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Bob Morales posted:There's a huge difference between removing an optical drive and removing every loving port on the machine Not really. I mean, there's a difference for you, personally since you still make use of them. Compare it to the 11" Air, though. There's literally one less port on the new MacBook. I doubt the big laptops will lose all their ports at once, either. Just one here and there as they become less and less important to the majority of people. ShadeofBlue fucked around with this message at 03:21 on Mar 10, 2015 |
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Mar 10, 2015 03:19
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No there's 3 less ports. Don't the airs have 1 displayport and 2 USB? Edit: I'm claiming the magsafe is a port here for clarity. If you're charging it then you'd have 0 vs 3.
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Mar 10, 2015 03:43
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Whirlwind Jones posted:Not really. The new model personally doesn't work for me (hell, the current MBA doesn't have the right types of ports for the stuff I do with it if I'm not near a Thunderbolt dock) and I can't see it getting much traction at work apart from people who go to conferences a lot but you need to remember that the MBA and rMBP lines still exist for a reason. I expect that eventually they'll merge the MacBook Air into the new line but I suspect that by the time that happens USB type-C will be more commonplace and wireless/streaming stuff will even more ubiquitous than it is now. I don't think the Pro line will get this sort of treatment all that soon (although I wouldn't be surprised if they try and change the adapter for some iteration of Thunderbolt to be similar sized to the USB-C port) since it's aimed at a decidedly different market that actually cares about external connectivity and performance.
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Mar 10, 2015 03:44
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My guess is you'll see the Air fade away in favor of this one once the costs on a retina screen fall to an even cheaper point. The MBP will probably continue to resemble the more typical laptop form factor. I don't know why we're harping about multi-gigabyte files on USB dongles so much. This is more targeted at the Air-class of consumer that isn't especially bothered about the occasional dongle to do things they don't need super often - someone that doesn't transfer files over USB or SD on a daily basis. Worst case they buy a USB 3.1C dock adapter with a hub, ethernet, and display in there and keep that tethered to their desk. A web developer that does everything on a server would probably get by great with one of these too.
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Mar 10, 2015 03:47
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Is there any merit to the idea that maybe they're not bothering with MagSafe because the thing is so light that a magnet sufficiently strong to not pop out accidentally all the time will just take the new MacBook with it? I think the new MacBook looks amazing, but I'm not in a hurry to own one. I am sure that the inevitable flaws of the first generation will get remedied in a year or two and the pain of losing the ports will become less as the world of computing continues to change. Honestly I'm torn a bit between the idea of a 15" rMBP with Broadwell or a retina iMac.
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Mar 10, 2015 03:47
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I would imagine they're continuing to make the Air because of a) existing business commitments (schools, universities, corporate purchasing, etc) and b) they've cheap as hell to make, the design hasn't changed significantly since fall of 2010. Due to their production volume they probably make as much profit right now on a 11.6" Air as they do a 12.5" Macbook.
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Mar 10, 2015 03:53
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I am looking to get a laptop and Im just laughing loudly at Apples feature creep. "oh you want more than 256GB storage and the 16GB upgrade on the base 13" rMBP? well the next 13" rMBP has the storage and its slightly cheaper....oh but with the 16GB of RAM its basically the same price as the 15" rMBP...but thats only 256GB storage too...hmm, better up that. oh now thats almost as much as the NEXT 15" rMBP."
