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My Impressions of the MacBook Pro M4

michael.stapelberg.ch

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Re: My Impressions of the MacBook Pro M4

#321

Post by znpy »

zrm wrote: post #44
whycome wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are so many base features that are inexplicably relegated to 3rd party apps. Like a better finder experience. Or keeping screen on. Or NTFS writing.

NTFS writing isn't that inexplicable. NTFS is a proprietary filesystem that isn't at all simple to implement and the ntfs-3g driver got there by reverse engineering. Apple doesn't want to enable something by default that could potentially corrupt the filesystem because Microsoft could be doing something unexpected and undocumented. Meanwhile if you need widespread compatibility nearly everything supports exFAT and if…

Apple is likely to be in the position to negotiate nrfs documentation access with Microsoft for a clean-room implementation, with NDAs and everything.

My money is on apple not having the will to do thar.

Re: My Impressions of the MacBook Pro M4

#322

Post by rsanek »

vbezhenar wrote: post #304
jofzar wrote: post #214

> I don’t notice going back to 60 Hz displays on computers. However, on phones, where a lot more animations are a key part of the user experience, I think 120 Hz displays are more interesting. I'm always so jealous of these people, 60hz is just so bad for me now and even make me a bit motion sick. I can see it in everything, moving the window, scrolling, the cursor.

I've made a test for myself. Screen split into two parts, two small squares moving and bouncing. First square moves every frame, second square skips every second frame, but moves 2x. So basically one half of the screen is full FPS, another half of the screen is half FPS. And I implemented it as a "blind test", so I could make a guess and then check it. For screen with 60 FPS, the difference between 30 FPS and 60 FPS…

Thanks for sharing the test. I'm surprised you aren't able to tell the difference -- I can pretty consistently (90%+) get the right answer to both sides at 120 fps "fast," speeds as low as ~500. At higher speeds it's much easier.

Re: My Impressions of the MacBook Pro M4

#323

Post by smileybarry »

hu3 wrote: post #244
jofzar wrote: post #214

> I don’t notice going back to 60 Hz displays on computers. However, on phones, where a lot more animations are a key part of the user experience, I think 120 Hz displays are more interesting. I'm always so jealous of these people, 60hz is just so bad for me now and even make me a bit motion sick. I can see it in everything, moving the window, scrolling, the cursor.

Same. I currently have a 160hz and a 240hz monitor. And I can tell the difference between them when scrolling pages with tons of text. There's less ghosting in 240hz. And scrolling on 60hz to me looks blurry. I'd like to think that those who don't notice the difference have improved brain GPUs that can compensate for ghosting.

Wait until you try an OLED computer monitor, that screws with the "higher refresh rate => less ghosting" thought process completely.

Re: My Impressions of the MacBook Pro M4

#324

Post by spinningarrow »

whycome wrote: post #22
flyinglizard wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s an awesome app called Vivid which just opens the HDR max brightness. I use it all the time with my M3 Pro when working outside and I believe it also works on earlier models.

There are so many base features that are inexplicably relegated to 3rd party apps. Like a better finder experience. Or keeping screen on. Or NTFS writing.

> keeping screen on

`caffeinate -d` in the terminal - it’s built-in

Re: My Impressions of the MacBook Pro M4

#325

Post by IshKebab »

brulard wrote: post #264
IshKebab wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean if you ranked all the hobbies in terms of cost, casually spending $3k on a laptop would be near the top of the list. But there are a small number of hobbies that are vastly more expensive. The distribution is highly skewed. Like wealth. The 99th percentile are near the top in rank (by definition) but nowhere near the top in absolute terms.

I can not think of many hobbies which are less expensive if you are serious about them. Some hobbies around me, where $3000 wouldn't get you far: Motorcycles, cars, cycling, collecting anything, woodworking, machining, music making, traveling, horses,...

I can think of dozens. Running, dance, knitting, painting, woodworking (you can go very far for much less than $3k), archery, chess, board games, drawing, painting, brewing, darts, cycling, etc. etc.

Obviously you can spend pretty much any amount of money on those if you want (if you are "serious" about it) but you don't have to and most people don't. Also he said this $3k expenditure wasn't for serious work.

Re: My Impressions of the MacBook Pro M4

#326

Post by jhbadger »

asdff wrote: post #82
criddell wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are going to start making a list of expensive hobbies, $3K for a computer isn't going to be anywhere near the top of the list.

The type of person shelling out 3k for a computer is not running it until the wheels come off.

I don't think you can say that -- I paid about that for my 2021 M1 Max with 64GB and I'm still using it four years later as my main machine. There's an argument to be made to buy an expensive computer every 5 years or so rather than a cheaper one that you need to replace every 2 years because it's become unbearably slow.

Re: My Impressions of the MacBook Pro M4

#327

Post by smileybarry »

accrual wrote: post #10

> My ideal MacBook would probably be a MacBook Air, but with the nano-texture display! :) I agree on the nano-texture display having used one in person for a little bit. It's sort of like an ultra fine matte texture that isn't noticable while using it, but is noticable compared to other devices in the same room. I hope it becomes a more standard option on future devices. That said, I've used Thinkpads with matte disp…

To be it looked very much like the matte coating on Dell monitors, where bunched up same-color pixels have this "feels like there's a rainbow here but if I focus on it I don't see it anymore" effect. Definitely better than ThinkPad matte, though.

Re: My Impressions of the MacBook Pro M4

#328

Post by _yb2s »

eastbound wrote: post #242
Onavo wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Try general aviation as a hobby. It will be eye opening

Thinking it’s a hobby is an american thing. I’ve never met anyone who do it, but for Kobe Bryant, Harrisson Ford, Tom Cruise it seems normal. Most people save $400 per month tops, that they spend on holidays.

It’s a doable common hobby for middle class Americans. I grew up in a rural area with a dirt airstrip and everyone owned planes- even people that could barely afford a reliable used car. You can sometimes find something like an old Cessna for about $20k, and if you’re willing to do “experimental” planes that you fix yourself, sometimes just a few $k. Like anything, if you’re an insider in the community you can get good deals, sometimes even free from friends that age out, etc.

Many universities in rural areas have student clubs that offer lessons and rent club owned planes for cheap.

Re: My Impressions of the MacBook Pro M4

#329

Post by jerojero »

omni wrote: post #317
gcr wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bullshit. I shelled $3k for my MBP M1 back in 2021 and I intend to use it until I can’t anymore. It depends on the person and the use case. Different personalities etc

That's not particularly rational given how quickly computers progress in both performance and cost, a current-gen $1k Macbook Air will run circles around your M1. You'd probably be much better off spending the same amount of money on cheaper machines with a more frequent upgrade cadence. And you can always sell your old ones on eBay or something.

i like using computers until they break on me, i've never really felt (for the usage i give my macbook) that it is lacking in power. Even after, what, 5 years?

i think i'll be upgrading in the next 2 or maybe 3 years if apple puts OLED screens on their new machines as it is rumored.

Re: My Impressions of the MacBook Pro M4

#330

Post by smileybarry »

chii wrote: post #257
veqq wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People have to pay money to change screen brightness on a Mac?!

I imagine what those custom brightness apps do is not magically increase the brightness, but change the various pixels' brightness in accordance to some method/algorithm such that you see what appears to be brighter whites when placed next to certain other colors. It's not what is implied by the parent post - where the mac is limiting the brightness only to have the app unlock it.

I think it's just a matter of some "I need HDR" syscall.
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