MacBook Pro with faster performance and new features for pros • Hacker News Board

Re: MacBook Pro with faster performance and new features for pros

#851

Post by gnicholas » Thu, Jul 12, 2018, 10:51 PM UTC

DennisAleynikov wrote: post #766

some_account wrote: post #756

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? Window sucks for me even before I log in first time, with stuff like "wait while we are setting you up, just relax...". I switched to Linux and felt the same feeling you did though. Happiness to be back in a nice new system where I feel at home!

I was extremely unsatisfied with the promise and then the delivery of my surface pro, ended up selling it to a friend with lighter computing needs. The touch bar macbook seems pretty useful itself considering how insanely good its IO is (4 thunderbolt ports!!!). I haven't been able to use it as much and im waiting for better eGPU options to come out. in the mean time I'm stuck just like you in the world of linux. My…

> The touch bar macbook seems pretty useful itself considering how insanely good its IO is (4 thunderbolt ports!!!)

Can a machine have "insanely good IO" if dongles are required for everything from iPhones to hard drives to memory cards? I could agree that a machine with 4 thunderbolt ports on top of the regular complement of power, USB-A, and SD slots would be insanely great. But I'm living the dongle life and not loving it.

Re: MacBook Pro with faster performance and new features for pros

#852

Post by spondyl » Thu, Jul 12, 2018, 10:53 PM UTC

Maybe I'm just not picky enough but as someone running whatever the current Macbook Pro is as my daily work driver, I haven't had any issues with the Esc key not being physical. I'd love to hear issues that users are having since I haven't really been exposed to the discussion around it.

On a side note, I agree the touchbar is useless on its own but BetterTouchTool + some python scripts has made it a neat feature for me. Personally, I use mine to display our on call roster from Pagerduty + the number of open incidents (if any)

Oh, I should mention I do use neovim somewhat lightly and it works alright.

USB C only can be a pain in the butt too

Re: MacBook Pro with faster performance and new features for pros

#853

Post by driverdan » Thu, Jul 12, 2018, 10:54 PM UTC

plopz wrote: post #545

driverdan wrote: post #508

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and there are still some aspects of Windows 10 that annoy me (namely the prevelance of ads) This is why I won't run Windows 10. It's spyware you pay for. No thanks!

Has anyone actually paid for windows 10? Everyone I know got it for free.

Anyone who buys a computer with it pre-installed is paying as part of the computer's cost.

Regardless of its price I still won't willing run spyware on my hardware.

Re: MacBook Pro with faster performance and new features for pros

#854

Post by na85 » Thu, Jul 12, 2018, 10:56 PM UTC

roryisok wrote: post #840

hmottestad wrote: post #767

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not my experience. I have to use windows at work. Got ubuntu running in a vm. Buggy as shit. - sharing screen in hangouts puts chrome on every virtual desktop so now you can't click on chrome to navigate to that desktop - slack crashes silently every 24 hours - virtual desktops is a mess, if one window overflows into another desktop, then when you click on that app ubuntu will take you to the desktop where you see th…

> ctrl-a and ctrl-e what the hell does ctrl-e do?

Emacs shortcuts for beginning and end of line.

Re: MacBook Pro with faster performance and new features for pros

#855

Post by danudey » Thu, Jul 12, 2018, 11:00 PM UTC

some_account wrote: post #756

fcbrooklyn wrote: post #744

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had to replace my 2015 MBP last week, because the kb started failing (it wasn't one of the ones eligible for a free repair, sadly, and I can't live without a machine for however long it takes them to fix it anyway). I was really torn, because although I could reluctantly live without the function keys, the escape key is a complete dealbreaker. After much debate I decided to take a chance on a surface book. I figure…

Really? Window sucks for me even before I log in first time, with stuff like "wait while we are setting you up, just relax...". I switched to Linux and felt the same feeling you did though. Happiness to be back in a nice new system where I feel at home!

My Windows machine at home is awful. Every time I go to boot it up, I have to wait another 5 minutes for it to… whatever it does, finish windows updates I assume.

I shut it down before a trip to Montreal; two weeks later I came back and it wouldn't boot. No idea why. Had to restore from a previous system snapshot and re-install a bunch of drivers and windows updates.

It's a lot better than it was, but there's still strange, ridiculous stuff that crops up seemingly out of nowhere.

Re: MacBook Pro with faster performance and new features for pros

#856

Post by BugsJustFindMe » Thu, Jul 12, 2018, 11:00 PM UTC

publicfig wrote: post #159

BugsJustFindMe wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This complaint always strikes me as trolling of the highest order. As though a 2018 laptop should definitely be designed to accommodate software structured for the limitations of 1970. In 2050, when the world has moved to direct neural interfaces, vi trolls on HN will still be saying "but my escape key!" I've never failed to hit the software escape key on my 15. Not one time since the past rev was released. What is t…

I really think that dismissing this complaint as "trolling" is odd. The escape key is used in a lot of applications, not just vim. It's used to cancel out of actions, it's used to often dismiss modals, it's used across a lot of software for a lot of purposes. And I'm personally someone that misses the key often enough that I wish it was still there. And the escape button on the touchbar is actually not at the same pl…

> And the escape button on the touchbar is actually not at the same place as it is on other keyboards, which makes me think you've maybe not used one of these new touchbars

Nonzero finger width easily makes up for the difference. You don't have to hit the center of it to register a touch. In fact you don't actually need to touch it at all.

