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MacBook Pro Keyboard Drives Me Crazy

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Re: MacBook Pro Keyboard Drives Me Crazy

#201

Post by birdyrooster »

banachtarski wrote: post #156
birdyrooster wrote: post #70

Unpopular opinion: I want a touch keyboard with incredible haptic feedback. Long-throw keys trigger my particular RSI symptoms the worst. If I could move my fingers even less and apply even less force than I need to on the butterfly keyboard, I would be ecstatic.

You would benefit more from actual feedback that lets you know when you've actuated the press before bottoming out (which causes you to apply excessive force). It's not usually the travel distance that hurts you.

Thanks for the suggestion. I've been using Cherry MX Brown with red O-rings at home and it's definitely less painful than some other mechanical keyboards I have, but it's not quite there yet. I think perhaps the positioning of my wrists is too low, I am going to try a wrist pad to increase their height and report back. Any other suggestions?

Re: MacBook Pro Keyboard Drives Me Crazy

#202

Post by docker_up »

zmmmmm wrote: post #35

The worst thing is, the 2015 MBP keyboard was nearly perfect. The vast majority of the time I don't even use an external keyboard even when I am working at a desk and am plugged into monitor. It's one thing to fail at designing something because it is hard and you haven't figured it out yet. It's quite another to regress to incompetence on something you already perfected.

2015 MBP was the last best laptop.

I've been suffering with a 2018 MBP as well, and I'm done. The Touchbar and the arrow keys are killing me.

I'm giving them one more chance to fix their mistake with the 2019 MBP which should be announced in the next few weeks, otherwise I'm, going to a Vaio.

Re: MacBook Pro Keyboard Drives Me Crazy

#203

Post by dx4100 »

Justsignedup wrote: post #199

For what it is worth. Key repeats as described is a hardware problem. I had the same issue with the letter H. Either duplicates or a random H mid-whatever. Every single macbook ive owned in the last 3 years has had some defect. Either a dead motherboard. Broken keyboard. Or both. Basically it is build like a piece of shit. Had I any option I would get a cheaper better faster windows pc in a heartbeat. Sure it'll be 0…

I downloaded Unshaky to help this out:

https://github.com/aahung/Unshaky

You can set custom timings per key, which is useful for particularly difficult keys.

Re: MacBook Pro Keyboard Drives Me Crazy

#204

Post by jagger27 »

harrisonjackson wrote: post #180

Apple is replacing these keyboards for free... https://support.apple.com/en-ca/keyboard-service-program-for... I get that it is hugely inconvenient to go without your laptop for any amount of time - I depend on mine for work at a 2 person startup, so really I do get it! But if you are this fed up with it, then I'd say go for it. I finally bit the bullet and found a local certified apple repair place (NOT THE APPLE ST…

I wish I knew this before I lost my machine for 4 days last year. My replacement has mostly held up too—just a few blasts of compressed air here and there.

Re: MacBook Pro Keyboard Drives Me Crazy

#205

Post by iamleppert »

johnbrodie wrote: post #18
iamleppert wrote: post #12

I switched to a Thinkpad after I had the horror of using a new Macbook. Running Ubuntu is lovely, so much so that for a developer there is little reason to be using a Macbook anymore. You can get a lot more bang for the buck using a Thinkpad AND have a functional keyboard. Apple should be very worried. Once they loose the developers, users won't be long to follow.

Why do you say that? Honest question - nowadays it seems like most users are just using web apps, so less need for native apps anyway. Plus the users are still there, so I'd think market forces would keep highly-used native apps going anyway.

Users will soon learn you can get the same (or better) experience with cheaper hardware.

Developers are generally the first to notice such things.

Re: MacBook Pro Keyboard Drives Me Crazy

#207

Post by Clubber »

megous wrote: post #95
ngngngng wrote: post #8

Switched to a thinkpad x1 carbon just over a month ago, coming from years of macbooks. I'm over the moon. The trackpad isn't as good, but all the things I use the trackpad for are easily replaced with keyboard shortcuts.

I don't get what people have with apple's trackpad. I once got some second hand macbook air or something for work, and it felt like sliding my finger on a fine grained sandpaper. A jarring experience that I didn't like. Pretty much anything else I ever used was more pleasant than that.

They are typically glass smooth, like an iPhone. Someone must have tried cleaning the one you have with some sort of abrasive or something.

Re: MacBook Pro Keyboard Drives Me Crazy

#208

Post by jwilliams »

I know this topic has been done to death on HN, but this remains a persistent concern.

I've had two keyboard replacements. If you haven't had it done, it's a "topcase" replacement - which involved a good half of the machine. It's a big change and I was told to allow for 5 business days as well.

My Macbook Pro is out of the 4 year replacement window - and the Spacebar is starting to fail.

I've owned every form-factor of the Macbook Pro - won't be next time round.

Re: MacBook Pro Keyboard Drives Me Crazy

#209

Post by slowmovintarget »

Raticide wrote: post #119
hannibalhorn wrote: post #25

For everyone that hasn't seen it, reports are they've already decided to change the keyboard on forthcoming models. Discussion here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20353148 Edit: added "reports are"

But they're still keeping the annoying touchbar. I suppose I'm stuck with Dell laptops now.

The Touchbar and the kernel panics in BridgeOS that go with it. That's the hardest thing to swallow.

Mine does this when I use video conferencing.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/2018-macbook-pros-crash...

Re: MacBook Pro Keyboard Drives Me Crazy

#210

Post by kalleboo »

tolmasky wrote: post #37

The worst part is that I can tell this keyboard is actually having a detrimental effect on my typing abilities. Since being on these keyboards for years now, I've noticed that my typing speed has slowed, as I spend a significant amount of cognitive energy preparing to fix mistakes. The faster you type, the more annoying it is to go farther back to fix something. I'm not sure how to quantify the focus it steals from t…

> having to wait 3 days for a repair

He's lucky he has an Apple Store to go to. I had to turn in my 2017 MBP to a "Authorized Service Provider" who in turn had to send it in to Apple. I was without my machine for 10 days (luckily I still had my old, working 2012 MBPr I could just imagine my machine onto and keep working)

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