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MacBook Pro 16" 2019 Teardown

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Re: MacBook Pro 16" 2019 Teardown

#211

Post by kalleboo »

SyneRyder wrote: post #187
ImprovedSilence wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if they go that way too. When I first heard that rumor, I thought "never!". But now I'm like... "hmm, hooray battery life, an OS that more fluidly switches from mobile to desktop, maybe not a bad option". Plus ARM is only getting faster/more powerful. Yeah yeah, apple will probably go the way of locking the OS down more, and thats a major buzkill/non-starter, but otherwise I think it's a…

Microsoft already has ARM-based laptops, so we can see what some drawbacks to ARM might be. The Intel-compiled app compatibility is unbearably slow, despite them making a custom ARM chip to improve performance, and the better battery life isn't happening. The Verge could only get 5-6 hours of battery life on the ARM-based Surface Pro X. [1] Presumably Apple is working harder on fixing all of those things than Microso…

For context, the current iPad Pro (still running last year's A-chip generation) benchmarks 50% faster than the Surface Pro X, and basic web browsing battery life tests peg it at around 13 hours battery life.

Apple killing off 32-bit app support (and Carbon, QuickTime API, etc) is probably them preparing for an ARM transition. Any app that managed to make that transition is well-prepared for a pretty trivial "just change the compile target and press the button" ARM port.

Apple would be betting on Mac app devs quickly getting ARM ports of their apps out there. In the Microsoft ecosystem there's zero chance of that happening, so they have to rely much more heavily on emulation.

There's also a chance Apple could do some kind of bitcode magic[0], but they don't enable bitcode on the Mac App Store yet, so that is probably not in the cards [0] https://www.highcaffeinecontent.com/blog/20190518-Translatin...

Re: MacBook Pro 16" 2019 Teardown

#212

Post by nknealk »

ctur wrote: post #175
ping_pong wrote: post #163

I just bought one and have been using it for a couple of days. So far so good. I still hate the TouchBar because it's completely useless, but the Esc key and directional keys was enough for me. I also have a 2018 MBP from work and the keyboard is shit. Within 3 weeks it was doubletyping and putting random .'s everywhere. I was days away from buying the top end Vaio and then I heard the news about the new MBP and deci…

For those who can't upgrade yet, there is an open source utility, Unshaky ( https://unshaky.nestederror.com/ ), that can help with double presses. It's sad and gross that it is necessary but it works well on my aging MBP.

Seconding Unshaky.

I use it on my work computer (2018 15" MBP). Does a very good job of detecting these double key presses and mitigating them transparently.

Re: MacBook Pro 16" 2019 Teardown

#213

Post by netsharc »

hbosch wrote: post #184
ping_pong wrote: post #163

I just bought one and have been using it for a couple of days. So far so good. I still hate the TouchBar because it's completely useless, but the Esc key and directional keys was enough for me. I also have a 2018 MBP from work and the keyboard is shit. Within 3 weeks it was doubletyping and putting random .'s everywhere. I was days away from buying the top end Vaio and then I heard the news about the new MBP and deci…

> putting random .'s everywhere. For anyone else having this problem, the new MBPs ship with the same autocorrect "feature" that comes on iOS where when you press spacebar twice (or, I should say, your keyboard thinks you pressed the spacebar twice) it inserts a period automatically. In addition, newer MBPs automatically capitalize and autocorrect spelling, like on mobile. You can disable this. I did, and, I don't th…

> I don't think any desktop computer should be telling me how to type.

I agree.. seems like Apple derped there. The auto-correct was because typing on a smartphone is a lot harder, but some genius must've thought "Hey, why don't we use this software on our desktops too?". Also holding down a hardware key to get to accented characters, oh fuck, how is that ergonomic?

Re: MacBook Pro 16" 2019 Teardown

#214

Post by Nextgrid »

saagarjha wrote: post #192
zelienople wrote: post #133

In case you haven't noticed, the planet is burning. Don't buy a laptop with a repairability score of 1.

