That's what I'm using at work, and what I've got for my personal laptop too. Are the new ones that much worse? They don't seem like there at all worse to me, I've been thinking about getting one.
They make a 13" MBP without the touchbar. Except it's using the lower power 15 watt CPUs, the same category the Macbook Airs used to use. So it's basically a Macbook Air with a retina screen and a hefty price hike.
In my opinion you would need to try one to know. My wife has one and the keyboard is such a far step back I can't even describe it properly. If nothing changes, I will be sticking to my 2014 or switching to Lenovo.
I hate the keyboard on the 2015 era ones too though, I'm always using my giant Microsoft hump style keyboard instad. I only use the built-in keyboard in hotel rooms/conferences/etc.
As someone who just inherited one of these at work and who had never played with a MacBook before, my first thought when seeing the headline was “If it’s not a MacBook Pro 2015, I don’t know what it is”.
This thing is pure functional art. The first time my screen just magically unlocked itself because I happened to be wearing a particular watch was the moment nerd-like turned into nerd-love.
Screen protectors work well for any size, but they need to be applied with special equipment; it's already hard to apply them without imperfections on a 5", I can't imagine doing that on a 12".
I totally agree, but I'm not happy to see this post for the selfish reason that I'm worried it will be harder to buy a refurbished one once the one I'm currently using dies. With the exception of the non-ergonomic keyboard layout, I could keep using this machine forever and be pretty happy.
I have a mid-2014 model and I absolutely love it. However, weird spots have been appearing on my screen now on the black edge and I'm kind of nervous/scared. Anyone else with these spots?
I got mine replaced for free from Apple (they even upgraded me to the most expensive model of the next generation as they didn't have my medium level one any more)
It's pretty good, yeah. I really would have loved it if they simply doubled the USB ports and re-included an Ethernet jack for the newest one instead of doing what they did.
I'm probably in the minority here, but to me, the best laptop ever made was the 15" unibody Macbook Pro, the predecessor to the Retina (so long as we forget the gpu dumpster fire that was the early 2011 models).
It had plenty of ports and had the perfect balance of portability and components that were easily upgraded by end users.
Except the new ones have USB-C, which can literally become any other port. Any one of them can become the Ethernet jack. Any one of them can become the video out. Any one of them can become the charging port.
This is the most elegant critique to the current line of Macs I've read so far. I hope it reaches the right eyes and ears.
While Steve Jobs was unique, I believe Apple has the right people to continue delivering the same great products. They just need to let them do their jobs.
This said, I'm looking forward to test a Pixel 2 Chromebook.
This is the most elegant critique to the current line of Macs I've read so far. I hope it reaches the right eyes and ears.
I tried a 12" MacBook. It was a gorgeous machine and wildly fast given its size.
But its trackpad is a grotesque monstrosity, and while I writing I too often activated it by accident, flinging the cursor to some distant spot by accident. Then I'd have to stop, recover, and reset.
I can't figure out what usability case would mandate a trackpad that large.
I returned the computer and suspect that the last generation of 13" MBPs may become "legendary," because they don't make the ginormous trackpad error.
> I can't figure out what usability case would mandate a trackpad that large.
I couldn't figure it out either. Did they have a bunch of focus group feedback saying "this trackpad is too damn small... moving my wrist 1/4" to touch the trackpad from a resting spot is way too much work, I'd rather have my wrists touching the trackpad"? That's the only feedback I can see them getting to justify it. That or... it's a general trend towards the ios-ification of mac, and pushing towards "touch interface" for everything (except, of course, on the actual screen).
Wow. I guess I didn't quite realize how much Macs have backslid until he started pointing out things we don't get anymore. I still can't believe they got rid of Magsafe. Jeez.
Using it right now - it's... so reliable. Had zero problems. Love these zero-problem products in life (and they are not that easy to find to be honest)
I've had problems with my 2014, but at the same time it's repairable. The screen went a bit screwy, so I opened it and replaced the LVDS cable. Right back to ticking along.
My first retina worked worked well for a few months. Until the screen started looking like it was being burnt by the keyboard (a now known factory defect)
My second one, around a year later, had the same screen problem! Not only that, it had a logic board failure that took me months to resolve and left it practically unusable (random crashes etc). Three times to the mac store to sort this one and a multi week wait at the end for a new logic board.
