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Thunderbolt 3/USB-C Adapters, Cables, and Hubs for New MacBook Pro

KPOM said:
And now we have 4 ports that EACH do everything that whole collection of ports could do.
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And only one of those ports has the bandwidth of the entire set on the pictured MBP.

Realistically, I just need TB3 and a good dock. Then when I get home, I plug in one cable and the following are connected:
RAID, two 27" displays, gigabit ethernet, wired mouse + keyboard, speakers, software defined radio, and lightning cable.
 
Yes, all of this is why I looked at the newly released Macbook Pros and decided to buy the old Macbook Pro instead for my wife who is a teacher. It's a pity - some of the new features are great but the ports are a deal-breaker.

It's far too hard to convince the school to buy a bunch of new adapters to allow the tech in her classroom to continue to work when it works fine now. Even just explaining why all these adapters are needed would be a right pain. The classroom won't have USB-C for at least 10 years!
 
ConnorMcJeebus said:
Since when did USB-C become a standard? Microsoft doesn't have a single USB-C port for their new Surface line. And a lot of laptops that do have USB-C ports only support speeds up to 5 Gbps or something. Not even across Apple's own lineup has it become a standard...
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USB flash drives would be the biggest problem for me. On one hand I'd love a USB-C flash drive, but on the other hand, nobody else could use it. Hell, I couldn't even use it with my desktop PC.

If Apple are that serious about USB-C, they should replace Lightning with it.
 
Question: for how many people is a CD-ROM read capability a truly historical need?
 
ConnorMcJeebus said:
Since when did USB-C become a standard? Microsoft doesn't have a single USB-C port for their new Surface line. And a lot of laptops that do have USB-C ports only support speeds up to 5 Gbps or something. Not even across Apple's own lineup has it become a standard...
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Yup, that's one of the terrible things about the Surface Studio. You get to pay $4000 on the high end, and don't get what Apple gives you on their low end 13" MacBook Pro. That's a serious drawback and I'm glad Apple went for the higher end USB-C / Thunderbolt option.

I can't imagine why anyone even remotely familiar with technology would want older, slower, less functional ports than newer ones that can do newer, faster things, OR emulate the older ones.
 
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KPOM said:
So? In many cases it's just a matter of getting the right cable. It isn't as if Apple supplied the cables to connect every type of peripheral back in the old days. On your 2010 models above, you still needed adapters to plug into a VGA monitor or HDMI.
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For VGA, it's like since 2002. And HDMI only existed on Apple laptops from 2012-2016. The dongle issue has always been there.

And between 2002 and 2008, we went through cable revision after cable revision requiring new dongles. We had Mini-VGA, Mini-DVI, S-Video, and DVI.
 
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http://www.bourgedesign.com/

I saw that in some other article. It seems super convenient actually. When taking a laptop on the go I usually don't want to unplug everything, so I can just unplug 1 thing to disconnect external displays, backup HDs, etc. Sucks it's $100+, but at least it does everything. I personally need Mini DisplayPort to run my old Apple monitor, I use HDMI sometimes for my TV, USB-A, pass through charging, and room for an SD card. Not bad.
 
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You can't make fun of Microsoft for not having USB-C on their current lineup.

They're making computers for users in 2016-2017. They're not throwing in futuristic ports for the sake of being futuristic, at the expense of a lot of pissed off people.
 
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I can see it now ... massive adapters that generate a ton of heat while using complex/unstable drivers will become all the rage and probably cost $300 to go from USB-C to (Thunderbolt 1/2, Thunderbolt 3, Ethernet, HDMI, DisplayPort, VGA, USB, Lighting, SD Card, et al).
 
Feenician said:
So where's the crying about it not being included on any MacBooks for many years and requiring a "dongle"?
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Don't be daft - it's about adoption and the argument is that even though You like USB-C because it's useful for You in a couple of eons, others actually have to use their computer to connect to stuff out there, where USB-C is nowhere to be found and dongles just makes that slick new Macbook look like the wrong tool for the job.
 
