The new MacBook Pro could easily be mistaken for its predecessor. That said, there are definitely some significant differences.

Like the Airs, the Retina MacBook Pro has given up its wired Ethernet port, but it comes with a few others to help earn it that “Pro” label. In addition to two USB 3.0 ports, an SD card reader, and a combination headphone/input jack, it includes a full-size HDMI port and two Thunderbolt ports that power users can count on to get their wired Ethernet and FireWire ports back if they really need them.

These are the first Macs shipping with Thunderbolt 2 ports. Great if you plan on buying a 4K display.

Those two ports have been upgraded to Thunderbolt 2 courtesy of Intel’s DSL5520 controller, and this is the first shipping Mac that uses the new version of the high-speed interface. The controller includes four Thunderbolt channels, which can provide data bandwidth of up to 20Gbps to each port (or 10Gbps per channel).

The original Thunderbolt used four 10Gbps channels too, but they were separated differently—the controllers provided two sets of 10Gbps channels, and the new ones provide one set of 20Gbps channels. Thunderbolt 2 additionally adds support for the DisplayPort 1.2 spec, which is necessary to support 4K output, though according to Apple’s spec sheet each Thunderbolt port can only support a single 2560×1600 display at once (for a total of three displays, including the laptop’s). The Retina MacBook Pro provides 4K video output through HDMI—that port supports 3840×2160 displays at 30Hz and 4096×2160 displays at 24Hz.

The biggest issue is the Retina display. Most of the mainstream apps support retina graphics, but outside that core, there are many that do not. Most web sites fit that latter category as well.

The biggest problem at this point is actually the Web itself. Having Chrome, Firefox, and Safari Retina-optimized means that text looks smooth and sharp regardless of the browser you’re using, but most sites still use lower-resolution images that look soft and vaguely blurry on a Retina screen. This situation should continue to improve now that high-density displays are proliferating in Windows laptops and Web standards are catching up, but for now browsing is still the least consistent thing about using a Retina Mac.

Lots more good stuff in this review.

If you are considering the highest-end Retina MacBook Pro, you might want to take a read of this review from The Verge.