On both laptops: Wifi doesn't connect to half the hotspots I ask it to. Boot times become long even with a bare minimum installed after a few months of use. Charging cables have a lifespan of less than a year and cost a fortune to replace.
Im a heavy user and admittedly I don't take care of my stuff as much as I could. But Id always bought macs because they were reliable and durable (My ancient powerbook is still in use) and not had any problems.
Indeed - after swearing off macbook pros I had the chance to try and later buy a 2012 macbook air. Damn - it reminds me of macs of old. 5 years old and it just.. works. I couldn't be happier and am seriously considering buying another to do me when this dies.
Im not sure if the tide will come back in but I think the high water mark was perhaps before the retina.
Only downsides: I have had 2 screens replaced due to delamination and this 3rd one has developed a purple line down the middle. Also picking it up with one hand on the corner can register a false touchpad click. Magsafe2 was a totally unnecessary change. Bizarre really.
But all that aside it's a champ and the only reason I would replace is because of the stuck purple line.
Yes, the coating coming off was a pity. After having my screen replaced, I thought I'd have one that didn't have the same production error anymore and yet it came back. Found out too late about the extended warranty program to have it replaced a second time. All I can hope for is that my new 2015 model does have a screen that will last, but I can't find any confirmation anywhere that the issue was ever resolved...
I use one at work and never thought much about it. But reading this I have to agree. It simply works. I never had to think about my hardware because it silently and adequately does its job. If I owned any other Apple devices, I imagine the experience would be even better.
I have an expensive Windows laptop for personal use. The much more impressive specs aside, the experience is admittedly inferior. Why is it taking so long to build a similarly seamless laptop on Windows?
Do we maybe need some kind of Mac-Reformation? Maybe Johnny could print this out and nail it to the front door of the new Apple HQ? (assuming it even has a front door, of course)
hopefully, a few people at APPLE read hacker news, and relay this information to more and more people in the company.... hope they realize this in 2018.
The current MacBook Pro should've been a separate product line, like the MacBook Air was. Those who are happy with the sacrifices it makes could switch over, but they wouldn't have to leave everyone else out in the cold.
Pro features like being incompatible with Apple's own products, having shorter battery time, often running hotter than the previous iterations, not having magsafe, etc..
Bringing a new meaning to "tortured artist", opening up for tortured software devs to join in a more literal sense.
Why don't we look for other cool ways to make excuses for things getting worse or being bad, like saying "It's a bad craftsman that blames his tools" and other platitudes to excuse away technology that is legitimately worse than its alternatives? It's so meaningful to everyone around us when we refuse to engage in any kind of discussion about how good things are and why some things could be considered worse than others.
If I could get one of the late 2000s 17" MacBook Pros, but with updated internals, that would definitely be my next laptop. I know several people that bought them for college and are still chugging away with them a decade later.
They made them as recently as 2011. Unibody aluminum. Matte or glossy screen. 1920x1200. IPS. 2.5ghz quad core i7. Ram's a little slow at PC3-1333. Those don't have replaceable batteries, but you can replace them yourself fairly easily. You can pick them up for about $1k.
It's sobering, really. The only substantial improvement made to laptops in the past 6 years is battery life.
The connections are standard mini-DisplayPort, which is still very much a thing. As is the Thunderbolt 1/2 protocol over those connections (in the audio world, for example)
While I agree with Marco (and would add that generations Air was the best consumer laptop every produced), I always feel like it's unfair to judge the final iteration of one architecture with any other iteration of a new architecture. A lot of things had to fall in place for the RMBP to be "perfect", specifically the move away from optical, the prevalence of speed of 802.11ac, etc.
The Touch Bar Pro is an equally great model, when used in a similar "perfect" world (USB-C peripherals, connected to an LG 5K). But it's a terrible model "in the field", as very few things are ready for USB-C (including USB-C in some respects).
I don't know, I kind of think that the best ever is Macbook Air 2015.
I would also argue that Macbook Air was the first laptop ever since it was the first truly portable - not just transportable personal computer ever. For the first time a notebook was light, performant and run long enough on battery to be actually usable out of your office or home.
Yep, the screen is not retina but it's also significantly lighter, thinner and has longer battery life.
The design, so perfect that hasn't changed since 2010.
