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Can't Get Used to Your MacBook Pro's Notch? These Apps Will Hide It for You

Iconoclysm said:
Ok, so going back to your original complaint that it's taking up room...that's really not your problem with it, now is it? You think it doesn't look good. Nothing wrong with that but let's keep that in perspective when everyone is claiming Apple made some kind of mistake here. The mistake they made was that they did something that is not pleasing to your sensibilities, aesthetically.

And this is really my point about "defending" the notch. If I said, "The notch is beautiful, you should like that and you're a jerk if you don't!" - that would be defending the notch. Getting us on the same page about what the notch is and why you don't like it is not "defending" the notch. In fact, I also find the notch ugly...but I'm more interested in its usefulness in expanding the screen size without a bezel there. I'm certainly not spending $4000 on a laptop so I can show off how great it looks.
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Here is my original comment:

Orange Bat said:
My problem with the notch is that its for a webcam, but I never use the webcam, and having a nice 1080p webcam doesn’t matter to me at all. In fact, I generally use my iPhone if I ever use a webcam. In other words, for me the notch is a completely unnecessary element that takes away from having a complete large screen.

I believe the notch will be seen as the Touch Bar in a couple of years. It was a change that didn’t need to happen and that few really like. Sure, with your brand new expensive laptop you don’t mind it at the moment. But over time I think many will come to really dislike this terrible design decision.
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I never said that ”it’s taking up room”. It’s about that it inserts itself on the screen, or it at least appears to, so that it breaks up the larger screen. It’s ugly and is a poor design decision. So you essentially agree with me. The difference is that I would prefer a larger bezel with a smaller screen and you‘d rather the larger screen and the notch.

Imagine if Apple sent you a computer with a larger screen where there was a notch-sized black space of dead pixels right at the top. You wouldn’t just accept it. You’d send it back. That‘s what it‘s like to me. As I said, I probably won’t use the camera much, if at all. It’s the same as having ”dead pixels” to me. I realize that’s not everyone’s use case, but its mine. I’m sure there are others who don’t use the laptop camera as much, and for them these will also be “dead pixels”.
 
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Is the menu bar on the 16" AS MBP any taller than it is on the 16" Intel MBP?

I ask because I'm curious why they have the bridge of pixels under the notch. If the menu bars are the same height, it's there because the vertical height needed for the menu bar is larger than that of the notch.

OTOH, if the menu bar on the new MBP is taller than that on the old one, it means they wanted the bridge for design reasons, and thus increased the vertical height of the menu bar so there would be a bridge.
 
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cmaas said:
One day in and I'm a believer. I would have voted no during the design review meeting, but now I have to admit the notch is brilliant. It's not like the phone notch which is a persistent carve out of screen real estate. It's more like a magical bezel that turns into a menu when you need it and otherwise disappears.
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Yeah i admit I was an initial hater. I was absolutely appalled. But now that I see you can simply run a permanent dark mode on the menu bar, and make the notch invisible, I see it as actually a bonus. I haven't seen it in person though, so I might change my mind.
 
no_idea said:
Maybe you should go apply for a job on the Mac engineering team if you are so passionate to find an alternative
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I'm sorry mate, but the entire management of the software division of Apple needs to be fired. Long ago. When a company has to drop its once glorious motto of "It just works", out of fear of being mocked endlessly, due to tragically fallen quality control, then you know there is a problem. I do not for the life of me understand why Timmy hasn't had the cojones to fire them and make a clean start.
 
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aevan said:
Ok, to everyone hating the notch, what would you prefer? You have these options, based on available technology:

- Have a small camera module and sensor, tucked in a slim bezel. The image quality would be bad. (Example: Dell XPS 2019+)
- Have a camera at the bottom of the screen. This would give you an unflattering angle. (Example: Dell XPS before 2019)
- Have a big bezel at the top. (Example: MBPs before 2021)
- Have a camera bump on the lid (Example: no one, thankfully)
- Have additional area left and right of the camera area (notch) for the menu bar, giving you more usable space in the regular work area (Example: MBP in 2021 and many PCs coming in the following years :)

Before you say "how can the squeeze it in phones" the answer is: width. You can have the camera sensor deeper in the phone, behind the screen and just leave an opening for the lens. On laptop lids, you have the options I wrote above. So, which one is it?
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I was initially appalled by the notch, and would personally have gone for taller bezel, and taller laptop to fit it. However, now that I've seen that you can successfully hide it with putting the menu bar in permanent dark mode, I'm actually all for the notch, as it basically places the menu bar in the bezel. Lovely.
 