Counterpoint: Apple's laptops have lasted me longer than any other computer I've had. I'm not sure that buying this is a net negative.

Their resale value holds much better than any other laptop; so I wonder if that somehow balances out the lack of repairability - working machines keep being used for much longer than equivalent PCs as people have more incentive to resell them.

Re: MacBook Pro 16" 2019 Teardown

#215

Post by erik_seaberg »

JanSt wrote: post #210
numlock86 wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> largest battery legally possible on a laptop What do you mean by "legally possible on a laptop"? My current machine (some rugged mobile power house) got 120Wh and I really don't wanna get arrested. Please enlighten me.

It's not allowed to take more than 100wh in carry-on flight luggage (in some countries).

US airlines might choose to approve 160 Wh batteries: https://www.faa.gov/hazmat/packsafe/resources/media/Airline_...

Re: MacBook Pro 16" 2019 Teardown

#216

Post by pcnix »

saagarjha wrote: post #196
henryfjordan wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They both share their roots in Unix. Linux is an open port of Unix whereas OSX is a fork of BSD which is itself also derived from Unix `ls`, `mv`, `cp` and other command line utility functions work relatively similarly across OSX and Linux. OSX has a package manager (brew) that works similarly to Package Managers found on Linux, etc... If you learn to use Linux, switching to OSX is relatively painless compared to Win…

Ah, I was expecting you to say something lower level than that. Homebrew is however quite unlike package managers I've used on Linux, and even MacPorts is a little different…I've heard that WSL is pretty decent and presumably APT works on it, though I haven't touched it since it first came out and it was broken in some way that I cared about.

You'll find that linuxbrew exists, apart from the AUR being a thing. And yes, apt and other distro package managers work perfectly fine in both wsl and wsl2.

Re: MacBook Pro 16" 2019 Teardown

#217

Post by choppaface »

JohnTHaller wrote: post #2

Most important point: Apple fixed the keyboard by ditching the flawed keyboard used for the past 3 years and returning to the Magic Keyboard scissor switch design. Comparing the 'new' keyboard to the Magic Keyboard: "side by side, we're hard pressed to spot any differences. Scissor switches, keycaps... There's slightly less space surrounding these new keys, and pundits will celebrate those reconfigured arrow keys—but…

Key travel for the 2016 is 1mm. The "bad" keyboards had 0.5-0.7mm travel. 2015 and earlier had 1.2-1.5mm travel. Not sure about the reliability of the new mechanism, but the 2016 keyboard does feel much more like the old 2015 one.

https://appleinsider.com/articles/19/11/15/heres-what-the-16...

Re: MacBook Pro 16" 2019 Teardown

#218

Post by leoh »

I bought a MBP 15" around the time of the fall keynote because the 16" was not announced. Does anyone know how I can replace it with a 16"? The keyboard really is driving me nuts.

Re: MacBook Pro 16" 2019 Teardown

#219

Post by numlock86 »

JanSt wrote: post #210
numlock86 wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> largest battery legally possible on a laptop What do you mean by "legally possible on a laptop"? My current machine (some rugged mobile power house) got 120Wh and I really don't wanna get arrested. Please enlighten me.

It's not allowed to take more than 100wh in carry-on flight luggage (in some countries).

Never had any problems traveling with it, even to the (supposedly super restrictive) US.

Re: MacBook Pro 16" 2019 Teardown

#220

Post by usaphp »

tolmasky wrote: post #165

I went with my gf to take a look at these last night at the Apple store. Her command key has completely stopped working on her 2018 MacBook that otherwise works perfectly fine. It feels clumsily large, especially since we’re coming from MacBook 13s. She kept asking me if I’d heard any rumors about when new 13s would come out. She went in pretty determined to get a new machine but decided to wait. The struggle continu…

Huh?? 64gb of ram, bigger screen, much more powerful GpU, bigger storage options, better thermals, better microphone, better speakers, bigger battery...it’s definitely not just “the same CPU” and a fixed keyboard”...not sure what else did you expect?
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