Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
i'd buy one immediately
[doublepost=1479206372][/doublepost]
you don't know how i use my laptop, you can't speak for everyone.

I'm not trying to speak for everyone at all, I'm just saying that you can't judge something without experiencing it first.
 
Tell that to the iPad Pro with keyboard. I see you own one. I Use the keyboard alongside the touch screen all the time.

I don't use a keyboard attachment with my iPad Pro. If I need to do extended typing in that fashion, I would use my laptop with a proper keyboard than trying to shoehorn one onto my iPad.
 
The compromise is mostly with touch targets. If you're building for touch, the entire OS needs to be chunkier. You lose the productivity gains that you get when the system is built around the precision of a cursor. What about mouse-overs and tool tips? There are no over-states with touch.

The only useful implementation of touch on a laptop I've seen is scrolling. I have a feeling that most of the fawning over that is because PC makers make such awful trackpads. How much are people zooming in on their laptops on a regular basis?

I get what you're saying but I don't think touch screen laptops are the future. Microsoft is throwing everything they can at the PC, but it's because they lost the mobile war. Apple has a very healthy PC business and a very healthy Touch business. They can be more selective about what the optimal experience on both is.

Apple builds covetable luxury devices. The thinness and the finish is absolutely a selling point. When you imagine the future, do you picture thicker devices with ports or do you imagine wireless thin pieces of glass?

That said, my point is Apple already solved this with iOS and their multitouch trackpad implementation. Again, touch can be implemented on a Mac where appropriate. So yes, targets would be small in certain existing apps or OS navigation. But you can write new apps (like the MS Paint app) that would take advantage of touch-based input, drawing, or a combination. You can enable multitouch on screen to do certain things, as an alternative or complement to the trackpad.

All it takes is some thought on how to best implement these things. We've already come up with some compelling reasons here. MSoft put out a BIG one with the Surface Studio.

Like I stated before, this is an issue of vision and imagination. Apple is giving up on both by calling it all "absurd".

The only absurd thing here is their lack of both of those.

P.D. You need to try newer PC laptop trackpads. You will be surprised (I certainly was). You can swipe between desktops in Windows 10 like you can on a Mac, with the same four-finger gesture even. Microsoft is doing their homework, and making OEMs code and make hardware that integrates much better. I don't think they're at Apple's level yet but it looks like they are hungry to get there and beyond. Apple dismissing things so cavalierly is a bad sign...
 
Yes, and I agree wholeheartedly; but MS has created a "buzz" around their ONE feature, and marketed the HECK out of it, to some obvious success.

But can you think of ONE other feature in ANY "Surface" commercial? Of course not! That's because the REST of their computers SUCK.

Oh, and don't forget: Windows 10.

I borrowed a Surface Pro from work for a couple days to play with. I can't think of any compelling reason for that device. Even the signature touch screen feature is awful; Windows 10 is not designed for touch. You can put it into that "pseudo-touch" mode, but then you lose access to other aspects of the system that were never redone in that mode. The Surface Pen is also horribly slow/laggy. Compared to using an Apple Pencil I was pretty blown away at how absolutely sluggish their pen is.
 
I borrowed a Surface Pro from work for a couple days to play with. I can't think of any compelling reason for that device. Even the signature touch screen feature is awful; Windows 10 is not designed for touch. You can put it into that "pseudo-touch" mode, but then you lose access to other aspects of the system that were never redone in that mode. The Surface Pen is also horribly slow/laggy. Compared to using an Apple Pencil I was pretty blown away at how absolutely sluggish their pen is.

You know, it's a shame Apple is out of the display industry, because their iPad Pro Display technology, in combination with the Apple Pencil, would make an "iMac Studio" the desktop for creative/graphic-artist types.

Apple just shot this down, frustratingly, and is ceding the idea to MSoft.

If Apple did it, it would be awesome, and well worth the ($4K) money.

Please, Apple. PLEASE!!! GET YOUR HEAD OUT.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pier
Lmao that is a cable dude. The whole point of the post is cable less not cable type
What's your point, then?
[doublepost=1479224981][/doublepost]
Yes I'm aware of that patent.

