USB-C converters to continue to use existing peripherals would add ~$200 to the price tag, and two MBP chargers would be made obsolete. Hard not to be turned off by that kind of change. Also, I am used to the Fkeys and am not in favor of replacing them with the TouchBar.
Ask HN: Would You Upgrade to the New MacBook Pro?
31–40 of 103 posts
Re: Ask HN: Would You Upgrade to the New MacBook Pro?
#32I am amused by all these comments of upgrading 2-3 year old laptops. I must be from an alternate world since I am using a 4 year old Lenovo carbon and it's awesome. I have no plans on replacing it until it just totally dies.
I'm with you, still use my 2010 Macbook Air for a lot of tasks. Works just dandy.
Re: Ask HN: Would You Upgrade to the New MacBook Pro?
#33Nah. Already pretty happy with my Dell XPS 13 running Fedora Linux. I imagine it'll be a couple of years before distros really take advantage of the 3200x1800 screen anyway. Besides, no one who uses Vim is gonna be happy to see the physical Esc key go away.
> Besides, no one who uses Vim is gonna be happy to see the physical Esc key go away. What kind of self-respecting Vim user physically reaches up to the top corner of their keyboard constantly? Even if you have a physical esc key up there you should be hitting ctrl-[ or remaping it onto the capslock. It's wasted motion to constantly pull off home row to hit escape.
Haha, I said the same thing to an emacs buddy who was expressing concerns about vim users, he sounded pissed that real Vim users don't use ESC, or even hjkl keys.
Re: Ask HN: Would You Upgrade to the New MacBook Pro?
#34We're a generation of devs raised by Macs. I'm wondering if another Mac is really the answer we need.
Re: Ask HN: Would You Upgrade to the New MacBook Pro?
#35Nah. Already pretty happy with my Dell XPS 13 running Fedora Linux. I imagine it'll be a couple of years before distros really take advantage of the 3200x1800 screen anyway. Besides, no one who uses Vim is gonna be happy to see the physical Esc key go away.
People who use Vim usually re-map caps-lock to ESC at a minimum, and possibly other uses. Mine is esc by itself, ctrl with any other key. I do remap the function bar right now, though. That will take some getting used to.
As I posted in another thread, I think it may actually be fine to have a different "feel" (touch vs physical) for escape, which is a very special key for us vim users (assuming you don't have it remapped).
Re: Ask HN: Would You Upgrade to the New MacBook Pro?
#36Yes, my personal machine is a late 2008 Macbook Pro 15". The screen alone on the new one would be an amazing, huge upgrade. The touch bar looks very cool to me. I think it's a great idea that will get copied (poorly) by other laptop manufacturers in a year or two. A lot of good ideas look bad at first. Remember the eternal warning of CmdrTaco's iPod review. Not that the touch bar must be good because it's getting pan…
I continue to dislike touch-screen interfaces and would love to have a hardware smartphone keyboard back. For me that has not changed since 2007.
Re: Ask HN: Would You Upgrade to the New MacBook Pro?
#37Unfortunately Windows is not an option (for me) and Desktop Linux in 2016 can still be a huge pain in the ass. I hear good things about the Dell XPS 13" Developer Edition (shipping with Ubuntu), maybe i will give that a try at same point.
So yeah, at the end of the day i probably will still buy the rMBP. There is no alternative at this point. But i am not happy with the direction Apple is going. Cutting ports, selling useless stupid gimmicks for $300 price bump instead of aiming for a better price/value. Not good.
Re: Ask HN: Would You Upgrade to the New MacBook Pro?
#38Late 2013 MBP, would like something that I can add a Razer Core to for gaming, so yes, I'll get the mid-range 13" one, but I'm going to buy abroad because the UK prices are 10% higher than US/HK/etc.
Re: Ask HN: Would You Upgrade to the New MacBook Pro?
#39Yeah, but I'm going to need to get a flash drive that has USB a on one side and USB c on the other. However, for the 90% of the time that I use it at my desk, I'll be happy with the graphics perforamnce and can have any function keys I want with an external keyboard. For the 10% where I need adaptors, I'll just suck it up.
It seems that in the long run, all other hardware decisions apple has made were right. We'll see about the headphone jack on the iPhone and the USB c on the new laptop.
Has anyone seen any specs on the charging time for the new MacBook Pro?
Re: Ask HN: Would You Upgrade to the New MacBook Pro?
#40Nah. Already pretty happy with my Dell XPS 13 running Fedora Linux. I imagine it'll be a couple of years before distros really take advantage of the 3200x1800 screen anyway. Besides, no one who uses Vim is gonna be happy to see the physical Esc key go away.
People who use Vim usually re-map caps-lock to ESC at a minimum, and possibly other uses. Mine is esc by itself, ctrl with any other key. I do remap the function bar right now, though. That will take some getting used to.
I keep seeing posts about remapping but I honestly don't get it why users should be forced to hacks and compromises to replace functionality which had no reason to be removed in the first place.