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New 13-inch MacBook Pro

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Re: New 13-inch MacBook Pro

#751

Post by abrowne »

trymas wrote: post #731
rconti wrote: post #717

Very interesting. I had assumed I'd buy a 13" Pro as a personal laptop replacement for my 2011 Air when they updated the keyboard. However, when the 2020 Air dropped, I snapped one up because it ticked all the boxes, and I really don't need the "power" of the Pro, especially given its presumed expense. I bought a loaded Air with 512gb which was I think $1650. Speccing out the Pro, the pricepoint for a similar machine…

I wonder if TDP of MBA vs MBP cpus is different and if yes - how much difference does it make?

It has been:

- the retina MBA is ~ 5 W (but I think it's configurable by the manufacturer and configured up, since it has a fan, though no heat pipe, unlike the 12-inch MB that was fully passive) [Edit: I think it's 10 W.]

- the 2-port (originally no touch bar) MBP is 15 W

- the 4-port 13-inch MBP is 28 W

Of course Apple never mentions this, or the Intel CPU model numbers.

(And FWIW the pre-retina MBA is 15 W, and before the USB-C models the 13-inch Pro was 30 W only.)

Re: New 13-inch MacBook Pro

#752

Post by horsawlarway »

aggronn wrote: post #600
mr_custard wrote: post #444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks. I'm am aware of this. I research this all the time, and regularly come away disappointed. I don't know if I verbalised clearly enough, but I have actively wanted good options for years, and I'm always open to whatever alternatives are current at the time of purchase. Seriously, I'm in the market for a new laptop and there are still too many concerns relating to support for these devices... not just Dell but u…

XPS 9560 4k model (2017 15") using Arch Linux. Recently formatted and re-installed arch (i had made a mess of some core linux things over the years and wanted a clean slate), and I don't recall any specific issues that were not user error trying to install or maintain an arch installation. The main "problem" that comes to mind is optimizing battery life while getting maximum performance from the discrete GPU. I chose…

I'm on the same machine. Also on Arch linux with Gnome Wayland as my DE.

It's been a complete delight. Actually, it's been leaps and bounds better than macOS Catalina on my work machine.

For me, the transition to Wayland made a HUGE difference. Trackpad actually feels basically the same as macOS, and better than windows 10.

Multi-monitor support is better than macOS (which loses my monitor arrangement consistently with two identical monitors and through a usb-c dock).

Bluetooth works as expected. (Not so for macOS catalina anymore, they've fucked up an truly astounding number of things...)

Suspend/resume are both fine.

Battery life is actually around 10 hours if I'm just doing light dev.

Basically - I've been pestering my office to let me switch for a while now. I'd take an XPS running linux over the current iteration of macbook/macOS hands down.

Re: New 13-inch MacBook Pro

#753

Post by scarface74 »

ksec wrote: post #560
extr wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have the latest Dell model (XPS 13 9300), and I'm left with a bit of chagrin as I probably would have looked into this new 13" MBP instead had it been available a few months ago, but overall I've been happy with my purchase. I'm not really "in" the Apple ecosystem so I'm probably a bit biased though. A few other Dell Pros: * 16:10 aspect ratio. The 4K touchscreen in general is fantastic, nearly borderless and reall…

> 16:10 aspect ratio..... MacBook ( Pro, Air or just MacBook ) has always been using 16:10 ratio. 16:10 on Dell is something new in the PC space that everyone is making a big fuss about it. Although I hope this change will finally run across the industry so we are back to 16:10 instead of stupid video consumption orientated 16:9 Ratio.

Old things are new again. 16:10 was the standard around 10 years ago. I still have an old Dell Core 2 Duo circa 2010 that has a resolution of 1920:1200

Re: New 13-inch MacBook Pro

#754

Post by dddddaviddddd »

fluffything wrote: post #576
Saaster wrote: post #505

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's still the exact same potato-cam in every model, from the Air to the $$$ MacBook Pro "16.

How do people WFH with their new $$$ macbooks ? Is there any external cam you would recommend ?

I use a Pixel 3a (rear camera) connected over USB + Droidcam as my webcam.

Re: New 13-inch MacBook Pro

#755

Post by H1Supreme »

defilan wrote: post #682
LASR wrote: post #654

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In macOS Keyboard Settings Remap CapsLock -> Esc Changed my life.

As a VIM guy myself, this was huge. I never felt like I was missing out having done this.

I've only been using vim (well, neovim) for a few months, but I just assumed everyone mapped ESC to the caps lock key. Nearly every beginner tutorial recommended it, for good reason.

