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How Apple Alienated Mac Loyalists, reportedly also failed to make a longer-lasting mbp battery

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motime

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Here is the link to the original Bloomberg article, I don't know if it has been posted before.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-20/how-apple-alienated-mac-loyalists

http://www.theverge.com/2016/12/20/14024322/macbook-pro-battery-development-failure

Apple’s new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar has been a huge disappointment when it comes to battery life, and a report from Bloomberg this morning seems to indicate why. According to the report, Apple was hoping to use a higher-capacity battery that was form-fit to the inside of the computer. But the design is said to have failed a “key test,” leading Apple to scrap those plans and ship the laptop with an older battery design.

That’s very possibly what’s responsible for the laptop’s poor battery life. When it comes down to it, the battery inside the new MacBook Pro, particular the Touch Bar models, has a lower capacity than the battery inside last year’s MacBook Pro, likely due to weight and space constraints. Had this reported design worked out, the story may have been different, and the laptops may have lasted the 10 hours that Apple claims they should, instead of the five to six hours that we saw in testing.

Bloomberg’s report also explores the state of Apple’s Mac development and the company’s apparent lack of dedication to ensuring its computers are cutting edge and up to date. Apple has put fewer design resources toward the creation of new Macs in recent years and has pulled enough engineers off of macOS that it no longer has a dedicated development team, according to the report. In both cases, the changes were made to redirect resources to the iPhone, iPad, and iOS.

The report also describes Apple’s Mac unit seeing departures by staff uncertain of its future and engineers who feel their time is being split between too many competing prototypes. There’s more in the story, including details on MacBook models that engineers considered but never shipped.

Apple declined to comment on “speculation.” But yesterday, the company’s CEO, Tim Cook, sought to reassure employees that Macs were still a focus, saying that “great desktops” were on the way. Bloomberg says this year’s iMac update will include USB-C ports and an updated graphics processor.
 
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motime said:
Here is the link to the original Bloomberg article, I don't know if it has been posted before.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-20/how-apple-alienated-mac-loyalists

http://www.theverge.com/2016/12/20/14024322/macbook-pro-battery-development-failure

Apple’s new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar has been a huge disappointment when it comes to battery life, and a report from Bloomberg this morning seems to indicate why. According to the report, Apple was hoping to use a higher-capacity battery that was form-fit to the inside of the computer. But the design is said to have failed a “key test,” leading Apple to scrap those plans and ship the laptop with an older battery design.

That’s very possibly what’s responsible for the laptop’s poor battery life. When it comes down to it, the battery inside the new MacBook Pro, particular the Touch Bar models, has a lower capacity than the battery inside last year’s MacBook Pro, likely due to weight and space constraints. Had this reported design worked out, the story may have been different, and the laptops may have lasted the 10 hours that Apple claims they should, instead of the five to six hours that we saw in testing.

Bloomberg’s report also explores the state of Apple’s Mac development and the company’s apparent lack of dedication to ensuring its computers are cutting edge and up to date. Apple has put fewer design resources toward the creation of new Macs in recent years and has pulled enough engineers off of macOS that it no longer has a dedicated development team, according to the report. In both cases, the changes were made to redirect resources to the iPhone, iPad, and iOS.

The report also describes Apple’s Mac unit seeing departures by staff uncertain of its future and engineers who feel their time is being split between too many competing prototypes. There’s more in the story, including details on MacBook models that engineers considered but never shipped.

Apple declined to comment on “speculation.” But yesterday, the company’s CEO, Tim Cook, sought to reassure employees that Macs were still a focus, saying that “great desktops” were on the way. Bloomberg says this year’s iMac update will include USB-C ports and an updated graphics processor.
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Another possibly-relevant article:

http://www.theverge.com/2016/12/21/14037686/apple-macbook-macos-focus-mobile-features-ios

Apple's basically lost interest in macOS at this point. It's a secondary market, and they're not pursuing it.
 
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New XPS 15 specs just came out, it's going to have kaby lake and GTX 1050 graphics. Depending on the price I might just switch.
 
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motime said:
New XPS 15 specs just came out, it's going to have kaby lake and GTX 1050 graphics. Depending on the price I might just switch.
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Plus, it will have that cool as heeell Windows Hello feature, where you an use your face to log in. If I hadn't gotten used to using MacOS in my workflow...
 
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Precursor said:
What's the battery size on that? And how long does it last?
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Not sure, I think it was a leak as the notebook showed up on some product page, don't think we will be able to verify any battery stats till after release anyway.
 
It's been obvious for a while now that Apple is doing the minimal to make sure that there isn't a mass exodus from the Mac, but isn't planning to make significant improvements in any meaningful way.
 
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tubeexperience said:
It's been obvious for a while now that Apple is doing the minimal to make sure that there isn't a mass exodus from the Mac, but isn't planning to make any significant improvements in any meaningful way.
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Yeah, their laptop market now is college kids, particularly those whose parents are buying for them.
 
