With Intel rolling out the new 22nm Ivy Bridge processors late last month it’s inevitable that Apple’s next hardware refresh will include the chips. And signs that Apple is already using Core-i7 Ivy Bridge processors in pre-production machines has now started to appear.
Geekbench, which provides a range of benchmarks for processor and memory performance, also keeps a database of results for different systems. Two new entries have been spotted in this database that point to a new MacBook Pro and iMac.
The first is listed as a MacBookPro9,1, which fits seeing as the existing MacBook Pro laptops are the MacBookPro8,x series. This new model apparently runs an unreleased build of Mac OS X Lion (Build 12A211) and a quad-core Core i7-3820QM clocked at 2.7GHz coupled with 8GB of DDR3 RAM.
The result of using that new Ivy Bridge chip is a Geekbench Score of 12,252. To put that in context, the existing line of MacBook Pros max out around 10,500.
The other entry is a model listed as an iMac13,2 and uses a quad-core Core i7-3770 running at 3.4GHz coupled with 4GB DDR3. The Geekbench Score is 12,183, which is not as impressive a gain as the MacBook Pro shows, but is still higher than the existing iMacs that typically post scores around 11,500.
Both entries point to a MacBook Pro and iMac refresh in the near future. So if you are considering an upgrade to your existing Apple hardware it’s probably worth waiting for the Ivy Bridge update. You will be getting a faster processor, even if it does run hotter than the Sandy Bridge part it replaces.
