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Apple updated its flagship MacBook Pro notebooks with Intel Core 2 Duo processors today, claiming an enormous leap in performance over the previous generation.

The new 15.4-inch and 17-inch MacBook Pros will contain Intel Merom Core 2 Duo processors, the mobile flavor of the Core 2 lineup. 17-inch MacBook pros will come standard with a 2.33 Ghz processor, while the 15.4-inch notebooks will have a 2.16 Ghz chip for the base model, with an option to upgrade to 2.33 Ghz.

Overall Apple claims that the change in processor will give the MacBook Pro lineup a 39 percent increase in performance over the previous generation. It remains to be seen whether than number indicates an increase in overall system performance or a single, errant benchmark that happened to perform exceptionally well with the new Merom chips. Either way Intel's Core 2 Duo is such a potent piece of silicon that it currently has no rival in the consumer market.

The new MacBook Pros also get a memory upgrade, with the 15.4-inch and 17-inch models boasting 1GB and 2GB of memory respectively. Apple's trademarked Superdrive DVD-RW drive also comes standard on both notebooks, with 6x DVD-writing capabilities on the 15.4-inch book and a hefty 8x DVD-writer on the 17-inch.

Apple updated its iMac desktop lineup early in September, employing the desktop version of Intel's Core 2 Duo dubbed Conroe. Benchmarks in the Core-2-Duo-equipped iMac lineup showed a 50-percent increase over its predecessors.Check out Apple's MacBook Pro HomepageRelated Articles

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*Originally published at TechFreep

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Mike Zazaian is the Editor-in-Chief and Webmaster of TechFreep.com, an online publication dedicated to daily technology and science news. He holds a bachelor's degree from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, where he majored in Film and Video studies with a sub-concentration in screenwriting. While only a minority of Mike's formal education encompassed the technology field, he has worked as a web developer, a freelance web designer, and has been a tech enthusiast for the better part of his life.