Now, hear me out, before you start hating me for creating a separate thread instead of posting this as a comment in one of the previously made MBP 14/16 threads 
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TL: DR - I loved my MBP 14, yet I returned it due to build quality issues.
I ordered my base config MBP 14 few weeks ago, had to wait for it. During that time I was going in circles, loops inside my mind whether I really need it or just want it and whether my M1 12.9 iPP and low-key ThinkPad Ryzen 4000 combo couldnt do it for my daily tasks, damn, that was crazy, because MBP 14 that I ordered cost almost 2300 euros, thats just how much they cost over here.
The day it arrived I was, well, positive about it, but not too excited, I mean, its just another piece of tech, not a worlds hunger and peace solver, right?
But, dang, after using it for almost a week I really started to love that machine, its old-school, squared design, its screen with its sharpness and colors(oh, the nothch is still there, but after few days I started to ignore it more and more, still, would have been better without it tho, uselessly big without faceID which I love on my iPP and webcam quality worse than much older Surface Book), how quiet it was, never heard fan on it, neither when updating OS, nor when installing numerous apps or having multiple apps and windows open with few audio editors launched, silent!
The battery life - that one I was a bit cautious about, but boy, if they say that M1/M2 MBA has considerably longer battery life than MBP 14, then Im positively scared as to how good it would be with MBA! I had MBP 14 on battery power for 50 hours, out of which more than 12h were screen-on time, screen brightness during daytime 7-9(out of 16) and 3-6 during evenings, late nights, all indoors. I think I could get 14h with my current light use if turned it off instead of sleep. And Im pretty sure that with low power mode enabled it would go even further, let alone if I lowered screen brigthness a notch or two, btw, Im using dark mode everywhere and that means that lots of content required turned up the screen brightness, so theres that, turn on light mode and you might want to turn that brightness down a bit and get even more battery life!
Now, the power of this thing - didnt get with it as far as to see how powerful it is, I will trust others, who have, on this one, but I looked at it not as just a simple, little laptop, but as a portable workstation with great battery life! With 16GB of RAM never got even a megabyte of in swap.
The speakers were great, not the loudest ones for a laptop, but very good sounding, I was impressed! Watched movies and listened to some background music without feeling the need for my usual bluetooth speaker!
The keyboard - coming from Thinkpad and Surface Book in our household I didnt like it at first, I expected it to be a bit quieter than those two and I wasnt sure if I can get used to shallow key travel. After a few days of using it I kind of started to type more accurately on it and also got used to key travel, didnt seem such a deal anymore, however, what seemed like a big deal was feeling of the keys themselves, they felt really good to the touch, like no other keyboard Ive touched before.
Trackpad was fine, I liked it, tho show desktop finger swipe didnt always work and I suspect it had to do something with how mission control works.
MacOS - I was surprised how well I started to adapt to it coming from Windows, I liked its looks tho there were some things that, for the time being, I found more familiar in Windows. Im using W11 and even with that I felt like, for me, macOS felt fresher and, combined with Macbook, more inviting for me to drop my procrastinations and get things done, so its subjectively my experience.
Ports - well, theres no such thing as too many ports, so I liked them, used SD card slots, love thats it full sized and not that botch half-measure microSD one like on so many recent laptops.
So, after such lengthy, positive hands on experience description, why did I return it, you might ask? After all, it felt just right, as a laptop and as a computer for me.
Well, its was its build quality - clicks and squeaks coming from bottom panel and right palmrest were just unacceptable for me, not for a 2300 euros. I was really trying to come up with excuses not to return it even if all that was asked was to reseat the bottom panel, but I didnt want to risk doing that just to end up not fixing its assembly issues and then getting charged by retailer for tampering with device when I return it, we dont have Apple stores here where one could just walk in and get instant replacement or get it fixed immediately, so I chose to return it.
What did I gain from these few days of trying out MBP 14? Well, peace of mind, so to speak. I tried out macOS in beautiful device and Im quite sure that, unless Miscrosoft released awesome Surface device/devices this autumn with great battery life, redesigned chassis and latest and greatest AMD CPU's with good performance-battery life balance, then my next laptop, or desktop computer, most likely will be a Mac.
And its coming from someone who couldnt care less for those overpriced Apple computers with crappy thermals, noise and battery life... until they released M1 with silent operation, long battery life and lots of power per watt.