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Mar 10, 2015 03:54
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Laserface posted:I am looking to get a laptop and Im just laughing loudly at Apples feature creep. That's not feature creep. It's upselling. Doesn't make it any better, but that's what it is called. enMTW fucked around with this message at 04:22 on Mar 10, 2015 |
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Mar 10, 2015 03:59
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Eeyo posted:No there's 3 less ports. Don't the airs have 1 displayport and 2 USB? Nope. The 11" Airs have 1 magsafe port, 1 USB port and 1 headphone jack. The new MacBook has 1 USB C port and 1 headphone jack. If you are charging your laptop, you have lost exactly 1 USB port compared to the Air. If you are not charging your laptop, you have lost nothing. EDIT: Crap, they also have Thunderbolt, sorry, you lose 2 ports. ShadeofBlue fucked around with this message at 04:35 on Mar 10, 2015 |
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Mar 10, 2015 04:30
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Jony Ive will not rest until he removes every single port in all Apple computers.
passionate dongs fucked around with this message at 04:38 on Mar 10, 2015 |
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Mar 10, 2015 04:33
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ShadeofBlue posted:Nope. The 11" Airs have 1 magsafe port, 1 USB port and 1 headphone jack. The new MacBook has 1 USB C port and 1 headphone jack. If you are charging your laptop, you have lost exactly 1 USB port compared to the Air. If you are not charging your laptop, you have lost nothing. If you are not charging your Macbook, you've still lost the ability to plug in a USB device without a separate dongle. Unplugging the A/C doesn't magically fart out a USB port unless you pony up 1.14 Apple TVs.
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Mar 10, 2015 04:40
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FCKGW posted:If you are not charging your Macbook, you've still lost the ability to plug in a USB device without a separate dongle. Unplugging the A/C doesn't magically fart out a USB port unless you pony up 1.14 Apple TVs. I guess that depends on how cheap/easy it is to get a USB to USB C cable from monoprice.
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Mar 10, 2015 04:47
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fleshweasel posted:Is there any merit to the idea that maybe they're not bothering with MagSafe because the thing is so light that a magnet sufficiently strong to not pop out accidentally all the time will just take the new MacBook with it? I'm pretty sure a MagSafe 2 port wouldn't fit. MagSafe 2 barely fits on the airs, and because of the heavy taper on these it'd be even worse. Plus, the actual board the MagSafe port sits on tends to be quite a bit bigger than the port.
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Mar 10, 2015 04:57
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All I want is a 13" Retina Air with no stupid USB C ports. How hard is that.
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Mar 10, 2015 05:11
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My Rhythmic Crotch posted:All I want is a 13" Retina Air with no stupid USB C ports. How hard is that. It's called the 13" rMBP and if it's not sufficiently thin and light for you I am completely baffled.
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Mar 10, 2015 05:14
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Hadlock posted:I would imagine they're continuing to make the Air because of a) existing business commitments (schools, universities, corporate purchasing, etc) and b) they've cheap as hell to make, the design hasn't changed significantly since fall of 2010. Due to their production volume they probably make as much profit right now on a 11.6" Air as they do a 12.5" Macbook. Getting rid of the Air also raises minimum cost of entry by $400.
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Mar 10, 2015 05:20
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If Apple gets rid of the "Pro" notebook and corresponding connectivity (Thunderbolt, basically) that'd shock me. There will always be people who need to be able to hook up to hardware with their laptops in professional spaces they like (audio, video, photography.) But what they did with the Macbook doesn't surprise me one bit. I'm sure they have data that says X% of users haven't ever plugged anything other than power into their Air, and of the ones that have almost all of them would have just gotten an rMBP instead of some other competitor laptop. I think it's going to do just fine.
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Mar 10, 2015 05:25
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apple tv question. i want to use airplay, but i have a mid 2011 air, does that mean i can't do it? apple's site says 2012 or later.
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Mar 10, 2015 06:05
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appropriatemetaphor posted:apple tv question. i want to use airplay, but i have a mid 2011 air, does that mean i can't do it? apple's site says 2012 or later. There are third party apps that work with AirPlay, but depending on your use case you might actually have a better experience air playing files from an iPhone (I have). There's an app I just bought called Infuse that can stream any kind of video to an Apple TV, even in the background.
