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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

#591

Post by csomar »

fumar wrote: post #277

I just came back to a MacBook Pro 2018 after several years of experimenting with Windows machines. Based on this thread I am outlier – I enjoy using the trackpad, touch strip, and the keyboard seems fine. In the past five years I have used the following; Thinkpad x230, Thinkpad X1 carbon, Thinkpad x370 yoga, Thinkpad X1 Yoga, Surface Pro 3,4,5, Surface Laptop, Surface Book 1,2, and a hackintosh Thinkpad X230. I was a…

I do share your sentiment. I live in a country with lots of "dust". I had concerns after reading people reviews but went ahead and bought the latest 2018 version.

Two things:

1- I really enjoy the new Macbook Pro keyboard. Way more than the 2014 one.

2- It is really dusty and I need to clean every week. Partly, because I work on cafes a lot.

So far (6 months), it has been going strong. No issues (the trackpad can be annoying at times, but that's it).

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

#592

Post by wingworks »

deminature wrote: post #526

To play devil's advocate, I've fully adjusted to the butterfly keyboard design and find the travel of the older keys excessive and unnecessary work for my fingers. All my colleagues type 8hr+ a day on the butterfly keyboard without complaints. While I have experienced the annoyance of debris getting caught underneath keys, it seems like a problem of refinement of the design rather than tossing it out entirely, as man…

I have a 2017 MBP and a few months in keys started to fail, I eventually got it repaired by 2 AASP, but had a TERRIBLE experience with Apple support (first repair agent they told me to send it to I later found out was known to be terrible and ended up breaking more than fixing on my laptop, I did my own research then and found a good AASP to get the first AASP work fixed).

All in all, it took over half a year to get it all fixed. I rarely have a need to go to Apple to get things fixed but this one incident really soured my view of Apple support.

Having said all that, since then the replaced keyboard has worked without fault since, so they must have put in a slightly refined one.

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

#593

Post by musicale »

SilasX wrote: post #275
weberc2 wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, the trackpads on Mac just work. I recently made a foray back into Windows a few years ago and was disappointed to learn that PC trackpads have made little progress in the intervening decade. Is it really easier to touchscreenify your entire software stack than to build a sane touchpad?

In terms of sensitivity it's good, but the new MBPs also have this enormous trackpad that makes it so I can't use the keyboard without accidentally swiping it all the time and moving the cursor in a way that does something I don't want. I know I'm in the minority here, since I do so much on the keyboard and don't use the mouse or the fancy trackpad features, but it's really infuriating. Edit: I must be getting old, b…

Older Apple laptops had palm rejection that basically worked, but the palm rejection on the MacBook Pro trackpad doesn't work properly for many people, and there's still no fix for it.

This is surprising and disappointing, because Apple's iPad (for example) still has excellent palm rejection.

Combining the awful butterfly keyboard with the disaster of a trackpad, it's really one of the least usable laptops Apple has ever produced.

The only thing that has worked for me is to use an external keyboard and trackpad. ;-(

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

#594

Post by saagarjha »

bnolsen wrote: post #248
robertAngst wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>buy Apple device and be sure that everything there is pretty good. The alternative is that you spend 30 minutes of research and get a superior product cheaper. This isnt an opinion, this is reality. You can find a computer with better specs than Apple, cheaper. I'm not sympathetic to the 'mom' who doesn't know what RAM is, they get penalized by Apple for being an uninformed consumer. Is there any reason for a 'Nerd'…

The apple hardware: crap keyboard, any slight usage leads to blaring fans and immediate thermal throttling. Options mean end users could actually pick something that fits their needs and not have to live with what Apple thinks YOU need. There have been times when choices haven't been good on the non apple side but in recent years the apple's few top down dictated choices on the hardware side have led to clearly infer…

> any slight usage leads to blaring fans and immediate thermal throttling

This has been my experience with Windows machines, interestingly. On the other hand, if my Mac makes fan noise I know exactly what caused it and it's going to be a compile job I kicked off, not some random driver spinning out of control in the background…

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

#595

Post by ericabiz »

tomxor wrote: post #554
lrem wrote: post #493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Macbooks used to survive that too. My 2009-ish Pro got half a liter of sweet tea to the keyboard. Keypresses sounded crunchy for almost a year, but otherwise it worked fine.

