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Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

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Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#81

Post by a_bonobo »

xienze wrote: post #69
userbinator wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing's going to stop you from running this laptop 10 years from now just like nothing's going to stop you from running a PC laptop 10 years from now. Except for the parts that fail and can't be easily repaired...? Incidentally, I know many people who are still using machines in the 6-8-year-old range, and it fits their use cases perfectly well. We're long past the days of multiple-times improvements in efficiency…

> Except for the parts that fail and can't be easily repaired...? And there aren't parts like that on a more open PC? I mean, if your USB port or display stops working, it's going to be a bit of an undertaking fixing it, glue or no glue. > Incidentally, I know many people who are still using machines in the 6-8-year-old range, and it fits their use cases perfectly well. We're long past the days of multiple-times impr…

> I mean, if your USB port or display stops working, it's going to be a bit of an undertaking fixing it, glue or no glue.

I've changed the display on my Dell XPS 15 laptop and it was very easy, since there's no glue. Open the case (~8 screws), pull out keyboard, unscrew the entire "monitor" part (1 screw), pull out the cable between monitor and motherboard, pry open the "monitor" with a guitar plectrum or a screwdriver to get to the glass, push in the new glass, perform above steps in reverse.

I've never done that before and with YouTube's help to find out which screws to leave in and which to take out the whole operation took about 30 min. No glue!

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#82

Post by s_kilk »

hollerith wrote: post #61
s_kilk wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> so that the user never has to look at the keyboard except when the keyboard needs cleaning. The user should learn to touch-type.

So you can hit the - key or the ] key without looking at the keyboard as quickly as someone who is looking at the keyboard? You just reach over and press the key and you never press an adjacent key by mistake?

Pretty much. I never look at the keyboard, and rarely mis-type. If I do then I don't need to look at the keyboard to correct myself, as I know the position of every key, I just backspace and hit the key I intended to hit in the first place.

And, as another commenter also mentioned, I don't use the layout that's printed on the keys anyway, so looking at the keyboard would not help.

None of this is particularly uncommon for anyone who can touch-type.

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#83

Post by userbinator »

ghshephard wrote: post #49
rndn wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps they are in the leading position, but shouldn't we strive for ever better products? I just upgraded a couple of old MacBooks and iMacs from HHD to SSD and all of a sudden they are usable again - and will probably continue to be so for the coming 2-3 years. That basically extended their lifetimes by perhaps 30-40% and the saved waste is presumably closely proportional to that. So, ideally, I think, all manufac…

It would be interesting to have the Industry Leaders, such as Apple, and Samsung, come out and explain what their thinking is regarding abandoning modular construction. Even Samsung, with the Galaxy 6, no longer includes a replaceable battery. My guess, is that in order to increase reliability, and reduce cost, companies have come to the realization that it's most straightforward to do that by abandoning multiple "pl…

The decision that Samsung took is interesting because they used to actually market the removable battery as a feature. The Galaxy series was one of the few high-end smartphones that had this.

It makes me wonder how much of the "we do this because it's what our users want" is what users genuinely want, and how much of it is actually the company using marketing to tell users what they want.

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#84

Post by CPLX »

mwcampbell wrote: post #80
xienze wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Creating products that will be useful for 10+ years Well that's just a matter of opinion, isn't it? Nothing's going to stop you from running this laptop 10 years from now just like nothing's going to stop you from running a PC laptop 10 years from now. The question is _are you going to want to_ continue using a 10 year old laptop? That's an eternity in technological terms. Sure you can upgrade a PC laptop to squeez…

Then we software developers need to get better at using hardware resources efficiently, so that the amount of RAM that's considered adequate today is still adequate 10 years from now. As I've said before, why isn't a PC with a 366 MHz processor and 64 MB of RAM (the laptop I used in college) good enough any more?

Why should it be?

You present this as a normative argument, that things should be a certain way. But do you have a cogent argument for why we should be retarding the growth of memory and speed with our personal computing devices?