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Mar 10, 2015 06:19
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ShadeofBlue posted:Nope. The 11" Airs have 1 magsafe port, 1 USB port and 1 headphone jack. The new MacBook has 1 USB C port and 1 headphone jack. If you are charging your laptop, you have lost exactly 1 USB port compared to the Air. If you are not charging your laptop, you have lost nothing. Nope.  All anecdotal opinion from here on, not looking to start any arguments I can completely buy the new MacBook being Apple's vision of the future of notebooks, just like the Air was when it was originally released. Having said that, the current models aren't going anywhere anytime soon: the Air was released 7 years ago and there's still a product in Apple's lineup with a DVD drive and network port. In that time most people's usage patterns have moved away from needing a DVD drive, and for the cases that don't (ripping CDs etc) I still believe a USB Superdrive sat on a desk is a good middle ground - increased portability 95% of the time but easy enough to use when needed. Sure there are people who's lives do need access to DVDs more frequently than that, but again there's still a model that fits that demand. I work as a programmer so I know my needs aren't representative at all, but I live with three "normal" housemates and all of them have pen drives lying around. How often they use them is a different matter (definitely far less often than I do), but the fact they exist implies it's greater than zero. Would they be willing to use an adapter for those occasions and have a smaller laptop most of the time? Maybe, but all of them have laptops way under the Apple price range so it'll never play out. I think it's also easy to overlook the barrier to entry for cloud services. For people like us (posters on internet forums) they're definitely easier and I personally live by Dropbox for most things other than copying large media files around, but there are definitely people around who prefer the simplicity of "copy it to this physical drive, take it with you". I do think the people saying "I need to travel around for work, plug in a pen drive and run a presentation, this MacBook is stupid" are missing the mark slightly. The Air still exists to fill all those needs and isn't significantly heavier. Sure you don't get the retina screen, but the rMBP is only a small jump on from the Air and has other benefits too. In its current state I don't see the new MacBook selling well outside early adopters, but Apple has far more market penetration than it did at the launch of Air, so I may well be wrong there. Personally I'm nowhere near being ready to give up USB ports completely without adapters, because of the proliferation of USB drives and needing to plug in iOS devices, but a few years down the line? Sure, I can see that. I've been using a 2010 Air as my main machine (outside work) since launch and I'm ready to upgrade, but I really can't decide whether to go for yesterday's updated 13" rMBP, a refurb of last year's model, or try to drag out another 9-12 months of life and wait for the SkyLake upgrade. Think I'll swing by the Apple store on the way to work and see if they have any demo units with the new trackpad.. Froist fucked around with this message at 09:38 on Mar 10, 2015 |
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Mar 10, 2015 09:27
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I like the look of it. I use 2011 MBPs at work and home and they essentially meet my needs, so as someone who already has a couple of thousand invested in more full-featured computers, and no particular need to upgrade to the rMBPs at the moment, this feels like a nice to have portable machine to carry around with me when travelling. But I wouldn't even consider it without a beefier machine to back it up when not on the move. That said, it could suit my girlfriend or my mother pretty well. I'll be keeping an eye on reviews and stuff for certain.
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Mar 10, 2015 10:38
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I'm wondering about the usage cases for this laptop. Clearly, most people complaining about an ultraportable not suiting their needs simply should buy the Air or the rMBP instead of the ultraportable. "1.1 GHz? This thing will take ages to compile my Gentoo kernel!" This thing is what you choose if you want something tiny, silent, light that has a keyboard and runs a real OS, not if you want ... well, anything else, I guess. But running presentations sounds like a rather important scenario actually, and you can't do that wirelessly AFAIK. Carrying around a fat one-purpose USB-to-video dongle seems to be missing the point of having an ultra-thin ultraportable in the first place. But Apple knows we can't expect every venue to have one of these lying around. And yet, giving spontaneous presentations you've prepared on the flight/in the airport seems like just what this thing should be good at doing. Is there a smooth solution for this?
