MacBook Pros (Creative Commons)

Apple unveiled its newest MacBook Pro with Retina display Monday at its annual developers conference (WWDC). The computer is being hailed as thinner, faster and "the best computer Apple has ever made."

PC Magazine reported some of the specs:

• Apple says this is the world's highest resolution notebook displays, with a resolution of 220 pixels per inch. The basic screen technology has improved as well, so it is still glossy but with less glare.
• The MacBook Pro with Retina display is 0.71 inches thin, about the same size as the MacBook Air, and weighs 4.46 pounds. It has quad-core processors from Intel's third-generation Core family, starting with the 2.3 GHz Core i7 and going up to a 2.7 GHz model, with turbo speeds of up to 3.2 GHz. It includes Nvidia GT 650M graphics (Kepler), with up to 16GB of 1600 GHz memory, up to 768 GB of Flash storage. Apple claims up to seven hours of battery life, or 30 days of standby.
• Other features include an SD card slot, HDMI (finally), two USB 3.0 ports, a thinner Mag Safe power slot, and two Thunderbolt ports (and optional cables for connecting Firewire 800 and Gigabit Ethernet to Thunderbolt). It also will have a glass trackpad, backlit keyboard, 802.11n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Facetime HD camera, dual microphones, and improved stereo speakers.

The base price (including a 2.3 Ghz quad-core Core i7 processor, 8GB of RAM, 1GB of graphics memory, and 256GB of Flash storage) is $2,199 but can be as much as $3,749 with all the added features.

“It will likely take rivals a year or two to catch up,” Forrester analyst Frank Gillet told Wired. “Anybody can go buy the processors from Intel, but even the track pads from these companies can’t match Apple. Apple has more discipline and control over every aspect of these machines, so it’s tough for the other guys, the Windows guys, to compete.”

Read more at PC Magazine and Wired.

Reach Managing Editor Paige Brettingen here.