Apple MacBook Pro 14″ (M4 Pro or M4 Max) vs Apple MacBook Pro (15-inch, Late 2011)
Better figure, where one is clearly better
| AppleMacBook Pro 14″ (M4 Pro or M4 Max) | AppleMacBook Pro (15-inch, Late 2011) | |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | ||
| Released | November 2024 | October 2011 |
| Display | ||
| Screen size | 14.2″ | 15.4″ |
| Resolution | 3024 × 1964 (better) | 1440 × 900 |
| Panel | Mini-LED | – |
| Refresh rate | 120 Hz | – |
| Brightness | 1,000 nits | – |
| HDR peak brightness | 1,600 nits | – |
| Touchscreen | No | No |
| Display type | Liquid Retina XDR display | 15.4-inch LED-backlit glossy widescreen display, 1440 × 900 native resolution and millions of colours. Optional 1680 × 1050 high-resolution glossy or antiglare display. Panel technologies, refresh rate and brightness unpublished by Apple; higher-resolution screens remain in details rather than unverified panel variants. |
| Pixel density | 254 ppi | – |
| Colour range | Wide colour (P3); 1 billion colours | – |
| Screen finish | Standard, or nano-texture as an option | – |
| Display features | 1,000,000:1 contrast; 1,000 nits sustained full-screen XDR brightness; ProMotion up to 120 Hz, with fixed 47.95, 48, 50, 59.94 and 60 Hz rates; True Tone | – |
| Performance | ||
| Processor | Apple M4 Pro or Apple M4 Max | Intel Core i7-2675QM, Intel Core i7-2760QM or Intel Core i7-2860QM |
| CPU cores | 12, 14 or 16 | 4 |
| CPU threads | – | 8 |
| Graphics | 16-core GPU, 20-core GPU, 32-core GPU or 40-core GPU | AMD Radeon HD 6750M (512 MB) or AMD Radeon HD 6770M (1 GB) |
| Memory | 24 GB, 36 GB, 48 GB or 128 GB (better) | 4 GB or 8 GB |
| Storage | 512 GB to 8 TB (better) | 128 GB to 750 GB |
| CPU | M4 Pro: 12-core CPU with 8 performance cores and 4 efficiency cores, or 14-core CPU with 10 performance cores and 4 efficiency cores; M4 Max: 14-core CPU with 10 performance cores and 4 efficiency cores, or 16-core CPU with 12 performance cores and 4 efficiency cores | Quad-core Intel Core i7 at 2.2 GHz or 2.4 GHz with 6 MB L3 cache; optional 2.5 GHz with 8 MB L3 cache. Exact i7-2675QM and i7-2860QM identities confirmed by EveryMac; i7-2760QM by Notebookcheck’s tested upper model. Optional 2.5 GHz rows retain the upper AMD graphics combination; unproven lower-GPU pairings omitted. |
| GPU | 16-core or 20-core (M4 Pro), 32-core or 40-core (M4 Max) GPU with hardware-accelerated ray tracing; Media Engine with H.264, HEVC, ProRes and ProRes RAW acceleration and AV1 decode, with two video encode and two ProRes engines on M4 Max | Lower model: AMD Radeon HD 6750M with 512 MB GDDR5. Upper model: AMD Radeon HD 6770M with 1 GB GDDR5. Both also use Intel HD Graphics 3000 with 384 MB DDR3 shared memory and automatic graphics switching. |
| AI engine | 16-core Neural Engine | – |
| Memory type | Unified memory; M4 Pro takes 24GB or 48GB; M4 Max takes 36GB (14-core CPU) or 48GB, 64GB or 128GB (16-core CPU) | 4 GB of 1333 MHz DDR3 in two SO-DIMM slots; configurable to 8 GB. |
| Memory bandwidth | 273 GB/s (M4 Pro), 410 GB/s (M4 Max with 32-core GPU) or 546 GB/s (M4 Max with 40-core GPU) | – |
| Storage type | SSD, configurable up to 4 TB (M4 Pro) or 8 TB (M4 Max) | Lower base: 500 GB 5400-rpm hard drive; upper base: 750 GB 5400-rpm hard drive. Maker CTO options: 750 GB at 5400 or 7200 rpm, or 128 GB, 256 GB or 512 GB SSD. Configuration rows distinguish capacities and CPUs/GPUs; both 750 GB speeds share one capacity row. 8× slot-loading SuperDrive supports DVD±R DL, DVD±RW and CD-RW. |
| Battery and size | ||
