UPDATE: 12/11/12
After following Anandtech and their WebKit beta benchmarking awhile back, I've been testing all the newer WebKit builds over the past week and the scrolling gets better and better every few releases. The Pinch to Zoom on text is actually MASSIVELY better than the current actual Safari release. I think it goes a long way in proving, the point that better threading, Intel 4000 drivers or GPU off loading or all the above making everything much snappier on Ivy Bridge SoC retina machines. Surely not too far from an actual Safari update. You can grab a webkit download for free and test it yourself. Updates come out nearly everyday or more often.
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If you don't own the machine don't review it. You are polluting the purpose of why Amazon has these here in the first place. To all the people who have "tried" the machine out for 30 seconds scrolling web pages and claim the 15 inch Retina is a better buy you are wrong. The 15 inch model which I also use at work also depends on the Intel HD4000 for everything on the OS aside from video rendering, Photoshop GPU load or games. The UI performance and web browser scrolling is THE EXACT SAME on the 15 inch model if not worse. You have no business "reviewing" a product without using it for an extended amount of time.
If you are buying this you are paying for the display. That's all there is to it. I reviewed the 15 incher Retina when we received it at the office and just about everything I said there applies exactly as it does here. The unit I purchased with my own money direct from Apple has been configured with the option Core i7 and 256gb SSD. I will reiterate my standings. I am a daily news and sports photojournalist and also an IT Manager. I work long days and long hours on both. I work with Linux, OS X and just about every flavor of Windows desktop or Server. I need fast, portable and reliable machines for tearing through my .NEF images from my D3 and D700. I need something fast and friendly for accessing Windows via Bootcamp. This 13 inch Retina Macbook is exactly what I need. But just like all of Apple products, it is not for everybody. That is why Apple has such a diverse catalog of machines somewhere in there, you will find something for your needs at the right price.
PROS:
This is a Macbook Pro through and through. It has a speedy processor that blows through most tasks. Though it's only a dual core, unlike the quad core 15, I/O is still really fast: startup, Application launches, saving, exporting they are all blisteringly fast for something this small. I can process batches upon batches of RAW images in my now "old" copy of Photoshop CS4 with zero hesitation. It just wipes them out.
Size and weight are PERFECT. The 15 inch Retina is a freaking boat anchor compared to this. It's simply too wide to be truly portable. My 11 inch Macbook Air is a cramped pain to edit more than a few dozen images at a time. This 13 inch Retina weighs marginally more than a 13 inch Macbook Air but not enough that feels significant.
It has a chunky keyboard and comfortable palm rest area.
Who needs a CD drive anymore? Dirt cheap and fast USB flash sticks are quickly becoming the new swappable storage. If you do need one the USB superdrive isn't bad, but a normal 15" model may be better in this price range.
Speakers and sound quality are simply astonishing for a laptop. I can't hear half what I play on my 11 inch air, here, you can Smokey Robinson or Vampire Weekend boom throughout the room with a real attention to clarity and low distortion.
It's built like a vault and feels more expensive than you will ever pay for it.
The display is just stunning. It's silky and subtle you don't notice fully until you see something else. I had a field assignment yesterday and packed in the Macbook Air 11 because I don't yet have a protective case for this Retina. I about threw up in my mouth for how bad terrible even the display on that Air is compared to this. You simply cannot go back.
CONS:
Battery life isn't that great. The five hour range isn't out of the questions, but don't expect a whole lot more than that.
I prefer the Magsafe connector that is parallel to the chassis and not perpendicular like this. That's picky but most Apple users are.
8 gigs of RAM forever sounds scary, but with the fast SSD, it is far less important than it would be with a slow platter drive. The soldered RAM is more of a talking point than actual problem.
THis is not a gaming laptop. PERIOD. I have owned EVERY SINGLE form factor iteration of the Macbook and a good deal of the Pro line, even back to the freaking Powerbook 160. Yes a 160. I can say with authority, the 13 inch Macbooks have NEVER done gaming or video on any level more than passable. I have a fire breathing GTX 670, SSD and 16gb of RAM PC at home for games and we have MacPros at work for FCP and Video.
Though most things are snappy, because of the Ivy Bridge 4000 Graphics, expect Mission Control and some scrolling on graphic heavy websites to drop frames. You can tell there's a struggle to push all those millions of pixels. The 15 incher performs EXACTLY like this. The nVidia discrete graphics acceleration is only called for heavy lifting apps, it isn't used for OS navigation at all. The biggest issue with the graphcs power has nothing to do with Apps the slower UI navigation shows up most obviously in the "MORE SPACE" display res mode of 1680x1050. Same as the 15 incher. This not a deal breaker though.
If you like to use your machines for work this is a fantastic computer in most ways. If you like buying computers to stare at how quickly Launchpad comes up while pressing the button for it really fast, then this is an expensive machine for that. If you want a gaming laptop buy a Razer. This computer does just about everything well, save gaming, with a display that is just in a class of it's own. This is totally in line with Apple's product DNA going back the old late 90s Cinema Display driven off crappy ATI Rage graphics with 16(!)mb of VRAM. If you don't like it, don't buy it.
8/10
UPDATE 3:
After living with this machine day in and day out for some time, I am 100% satisfied with my purchase. I will address the "whys' Apple chose the supposed "cheap" Intel 4000 over another discrete unit. Agree or not, this is why:
Manufacture, dev costs and higher margins. Duh
Lower power, better battery
Apple is in love with integration. They are pushing Intel and trying to give them incentive for bulking up their SoC silicon.
High spec gaming is niche. Fact. Metro 2033 and Battlefield 3 are MIA for Mac and few designers or photographers I know even know they exist.
iOS devices have great integrated graphics and in two years after Haswell and later Broadwell, I would think discrete graphics are facing complete extinction for all X86 mobile computers. Time will tell.
UPDATE 2: Well I had to amend my review. Turns out this thing is in fact pretty good with video. Exporting and manipulating files in FCP is pretty swift. I would say gaming and the CoreAnimation performance are the only two relative weak spots.
UPDATE: Just some Geekbench numbers to toss out there. On the free 32-bit suite, my Retina 13" i7 kicks out a 7759 score, within striking distance of 8580 score for my homebuilt Sandy Bridge i5 3.3ghz quad core with SSD, GTX 670 FTW and 16gb of RAM. Pretty impressive. My Sandy Bridge Air 11" with i7 comparatively scores a 5870. So for the numbers people, this is a reasonable indicator that the machine is a performer. Just not if you're trying to run Battlefield 3 on Ultra in Bootcamp.
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