No Reason To Upgrade?

[neteng101]

Count me perplexed - I have a late 2013 13" rMBP - what was the $1799 option of that time with 512GB SSD.

Used to be curious each time MBPs got its yearly refresh before that, but everything that's come out since then makes me yawn and not want to upgrade. USB-C? I got nothing that uses USB-C. I've used every port in my rMBP except for ThunderBolt - USB, HDMI, SD card reader. TouchBar? I'd rather have normal function keys. Thinner? Who cares, I went from a 13" MBA before this to a heavier laptop.

No 32GB option to make a 15" desktop replacement anymore attractive. Non-touch-bar 13" are crippled with weaker processor options. Stupid AMD graphics for dGPU in the 15" - just NO for me.

Apple for a hardware company just can't seem to produce an iPhone level MBP? Its perplexing to me. If it ran OSX, I'd go out and buy a Razer Blade today. That's the only thing stopping me from switching at this point!

But my faithful old rMBP is running just fine, so I'll just soldier on with this lump from 2013 for now.

FWIW - I own Apple stock, but its certainly not because of Macs. If it wasn't for the iPhone, this company will be worth 1/100th or less of its current stock value. It just amazes me that Apple can't produce a killer MBP with all the stuff that power users might want.

A 14" laptop is my ideal dimensions, something Apple's never done. They figured out how to build a 10.5" iPad Pro but can't figure out how to make a 14" MBP.

I could go on and on - but yeah, this is just beyond dumb to me. Even water/spill protection which Lenovo has long figured out would be better addition than the TouchBar nonsense and such.

 

[keysofanxiety]

Silly comments. It's obviously not for you so don't buy one. But for what the 2016/17 is good for certainly justifies the upgrade.

Basically, don't think that what you want from a laptop means everybody agrees. Thinner, lighter, and better battery life is always a good thing for a portable product. The dGPUs are monsters when it comes to FCPX/LPX performance and make mincemeat of NVIDIAs for that. Better gaming performance doesn't automatically mean a GPU is better in every other area.

The TB3 ports can be transformed into anything you want and have crazy bandwidth; additionally you can charge the laptop through it. It's the best MBP if you're looking for it to control your static workstation. Plenty of power users bought it and plenty love it.

If you dislike it, that's your prerogative. We all need different things from a product. However it's arrogant to suggest that if you can't justify the purchase, it's somehow less "Pro" or isn't suitable for anybody else.

 

[JohnnyGo]

Upgrading computers every 2-3 years is silly. That's why some of us are frustrated with the various "no reason to upgrade" posts.

Apple producing multiple screen sizes is also not happening. Even the iPad is now focused on 2 screen sizes (iPad mini EOL, the cheaper iPad at one point will migrate to 10.5).

The iPhone is an exception at this point in time because of the transition from 4" to larger screens. It will soon come back to 2 screen sizes (and no home buttons nor headphone jack). If they keep 3 screen sizes (fitting a larger screen into a revised iPhone SE) it's because iPhone sales are in the range of 200 million units.

Camera technology and mobile SOCs have jumped 10x in performance over the last 5-10 years. No one can match that development pace. The SJ analogy of cars and trucks is now being revisited to say smartphones are the cars, PCs are trucks and tablets fall somewhere in between.

Macs are hamstrung by intel for most of performance gains (including poor internal GPUs). But you can see how far Apple has come with SSDs since the first MBAir. For example, the last three rMBs have shown significant storage performance again, one year after another with only 27 months between them (March 2015, June 2017).

Still, that does not mean that a new 2017 rMB will make early adopters of 2015 rMB upgrade. It means others with classic MacBooks or MBAir can now move to these new light machines while others can move to the new/lighter 13" MBP. Some choosing Touchbar version whilst others go for the nTB/classic version.

I can only thank Apple for steering us all in this transition. Does Apple deserves to be criticized? Sure! I have tons of complaints. Can they do it better? Yep! But that does not mean they are doing a bad job or just performing OK. It's an amazing job so far and all the new machines are top of class in their categories.

It's human nature: we always want more. Just my humble opinion.

 

[The Mercurian]

A 14" laptop is my ideal dimensions, something Apple's never done. They figured out how to build a 10.5" iPad Pro but can't figure out how to make a 14" MBP.

Actually - I agree - I'd like to see a 14" option. right now they have 12" 13" 15" & 11" still on refurb. They should simplify the line into 12", 14" & dare I say it a 16" option for those folks who still whinge about the lack of a 17" option

 

[bbowser12]

Count me perplexed - I have a late 2013 13" rMBP - what was the $1799 option of that time with 512GB SSD.

Used to be curious each time MBPs got its yearly refresh before that, but everything that's come out since then makes me yawn and not want to upgrade. USB-C? I got nothing that uses USB-C. I've used every port in my rMBP except for ThunderBolt - USB, HDMI, SD card reader. TouchBar? I'd rather have normal function keys. Thinner? Who cares, I went from a 13" MBA before this to a heavier laptop.

No 32GB option to make a 15" desktop replacement anymore attractive. Non-touch-bar 13" are crippled with weaker processor options. Stupid AMD graphics for dGPU in the 15" - just NO for me.

Apple for a hardware company just can't seem to produce an iPhone level MBP? Its perplexing to me. If it ran OSX, I'd go out and buy a Razer Blade today. That's the only thing stopping me from switching at this point!

But my faithful old rMBP is running just fine, so I'll just soldier on with this lump from 2013 for now.

FWIW - I own Apple stock, but its certainly not because of Macs. If it wasn't for the iPhone, this company will be worth 1/100th or less of its current stock value. It just amazes me that Apple can't produce a killer MBP with all the stuff that power users might want.

A 14" laptop is my ideal dimensions, something Apple's never done. They figured out how to build a 10.5" iPad Pro but can't figure out how to make a 14" MBP.

I could go on and on - but yeah, this is just beyond dumb to me. Even water/spill protection which Lenovo has long figured out would be better addition than the TouchBar nonsense and such.

Good news.