According to Apple Insider, the Sandy Bridge issues Intel is facing has changed Apple’s plans for the upcoming generation of MacBook Pros:
The impact on Apple due to the setback hasn’t been immediately clear. However, one person familiar with the matter tells AppleInsider that some — not all — of the company’s upcoming MacBook Pros were affected by the situation. According to this person, the Mac maker elected to make minor tweaks to the logic boards of those models, but that those changes would translate to a delay of less than two weeks.
With numerous conflicting reports about these machines out there, this latest report makes a good bit of sense to me. Apple isn’t likely to ship notebooks with a hardware work-around in place, so a more modest spec bump may hold customers over until things can get straightened out with Sandy Bridge.
With rumors of a chassis design change in the works, a more modest spec bump may mean more of the same, visually at least, for the MacBook Pro line.
The MacBook Pro family got some new CTO options in October, but hasn’t seen a significant refresh since April 2010.