Re: New 13-inch MacBook Pro

#756

Post by molszanski »

cletus wrote: post #631
tw04 wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After several years I can unequivocally say I still hate the touch bar. I love touch ID, but the bar needs to go. USB-C was all about standardizing. I'm still not sure how I feel about it, I did love magsafe, but I also love that in theory someday I'll have one cable to rule them all. And I'll be able to charge my headphones/laptop/phone/random device with a usb-c cable instead of needing 8 of them.

> USB-C was all about standardizing. USB-C is all about having a thinner connector and giving the appearance of standardizing. Previously if the cable fit, it worked. There were just a bunch of different cables but that had largely settled down to USB-A cables to like 2 maybe 3 connectors on the other end. Now we have cables that have the same connector on each end but do vastly different things and there's no clue a…

USB-C is shit. Apple lightning physical connector is still lightyears ahead in reliability, maintenance (dust) and physical size.

USB-3 standard is even a bigger mess. This whole USB 3.2 Gen 2 x 2 is the biggest clusterfuck in the history of naming things.

Re: New 13-inch MacBook Pro

#757

Post by horsawlarway »

mr_custard wrote: post #382
alexggordon wrote: post #125

I was curious how the 13 inch was priced so I compared it to a new Dell XPS 13. Dell has a better processor (maybe, [2]) , but I couldn't find the option to upgrade the Dell to 4TB internal SSD, so I compared both with the 2 TB option. Ram is the same at 32GB. Dell came out to $2399[0] USD and Apple came out to $2999[1] USD. Dell Pros: * Row of function buttons (I've used BTT to customize my touch-bar to the point wh…

Useful figures, so thanks for providing those. It's been a few months since I last looked into the latest prices. I agree with you that it's still worth it. However, I feel that without comparing the OS and tight OS integration, this doesn't represent one of the most important aspects of a comparison between the two, when considering a purchase. I go through this same loop every time I buy a new machine... yes, usual…

If you're fine paying a consistent 600 tax, just make the leap and give a reasonable xps machine running linux another chance.

My work machine is a 13" macbook pro on Catalina, my personal project machine is a 15" dell xps from 2017.

Of the two, I'm delighted by the XPS running Arch/Gnome/Wayland.

I'm much, MUCH less delighted by the Catalina crap box.

Re: New 13-inch MacBook Pro

#758

Post by mgraupner »

rconti wrote: post #717

Very interesting. I had assumed I'd buy a 13" Pro as a personal laptop replacement for my 2011 Air when they updated the keyboard. However, when the 2020 Air dropped, I snapped one up because it ticked all the boxes, and I really don't need the "power" of the Pro, especially given its presumed expense. I bought a loaded Air with 512gb which was I think $1650. Speccing out the Pro, the pricepoint for a similar machine…

Previous generation MacBook Pro 13 with i5 1.4Ghz (2019) was 14% faster in single core at Cinebench 15 and 42% faster in multi core benchmark than 2020 MacBook Air i5. Most important difference between these two processors is TDP, Air CPU is allowed to use only 10W and Pro is allowed up to 28W. Especially in sustained multicore usage the Pro has a lot of advantage, better cooling system too to get rid of the heat...

Re: New 13-inch MacBook Pro

#759

Post by tolmasky »

I decided to switch back to the (new) MacBook Air instead. I feel that had the butterfly fiasco never happened, this generation of laptops may have just dumped the Touch Bar entirely, but instead, there were so many general keyboard complaints (escape key specifically, general Touch Bar complaints, and of course the butterfly keyboard complaints), that it is reasonable that they are trying to see if this new "reduced" Touch Bar will stick, but it's just not for me. I feel that the fact that the Touch Bar has not made its way into any other keyboard (desktop keyboards or even iPad keyboards), is somewhat of an admission that it's not that crucial.

It's a really weird feeling, because on the Air the keyboard has once again returned to just being something I don't think about. I'm not ecstatic or something. Just overnight I stopped getting infuriated at my machine and feeling like a complete idiot when I'd see an email where I sent "butt" instead of "but" due to repeated keys. But it's like fixing a dead pixel, my experience is not amazing now, it's just not an issue anymore.

The problem I've always had with the Touch Bar is that I'd lightly brush some random button and all of sudden I would have triggered some action. When I first got a Touch Bar MacBook Pro, I could swear we had some weird state-resetting bug in our website. Turned out, I would just every so often accidentally hit the refresh button on the Touch Bar. Do "normal people" ever refresh a website? I feel that refresh has basically become a pro-level feature now for development. Anyways, I ended up just manually removing just about every button from the Touch Bar.

So, back to where we were 3 years ago as far as I'm concerned (on the Air).

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