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Mar 10, 2015 12:03
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That's a good point, if you're just looking for "iPad with a keyboard with the ability to occasionally run desktop apps" the new 12.5" Macbook fits that use case very well, which is probably 98% of Apple users. If you like to power arduino projects while using wired a mouse and possibly one other USB dongle, or < insert "power user use case" here >, you're going to need a different type of laptop. I was looking really hard at the Macbook, especially with that screen, but I think more about my use cases with my existing laptop, I'm probably in the market for something like a 1080p screen XPS 13 or X250 
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Mar 10, 2015 12:12
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So I'm going to be getting a 13" rMBP, primarily for work but I'll likely end up using it as a day-to-day non-gaming computer rather than sit at my desktop. My needs are fairly normal for a rMBP user I guess. Basic webdev stuff with a few VMs running, IDE/editor, browsers, utilities watching and compiling assets etc etc. I'll be keeping this for a few years. I'm going to go with 16gb RAM for the VMs and general future-proofing, but looking for some advice with the rest of it as it's been ages since I bought hardware (and I've not had a personal laptop that wasn't given to me for some other purpose since 2004). What sort of CPU should I be looking at? I guess to some extent this is limited by what SSD size I go for. I'm considering going for the 512 here, simply because I'll probably end up putting terrible anime or something on there because I'm too lazy to turn on my desktop with actual storage space. This of course means that I either get the 2.9 i5 or upgrade to the i7. I can afford to do so but I'm not sure that it's worth it. The other question is what accessories I should be looking at. I'll be trying to connect ethernet and hopefully two DVI/HDMI monitors for work (my current office screens). Obviously I'll need the thunderbolt > ethernet adaptor, but what should I be looking at for the monitors? Will I be able to grab the thunderbolt > DVI adaptor and then plug in the other via HDMI? Or is there a better way? I'm also not clear about whether the machine will run two monitors and its own screen at the same time or not (but my current understanding is that it will). Thanks.
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Mar 10, 2015 12:30
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It'll definitely run 2 monitors plus itself, but I don't know if you can have different kinds of video outputs (1 hdmi & 1 dvi) and still get everything up and running. There probably is a way to do it and I'd like to know how as well. I've only seen the 3 display setup with the rMBP outputting to daisychained thunderbolt displays.
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Mar 10, 2015 12:39
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Is it possible or going to be possible to upgrade the SSD in the Retina MBP in the near future? all I can find is that 'maybe something will hit the market someday'
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Mar 10, 2015 12:57
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Laserface posted:Is it possible or going to be possible to upgrade the SSD in the Retina MBP in the near future? all I can find is that 'maybe something will hit the market someday' Yes it is. You have to buy an OEM drive on eBay, or if you have a 1st generation Retina you can buy an mSATA to Apple's slot adapter.
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Mar 10, 2015 13:06
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The Air is so drat popular because you can easily live without a DVD drive built into your machine. Worst case you can connect one via USB. It's so small and light yet I can plug stuff into it, I can connect to ethernet, I can plug a monitor into it... Sure, if I have Bluetooth or Wifi -everything- I would probably be able to live with that new goldbook or whatever the gently caress it's called. But why pay extra for less?
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Mar 10, 2015 13:08
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Hadlock posted:If you like to power arduino projects while using wired a mouse and possibly one other USB dongle, or < insert "power user use case" here >, you're going to need a different type of laptop. I was looking really hard at the Macbook, especially with that screen, but I think more about my use cases with my existing laptop, I'm probably in the market for something like a 1080p screen XPS 13 or X250 If you need to give a presentation, you need to carry the 80$ dongle (possibly another, HDMI->VGA/DVI). If carrying two dongles is a deal breaker for you, then I suppose you need a different laptop. There are other Apple laptops that weigh a fraction of a lb more to slightly more that have the ports you need. AFAIK, all other Core M notebooks have micro-HDMI anyways, which you definitely still need a dongle for to give your professional presentations with. passionate dongs fucked around with this message at 13:35 on Mar 10, 2015 |
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Mar 10, 2015 13:14
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Its nice to see Apple shedding their Thunderbolt ports before anything worthwhile is released for them too.