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Neepman said:
Seriously difficult not to write a post here with words that would get me banned. This could have been FAR less an issue and irritation if they had given us even ONE USB-A port. You know... the one that literally has billions of devices out there that still use it.
F you and F your mother apple.
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Nope. No way would I want an old USB A connector on a modern laptop, either as an addition, or at the expense of getting rid of a TB 3 port that's FAR more versatile and much faster.

That would also be fugly, something Dell or Sanyo would do.

Just get one of these for $9.99. They're tiny...
135073.jpg
 
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this just shows how ridiculous and out of touch apple has gotten. adapters/dongles that expand the utility of devices is once thing (ex. SD card adapter or hdmi for ipad), but requiring adapters to do basic functions that you didn't need adapters for previously is silly. I can even understand on a desktop you need different cables and maybe adapters, but on a laptop (AKA PORTABLE) you shouldn't have to carry around a bunch of adapters to do everyday functions.
 
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TigerWoodsIV said:
http://www.bourgedesign.com/

I saw that in some other article. It seems super convenient actually. When taking a laptop on the go I usually don't want to unplug everything, so I can just unplug 1 thing to disconnect external displays, backup HDs, etc. Sucks it's $100+, but at least it does everything. I personally need Mini DisplayPort to run my old Apple monitor, I use HDMI sometimes for my TV, USB-A, pass through charging, and room for an SD card. Not bad.
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Not a single dock offers any other card type than SD anymore. :(
 
As sad as it is I really hope one of these lines just bombs really bad in sales inline with the reactions were are seeing online. Ultimately I think it would be good for them to hopefully get a bit of a reality check with regards to some of their decisions re ports and price.
 
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Feenician said:
August 2014 when it was released by the USB Implementers committee



Lol
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Yeah I corrected my post. As for the "Lol" part of your post, a lot of people work with both Windows and MacOS machines and have to switch back and forth (not just VM or Bootcamp). It'd be nice to be able to "plug and play" some accessories between both types of machines. Also, Microsoft is a competitor of Apple. Like it or not, what they put in their machines is actually relevant.
 
KPOM said:
It's not a matter of penalizing people but instead trying to push the market forward. VGA required an adapter on the 2012-2015 MacBook Pro. It still does (just a different one). HDMI is specifically built into the USB-C protocol, so we'll see lots of USB-C to HDMI adapters and cables from different suppliers. HDMI plugs (and regular DisplayPort) tend to be big and bulky, so in that respect I prefer an adapter since the mini-cable is more flexible.
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You can't have one without the other - at this point you are penalizing most users simply because they have more stuff that connects to the older ports. I get that you need a VGA adapter, my point was simply that while people tend to think that technology and adoption happens very quickly it is actually far from the truth. The next couple of years will be tied together by dongles, that annoys me, simple as that.
 
dv8r said:
Don't be daft - it's about adoption and the argument is that even though You like USB-C because it's useful for You in a couple of eons, others actually have to use their computer to connect to stuff out there, where USB-C is nowhere to be found and dongles just makes that slick new Macbook look like the wrong tool for the job.
Click to expand...

I had to plug into a vga projector this very day at the head office of one of the largest PC OEMs and I had to use a dongle to do it as neither my Mac nor the laptop they provided me had a vga port. They both had thunderbolt though.

I cried about it for days on an Internet forum... No wait, I didn't do that.
[doublepost=1478043335][/doublepost]
ConnorMcJeebus said:
Yeah I corrected my post. As for the "Lol" part of your post, a lot of people work with both Windows and MacOS machines and have to switch back and forth (not just VM or Bootcamp). It'd be nice to be able to "plug and play" some accessories between both types of machines. Also, Microsoft is a competitor of Apple. Like it or not, what they put in their machines is actually relevant.
Click to expand...

See above
 
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