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Hands-On: OWC's 'DEC' Adds an SD Card Slot, Ethernet, and USB Type-A Ports to the MacBook Pro
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They're going to adopt Apple's design philosophy and use glue as well. Lots and lots of glue!
When needed is the operative phrase, isn't it? Other than when working in my studio and connecting to my Caldigit TB2 dock from my old MBP (1 adapter, always attached, same effort as before) I have plugged a dongle into my 2016 MBP exactly twice in the more than a month I have owned it. I hadn't fully realized how much I used Dropbox, etc, to transfer files and if I am editing on the road I load media onto my Oyen RAID USB-C 3.1 Gen2 chassis with 2x 1TB SSDs installed that conveniently shipped with 2 cables, USB-C and USB-A. Not schilling, it's just a good product that I bought at $90USD.
Of course, different users will have different experiences but I suspect I am not the only owner with this experience.
And the worst of all is that MagSafe is being removed for all MacBooks, not just the Pro. Mind you, the MagSafe was a reason that confirmed me the MacBook purchase was a good decision and that it was superior to competitors. Without the MagSafe, the MacBook is closest to PC laptops than ever. People are annoyed because of the removal of ports. I agree. But removing the MagSafe is far worse, because it cannot be fixed with dongles.
This is not a bad idea. Maybe Apple could do a version of the laptop with all of these functionalities already included out of the box and call it the "MBP Pro".
/s
/s
It's depends what you do for a living. Not everyone has the same needs, the problem is Apple assumes everyone does have the same needs and now offers no choice in hardware configurations. A lot of people don't want a thin laptop, they want one with lots of ports, upgradeable RAM and storage, Ethernet and a matte screen option would be great. I need it to work, not to look cool.
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Or they could just transpose the motherboard into a whole new case....
[doublepost=1483705321][/doublepost]The sad thing is with all of this is none of it gets around the 16GB RAM limitation of the MBP. Yes it needs more ports, Ethernet, SD and a better keyboard, but 16GB RAM isn't enough.
Well, I think this thing represents Peak Cook.
The fact that the idea of screwing a third party dock to a £2K + laptop is being greeted with "Hmmm... you know, that might just make this machine feasible for me" instead of being laughed out of the room says all we need to know about Apple's recent direction.
The fact that the idea of screwing a third party dock to a £2K + laptop is being greeted with "Hmmm... you know, that might just make this machine feasible for me" instead of being laughed out of the room says all we need to know about Apple's recent direction.
The article is here; I read it. Unlike others here, I see no reason to criticize something intended to make a better MBP. Do you people bellyache every time your coffee is too hot?
If Apple would make decent desktop computer, that would be an option.
Btw, there are people who need ports in other places than at your own work desk. You could buy one dock to go, one to work and one to home, but...
We replaced an older unit with a Dell largely because it provided the desired connectivity options. Interestingly, my wife, who is a heavy ipad user, seamlessly transitioned to the Dell because of its touchscreen. Has Apple also missed the boat by not providing ipad users with a comparable physical interface in the macbooks?
This will probably cost close to $1k and for what? Not much really. They should have taken the modular approach like Google and LG are trying to do with phones (but notably failing).
All connected internally via USB-C. You could probably get a total of 4 modules into this thing, 2 on the left side and 2 on the right. Maybe some modules would need 2 slots but whatever...
You could then add a real GPU, SSD, more Battery power, blah, blah, blah....
Now that would be innovative and definitely would put the PRO back in MacBook PRO. I mean, you could turn this thing into a portable Flame... Oh, wait... nope, 16gb RAM limit... Too bad... Apple could have done this themselves and opened up that RAM limit... I was all set to buy a new MBP too, it was time for an upgrade but I'm holding off now until June to see if they do a spec bump.
Perfect solution too... Those that care about thinness can keep using their anorexic MBP and those that don't care and would rather have computing power and capabilities can opt for the "fatboy" add-on. Hell, they could even do a fatter version that vertically stacked modules so you could get 8 total.
- SSD Module
- General Ports Modules
- Optical Drive Module
- Battery Module
- GPU / Video module for gaming or 3d modeling / animation
- Video production specific ports module
- Audio production specific ports module with built in interface, XLR, etc...
All connected internally via USB-C. You could probably get a total of 4 modules into this thing, 2 on the left side and 2 on the right. Maybe some modules would need 2 slots but whatever...
You could then add a real GPU, SSD, more Battery power, blah, blah, blah....
Now that would be innovative and definitely would put the PRO back in MacBook PRO. I mean, you could turn this thing into a portable Flame... Oh, wait... nope, 16gb RAM limit... Too bad... Apple could have done this themselves and opened up that RAM limit... I was all set to buy a new MBP too, it was time for an upgrade but I'm holding off now until June to see if they do a spec bump.
Perfect solution too... Those that care about thinness can keep using their anorexic MBP and those that don't care and would rather have computing power and capabilities can opt for the "fatboy" add-on. Hell, they could even do a fatter version that vertically stacked modules so you could get 8 total.
Thats a lot of sacrifice just to use OS X....
expensive under powered laptop, no ports, unupgradable, have to buy extra dock to attach at bottom, have to deal with thicker laptop than competition.
Just buy a Windows laptop.
expensive under powered laptop, no ports, unupgradable, have to buy extra dock to attach at bottom, have to deal with thicker laptop than competition.
Just buy a Windows laptop.
I hope Apple sees this as a red flag how crazy an unrealistic their products become. PLS Apple don't be that arrogant!
This thing could be a lot thinner if they didn't include the Ethernet jack. That one port determined the thickness of the entire, basically empty, shell.
Even without seeing a teardown... I'm pretty sure it's mostly hollow space inside. All the I/O is on the edges... and the 2.5" hard drive doesn't take up much room either.
But it's soooo thick because of that Ethernet port.
The other odd choice they made... why no battery? There's clearly room inside. But no... it's just a bunch of ports along the edges.
They basically took this:
and spread it out across the entire laptop while adding substantial thickness everywhere. Sure there's a hard drive in the OWC DEC too... but it's still unnecessarily thick, in my opinion.
I'm not saying this thing needs to exist at all. But if they're gonna go down this road... they could have made it a little more streamlined.
I agree with you on all points. I would rather have a dongle for Ethernet for the rare times I need it. And a 2.5 drive is light weight and does not take up that much space, that would make sense. But something tells me they will be going with a PCI based SSD which will double the price.
As I predicted during all the initial outcry. Custom solutions for the small percentage of people who need it. Just need an extra 1000mAh? Use an existing universal battery pack. Need the works? Get one of these. Just need an SD card reader? Buy a dongle.
There are dozens of video, data, printer, audio ports from the last 40 years. Every one of them is still in use. Even ancient stuff like VGA is very common in conference rooms. [Gee I sure wish I could hook the RCA stereo of my turntable up without an adaptor...] Everyone does not need or want a dozen+ ports of varying obsolescence on their laptop.
Queue all the thickness whining from the people who whined about thinness.
its okay, its so chunky the cable is likely gonna rip before pulling your laptop with that atrocity attached.
Exactly what I and millions of others have been forced to do by buying a Mophie case - all that time spent making it look beautifully thin wasted because the thing doesn't actually work for a whole day of heavy use...
