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Apple introduces 8-core MacBook Pro

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Re: Apple introduces 8-core MacBook Pro

#271
The MacBook has always been mediocre hardware hyped and marketed beyond all reason. Even way back all the nonsense about unibody construction was a total myth, Thinkpads were even more durable but didnt have the hype.

Apple knows they will keep selling these things due to the brand image.

Re: Apple introduces 8-core MacBook Pro

#272

We repair these as part of our business, and to be clear, both the keyboards and the screens are failing on these at an alarming rate. iFixit detailed the issues with the screens, which (in Apple's unending quest for "thinness") use a thinner flex cable to connect the display to the rest of the laptop. This thinner cable is prone to breakage, and we are already seeing 2016-2017 MacBook Pros in our shop regularly for…

Yeah the upgrade policy at my work kicked in and they tried to give me one of these... instead I got a Thinkpad X1 Extreme and put Linux on it. No regrets.

PopOS? I've had fits, even w/ stock 19.04 on my X1E.

Re: Apple introduces 8-core MacBook Pro

#273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just had the keyboard (really the entire top assembly) replaced on my 13" 2016 mbp, and I'm pretty sure it got the 4th gen keyboard. The keys feel and sound significantly different, and the Apple employee who did the replacement (or I think that's who I talked to) said that they were putting redesigned keyboards in for the replacements. I was pretty unhappy that I had to get this done and I'm still not in love with…

That's really interesting. Where are you located? I had my 2017 done a few months ago (back when they were shipping them all out), and I definitely got the old mechanism. Would love to get the new version!

This was at the Apple store in Walnut Creek. I think they’re shooting for 24-ish hour turnaround at all of their stores now. I was putting the repair off until I was sure that I could get it done quickly. They told me that they’re not yet quoting 24 hours, but they do do them in store now, and they typically quote 3 days or so.

Re: Apple introduces 8-core MacBook Pro

#274
post #125

What a clusterF is modern Mac hardware: - Keyboards with much worse action that are more prone to failure (from dust no less) and require replacing the motherboard to fix... all for a Touchbar no one wants and 0.5mm cut in thickness. - Loss (over the years) of the ability to upgrade the CPU, SSD or memory; - Display failures due to broken ribbon cables; - The USB-C clusterF; and - Loss of MagSafe (this one still hurt…

But look at what we got in return... The laptops are now 1mm thinner than they were before!

Re: Apple introduces 8-core MacBook Pro

#275
post #14

These used to excite me because I've desperately needed 32gb and faster procs and used to upgrade every 2-3 years but now I just yawn at MBP releases. I'm so unexcited by everything about this form factor other than the fact that it has OSX. I'm guessing I'll be on my 2016 until I finally bite the bullet and quit using OSX if they don't make a more compelling package to spend my $3k on in the next few years. I don't…

I thought the same thing. Now I'm stuck with a $1500 Asus laptop that barely plays Netflix a year and a half later. despite an 7th gen i7 and 16gb of DDR4. Now I'm saving up for a Macbook Pro again, despite my hatred for the keyboard and touchbar.

Check for thermal throttling. Dust can severely slow down a laptop, even though task manager says that it is only using 10% of the CPU.

Re: Apple introduces 8-core MacBook Pro

#276
post #7

Wish there was an option to buy a 15 inch with no touch bar. I cannot find any suitable use for it on my current model, and I often hit items inadvertently due to the lack of tactile feedback

https://github.com/niw/HapticKey

Cool, thanks for sharing! (Seems like a missed opportunity that Apple didn't add their own built-in haptics to the TouchBar.)

Re: Apple introduces 8-core MacBook Pro

#277
post #36
post #7

Wish there was an option to buy a 15 inch with no touch bar. I cannot find any suitable use for it on my current model, and I often hit items inadvertently due to the lack of tactile feedback

I never got why, if they really want the touch bar, they don't do both . F-keys and touch bar. I kinda would have welcomed this because the "fn" key is a horrible presence on any laptop keyboard anyway and I'd happily would have seen them delegate screen brightness and audio to the touch bar as a separate input.

> I never got why, if they really want the touch bar, they don't do both. F-keys and touch bar.

That would consume room for the touchpad.

Re: Apple introduces 8-core MacBook Pro

#278
The whole thing can't keep a 4 core CPU from overheating and throttling. Not too mention with that small power brick and the USB-C charging cable, you can't even provide enough power to that beast of CPU regardless of i9 being less power hungry then the i8 is.

Apple just doesn't want to learn.

Re: Apple introduces 8-core MacBook Pro

#279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lots of people on HN call the Mac OS 'great' ... But why? What is so great about it that is not similar on Linux or Windows? When ye say "great", I think ye mean "the one I am familiar with".

Windows is crap. The UI is totally schizoid, with different apps using different toolkits. Office for Mac integrates more cleanly into the look and feel of the rest of the OS than Office for Windows. There are two different settings apps with different features. Basic things are poorly designed. E.g. if you put the task bar in autohide mode, it routinely gets “stuck” because some notification is keeping it from hidin…

Of course, electron is bringing this great fragmented ui experience to macOS

Re: Apple introduces 8-core MacBook Pro

#280
post #14

These used to excite me because I've desperately needed 32gb and faster procs and used to upgrade every 2-3 years but now I just yawn at MBP releases. I'm so unexcited by everything about this form factor other than the fact that it has OSX. I'm guessing I'll be on my 2016 until I finally bite the bullet and quit using OSX if they don't make a more compelling package to spend my $3k on in the next few years. I don't…

"I don't want thinner" is really what apple needs to hear.

Thinner means you take away my ports so I have to carry dongles. Yes, I'd actually love to have at least one old-fashioned USB2 port. I know, I'm insane, but USB2 devices didn't exactly disappear just because USB-C is great. I still have a lot of them.

Thinner means you take away magsafe, which is one of those great "gosh, apple is so clever" features that's very, very useful.

Thinner means you give me a keyboard which, at best, completely sucks (layout, feel) and at worst, can't actually do its job because of reliability problems.

Thinner means I could have more battery life.

I'm literally carrying around TWO 2015 MBPs on a daily basis right now and it's TOTALLY FINE, APPLE. I'm not dying over the weight or amount of space they take up. I hardly even notice. For what developers do with laptops, thinner is way down on the priority list. I wish you'd listen to us.

Also: I literally have no use for the touchbar that isn't perfectly handled by function keys, and I hit ESC 1000 times a day because I'm a vim user. Why do you hate me?

Please just release a mac that looks exactly like a 2015 MBP with an i9 and some USB-C ports, and I will be lining up to throw $3k at you. As is, I'm getting as much life out of my 2015's as I possibly can (they're running great, btw, but I doubt they'll make it to your next refresh if it's 3 years away). When they finally die, if the only MBPs available have garbage keyboards and touchbars, I will grudgingly stop being a Mac user.

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