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Mar 10, 2015 13:29
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WTF a laptop without a DVD drive? This is bullshit
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Mar 10, 2015 13:44
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Bob Morales posted:The Air is so drat popular because you can easily live without a DVD drive built into your machine. Worst case you can connect one via USB. It's so small and light yet I can plug stuff into it, I can connect to ethernet, I can plug a monitor into it... I tend to think it's popular because it's $899. That's a whole lot less than a MBP or this new machine.
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Mar 10, 2015 13:48
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enMTW posted:You never thought that your optical drive complaints made you the absolute wrong person to talk about USB Type C? Not at all. Removing the optical drive is annoying to me but still understandable. Saying "only a small minority of people use any kind of USB devices" is completely loving idiotic.
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Mar 10, 2015 13:49
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It seems that Apple, renowned for its fickle support of peripherals for decades, has once again proven to be a disappointment.
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Mar 10, 2015 14:05
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If they release some kind of octopus looking adapter that had: 2 USB Video out of some sort Gig Ethernet I would be able to live with it
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Mar 10, 2015 14:07
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Why does the thread suddenly care about optical drives? Have I wandered into crazy-land? Are all of you in on some joke that I'm not? Or are you just being stupid
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Mar 10, 2015 14:08
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I haven't used the optical in my last two iMacs. Lest of all the portables. Edit: actually, I just learned iMacs don't even have optical drives anymore either. It truly is the future, this is better than rocket cars.
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Mar 10, 2015 14:15
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Pivo posted:Why does the thread suddenly care about optical drives? Have I wandered into crazy-land? Are all of you in on some joke that I'm not? Or are you just being stupid I think they're joking. I've needed an optical drive TWICE since 2011 Making a CD for the bar jukebox Making a Windows 7 DVD
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Mar 10, 2015 14:18
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Cingulate posted:But running presentations sounds like a rather important scenario actually, and you can't do that wirelessly AFAIK. Carrying around a fat one-purpose USB-to-video dongle seems to be missing the point of having an ultra-thin ultraportable in the first place. But Apple knows we can't expect every venue to have one of these lying around. And yet, giving spontaneous presentations you've prepared on the flight/in the airport seems like just what this thing should be good at doing. Is there a smooth solution for this? Well, they did just drop the price of the AppleTV. If I remember rightly one of the OSX updates allowed that to act as an Airplay target/external display? Thinking about it, it's actually cheaper than their dongle, means you're not tied down with cables, AND it's probably not that much bigger than the dongle.. TheDukeOfFail posted:The other question is what accessories I should be looking at. I'll be trying to connect ethernet and hopefully two DVI/HDMI monitors for work (my current office screens). Obviously I'll need the thunderbolt > ethernet adaptor, but what should I be looking at for the monitors? Will I be able to grab the thunderbolt > DVI adaptor and then plug in the other via HDMI? Or is there a better way? I'm also not clear about whether the machine will run two monitors and its own screen at the same time or not (but my current understanding is that it will). eriddy posted:It'll definitely run 2 monitors plus itself, but I don't know if you can have different kinds of video outputs (1 hdmi & 1 dvi) and still get everything up and running. There probably is a way to do it and I'd like to know how as well. I've only seen the 3 display setup with the rMBP outputting to daisychained thunderbolt displays. I had a rMBP at my old job and once (just to see whether it worked rather than for day to day use) I hooked up 3 external monitors to it - thinking back that was probably two over DisplayPort and one over HDMI (plus its own internal display). There was definitely a HDMI involved as I had to borrow the only monitor we had with that input, so you can mix and match them.
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Mar 10, 2015 14:34
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Bob Morales posted:I think they're joking. I've needed an optical drive TWICE since 2011 Of course the simplest reason to need a DVD drive in a laptop is to watch DVDs.
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Mar 10, 2015 14:43
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