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#85

Post by masklinn »

colinramsay wrote: post #15
[deleted] wrote: post #12

[deleted]

"Repairability" really means two things: 1) You can fiddle with the insides 2) You can fix it when it goes wrong Despite what you may read on places like HN and Reddit, no-one in the real world gives two hoots about #1, and if you make a product that has good reliability then #2 becomes moot.

> no-one in the real world gives two hoots about #1

I was reasonably glad I could swap more RAM and an SSD (twice) into my current machine.

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#86

Post by X-Istence »

hollerith wrote: post #40

>Apple has opted to transition from using a row of LEDs with a light guide panel, to installing individual LEDs beneath each key. That's progress. Now, Apple, please replace each LED with an infra-red or a visible-light sensor, so that someone can write software to put a representation of the keyboard onto the screen that shows which keys have a finger hovering over them, so that the user never has to look at the key…

I have a backlit keyboard in my MacBook Pro Retina, but even in the dark I am able to touch type without needing to look at my keyboard.

Once you learn to touch type you no longer care about what is printed on the keys or that there is a light to light up the keyboard because it is no longer important.

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#87

Post by gregschlom »

Rossimac wrote: post #79
rsynnott wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Creating products that will be useful for 10+ years instead of until the next model cycle. I've had my current Apple laptop for three years, and see no need to replace it any time soon. The Apple laptop I had before that lasted me five years, and a relative is still using it (so, eight years). The HP laptop I had before that lasted about a year and a half before literally beginning to fall apart. If anything, I wou…

I'm still rocking my MacBook Unibody (Late 2008). Coming up to 7 years old and the only issue is the battery is down to an hour and half, which sucks. Other than that, 8GB RAM and a 120GB SSD gave it the much needed boost (5 years ago...).

> Other than that, 8GB RAM and a 120GB SSD gave it the much needed boost (5 years ago...).

Which actually proves the GP point that making devices not easily repairable and upgradable does generate more e-waste

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#88

Post by [deleted] »

hollerith wrote: post #61
s_kilk wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> so that the user never has to look at the keyboard except when the keyboard needs cleaning. The user should learn to touch-type.

So you can hit the - key or the ] key without looking at the keyboard as quickly as someone who is looking at the keyboard? You just reach over and press the key and you never press an adjacent key by mistake?

[deleted]

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#89

Post by wil421 »

revelation wrote: post #54
ghshephard wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is that Apple is one of the leading companies when it comes to eWaste. Also, this is the one of the rare Apple product that that only has industry standard ports/power chargers on it. You can't critique them on building a product that is hard to repair (and wow, this one looks next to impossible for your average non-technician) - but the ewaste/standard charger concerns don't appear to be valid.

Only if your understanding of "leading companies in ewaste" is that their products tick a bunch of boxes for materials used to be easily recyclable. But that is not the essence of the term. To avoid ewaste, you should avoid creating any in the first place. Creating products that will be useful for 10+ years instead of until the next model cycle .

I've had my MBP since 2011 and it shows no signs of slowing down. It will probably get 6-8 years before I replace it (it will be sold or given to someone after I'm done). The same would be said if I bought the latest no repairable rMBP or the new MacBook. Some old classmates and friends still have the older aluminum MBPs that are still running strong.

My iPad is also 3 years old and I will probably not update it until 5 years or so. Even then I will just give it to a family member so it will still have a useful life after me.

>Creating products that will be useful for 10+ years instead of until the next model cycle.

Which products does apple sell that only last this long? Most of my old phones have gone to either family members, craigslist/ebay or resellers like Gazelle.

Re: Retina Macbook 2015 Teardown

#90

Post by [deleted] »

CPLX wrote: post #84
mwcampbell wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then we software developers need to get better at using hardware resources efficiently, so that the amount of RAM that's considered adequate today is still adequate 10 years from now. As I've said before, why isn't a PC with a 366 MHz processor and 64 MB of RAM (the laptop I used in college) good enough any more?

Why should it be? You present this as a normative argument, that things should be a certain way. But do you have a cogent argument for why we should be retarding the growth of memory and speed with our personal computing devices?

[deleted]
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