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Its butterfly keyboard design has failed, but Apple has yet to admit its mistake

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Re: Its butterfly keyboard design has failed, but Apple has yet to admit its mistake

#381

Post by pimeys »

mcguire wrote: post #255
rayiner wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don’t have to tune Linux to get it to work, then why does every single complaint about Linux’s battery life in laptops get met with “install TLP?” Of course Windows is shit in this respect too these days. I got two extra hours of battery life from my X1 Carbon by wiping the disk and installing Windows LTSB. But even then I still have to police things, watching for driver updates or software installs that rando…

The only thing I have had to configure on the last two laptops I've installed is, weirdly, to go to sleep when I close the lid. The battery life on the X1 Carbon is about one and a half to two hours, which i think is acceptable given that the battery is reporting less than half of its original capacity.

I just installed OpenBSD to my ThinkPad X200. 5 hours of battery life, everything worked out of the box, and closing the lid suspends the machine, opening it up brings it awake. Every time.

I tend to go with older laptops, but they are definitely fast enough and I like how robust the experience is.

Re: Its butterfly keyboard design has failed, but Apple has yet to admit its mistake

#382

Post by moogly »

threeseed wrote: post #110
coldtea wrote: post #78

15+ years as an Apple user, this is my biggest pet peeve. The other two being: - the touch strip, which I find mostly annoying. I'd prefer physical buttons with the ability to show different labels (a la Optimus keyboard). - whichever idiot thought putting the power plug at the bottom of the Magic Mouse was a good idea.

People still bringing up the Magic Mouse. The idea is you weren't supposed to leave it plugged in. 2 hours of charging = 2 months of use so it's not like charging was supposed to be a regular occurrence.

It's still an inelegant and goofy design — from a company that prides itself on caring about design and with a history of making fun of other companies' designs.

To me, it just reeks of laziness, just like the iPhone X "notch" and the Pencil gen 1 charging. In all these fairly recent examples, Apple basically gave up and didn't even bother trying.

Re: Its butterfly keyboard design has failed, but Apple has yet to admit its mistake

#383

Post by davidandgoliath »

gnicholas wrote: post #373
davidandgoliath wrote: post #365

I abandoned apple in Dec. of '17 after 5+ years in the ecosystem & went on a hefty soul search for what to use next. I knew the touchbar was sort of a warning flare that they were trending away from what I'd need out of computing. After frustrations with windows / linux (laptop, dell xps 13), I ended up shelling out a bunch of money to get a macbook pro '16 with just the two ports: No touchbar. Had to have the top re…

> Now on a '19 macbook air, because surely they've fixed it, yes? Is there a 2019 MBA? I thought it was most recently updated in 2018. It certainly feels better than the older models, and even a smidge better than the 2018 MBP, which was updated earlier in the year. But there are still reports of issues with the 2018 MBA, including in the WSJ writeup IIRC.

Keen point: It's likely the '18. Bought early '19. Regardless, keys already becoming non-functional on the left-hand side of it after very little use.

Re: Its butterfly keyboard design has failed, but Apple has yet to admit its mistake

#384

Post by headsupftw »

lcnmrn wrote: post #374

Actually it's the best keyboard I ever type on. I just loved. I have a 13-inch MacBook Pro Touch Bar at work. It's fast and reliable with every key press.

I second this. You may hate the butterfly keyboard but I love it. So claiming the design has clearly failed is a little bit of a stretch.

Re: Its butterfly keyboard design has failed, but Apple has yet to admit its mistake

#385

Post by cmiles74 »

headsupftw wrote: post #378
cmiles74 wrote: post #324

A co-worked of mine convinced the company to buy them a MacBook (the first the company has ever purchased) to replace their aging Dell laptop. They have been doing more and more work on the company's iOS app and the aging Mac mini the company had purchased needed to replaced anyway. After having the laptop for just over a year, they called me upset as the laptop would no longer power on. After some gentle interrogati…

By Bay Area standards, you work for a super shitty company.

I don't think anyone was prepared for this to be something that wasn't covered under warranty or, if it wasn't covered, so expensive.

Where I work there is an insurance policy to cover laptop damage, they are currently in talks with the insurance company to get the damage covered. I think that in the end my co-worker will be refunded the money. I don't think they will be left with the bill.

