a full 18 inches?!

[jayryco]

This is me speculating but with the recent announcements at CES and the release of so many 18inch laptops, it seems that tech companies believe the general public want these larger screen laptops again. Given most of these are indeed gaming laptops but gaming laptops are more subtle than they have ever been, with far more clean design than in the past, they are easily for any power user needing portability.

Is this something Apple could also potentially be interested in again? I remember they used to have a 17inch about a decade ago.

Perhaps the larger form factor could allow for the more powerful Ultra chips to fit inside and get cooling? Potentially M4 Ultra models? And not to mention the other benefits of increased real estate.
Indeed it could likely complicate Apple's lineup even further and even disrupt the sale of their own laptops?

Anyways just lots of speculating as I was seeing all the CES announcements.

 

[M3Stang]

I would love a 17". I have a collection of 17" PowerBook G4s and early MacBook Pros. I remember wanting one so bad as a middle school kid. Just bought an M3 Pro 16" and its pretty darn close to a 17 with them side by side but it would be cool to get back to that size again.

 

[subjonas]

I don’t think it’s likely, but I do want something around that size. But what I really want is a floating screen with pen input. Like this but Mac and actually available:

ConceptD 7 Ezel & ConceptD 7 Ezel Pro | Mobile Workstation | ConceptD Creator | ConceptD | Acer United States

A convertible laptop with six display modes, ideal for 3D graphics artists who need the speed and responsiveness of a desktop in a highly portable format.

www.acer.com

 

[Rnd-chars]

Is this something Apple could also potentially be interested in again?

It’s possible, but so many folks already lament the size and weight of the 16” models. Also, the heat sink on the Ultra chips is massive, and I don’t see how the thermals would work in any sort of thin-ish and portable-ish device. And while I’m sure there are people who would love some sort of larger higher performance-than-a-Max laptop, I doubt there’s enough demand to spin up a whole new form factor. Finally, it seems like an Ultra chip with a massive screen would consume the battery quite quickly.

It’s an interesting idea for sure, but it seems a bit too niche for Apple to prioritize.

 

[JamesMay82]

I'd like one, yeah it's pain working on a small train table and some coffee shop tables. But for me it's nice having the bigger screen while working from home and also when doing presentations to customers at their offices.

Lots of places have TV's when I go to present but no one seems to know how to get them set up lol

 

[jayryco]

It’s possible, but so many folks already lament the size and weight of the 16” models. Also, the heat sink on the Ultra chips is massive, and I don’t see how the thermals would work in any sort of thin-ish and portable-ish device. And while I’m sure there are people who would love some sort of larger higher performance-than-a-Max laptop, I doubt there’s enough demand to spin up a whole new form factor. Finally, it seems like an Ultra chip with a massive screen would consume the battery quite quickly.

It’s an interesting idea for sure, but it seems a bit too niche for Apple to prioritize.

Indeed good points. I suppose they would rather focus more resources into their 'spatial computing' platform as opposed to launching another laptop which could potentially saturate their own lineup and cannibalise itself.
Perhaps if they found a way to reduce the entry costs of their whole lineup to make available a price point for the 18inch but anything above the current 16inch price and it becomes a hard sell.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

All tech trends are towards mobile screens that are bigger. That's why folds & rolls are a thing too. The market must want bigger mobile screens. The trick is how to do it without the creases, hinges, bulk & weight.

I suspect PLENTY of people would like a MB 17", probably a MB 18" and maybe a MB 20"... EXCEPT for how much more those would be priced and the commensurate weight and bulk that comes with bigger sizes.

My guess is that Apple is taking a shot at these kinds of wants with Vpro... which basically delivers a MB screen of ANY size in the same mobile, light-weight package. It can probably also deliver an iPad and iPhone of any size too. No creases, no folds, no hinges, no weight scaling with size, etc.

Else, if MBpro at 16" is "starting at $2499", I would guess that MBpro 18" starts at $2899 if not more and weighs about 15-25% more, etc.

If Vpro works well like that, the concept of putting a lidless MB 14" into the bag with Vpro offers a new take on the classic laptop: the Mac + computer + trackpad part relatively thin & compact and the screen virtualized to any size user needs in the moment... like a modernized Commodore 64 or Amiga 500 "all in one" with separate monitor. TBD.

 

[Queen6]

The 17" MBP was overpriced & didn't differentiate enough from the 15" MBP which resulted in poor sales and was subsequently dropped. Many already dislike the bulk of the current 16", for a 18" MBP to have an impact it would need to offer the Ultra SOC the additional size, weight & pricing would likely only attract a small audience.

Today things are greatly different with secondary, even potable displays being easily available. So I don't see a resurgence of a larger notebook.

Q-6

 

[Rnd-chars]

Perhaps if they found a way to reduce the entry costs

True, but even then I’d wager it’s a relatively small number of people who really need an Ultra over a Max.

If there were justifiable business case for something significantly faster than a Max on the go, I could see Apple going one of two ways. Use Vision Pro to remotely access:

• Your high performance Mac at home/work from wherever you are
• A high performance Mac in the cloud (either provided by Apple or a third party)

The advantages to this:

• No new hardware, which reduces risk and increases ROI of existing products
• Encourages sales and adds value to the Vision line
• Reduces time to market, especially since Vision Pro can already access your Mac locally. In fact, depending on the protocol used, it might be possible today just by properly configuring one’s firewall.

The downsides:

• That obviously depends on connection speed, stream quality/compression and latency, so it could be as good as GeforceNow at its best versus VNC at its worst.
• The other drawback is that it’s going to work poorly when you need to send terabytes of data (think ProRes video) from a local client site where it was captured to your remote Mac.
• This is all actually pretty analogous to what you can do today with a portable Mac (eg, connect from your Air to a your Studio back home), so it’s likely Apple isn’t going to do anything extra to enable this since it basically already exists.

 

[Onimusha370]

Yeah as others have said, I do think the case for an 18 inch MBP is limited, but I would also love one... I made this thread a few years back which you might enjoy reading through on the same topic!

18 inch MBP?

Hey everyone, I was thinking today whether there would still be appetite for a bigger MacBook Pro, i.e. an updated 17 inch like the one from 2006-2011. I personally never owned that monster, but having recently bought an M1 Pro 16 inch MBP, I can't help but think that an even bigger MBP with...

forums.macrumors.com

The only things thats changed since then is the rollout of M2/M3 series chips. I'd say that the likelihood of an Ultra chip being able to fit into an 18" laptop are slim going forwards, as the maximum power draw of the Max chips has actually gone up over time. My M3 Max is regularly drawing 130W under load, so a 260W M3 Ultra would seem pretty insane in a laptop. My dream of an M3 Max 18" variant is still alive though, as it would allow for better cooling than the 16 inch which does get pretty toasty quite quickly now.

I do think the point around the Vision Pro is a good one - if anything I can see people downsizing in the future to the 14 inch and carrying around some sort of Vision device to use as an external monitor. No point lugging round an 18 incher when the 14 inch can have the same chips and give you the same experience in Vision Pro. Interesting times ahead