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New 13-Inch MacBook Pro Sans Touch Bar is Marginally Faster But More Efficient Than Last Year's Base Model
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You are very smart, thanks for setting the standard this high.
This is not about affording or not. I can go and buy 10 of them tomorrow if i want, but as a sane person i'm not going to use my hard earned money as a toilet paper.
"More efficient" except it has a 2 hour shorter battery life.
Or are you not able to listen? Back when they introduced Lightning with the iPhone 5 the new connector was described as 'all-digital and adaptive' meaning they planned to use it for other stuff as well. Samsung even made fun of them ("I heard the connector is going to be all digital. What does that even mean?"). Well it means it's going to be the only port you'll ever need on a mobile device. The same is true for USB-C/TB3 but Intel is only now writing the audio specifications, so we've got to wait a little longer before the Headphone Jack can disappear on Macs.
Intel Touts USB-C as Future of Digital Audio as Apple Set to Ditch Headphone Jack
they could have slapped a retinal display on the mac book air and make a perfect laptop
Well, I need both. The new MBP delivers the same tier of performance than the previous one while being more mobile. Its perfect. Its not like they would be able to jump to the next GPU tier by retaining old design. Ist so weird. People seem to complain simply because these new laptops are lighter, without apparently realising that they spot the same class of hardware than the old ones. What Apps did was to take the old laptop, replace the old parts by fastest currently available contemporary parts of the same class and then significantly reduce the laptop footprint, without sacrificing battery life. The complains about he new design are beyond comprehension.
Most people don't connect more than a device or two to ports in the first place. That's probably why Apple included only 2 ports. But those doing the most complaining are people like you for whom there are plenty of solutions. You were the same people complaining when Apple dropped floppy drives, DVD drives, Ethernet, and FireWire.
Well if we are going to compare to Mac Mini's (2014), we better not forget MacMini 2012 with four core i7. Geekbench 4 Core speed of around 11,000 (depending on which measurement). (https://browser.primatelabs.com/v4/cpu/search?utf8=✓&q=Mac+mini+2012). I bought refurb MacMini 2012 for 750 with one year warranty, waiting out for new models of Macpro, but now my old MacMini 2012 is nearly twice as fast in multicore as this model? I need to run Win 10 in Parallels, so I added fast SSD and 16 GB RAM and it is fast. How much more money would that take for a new MacPro to match the processing power? I appreciate the slimness, etc... but I thought this was a professional model? I don't need 15" screen, I need speed. One Can still pick up a 2015 13 RMB I7 for $1000 on Ebay. Plus, i still need some of those older ports. If I want very portable, a MacBook or old Air is fine. It seems Nearly every new spec of the new Pro line is in the wrong direction for me, save a better keyboard and ability to run 4k monitor at 60hz. I am in no hurry to purchase now. For me, Apple keeps going backwards just as i am 'a new fan and recent convert from Windows. Disappointed with the launch.
That's sort of what the base MacBook Pro is. But you get better ports on the MacBook Pro since they are more versatile.
The new machines are faster than the last generation, with a much better screen, with a much bigger and better trackpad, have 2 high speed state-of-the-art ports, and are much thinner and lighter and have at least as good battery life. These are great reasons to prefer the new model over the old... why all the complaints?
MacRumors member since 2002, actually looked at the MS Surface products. This makes me sad.
I just looked up GeekBench on my Mid-2012 MBP i7 13" and it's about as fast as today's MBP discussed here. Mind you I get all the value add in Retina, more efficient, and longer battery... but for what is now a +$300 machine from last purchase... I would like to have a little speed please.
My 2011 MBA is still running like a champ. Wanted to replace it last year but the MB didn't appeal. You know I've been moaning like a petulant toddler for a new mac mini. Didn't get that either (last update was like pee in my Cheerios). For the number of laptops I own, the MBP would be overkill, expensive overkill at that.
