Did somebody say Quad-Core? That’s right – with the release of 8th-Gen Intel CPUs, the 2018 MacBook Pro was leaps and bounds faster than any generation before it. You now have an entire 2 extra cores with 4 extra threads, but you have to cough up some extra money and grab a TouchBar model ($1799). The Mid-’17 13″ non-touch bar from the previous year remains with Dual-Core 7th gen Intels. A slightly updated butterfly keyboard comes along too, with silicon underneath the keycaps to address the keyboard issues in 2016/17. Apple also addressed the “flexgate” issue in the 2018 model – an issue affecting 2016/17 models where the display cable was too short, fraying over time and causing display issues.

Butterfly Keyboard Issues

The main deal comes down to the way the butterfly keyboard was designed in and of itself. The hinge in the middle that holds together the two keyboard switch parts, allows a lot of gunk to get into it. Then, the key gets stuck, could repeat-type the same character, or just stop working altogether. In a world of computers, this was and still is a bit of a race car. But like a race car, some of these had to be rebuilt. The 2018 13″ MacBook Pro remedies this somewhat by adding a silicon membrane under each keycap. Despite this, the issue persisted albeit to a lesser degree.

Indeed this body style was among the thinner ‘Books at the time, coming in at 1.49cm, close to the thickness of an M1 iMac. The chassis was not the most suitable for the type of heat output the CPUs and GPUs were giving. The first thing you’d wanna install is Macs Fan Control. This was a plenty-fast computer to use especially for work in 2017, but my recommendation – treat it like a Titanium PowerBook G4, air-dust the keyboard twice daily, and keep the original box if you can.

The Intel UHD/HD line of Integrated Graphics continue trend of “vampire video” (that’s where the video bites into system memory). The 2006 Mac mini was the first Mac in a long, long time to do this, and more Macs started doing this in the late 2000’s – early 2010’s. Apple Silicon GPUs have unified memory, changing the traditional views on how system memory is used and shared throughout the system.

What You Need to Know

• These ‘Books shipped with 8 GB of RAM which is fine for basic tasks, but is increasingly impractical these days. For a serious speed boost, opt for 16 GB of RAM, and more storage. Chipset supports 32 GB of RAM but requires soldiering. Support for 32 GB on Macs have not been confirmed but cannot be denied.
• Multiple NANDs allow for parallel processing/RAID, increasing Read/Write speeds for the main boot drive.

Closed Lid Mode: All Intel ‘Books support “lid closed” (or clamshell) mode, which leaves the built-in display off and dedicates all video RAM to an external display. To used closed lid mode, your ‘Book must be plugged into the AC adapter and connected to an external display and a USB or Bluetooth mouse and keyboard (you might also want to consider external speakers). Power up your ‘Book until the desktop appears on the external display and then close the lid. Your ‘Book will go to sleep, but you can wake it by moving the mouse or using the keyboard. The built-in display will remain off, and the external monitor will become your only display.

To resume use of the internal display, you need to disconnect the external display, put the computer to sleep, and then open the lid. This will wake up your ‘Book and restore use of the built-in display.

Battery life is claimed to be 10 hours of wireless web, 10 hours iTunes movie playback, and up to 30 days of standby time.

eGPU Support

All Core branded products in the 8th generation have AVX 2, so it shouldn’t have issues with hardware acceleration even if the OS is unsupported when using Polaris/Navi eGPUs.

Details

• Announced July 12th 2018
• Apple model number: A1989 (EMC 3214)
• Model ID: MacBookPro15,2
• Order: MR9Q2LL/A (Space Gray 256 GB)
  • MR9U2LL/A (Silver 256 GB)
  • MR9R2LL/A (Space Gray 512 GB)
  • MR9V2LL/A (Silver 512 GB)
• Discontinued May 21st 2019

Mac OS

• Requires macOS 10.13.6 High Sierra (Build 17G2112) or later.

Core System

All CPU options are Quad-Core, Hyper Threaded, 14nm Coffee Lake i5/i7 CPUs.
Sockets supported: FCBGA1528

Legend: L1i = L1 Instruction Cache, L1d = L1 Data cache

• Intel Core i5-8259U ($1799): 2.3 Ghz, 4 Cores, 8 Threads, 3.8 GHz Turbo
  28W TDP, 14nm, Per-Core: 32KB L1i/32KB L1d, 256KB L2, Shared: 6 MB L3
  Comes with: MMX, SSE 4.2, AVX 2, EIST, XD Bit, VT-x, HTT, vPro, SGX
• Intel Core i7-8559U ($2099): 2.7 Ghz, 4 Cores, 8 Threads, 4.5 GHz Turbo
  28W TDP, 14nm, Per-Core: 32KB L1i/32KB L1d, 256KB L2, Shared: 8 MB L3
  Comes with: MMX, SSE 4.2, AVX 2, EIST, XD Bit, VT-x, HTT, vPro, SGX

Memory

• All models: 8/16 GB 2133 MHz PC3- LPDDR3 SDRAM @34.1 GB/s
  • 16 GB (+$200)
  • Chipset supports up to 32GB but requires soldiering. Apple options: < 16 GB.

Video

• All models shipped standard with Intel Iris Plus 655 GPU, 300 MHz – 1.05 Ghz
  • 128 MB eDRAM, 32GB Max VRAM Allocation, PCIe 3.0
• 13″ IPS TFT LED-backlit LCD Retina display, 2560 x 1600 @227PPI
  • Support for millions of colors
  • 500 nits brightness max
  • Wide Color (P3)
• “Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display at millions of colors and”
  • 1x 5120×2880/60Hz, 2x 4093×2304/60Hz Millions, 2x 4K60 Billions of colors

Drives

• 256 GB PCIe SSD (Base model), PCIe v3.0, ~2.5 GB/s Read/Write
  • 512GB (+$200), 1 TB, 2 TB

Expansion/Misc

• Touchbar Models: 4x USB-C style Thunderbolt 3 ports (40 Gb/s), with support for USB 3.1
• 3.5mm headphone jack
• WiFi: 802.11ac (a/g/b/n)
• Bluetooth: BT 4.2 built in
• 720p FaceTime Camera
• 2 Microphones
• High Dynamic Range Stereo Sound, 2x Speakers
• Charging via USB-C

Battery

• 10H Web / 10H iTunes Movies, 30 days standby.
• 58 W/h Li-Ion Polymer battery

Included Peripherals

• MacBook
• 61W Power Brick + Cord

Physical

• Size:H/W/D 0.59 x 11.97 x 8.36 in/1.49 x 30.41 x 21.24 cm
• Weight: 3.02 lb./1.37 kg