Apple has warned its retail store employees to expect a “major rush” of employees this week, following the company’s unveiling of new products Monday through Wednesday, says Bloomberg‘s Mark Gurman.
Gurman commented in his Power On newsletter on Sunday, says some Apple retail employees see Apple is preparing to see foot traffic “on par with what happens before the debut of new iPhones in the fall.” The stores will in a word be “crowded.” Gurman’ says at least on eof the new products will have “major mainstream appeal.”
One Apple product that could spur such foot traffic is the widely-expected new entry-level MacBook. Gurman says Apple believes the new MacBook is an “incredible value” that will “drive a serious number of switchers from Windows machines and Chromebooks.”
The new entry-level MacBook is expected to be priced in the $599 to $799 range in the United States, with a $100 discount available for college students and educators.
The new MacBook is expected to be powered by the iPhone 16 Pro’s A18 chip, with no M-series chip upgrade availability. While the new laptop certainly won’t be attractive to developers, creators, and other “power users,” the new MacBook should prove quite attractive to folks looking for a more reasonably-price entry into the world of MacBooks.
In addition to a lower-level of processing power, the new MacBook will also likely have only 8GB of RAM (the minimum of Apple Intelligence), a smaller display, and standard USB-C ports in place of Thunderbolt ports.
The new MacBook’s shell is expected to be made out of aluminum, forged with “a new manufacturing process that allows the shells to be forged more quickly.” “Fun” color options are rumored to be blue, green, pink, and yellow.
The new MacBook is also expected to lack Apple’s new N1 chip, and SSD storage options will likely be limited to 256 GB and 512 GB, using slower SSD modules to keep costs down.
The new MacBook on the block is also expected to lack support for high impedance headphones, no True Tone display, a less bright display, no backlit keyboard, and no support for fast charging.