I don't understand Apple sometimes. If my wife and daughter didn't use iPhones, Apple would literally have no current products that interest me. And I'm easy. I spend money on tech just because. 'Cept when my wife says I can't. She saw me looking at the Surface Studio and was emphatic. No. No. NO. It's not like I can hide it in the basement for 3 months and claim I've had it for years.
LOL. We just turned our basement into an Airbnb, so hiding is no longer possible for me (although being in the dog house is amazingly easy).
The Surface Studio certainly looks good in some regards - if I was an artist and needed a big screen like that to draw, this seems like the best show in town right now. But I am not a drawer at all, so this thing is of no use. I don't like the brackets or that base and of course not a fan of windows (even though it is better than before). As you well know, I am still hoping that ipads will improve and who knows, maybe the next version will be enough for me to replace the MacAir with the ipad pro plus. At this point, it seems clear that Apple is limping along while they are either fighting internally on direction or waiting for the chip and iOS system to mature. Tim has stated that the iPad is the laptop replacement (it's not.... yet), so I am guessing they are slowly killing of the other lines and focusing on the iDevices. But the fact that they are going so slow is indicative of the in-fighting. I hate to use Steve, but the one thing is that he had no issue pulling the trigger and even if the road got strewn with dead bodies. Tim should pull the guys in and say "I want iPad that is truly an laptop killer and I want it for the march release, now get out of my office and make it happen." The he can go back to his political career for the rest of the week.
In the meantime, might I suggest that you sneak in the tech to the basement, just so long as you don't make the rookie mistake of forgetting to destroy the evidence - boxes, receipts, etc.
- You mean when it got thinner? As it with almost every case design (2016: 15.5 mm, 2013: 18 mm, 2012: 19 mm, 2009: 24.1 mm, 2006: 25.9 mm, 2001: 28 mm, 2000: 26 mm, 1999: 41 mm, 1998: 51mm, 1997: 61 mm).
- Or do you mean when it lost ports? As it did with every case design (2016: USB-A, TB2/mDP, HDMI, SD card, MagSafe; 2012: Ethernet, FW800, Kensington lock; 2009 ExpressCard, DVI, FW400; 2006: modem, CardBus, S-video, round power plug; 2002: VGI, infrared; 2000: SCSI; 1998: Serial, ADB, HDI-15
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unfortunately not! the current mac book pro has only 2 USB-C ports and when you are charging it you are left with one.
the MacBook air has 2 x usb3 ports, magsafe, thuderbold and sd card slot
Drastically increased price, removal of MagSafe, dongles for everything. Reasons given for not adding more "Pro" features were increased power usage but at same time they decreased battery size over last years. Apple is catering more to the mainstream users with the Pro line now instead of what real Pro users want.
Blame intel for the lack of progress. Of course it's only marginally better then last year....
The entire keynote was a subtile shift in sales strategy. That higher price might be a Jedi trick to move more people to iOS with an iPad Pro. But I find that OS far from productive. Even with IBM on board not half of the use cases for my workflows are covered by iOS.
Or are they compensating for the longer product cycles?
Whatever their strategy, I don't feel compelled and my late 2013 runs still very smoothly. I'll wait a year at least. I don't know if I stay in the apple eco system after this car crash called "keynote".
The entire keynote was a subtile shift in sales strategy. That higher price might be a Jedi trick to move more people to iOS with an iPad Pro. But I find that OS far from productive. Even with IBM on board not half of the use cases for my workflows are covered by iOS.
Or are they compensating for the longer product cycles?
Whatever their strategy, I don't feel compelled and my late 2013 runs still very smoothly. I'll wait a year at least. I don't know if I stay in the apple eco system after this car crash called "keynote".
Three reasons:
- That price increase also included a 128 GB SSD on top of going retina (which was a downgrade in size but an upgrade in speed).
- The non-retina model wasn't only kept in the line-up, it also got the new processor generation and USB3 (thus those wanting no change except for internal improvements got shut up).
- The sentiment that Apple has abandoned the Mac and stopped updating them wasn't as strong then.