Edit: Video proof https://streamable.com/ao18b

> which makes me think you've maybe not used one of these new touchbars

You were saying?

Re: MacBook Pro with faster performance and new features for pros

#857

Post by cytzol » Thu, Jul 12, 2018, 11:03 PM UTC

eridius wrote: post #754

wwweston wrote: post #669

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I know it's trendy to hate on the touchbar The touchbar hate is not trendy . It's based in specific complaints. If, on the balance of how you evaluate the problems and benefits of the touchbar, it's useful for you, great. That doesn't mean the primary reason people express a distaste for the touchbar is essentially a social fashion.

In my experience, most of the people (not all, but most) who complain about the TouchBar haven't actually even used one for any significant period of time. It's definitely trendy.

I’ve got an issue with the Touch Bar that, as far as I can tell, only I am experiencing:

Take your MacBook Pro, put it in a room indoors, and flick the lights on and off in that room several times a second. You’ll notice high CPU usage on a process called “TouchBarServer”, as it tries to adjust itself to the changing light levels so it can display its screen. For some reason, as it does this, it lags the entire rest of the computer: scrolling will freeze every couple of seconds, clicks won’t register, the mouse will lag, and keystrokes will just be ignored.

Why would you do this, you might ask? I work on trains a lot, and I get this same flicker effect as the trees by the tracks go past. As they pass the windows of the train, it’s like a bright light source is being rapidly turned on and off.

I don’t ever use the Touch Bar — nor did I want one — but merely having one renders my laptop unusably slow for two hours every day. I hate this computer.

Re: MacBook Pro with faster performance and new features for pros

#858

Post by cytzol » Thu, Jul 12, 2018, 11:05 PM UTC

jclardy wrote: post #678

aquamo wrote: post #663

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMHO the touchbar requires more effort and distraction to control the brightness and volume. What previously was one key-press to dim/brighten or mute/volume - all without me having to take my focus from the screen now requires a multi-stages process with no tactile feedback. No thanks. Plus the keyboard will likely have the same issues my 2016 version has. I’ve had keys replaced 4 times already.

Just to note because it is non-obvious and not documented - both volume and brightness buttons are one touch. You can just tap and drag up/down to immediately adjust, and you don't have to tap, move over to the slider, tap again, then drag.

Your tip only works for _decreasing_ the volume. If it’s turned all the way down, and you want to turn it up, you can’t tap-and-drag it because the fingerprint sensor gets in the way.

Re: MacBook Pro with faster performance and new features for pros

#859

Post by frenchie14 » Thu, Jul 12, 2018, 11:05 PM UTC

hmottestad wrote: post #767

some_account wrote: post #756

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? Window sucks for me even before I log in first time, with stuff like "wait while we are setting you up, just relax...". I switched to Linux and felt the same feeling you did though. Happiness to be back in a nice new system where I feel at home!

Not my experience. I have to use windows at work. Got ubuntu running in a vm. Buggy as shit. - sharing screen in hangouts puts chrome on every virtual desktop so now you can't click on chrome to navigate to that desktop - slack crashes silently every 24 hours - virtual desktops is a mess, if one window overflows into another desktop, then when you click on that app ubuntu will take you to the desktop where you see th…

I have a similar setup at work, albeit Ubuntu VM in a Mac OS host (I don't like Mac OS). A lot of these sound like VM issues. For example - the copy to clipboard if you select a string. That's how your VM is "sharing" the clipboard between the VM and the host. Try highlighting a string in the VM and then hitting paste in a text editor in the host and you'll see what I mean.

Re: MacBook Pro with faster performance and new features for pros

#860

Post by danudey » Thu, Jul 12, 2018, 11:07 PM UTC

gnicholas wrote: post #851

DennisAleynikov wrote: post #766

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was extremely unsatisfied with the promise and then the delivery of my surface pro, ended up selling it to a friend with lighter computing needs. The touch bar macbook seems pretty useful itself considering how insanely good its IO is (4 thunderbolt ports!!!). I haven't been able to use it as much and im waiting for better eGPU options to come out. in the mean time I'm stuck just like you in the world of linux. My…

> The touch bar macbook seems pretty useful itself considering how insanely good its IO is (4 thunderbolt ports!!!) Can a machine have "insanely good IO" if dongles are required for everything from iPhones to hard drives to memory cards? I could agree that a machine with 4 thunderbolt ports on top of the regular complement of power, USB-A, and SD slots would be insanely great. But I'm living the dongle life and not l…

A machine can have "insanely good IO" if you're not judging it in the context of older hardware, yes.

Four thunderbolt ports is great. One adapter to plug in all of the things you mentioned is also great. iPhones and hard drives don't need dongles, they just need cables. A USB-C to USB-B 3.1 cable is $1.33 from Monoprice; USB 2.0 version is just $1.12. Not too shabby.

For iPhones: the only times I've had to plug my iPhone into my laptop is doing development, but a cable for that only costs $20.

But let's compare it to the previous (2015) MacBook Pro: two USB ports and two Thunderbolt-and-Displayport ports, and HDMI. Five ports total, but no flexibility. Our office was full of DP-to-DVI dongles already, so swapping one dongle for another seems like a no-op. Difference now is that we can buy USB-C monitors which also serve as a power source and a USB hub, meaning one cable to plug in my entire desk. That's something you can't really get on the old MacBooks (at least, not without spending a lot more than it costs to do it on the new MacBooks.

So yeah, the machine has "insanely good IO", and once the rest of the world catches up it'll be even better.