I agree. I have the 2012 model, bought new in 2013 for cheap. 8 gigs of ram with an i7. I recently had the battery replaced. I has some blemishes on the screen. Every ones in a while I'm looking at upgrading to a Mac Pro, but then again, this little laptop is still going strong, so why should I?
Exactly my experience, except I just spilled coffee on it and now the keyboard needs replacing. That's expensive and a bit hard to justify on a 5 year old machine, so I'm going to break out the screwdrivers soon and give it a go.
With every previous laptop I would have just taken it as a good moment to buy a new device, but I honestly don't see the point right now.
I tried to like the Air but the aluminum bezel around the screen is a non-starter for me. If there has to be something around the screen it better fade into the background (like the MBP's black glass or a typical desktop monitor's black plastic).
I've been using a 13" MBPr for the last few years (on number 2) and I still miss the MacBook Air I was using previously.
The Air was easily Apple's greatest laptop in my opinion. They made the perfect compromises on size, weight, and performance for my use case.
I was hoping when they released the MacBook it would continue the tradition... but that price! I wanted a Retina screen, but after comparing specs and price with the 13" MBPr, the pro was the clear winner, and a pretty great laptop too. No way I'm getting a touchbar though, and with Mac alternatives like the Pixel pushing touch screen / tablet mode... I might have to go back to the Air.
Sadly my 2013 MBP logic board died after some spilled beer. I purchased and quickly returned a 2017 15" MBP. This is not the MBP which made me switch from Windows.
Apple laptops are becoming too thin at the expense of features I care about: larger battery, more diverse (HDMI and USB3) port, the mag safe connector and a longer travel keyboard. I could care less about Apple having the thinnest laptop. That's what the Air line was for.
I have a 2012 13" Macbook Pro at the office. It's still going strong, and I'm still just a bit more productive on it than on my fancy schmancy Asus laptop with a GTX 1070. Since I'm running Xubuntu in VirtualBox in seamless mode, installing software for cloud/game server development is sometimes more convenient on the Asus, but I still have to deal with running a VM. The trackpad is better on the Macbook Pro. What's more, Windows 10 startup got corrupted by an update last night, and I'm still dealing with that. I've had to deal with the equivalent level of problem on the Macbook (SSD failure) but the tools that come with MacOS make that at least 5X easier. (It has been a real saga with the Windows 10 laptop, which I will leave out the details of.)
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[ 2.6 ms ] story [ 235 ms ] threadNot to mention that the touchbar is not very useful, and as an emacs user, a big pain to not have a physical <esc> key.
The trackpad isn't improved, the touchbar is crappy and it runs for less time and runs hotter.
If any HW startup wants to do a Macbook Pro 2015 redux (maybe using an ARM core) i'd throw money at them.
This thing is pure functional art. The first time my screen just magically unlocked itself because I happened to be wearing a particular watch was the moment nerd-like turned into nerd-love.
(I have this wonderful macbook too, but I got used to the glare, it's not as bad as previous glassy versions)
Once you'll laminate a glossy screen, you'll never want to go back again.
I don't know in USA, but in Europe, a German company does it: http://www.tdcomponents.com/shop/displayschutz_laminierung.p...
Of course, you'll pay the shipment to the company.
I got mine replaced for free from Apple (they even upgraded me to the most expensive model of the next generation as they didn't have my medium level one any more)
Edit: https://9to5mac.com/2017/02/24/retina-macbook-display-staing... Oh my! I think I could go get a shiny fix/replacement. I am definitely going to have to do that
Thanks for this post! hah
I'm probably in the minority here, but to me, the best laptop ever made was the 15" unibody Macbook Pro, the predecessor to the Retina (so long as we forget the gpu dumpster fire that was the early 2011 models).
It had plenty of ports and had the perfect balance of portability and components that were easily upgraded by end users.
While Steve Jobs was unique, I believe Apple has the right people to continue delivering the same great products. They just need to let them do their jobs.
This said, I'm looking forward to test a Pixel 2 Chromebook.
I tried a 12" MacBook. It was a gorgeous machine and wildly fast given its size.
But its trackpad is a grotesque monstrosity, and while I writing I too often activated it by accident, flinging the cursor to some distant spot by accident. Then I'd have to stop, recover, and reset.
I can't figure out what usability case would mandate a trackpad that large.