So doing nothing for 6 years is not having your head in the sand?

Who knows, they may revisit this design, but it'll just look like copying MS.
No. Maybe they built a mock-up and they didn't like the way it worked/looked.
 
Schiller has seen the surface studio, right?

Surface Products are different though. For example, I love the touch screen on my SP4 because its a tablet and I frequently use the drawing ability for notes. For my rMBP, I like the trackpad enough that I don't need or miss a touch screen.

Same with the Surface Studio. I don't think even Microsoft expects users to be using the Surface Studio's touch screen in iMac mode. The iMac is not designed to be a drawing device, thus a touch screen iMac makes no sense.

PC manufacturers use touch screens to add another feature to the spec list.
 
Last edited:
Sure, you can slide your arms / hands / fingers forward toward the screen, with elbows on the desk, but it is a very inefficient movement and if your entire work day revolved around doing that, you'd likely develop tennis elbow very quickly.

I'm sitting at my desk now, in fact, and my normal hand/finger position on the keyboard does not allow me to even touch the screen (not even at the bottom where the dock is), without having to slide my arm forward. The only movements my elbows / arms make are very small adjustments if using the trackpad, otherwise my wrists are resting on the wrist rest of my 15" rMBP and I can work uninterrupted for hours in this position. The same is true when I'm standing at my desk (a sit-stand unit).

I've mentioned this before, that I tried to make an iPad and BT keyboard work similarly, for travel instead of bringing my rMBP with me, but it is just so inefficient, having to move between keyboard and screen, I stopped trying and went back to either bringing the laptop or just the iPad (using on-screen keyboard).


I guess that's why choice is important. The things you can't do comfortably I can. But that's not surprising as we're all built different.

For example, on the touchscreen Dell 7000 series (work laptop) I can hit items in the Windows taskbar with my ring finger and index finger while my index fingers still rest on the home keys and without raising my elbow. Also, the addition of a touchscreen didn't necessitate removal of the touchpad or support for external mice so I use the feature only out of convenience when I want to use it and am not bound to it.
 
Back in 1980 Phil would have denied the iPhone... as it is cumbersome to finnick with your fingers on a screen where you could easily use a pencil.
Phil => IT IS APPLE'S ROLE to achieve the UNCOMMON and imagine the IMPOSSIBLE to be implemented.
You were asked to stay young and foolish instead of arrived, mellow and immobile.
Go work out a zillion patents laying around that remain unused - so stop the defensive attitude.
Are you guys soo overloaded with dongles that your minds stopped working anyway ?
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: trifid
At the end of the day I do not want a company like Apple artificially limiting what I can do with a device.

With a Surface Book I have the power and flexibility to do what I want how I want.
 
I won't deny that a 27 inch touch display is absurd (for the average household). But in a laptop? I can certainly respect his opinion but I'd have to disagree.

I do think the touch bar is a step in that direction. Maybe someday.
 
I'm totally with you on Grubers myopia, but is there any evidence that suggest they didn't need larger batteries for LTE though?

Did LTE phones try to include a more powerful battery? Oh sure, many did.

But if an engineer needed better battery life, the first thought would hardly be to go with larger displays (which are the biggest eater of batteries). It'd be much cheaper and easier just to make the display smaller, or the case a bit thicker or have larger bezels!

Heck, some of the first Android LTE phones were not much bigger than the first LTE iPhone. For example, I think AT&T started with the HTC Vivid, which was only 1/10" taller and wider than the iPhone 5... but still had a bigger screen (pretty common for phones compared to the iPhone with its large bezels).

--

GRIN - then again, the first LTE iPhone _did also_ have a bigger screen / body than iPhones ever had... which I suppose someone looking for a connection could take as circumstantial evidence that a larger display was "necessary" for Apple to support LTE :D

I don't think so. Larger screens were coming anyway (as we've seen since then). Having more room inside was just a side perk.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: H2SO4
But if an engineer needed better battery life, the first thought would hardly be to go with larger displays (which are the biggest eater of batteries). It'd be much cheaper and easier just to make the display smaller, or the case a bit thicker or have larger bezels!

