Nearly everyone in this thread has to qualify their ownership of this Mac.
"It's an awesome machine, BUT" _________________
A. "I wouldn't use it as my only Mac"
B. "I only have modest requirements"
C. "the issues it has are reasonable given its a 1st gen product"
Then there are the deniers who turn the recognised weaknesses into strengths or dismiss them altogether.
"It's an awesome machine, " _________________
A. "Never in my life have I used a printer/wired mouse or keyboard/USB storage/wired ethernet/SDCard"
B. "I actually like that the keyboard has less travel and an odd layout, I can type faster!"
C. "I never see any UI lag with Yosemite, it's perfect"
These kinds of compromises and self-delusions should not have to be made on a Mac which costs this much.
But what about my
factual benchmark scores above, and the fact that my rMB crushes my old 2011 i7 MBA both in benchmarks and real world experience whilst providing more screen real estate with monstrously better colour accuracy and viewing angles, and 3 times the battery life?
What about the
fact that I have a lighter, less cumbersome laptop bag now than I did with my 11" MBA setup, and actually have more wired connections available to me now than with the MBA to boot?
Everything is relative.
You seem to think that the rMB should be a no compromises Mac Pro killer in a size 1 dress and cater to every possible use case any Mac has ever been subjected to and blow everything else away. Why, pray tell, is that even close to a realistic expectation level? Because it was released in 2015? You do realise the we are talking about a Broadwell Core M packaged in an ultralight, ultra thin, fanless design right?
Why is the universal UI lag in OS X known to plague every single retina Mac model there is suddenly a hardware problem only when talking about a rMB, but mysteriously transmutes into a software/optimisation/driver issue when talking about a mighty Ultimate 15" rMBP?
Why is one extra adapter or cable exaggerated into a "bag full of dongles and external hubs" when in fact the flexibility of that one USB-C port allows a user to actually make that laptop bag lighter and more efficient than ever before whilst still maintaining at least an equal number of wired connections, leaving aside the entire wireless argument.
I make no reservations about the rMB. For me personally, it was a major upgrade that resulted in zero compromises and in fact made my work more productive, allowing me to work harder and longer than ever before, my workflows more free and flexible than ever before, and my Mac experience better in every way than ever before.
I've never owned a rMBP, and I probably never will. I don't do gaming, audio, video or photos, and only very basic graphics on my Macbooks, they are purely for my professional work, which involves business management, finance and accounting. The other stuff is personal and I do it on the stationary home media server. iMovie, Photos, Blu-ray burning and transcoding, media library stuff, all on the desktop.
YMMV of course, and obviously, if you've even done more than played around with a demo at a store, it does, because your use is probably very different than mine, and in that case the rMB isn't a good fit for you, but to just blindly say that the rMB doesn't provide a basic Mac and OS X experience that isn't every bit as good as its more powerful brethren is just that - blind - and uninformed - and sensationalist.
Kind of like when I painted my car red.. it just feels faster, man.