I returned the computer and suspect that the last generation of 13" MBPs may become "legendary," because they don't make the ginormous trackpad error.
I couldn't figure it out either. Did they have a bunch of focus group feedback saying "this trackpad is too damn small... moving my wrist 1/4" to touch the trackpad from a resting spot is way too much work, I'd rather have my wrists touching the trackpad"? That's the only feedback I can see them getting to justify it. That or... it's a general trend towards the ios-ification of mac, and pushing towards "touch interface" for everything (except, of course, on the actual screen).
How? Where?
I have the 2017 MBA 15" . Hate how the thing crashes all the time from using USBC peripherals... arghh..
https://www.apple.com/shop/browse/home/specialdeals/mac/macb...
If that doesn't work, go to Mac > Macbook Pro > Buy > 15" > Scroll down to the 3rd option.
They come in and out of stock though.
I'm in IT and order these all the time for engineers and sales folks; it's much preferred over the new models. ;)
Typing this on a 2012 rMBP that's still a champ.
My second one, around a year later, had the same screen problem! Not only that, it had a logic board failure that took me months to resolve and left it practically unusable (random crashes etc). Three times to the mac store to sort this one and a multi week wait at the end for a new logic board.
On both laptops: Wifi doesn't connect to half the hotspots I ask it to. Boot times become long even with a bare minimum installed after a few months of use. Charging cables have a lifespan of less than a year and cost a fortune to replace.
Im a heavy user and admittedly I don't take care of my stuff as much as I could. But Id always bought macs because they were reliable and durable (My ancient powerbook is still in use) and not had any problems.
Indeed - after swearing off macbook pros I had the chance to try and later buy a 2012 macbook air. Damn - it reminds me of macs of old. 5 years old and it just.. works. I couldn't be happier and am seriously considering buying another to do me when this dies.
Im not sure if the tide will come back in but I think the high water mark was perhaps before the retina.
https://www.macrumors.com/2015/10/17/apple-mbp-ar-coating-qu...
But all that aside it's a champ and the only reason I would replace is because of the stuck purple line.
I have an expensive Windows laptop for personal use. The much more impressive specs aside, the experience is admittedly inferior. Why is it taking so long to build a similarly seamless laptop on Windows?
- macbookpro 13" 2011 user
Bringing a new meaning to "tortured artist", opening up for tortured software devs to join in a more literal sense.
Why don't we look for other cool ways to make excuses for things getting worse or being bad, like saying "It's a bad craftsman that blames his tools" and other platitudes to excuse away technology that is legitimately worse than its alternatives? It's so meaningful to everyone around us when we refuse to engage in any kind of discussion about how good things are and why some things could be considered worse than others.
It's sobering, really. The only substantial improvement made to laptops in the past 6 years is battery life.
And those replaced the ubiquitous RJ45 Ethernet jack?
At least they had the good sense to include HDMI and not go full TB.
The Touch Bar Pro is an equally great model, when used in a similar "perfect" world (USB-C peripherals, connected to an LG 5K). But it's a terrible model "in the field", as very few things are ready for USB-C (including USB-C in some respects).
I would also argue that Macbook Air was the first laptop ever since it was the first truly portable - not just transportable personal computer ever. For the first time a notebook was light, performant and run long enough on battery to be actually usable out of your office or home.
Yep, the screen is not retina but it's also significantly lighter, thinner and has longer battery life.
The design, so perfect that hasn't changed since 2010.
With every previous laptop I would have just taken it as a good moment to buy a new device, but I honestly don't see the point right now.
It's shape also allows more casual usage, there's something magical about being able to pick a laptop with one hand and swing it.
The Air was easily Apple's greatest laptop in my opinion. They made the perfect compromises on size, weight, and performance for my use case.
I was hoping when they released the MacBook it would continue the tradition... but that price! I wanted a Retina screen, but after comparing specs and price with the 13" MBPr, the pro was the clear winner, and a pretty great laptop too. No way I'm getting a touchbar though, and with Mac alternatives like the Pixel pushing touch screen / tablet mode... I might have to go back to the Air.
Apple laptops are becoming too thin at the expense of features I care about: larger battery, more diverse (HDMI and USB3) port, the mag safe connector and a longer travel keyboard. I could care less about Apple having the thinnest laptop. That's what the Air line was for.