| Battery life (maker's claim) | Up to 22 hours | Up to 7 hours |
| Battery capacity | 72.4 Wh | 77.5 Wh (better) |
| Weight | 1.6 kg (better) | 2.54 kg |
| Thickness | 15.5 mm (better) | 24.1 mm |
| Width × depth | 312.6 × 221.2 mm | 364 × 249 mm |
| Battery life detail | M4 Pro up to 22 hours video streaming and 14 hours wireless web; M4 Max up to 18 hours video streaming and 13 hours wireless web; lithium-polymer battery | Built-in 77.5 Wh lithium-polymer battery; up to 7 hours wireless web in Apple’s test. Reference weight varies by configuration and manufacturing process. |
| Charger | 70 W USB-C Power Adapter included with the 12-core-CPU M4 Pro; 96 W with the 14-core-CPU M4 Pro and M4 Max | 85 W MagSafe Power Adapter with cable management |
| Fast charging | With the 96 W USB-C Power Adapter | – |
| Materials | 100% recycled aluminium enclosure; 35% recycled content overall | Aluminium unibody enclosure and glass trackpad |
| Colours | Space Black, Silver | Silver |
| Connections | ||
| Ports | 3 × Thunderbolt 5, HDMI, SD card slot, MagSafe 3, headphone jack | 2 × USB-A, MagSafe, headphone jack, SD card slot, Ethernet, Thunderbolt |
| Wi-Fi | Wi-Fi 6E | 802.11n; compatible with 802.11a/b/g |
| Bluetooth | 5.3 | 2.1 + EDR |
| Webcam | 12MP Center Stage | FaceTime HD camera |
| Operating system | macOS | macOS |
| Port detail | 3 × Thunderbolt 5 (USB-C) with charging, DisplayPort 2.1, Thunderbolt 5 and USB 4 (up to 120 Gb/s); HDMI (up to 8K 60 Hz or 4K 240 Hz) with multichannel audio output; SDXC card slot; MagSafe 3; 3.5 mm headphone jack with high-impedance headphone support | One Thunderbolt port up to 10 Gb/s, two USB 2.0 ports up to 480 Mb/s, one FireWire 800 port up to 800 Mb/s, Gigabit Ethernet, SDXC card slot, MagSafe, separate audio line-in and headphone/audio line-out ports, and Kensington lock slot. Thunderbolt provides native Mini DisplayPort output; DVI, VGA, dual-link DVI and HDMI require separate adapters. |
| External displays | M4 Pro up to two at 6K 60 Hz over Thunderbolt, or one at 6K 60 Hz over Thunderbolt and one at 4K 144 Hz over HDMI, or one at 8K 60 Hz or 4K 240 Hz over HDMI; M4 Max up to four (three at 6K 60 Hz over Thunderbolt and one at 4K 144 Hz over HDMI), or three (two at 6K 60 Hz plus one at 8K 60 Hz or 4K 240 Hz over HDMI); all alongside the built-in display | Built-in display plus one external display up to 2560 × 1600, both at millions of colours; dual display and video mirroring. |
| Keyboard | Backlit Magic Keyboard, 78 (US) or 79 (ISO) keys including 12 full-height function keys | Full-size backlit keyboard with 78 US or 79 ISO keys, 12 function keys and four arrow keys. |
| Trackpad | Force Touch trackpad | Multi-Touch trackpad supports inertial scrolling, pinch, rotate, swipe, three- and four-finger swipe, tap, double-tap and drag. |
| Speakers | High-fidelity six-speaker sound system with force-cancelling woofers; wide stereo; Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos | Stereo speakers with subwoofers |
| Microphones | Studio-quality three-mic array with directional beamforming | Omnidirectional microphone under the left speaker grille |
| Biometrics | Touch ID | – |
| In the box | 14-inch MacBook Pro, 70 W (12-core-CPU M4 Pro) or 96 W USB-C Power Adapter, USB-C to MagSafe 3 Cable (2 m), polishing cloth (nano-texture display only) | MacBook Pro, display cleaning cloth, 85 W MagSafe power adapter, AC wall plug, power cord and documentation; OS X Lion and iLife. |
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