require less power, run cooler, and provide more processing power than their predecessors. It’s definitely not a “sell my MacBook Pro and buy a Core2 Duo MacBook Pro” kind of upgrade, but definitely more incentive for those considering a purchase.

[ AppleInsider :: Apple Introduces Core2 Duo MacBook Pro Notebooks ]