Well, I salute all of you who read it through all this long rambling and not just TL: DR part!
!TL: DR - I loved my MBP 14, yet I returned it due to build quality issues.
I ordered my base config MBP 14 few weeks ago, had to wait for it. During that time I was going in circles, loops inside my mind whether I really need it or just want it and whether my M1 12.9 iPP and low-key ThinkPad Ryzen 4000 combo couldnt do it for my daily tasks, damn, that was crazy, because MBP 14 that I ordered cost almost 2300 euros, thats just how much they cost over here.
The day it arrived I was, well, positive about it, but not too excited, I mean, its just another piece of tech, not a worlds hunger and peace solver, right?
But, dang, after using it for almost a week I really started to love that machine, its old-school, squared design, its screen with its sharpness and colors(oh, the nothch is still there, but after few days I started to ignore it more and more, still, would have been better without it tho, uselessly big without faceID which I love on my iPP and webcam quality worse than much older Surface Book), how quiet it was, never heard fan on it, neither when updating OS, nor when installing numerous apps or having multiple apps and windows open with few audio editors launched, silent!
The battery life - that one I was a bit cautious about, but boy, if they say that M1/M2 MBA has considerably longer battery life than MBP 14, then Im positively scared as to how good it would be with MBA! I had MBP 14 on battery power for 50 hours, out of which more than 12h were screen-on time, screen brightness during daytime 7-9(out of 16) and 3-6 during evenings, late nights, all indoors. I think I could get 14h with my current light use if turned it off instead of sleep. And Im pretty sure that with low power mode enabled it would go even further, let alone if I lowered screen brigthness a notch or two, btw, Im using dark mode everywhere and that means that lots of content required turned up the screen brightness, so theres that, turn on light mode and you might want to turn that brightness down a bit and get even more battery life!
Now, the power of this thing - didnt get with it as far as to see how powerful it is, I will trust others, who have, on this one, but I looked at it not as just a simple, little laptop, but as a portable workstation with great battery life! With 16GB of RAM never got even a megabyte of in swap.
The speakers were great, not the loudest ones for a laptop, but very good sounding, I was impressed! Watched movies and listened to some background music without feeling the need for my usual bluetooth speaker!
The keyboard - coming from Thinkpad and Surface Book in our household I didnt like it at first, I expected it to be a bit quieter than those two and I wasnt sure if I can get used to shallow key travel. After a few days of using it I kind of started to type more accurately on it and also got used to key travel, didnt seem such a deal anymore, however, what seemed like a big deal was feeling of the keys themselves, they felt really good to the touch, like no other keyboard Ive touched before.
Trackpad was fine, I liked it, tho show desktop finger swipe didnt always work and I suspect it had to do something with how mission control works.
MacOS - I was surprised how well I started to adapt to it coming from Windows, I liked its looks tho there were some things that, for the time being, I found more familiar in Windows. Im using W11 and even with that I felt like, for me, macOS felt fresher and, combined with Macbook, more inviting for me to drop my procrastinations and get things done, so its subjectively my experience.
Ports - well, theres no such thing as too many ports, so I liked them, used SD card slots, love thats it full sized and not that botch half-measure microSD one like on so many recent laptops.
So, after such lengthy, positive hands on experience description, why did I return it, you might ask? After all, it felt just right, as a laptop and as a computer for me.
Well, its was its build quality - clicks and squeaks coming from bottom panel and right palmrest were just unacceptable for me, not for a 2300 euros. I was really trying to come up with excuses not to return it even if all that was asked was to reseat the bottom panel, but I didnt want to risk doing that just to end up not fixing its assembly issues and then getting charged by retailer for tampering with device when I return it, we dont have Apple stores here where one could just walk in and get instant replacement or get it fixed immediately, so I chose to return it.
What did I gain from these few days of trying out MBP 14? Well, peace of mind, so to speak. I tried out macOS in beautiful device and Im quite sure that, unless Miscrosoft released awesome Surface device/devices this autumn with great battery life, redesigned chassis and latest and greatest AMD CPU's with good performance-battery life balance, then my next laptop, or desktop computer, most likely will be a Mac.
And its coming from someone who couldnt care less for those overpriced Apple computers with crappy thermals, noise and battery life... until they released M1 with silent operation, long battery life and lots of power per watt.
Well, I salute all of you who read it through all this long rambling and not just TL: DR part
!
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