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16-inch MacBook Pro

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Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#551

Keyboard re-design and bringing back the ESC key will be huge. 64GB of RAM in a laptop... yowza.

Typing this from my two year old thinkpad with 64GB.

Even though I dislike their now standard 16:9 ratio, Thinkpads are top tier. I've been using them since the late 90s. I think the 770ED was my first one. I still have a W500 that's in use from time to time.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#553
post #373

It's hilarious to me that their own marketing image has two dongles plugged into the laptop so that the user can still use USB. Apple please for the love of usability: please give me back USB. I AM the pro that you want to feature in every one of your marketing videos. I have a music studio in my house, I build interactive lighting installations for the biggest music festivals in the world, I build custom hardware co…

I'm the opposite so I guess our desires cancel each other out. I will never buy a laptop or any device that has USB-A on it. None of my devices use USB-A and it's a legacy port that is ugly and wastes space. Same with micro-usb, mini-usb, lightning, etc. I'm living a 1 port lifestyle and it's phenomenal for traveling, minimalism, and just not having to worry about having the right cable in the right place.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#554
post #507

Why does everyone seem grateful that they kept the headphone jack? Where did Apple give the impression that they would remove it from a more stationary device?

Apple sent a survey asking once how macbook owners would feel if they removed it. They believe the answer is going to be Bluetooth.

Music production is usually Mac at this point, and that requires wired headphones/speakers. Not sure it’s big enough of a market that Apple wouldn’t drop it anyway, but Bluetooth latencies are too high to be a substitute there.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#556
I'm thrilled that they've rolled back some of the worst post-2015 MBP changes. I'm a vim user, so I was never going to switch to something without a physical escape key. The key travel on the new machines were terrible; it's like typing on a piece of glass. Most importantly -- regardless of whether or not I have an external keyboard plugged in (sometimes I do, right now I don't) -- an internal keyboard needs to be reliable! I'm really glad Apple has seen the light and returned to the reliable scissor switched keys that I'm currently typing on.

My Late 2013 MBP has been serving me well for the last 5 or so years, but I've been wanting to upgrade it ever since 2016 (the battery life is quite poor & the GPU is showing its age). I refused once I saw the changes in the 2016 MBP, and was glad I never bought in after seeing more and more complaints about the machines roll in every subsequent year. I spent the next two years hoping for a redesign & started to give up. As much as I didn't want to, I've been spending the past few months looking at ThinkPads and Dells and mapping out my transition from OS X to Linux.

As much as I love OS X (and I do -- I've been dreading having to leave it), I just could not spend $2000+ dollars on a computer that I was going to have to fight with to make it work like my old one. This is going to be a daily driver, not a novelty or a toy. Yes, I could've remapped my escape key to caps lock. Yes, I could've bought a bigger laptop bag that could fit a small external keyboard. Yes, I could have learned to live with the new key travel. This is all beside the point if you ask me: I shouldn't have to do that.

Frankly, I'd be okay if Apple kept the old model around, as some people (including many commenters above me) have grown to prefer the butterfly keyboard. Maybe some people prefer the extra touch bar space? (I don't see why it has to be one or the other; I remember how many MBP variations/SKUs Apple carried when I started buying MBPs back in 2010.)

Just give me the option to opt out of these things -- even most of these things -- and I'll keep writing you checks. I'm looking forward to doing this in a couple months assuming the reviews on this machine are good.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#557

Can someone explain to me how Apple can justify only including a 720p FaceTime HD camera into the "the world’s best pro notebook"? The last iPhone that had this FaceTime camera was the 6S, released in 2015. Since the iPhone 7 (2016) the phones have had at least a 1080p FaceTime camera. Given that FaceTime / Skype calls are such a common use case and rarely anyones uses external webcams anymore, why doesn't Apple use…

I would AT LEAST expect 1080p. That's a huge bummer in the year 2020, when even my phone can do 4K. Conferences and Facebook livestreams just don't work with 720p :(

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#558
post #541

This is Apple going all in on pro for this laptop. The display is fantastic all around, 64 GB of ram, 8 GB of DDR6 VRAM, 8 cores, biggest battery FAA will allow on planes, 8 TB SSD, etc. This will also be able to connect to Apple's upcoming 6K 32-inch display. This is a very impressive update all around and it shows Apple putting a lot of space between their pro laptops and the MBA and iPad Pro now. The lineup is sta…

When people cite the great feat of putting in a 100Wh battery into this laptop they seem to keep forgetting that the 2012-2014 models had a 95Wh battery and the 2015 model had a 99.5Wh battery. Only when flattening the design for the 2016 year did they reduce it to 76Wh.

We're hoping undoing mistakes is a good step towards actual progress

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#559
I have a one year old 15” that I’m super bummed about now. It’s a pretty powerful machine w/ 32gb of ram but I wish I could have waited for this.

Problems I currently have that are annoying:

- I miss the 13” air form factor a lot. I knew it would be a trade off for the performance, but using this beast anywhere but on a desk is pretty tough. On a plane you need a first class seat to open it. It gets super super hot with most workloads.

- there is an obnoxious electrical whine coming from the mainboard and it might be the SSD. Lots of videos on YouTube show that the ssd actually makes a lot of noise and almost sounds like it’s a physical disk. Poor manufacturing from Toshiba.

I guess that’s really it. I just wish I could use it on the couch without burning my thighs. I don’t have any qualms with the keyboard or touchbar. I have caps lock remapped to escape so that doesn’t bug me. Also the touchbar is in “old school mode” or whatever so it looks like a regular function key bar on a non touchbar Mac.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#560

64GB RAM is like "hallelujah". Doing enterprise dev with Docker + Java is pretty horrible with 16GB on my 2017 MBP. The fact that this review didn't even once mention the fact that this machine is now thicker & bigger and yet they didn't add any useful ports back in is amazing. I still hate that the 2017 one I have has only USB-C + Headphone jack. I appreciate that it still has the headphone jack. But at our office w…

I have the 15" with 32gb and I thought docker was making my laptop shit the bed - screens flickering all the time, mouse barely moving, etc.

It turned out to be docker plus Firefox (current version/Quantum yada yada) that was too much - I can't stop using all this docker stuff but I switched to Safari and haven't had any problems at all

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