Yeah, actually you're probably right, screen going larger makes no sense in this argument.
 
  • Like
Reactions: kdarling
This guy is in complete denial...

THe design of the Macbook is a complete flaw.
You need several dongles, SSD and RAM are fixed into Logic board, Limited to 16 GB ram,

And they call it "PRO".
The only Pro thing is the price,
PRO OVERPRICEd....
PRO Dongle
PRO Not expandability

I wonder why they had to come and do damage control and lower the prices of dongles...

Biggest product growing category at Apple: Dongles...
[doublepost=1479242226][/doublepost]Schiller needs to go away and buy a Basketball team...

All the latest APPLE hardware design has been a flaw.
THe MAC PRO
THE NEW MACBOOKS,
 
Wow. I knew my suggestion was far from revolutionary/unique to me... But that Tactus device looks interesting. And yes, you'd likely never hear he end of it here. Which means Apple will likely do something like it. Ha.

Thanks for the link. Cheers!

I actually think I saw Dream Theatre keyboardist Jordan Rudess using one of the Tactus keyboards in a video. Well, not using it, but it seemed to be there in his keyboard rig.
Things have moved on in 6 years but Apple have not.
ORLY?

People's physiology has changed to the point where what was uncomfortable and unnatural six years ago is now perfectly fine?
 
Has everyone forgotten that Apple has a patent on how the Surface Studio adjusts the screen to drawing mode? Apple has obviously tested this already and didn't find any value in it.
 
I have no need for a desktop Mac with a touch screen because I already have one. I've been using a small Wacom Cintiq as my only monitor and only input device with a Mac Mini for over 6 years now. How's that for testing?

I never use a mouse or a touch pad. I hold the tablet-ish monitor in my lap and keep the keyboard on my desk. It's the most natural-feeling desktop computer interface I've ever used. Like holding a sketchpad, a book, or a huge clipboard.

I know plenty of artists (animators, comic artists, illustrators) who use mid-size Cintiqs on mechanical arms attatched to their desks or giant Cintiqs as desktops, in a similar manner to the Surface Studio. Modern Cintiqs are both touch sensitive and penabled, by the way.

Of course, if there's real concern that macOS doesn't work perfectly, it could be tweaked to work better with a touch screen without compromising usability. A tablet mode, a slightly thicker menu bar, etc.

Maybe insisting on keeping a touchscreen monitor at a 90° angle behind the keyboard is what's absurd?
 
  • Like
Reactions: huperniketes
Has everyone forgotten that Apple has a patent on how the Surface Studio adjusts the screen to drawing mode?

Do you mean this patent?

apple-display-modes-patent.png


That patent was not about moving the screen between vertical and horizontal. It's about changing UI resolutions when you do that.

In other words, when vertical it would display a high resolution UI with tiny mouse targets. When horizontal, the computer would switch to using big UI elements designed for touch input.

Apple has obviously tested this already and didn't find any value in it.

Or maybe it just doesn't fit their product / marketing agenda. That's quite different from nobody finding value in it. After all, they found enough value to file for a patent on it.

(It could be like when Gates/Ballmer killed the wonderful Courier tablet project because it didn't promote the use of MS Windows.)
 
Last edited:
Surface Products are different though. For example, I love the touch screen on my SP4 because its a tablet and I frequently use the drawing ability for notes. For my rMBP, I like the trackpad enough that I don't need or miss a touch screen.

Same with the Surface Studio. I don't think even Microsoft expects users to be using the Surface Studio's touch screen in iMac mode. The iMac is not designed to be a drawing device, thus a touch screen iMac makes no sense.

PC manufacturers use touch screens to add another feature to the spec list.
Can you search what you wrote in your handwritten notes?
 
iMac G4 monitor arm was one of the best things ever to adjust the display to be comfortable for viewing. I would imagine it would be perfect for a touch-screen mac.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.