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sideshowuniqueuser said:
I was initially appalled by the notch, and would personally have gone for taller bezel, and taller laptop to fit it. However, now that I've seen that you can successfully hide it with putting the menu bar in permanent dark mode, I'm actually all for the notch, as it basically places the menu bar in the bezel. Lovely.
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I wouldn't go so far as to say I like the notch there, I still think it's ugly and I wont use the camera anyway, but hiding it by turning the menu bar black is an acceptable solution.
 
contacos said:
I tried one of them but I actually prefer the notch. Seeing the black bar at all time makes the screen appear smaller for some reason. Trick to the brain?maybe because this way you will have the actual bezel + the black „digital bezel“ from the menu bar so it ends up looking like one big bezel. I prefer seeing the wallpaper behind the menu bar
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Notch, Bezels? What's everyone talking about?


tempImagenvZ3z6.jpg



Contacos, I agree with you it is a mind game, if you make only the menu bar black it makes the display look smaller the same way what I did makes it look bigger.
 
I just opened my preferred desktop wallpaper in Preview and added a black filled box at the top. I like that the notch is completely hidden, and I won't have another app running in the background.
 
aevan said:
It's a very good compromise that is a better solution than any alternative (which would be a worse camera like the one on Dell XPS or a top bezel like the one on older MacBooks). This is a very smart way to use additional area for the Menu Bar and it's some very good design (good design is how it works, not just how it looks).
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I'd choose no camera over the Hitler mustache in a heartbeat. Good design my s(h)itting parts.
 
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Avatar74 said:
But did the notch hurt iPhone sales? No.

Will this hurt MacBook sales? Probably not... I've not even noticed or cared about it in the last day that I've had my new MBP... It's not even an eighth of an inch short of 16". Still more real estate than the 15", for $300 less than the price points would have been with the Intel processor.

The problem with chasing niches and notches is that no matter what you do you're going to make someone unhappy. I learned that in 15-20 years of writing film criticism. Apple failed miserably when it tried to be all things to all people, and this is an absurdly silly debate.
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Actually, I don’t know if it hurt iPhone sales or not, and I’m not sure how that can be measured. I have a friend that hated it enough to switch to Samsung, and several acquaitances that also switched to other phone brands. Did it tank iPhone sales? Obviously not. Was it a normal exchange of iPhone users trying new brands vs other people buying iPhones for the first time? Maybe. Each new phone cycle has people buy into and dropping out of Apple, it’s a question of whether specifically the notch caused more people to buy another brand.

For me the notch in a phone made sense because you want the screen as big as possible while keeping the phone itself as small as you can. You have to have a front camera and FaceID sensors so you either have a top bezel of about 3/8ths of an inch or you put in a notch.

Laptop and computers aren’t as tightly space contained. A 3/8 of an inch bezel only at the top of the laptop-and no notch-isn’t going to increase production costs or make the unit too big compared to competitors. And there already is a vocal group of notch haters, and unlike phones Apple isn’t anywhere near the largest laptop (or desktop) seller. Having people write into reviews how much they hate the notch may be enough to stop some people from buying a MacBook.
 
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TheLinkster said:
Why do you feel the need to be an apologist? Does it bother you when criticism goes undefended, especially when it doesn't fit within your view of the world? Seems to me that's the very thing wrong with the world at the moment: I'm not allowed to have an opinion unless it's yours, and you'll spend more energy than necessary trying to convince me I'm wrong.

I hope that brings you joy; otherwise it's wasted energy.
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Again, it's not being an apologist. It's not about a view of the world...I'm rarely if ever stating an "opinion". You are a waste of my energy though, questioning what other people have to talk about is just ridiculous.

Otherwise, what you're doing here is being a "troll apologist" by your logic.
 
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Orange Bat said:
Here is my original comment:


I never said that ”it’s taking up room”. It’s about that it inserts itself on the screen, or it at least appears to, so that it breaks up the larger screen. It’s ugly and is a poor design decision. So you essentially agree with me. The difference is that I would prefer a larger bezel with a smaller screen and you‘d rather the larger screen and the notch.

Imagine if Apple sent you a computer with a larger screen where there was a notch-sized black space of dead pixels right at the top. You wouldn’t just accept it. You’d send it back. That‘s what it‘s like to me. As I said, I probably won’t use the camera much, if at all. It’s the same as having ”dead pixels” to me. I realize that’s not everyone’s use case, but its mine. I’m sure there are others who don’t use the laptop camera as much, and for them these will also be “dead pixels”.
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You said it takes away from having a "complete large screen". You have a complete large screen below the notch, then you have two "shoulders" above that. I understand that you don't like how it looks but there's no denying that the screen is completely what you would have had without the notch and then some.
 
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