The most recent changes in FCPX, Motion, Logic? (don't know, I'm not much of an audio guy) tell another story, just like this:
http://finalcutprox.guru/blogs-main/editorial-blog/files/putting_demons_to_rest.html

Maybe Apple does indeed abandon MacOS as a whole. I'm ok with that, as long as they keep pushing their platform for creatives. So far, they've done a decent job in these regards imo. If their future vision is iOS, together with intuitive tools for both creative amateurs and professionals, I'll gladly be part of that vision. Every tool that eases up my workflow, or even just makes it more fun, is a welcome tool. I'm no sympathiser of an elitist attitude anyways. Software doesn't need to be complex to offer a large creative space.
Microsoft did the same with Visual Studio Code. I hated their bloated IDE, over the years it made me rage constantly. Xamarin Studio was a welcome diversion, which later got bought by Microsoft. Their new lightweight stuff is simply lovely, back to the essence. It's something I can very well imagine on a mobile device some iterations later down the road.

There'll always be a part of the industry that wants to hang on to old standards (or can't afford to do otherwise, legacy stuff). I'm glad, that some people keep pushing the industry into another direction. For some, it may be dumbing down. Others forget their pride and appreciate the depths of new tools, pushing themselves even further towards the new possibilities. I'm observing this trend over and over again, always with the same results. Some people simply don't like change, in most cases for their worse.

However, if - contrary to the clues I've read so far - Apple ends up denying their creative customer base, this'll backfire sooner or later. Without their creational aspect they're nothing else than just another cool toy. If there's nobody doing some awesome stuff with it, all the hipsters out there will abandon it as soon as the next trendy stuff catches their attention. It's the creative user base that's the fundament of their marketing strategy, it always was (You know, that feeling when you think buying an Apple device will make you a creative professional like the dude you've seen the other day).
 
Speculative, unoriginal, clickbait nonsense. These articles come out every year since the 90s. All they need is a template document for this crap and just change a few numbers and names every time it is published.

We already know that there is a population shift towards mobile devices but the desktop will always be there - but changing form, become more cloud based, becoming more cable free, and using more distributed computing.
 
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SoyCapitanSoyCapitan said:
Speculative, unoriginal, clickbait nonsense. These articles come out every year since the 90s. All they need is a template document for this crap and just change a few numbers and names every time it is published.

We already know that there is a population shift towards mobile devices but the desktop will always be there - but changing form, become more cloud based, becoming more cable free, and using more distributed computing.
Click to expand...

Completely disagree. The verge are the biggest Apple shills ever. I don't remember them publishing anything like this ever! Something like this coming from the Apple's biggest shills is telling something.
 
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SoyCapitanSoyCapitan said:
Speculative, unoriginal, clickbait nonsense. These articles come out every year since the 90s. All they need is a template document for this crap and just change a few numbers and names every time it is published.

We already know that there is a population shift towards mobile devices but the desktop will always be there - but changing form, become more cloud based, becoming more cable free, and using more distributed computing.
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Another nonsensical and useless post by you. I linked to the original Bloomberg article the verge was referring to. Thanks for the much needed insight though.
 
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dark_mark said:
Completely disagree. The verge are the biggest Apple shills ever. I don't remember them publishing anything like this ever! Something like this coming from the Apple's biggest shills is telling something.
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You haven't read the Verge very much if you think they are Apple shills. They are a slightly higher end link bait site than the other ones and that's all.
http://www.theverge.com/apple
Just on that page are many critical headlines and articles.
The article is overblown and so is criticism of the new MBP.
I'm not having battery life issues after the initial settle in with spotlight indexing etc. I can see people saying they didn't have to make it thinner and could have used a bigger battery though. What laptop couldn't.
The screen is great and even better than before.
The speakers are significantly better.
Keyboards are subjective but I like the new one. It took a short amount of time to type lighter and I like the shape and especially the lighting of the keys more.
Nobody else makes a laptop with sequential read/write speeds of 3.1Gbps and 2.1Gbps per second.
I'm happy as a clam about four USB-C ports. What a great port and I can use a few dongles for a short time. Boo hoo.
Touch ID is really great and a no brainer. Not sure how useful the touch bar will be but no issues with it for me.
It's silly how long it is taking Apple to update Macs though. You can only blame intel for so long. Alot of the features of the new Mac could have already been implemented by now.
Pro in the name is nothing more than marketing. Do people think only Pro's or "creatives" (ugh) buy the 13 and 15 inch laptops? Thats not anywhere near enough market to sustain the Mac.
Cost increase isn't good over the last generation either. They milked the same design for years and should have kept the same prices.
 
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Everyone gets a review unit they are "supposed to send back".
So. Nobody cares if they enjoy a free MacBook Pro.
Spending money on it - even if you can - is a totally different perspective.
 
motime said:
New XPS 15 specs just came out, it's going to have kaby lake and GTX 1050 graphics. Depending on the price I might just switch.
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Life is too short to use Windows. Hardware alone doesn't justify it. Oh and Dell "support"..
Kaby Lake is not out in full production from Intel by the way so don't expect many of these for awhile and no way could they supply enough for the new MacBook Pro.
 
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