Re: Its butterfly keyboard design has failed, but Apple has yet to admit its mistake

#386

Post by evoloution »

dathinab wrote: post #351
cmiles74 wrote: post #324

A co-worked of mine convinced the company to buy them a MacBook (the first the company has ever purchased) to replace their aging Dell laptop. They have been doing more and more work on the company's iOS app and the aging Mac mini the company had purchased needed to replaced anyway. After having the laptop for just over a year, they called me upset as the laptop would no longer power on. After some gentle interrogati…

Honestly any Laptop you pay 1200+ on should "survive"(1) you _splashing_ Coffee on it, not just a view drops of liquid. It's totally technical doable in a number of ways and the only thing in its way is because you are fanatic about getting your laptop another mm thinner and/or profit margins. (1): Survive in the sense that it's in general fine and you at most have to replace some easy to replace not super expensive…

Several years ago, I had a Sony Vaio VGN-FS115M and it was in the waterproof laptop sleeve in my bag. I literally poured a whole hot latte with sugar in the sleeve and the laptop was swimming in coffee. I took it out, removed the battery, disassembled it, took away all visible stains carefully with a good quality paper towel and let it dry. A year later the only thing not working was the lan port and I blame the sugar for that... If the same thing happened today my laptop would be long dead before I could disconnect the battery...

Re: Its butterfly keyboard design has failed, but Apple has yet to admit its mistake

#387

Post by da_chicken »

alexhutcheson wrote: post #328
cmiles74 wrote: post #324

A co-worked of mine convinced the company to buy them a MacBook (the first the company has ever purchased) to replace their aging Dell laptop. They have been doing more and more work on the company's iOS app and the aging Mac mini the company had purchased needed to replaced anyway. After having the laptop for just over a year, they called me upset as the laptop would no longer power on. After some gentle interrogati…

Is it normal for companies to expect employees to pay for accidentally damaged equipment? At everywhere that I've worked, some accidental damage was treated as a cost of doing business, and IT would replace it.

IMX, it varies. At the hospital I worked, damaged equipment was replaced without question, but only doctors were issued laptops or iPaqs (this was pre-smartphone). If the same individual kept damaging equipment it went to the individual's lead or supervisor for disciplinary reasons, but I only ever saw that once when a guy threw three iPaqs against a wall (never found out why).

At the school district I work, the policy for staff is similar to the policy for students.

If the damage is caused through normal wear, the district pays.

If the damage from a preventable accident and a first incident, the district pays. Everybody gets one excused.

If the damage from a preventable accident and it's a second or later incident, the staff member is charged $25 or the cost of the repair (whichever is greater).

If the damage is intentional, then the staff member always pays. This comes up more often than you might expect.

Stuff like lost keyboard keys we didn't track, but pretty much everything else we did. We have about 600 staff devices. There's usually one or two individuals every year who are careless enough or unfortunate enough to have to pay for damage to their district issued system. I recall one teacher whose children kept damaging her work laptop. That year she bought 3 chargers (cord cut) and a laptop (it had to have been thrown or dropped over 10 feet). She was told she couldn't take her laptop home anymore.

Simply put, the district does not have the funding to replace laptops that staff members damage.

Re: Its butterfly keyboard design has failed, but Apple has yet to admit its mistake

#388

Post by wazoox »

darrmit wrote: post #117

It’s not just the keyboard, either. I’ve been buying Macs since they switched to Intel in 2006 and the most recent MacBook Pros are the most problematic I’ve ever had. - Bluetooth seems to be fundamentally flawed at a hardware level. AirPods, Plantronics, doesn’t matter. It just randomly connects and disconnects as it pleases. - USB-C dongles are a minefield of poor functionality However, I’ve run Linux off and on si…

I've tuned and configured my WindowMaker desktop in 2003, and it didn't change much since then, through many, many upgrades of hardware and software, switch to 64 bits, etc. Oldies are goldies. If it ain't broken, don't fix it.

Re: Its butterfly keyboard design has failed, but Apple has yet to admit its mistake

#389

Post by dwaite »

cmiles74 wrote: post #349
scarface74 wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m in no way defending Apple’s keyboards and there are some real issues with tiny bits of dust completely ruining a keyboard, but normal laptops have always been susceptible to even a little liquid damage. But if your coworker couldn’t just go to his manager, tell them what happened and the company paid for it, that says more about the company.

At least for myself, I fully expected Apple to fix the laptop. I had read about these keyboards and their issues, I was really surprised when Genius refused to take it in for warranty repair. I suspect that if we had purchased the extended warranty, there's a good chance it would have been covered. Reading through the text of on their website it seems like this kind of thing might even be somewhat expected (like peop…

Coverage for accidental damage is not available from Apple for Mac products. You would need third party coverage

Re: Its butterfly keyboard design has failed, but Apple has yet to admit its mistake

#390

Post by Bud »

cmiles74 wrote: post #349
scarface74 wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m in no way defending Apple’s keyboards and there are some real issues with tiny bits of dust completely ruining a keyboard, but normal laptops have always been susceptible to even a little liquid damage. But if your coworker couldn’t just go to his manager, tell them what happened and the company paid for it, that says more about the company.

At least for myself, I fully expected Apple to fix the laptop. I had read about these keyboards and their issues, I was really surprised when Genius refused to take it in for warranty repair. I suspect that if we had purchased the extended warranty, there's a good chance it would have been covered. Reading through the text of on their website it seems like this kind of thing might even be somewhat expected (like peop…

AppleCare Plus definitely would have covered this incident, no question.
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