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Why the M1 Mac Pro may be dead after all

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Now that the M2 MacBook Air is on sale, more news has surfaced about Apple’s prior plans to release a new Mac Pro before the end of the year.

M2 MacBook Air Drama vs Mark Gurman: What went WRONG?! ?

Bloomberg journalist Mark Gurman recently revealed in an interview with YouTube channel Max Tech that Apple had a Mac Pro model featuring its M1 proprietary silicon but scrapped the project in favor of a future Mac Pro‌, which will feature an “M2 Extreme” chip.

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Had Apple announced an M1 Mac Pro, it likely would have been unveiled at WWDC, alongside the M2 MacBook Air. However, Gurman expects the brand will announce this “M2 Extreme” Mac Pro later this year and release it in 2023, potentially in the spring or summer.

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These details might coincide with others Gurman shared about Apple’s product road map shortly after the M2 MacBook Air announcement in June. Once the second-generation silicon was officially revealed, the journalist indicated there might already be M2 Pro and M2 Max MacBook Pros planned for a launch later this year. He claims the laptops go by the codenames, J414 and J416, which indicate their 14-inch and 16-inch displays.

Apple has similarly released M1 Pro, M1 Max, and M1 Ultra chips after the release of the original M1 chip, which seems to pair with different product series, whether they be laptops, desktops, or professional-focused, creative-focused, low-end, or top-tier devices.

If the “M2 Extreme” is anything like prior M1 chip updates, it could be made of multiple M2 chips fused together. Or it could be an M2 chip with additional GPU cores, in addition to a security chip, AI chip updates, and other tweaks to make it sound like an upgrade.

Apple's M2 MacBook Air is super thin and light.

With the M2 MacBook Air now on sale, it is also possible Apple might transition its focus to M2 silicon and no longer introduce any new products with M1 silicon to the market. That might have been the point of scrapping the M1 Mac Pro launch at WWDC.

The last M1 series product was the Mac Studio computer, which was released in March running the M1 Ultra chip.

Gurman has also said previously that Apple has an M3 chip in its product road map, which might pair with a future iMac, in addition to other products.

Additionally, the journalist noted in the interview that the brand currently had no plans to update its Mac Mini computer, likely due to the similarities to the Mac Studio.

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Fionna Agomuoh
Fionna Agomuoh
Computing Writer
Fionna Agomuoh is a technology journalist with over a decade of experience writing about various consumer electronics topics…
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