I still have a 2009 MBP (although was running linux for the last 5 years), I only just upgraded to a Dell XPS 13 this year. Here's the funny thing: the keyboard started to fail after 9 years of use, this is the only thing that pushed me to finally get a PC replacement (new macs are terrible linux machines) - the little rubber domes under the keys just started cracking and breaking apart so some keys feel really squid…

Just do what Apple would do and replace the entire top case. They typically run $30-$50 on eBay for older MBPs. That and a SSD upgrade (if you haven’t done that already) and you will have a functional backup computer again.

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

#596

Post by saagarjha »

powvans wrote: post #451
dwaite wrote: post #414

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Easily the worst way to design a mouse, ever. I don’t understand how it was approved. I do. It was on purpose. They do not want people using the wireless mouse as a wired mouse with a short, thick cord not designed for it. Which is totally what my parents would do.

That's easily solved by disabling the mouse when it's connected to the cable. If what you're asserting is true, at by disabling it they could have avoided this endless mocking.

> disabling the mouse when it's connected to the cable

Like this wouldn't invite even more outrage?

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

#597

Post by thaumasiotes »

martinpw wrote: post #348

The Benjamin Button review of improvements in older Macs compared with newer ones: https://blog.pinboard.in/2016/10/benjamin_button_reviews_the...

A comic from the same month making the same point: http://chainsawsuit.com/comic/2016/10/29/the-new-macbooks-ar...

"We want to make a laptop so thin you'll close it and never find it again."

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

#598

Post by thelittleone »

So far I have spent over $5k ferrying my 2017 Macbook Pro (15" with touchbar) to and from Apple. Is this a super isolated hardware situation or have others experienced similar?

- March 2018 I start my laptop in the morning to find the screen doesn't go on. I take it to the service center in Bali where they inform me it will take 6+ weeks to service. I can't do 6 weeks without my primary work device. I fly to Sydney and visit the genius bar. They replace the screen and the logic board (losing all the data) ($750 flight + other expenses).

I fly back to Bali (battery's ~ 80%) open up the laptop and find that the screen is dead again. After a week of conversations with Apple they agree to give me a new MBP but I have to fly to Sydney to get it ($750 flight + other expenses).

- March 2019 screen stops working. I fly to Kuala Lumpur where the authorised service center says 3 weeks to fix. That won't work, so I fly on to the new apple store in Bangkok. They replace the screen and logic board (losing all data) ($1.5k)

- April 2019 (5 weeks later) the screen gets pink lines. I fly back to Bangkok, they replace the screen (another $1.5k on travel) and offer me $980 off a new MBP + free 3 year applecare.

So far 12 international flight sectors, over $5k in expenses (hotels / flights etc) and 6 weeks with no device.

To stay on Apple I'm having to seriously consider a second standby laptop. Or make the switch to Windows as Dell has fast domestic warranty repair.

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

#600

Post by breatheoften »

therein wrote: post #571
TheOperator wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lack of emphasis of good input is absolutely maddening when people were buying macbooks with lousy specs for the price, low-res displays for the price, who absolutely loved the fantastic trackpad, adequete keyboard, and good build quality. Now the devices are getting more fragile and the keyboards aren't even average they're junk. The touchbar is shit. Apple seems to be regressing to their form over function puck…

> The touchbar is shit. It really is. Way to go making it impossible to (un)mute and adjust the volume without opening my eyes. And in exchange of what, really? The privilege of losing the physical Esc?

Not to mention the touchid sensor is completely terrible. It never - ever - works for me. I never had this level of problem with touchid on the iPhone ...

The new iCloud Keychain password prompt, which shows only touchid with password prompt hidden behind a button is fucking terrible — along with the auto submit behavior after filling out the form - which very often results in extra password required popups.

I’m starting to wonder if anyone at apple is using this stuff — maybe corporate disabled all these features for security reasons and apple developers actually aren’t allowed to use in practice ...?

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