MacBook Pro With Touch Bar Has Non-Upgradeable SSD Chips, Users Report

The base MacBook Pro variant teardown has been done extensively, and all reports bear good news - the SSD is removable and replaceable. This is important because in the future, if users want to upgrade their SSD, they can do so. However, the MacBook Pro with Touch Bar doesn't follow the same pattern. Apparently, some owners have found that the SSD chips in the Touch Bar variant are soldered to the logic board.

MacRumors readers have discovered that 'memory chips and controller are soldered, seemingly on both sides of the motherboard'. This is problematic, as users do not have the option to upgrade their storage if they so desire. To put it simply, the amount of storage you choose at the time of purchase, cannot be upgraded later on, and you will be stuck with that much flash storage for the rest of the product's life.

This soldering of SSD chips is seen for the first time on the MacBook Pro lineup. It is important to reiterate that the new MacBook Pro without the Touch Bar has removable SSDs, as per official teardown reports. The only other laptop from Apple to have the memory chip soldered to the logic board is the 12-inch MacBook.

This also puts emphasis on backing up of data that is stored on MacBook Pro, to prevent any data loss due to a logic board failure. The MacBook Pro with Touch Bar hasn't gone through any official teardowns by iFixit and the others, and more clarity on its repairability will be known then.

In the meanwhile, another MacBook Pro with Touch Bar user said that once the laptop was opened up, a large gap was noticed around the batteries - almost as if smaller batteries were used in the slot. Separately, The Verge and Business Insider report that the MacBook Pro with Touch Bar units they tested had significantly lower battery life than advertised. While Apple claims a 10-hour battery life, the two publications reported battery life of 5-6 hours and 6-8 hours respectively.