No listing of all the ports and connectors? THAT is what separates a pro computer from the incapable POS’ we’ve been getting called MacBook Pro.
UPDATE: Four Thunderbolt 3 ports. That’s all. Good lord... from their web site:
” MacBook Pro is equipped with four ports, so you can do all of that from either side. Existing devices are easily connected with a cable or adapter. And Thunderbolt 3 is reversible, so no matter how you plug in, it’s always right side up.”
It’ll still be a massive shitpile of adapters on a regular desk. Hate this mentality of theirs. Is it really asking for too much to expect some actual USB, Ethernet or other kinds of ports to REDUCE the number of adapters?
Suck it up. All of those ports are going away. Not just with Apple, but for everyone. The only one that will still be around for some time is Ethernet. I have an adapter for that which stays on the Ethernet cable. Not exactly a big deal.
Is HDMI going away? Or the mini DV? I get the switching for USB but almost no place one goes today can one connect to an external presentation screen, projector etc with USB-C. One missing dongle and your presentation is in trouble. Imo they should have kept HDMI and the SD card slot.
The majority of users have no use for HDMI. Get that keychain adapter I posted on the previous page and take it with you to your presentations. Why the rest of the world is responsible for you being prepared for your job is beyond me.
We'll see if it still has the keyboard/battery/ top case melded together design like the previous generations but in the EU it starts at 2,699€ and quickly blasts past 3,000€.
PS: what the heck are ' force-cancelling woofers'?
Marketing lingo for “we decided to use six 4 cent greeting card quality speakers to accommodate the design and needed to make this deficiency sound cool”.
In other words - the sound will be garbage as they couldn’t put in a decent sized speaker cone physically capable of producing sound waves - so jammed in 6 small deficient ones and using harmonic algorithms to give the impression of full sound through volume.
In in other words, it will sound like a louder iPhone.
Are you fucking kidding? The sound on my 2018 MBP is incredible for a device this size already, and this improves on that, which is mind boggling. I don't recall where I read it, but with the previous generation I've seen people refer to the sound coming out of these things as designed by "wizards" in Apple's audio department.
Bottomline for all of the whiners about the HDMI port...IT'S NEVER COMING BACK! Same with USB-A, Ethernet, SD Card Slot, etc. So stop bitching about it. FFS! If you want it so bad, then go find a laptop that has one. That being said if the lack of an HDMI port is a dealbreaker for you then thats really sad.
It's not like Apple is purposely leaving it out when everyone wants it in. If it were really that big of a deal and Apple was losing massive amounts of sales because of the lack of those ports then you can bet your ass Apple would put them back in. You do not single handedly represent the mass base of Apple Pro users who buy this laptop. Pretty much 99% of us in face do not. Some people just don't realize this.
This. HDMI is THE standard when it comes to video connections for presentations. It’s simple and nearly universal. I have yet to see a video projector in a conference room that doesn’t have it and beyond that, none of these projectors can do 4K, so being able to connect 100 monitors via the thunderbolt 10 port is a completely moot point. My daughter needed a new laptop for college and her first question was “does it have an HDMI port, ‘cause that’s what I need to do presentations”
Now all of the Apple sycophants will go on and on about ‘just buy an adapter’ and ‘be prepared’ and how it’s obviously your fault for not having the right equipment with, and I assume that none of these people have ever forgotten anything or had an adapter break or have someone borrow it and not return it, etc. Nor have they had an adapter not work properly. The fact of the matter is, rather than have a couple of the most common ports available to people, Apple made a decision that ‘we can make USB C do everything’ and, user convenience be damned, they can go out and buy all the ports cables and docks and hubs.
As for “cables vs adapters” - that’s a completely semantic argument and ignores the point.
I'll byte.
What about the users who want this laptop, with 4 USB-C ports, and never ever want to do a presentation? Never in need of HDMI?
See Phil's take on ports: “Do you think there’s ever a chance that the SD card slot makes a comeback?”
Schiller replied:
“Probably not, again nothing about the future is in stone, and things can always change. But, as we’ve been spending a lot of time with MacBook Pro surveying what our customers use, what I/O they need, where their needs are growing and how they are changing, and did a lot of soul searching on it and asking ourselves about a lot of connectors about USB-A about SD card readers, about HDMI and requestioning everything. And really what we came down to is more and more customers are taking advantage of USB-C and Thunderbolt, love the incredible headroom in performance there is there, the higher power there is, the charging ability there is, and so we think having on the highest-end notebook four USB-C/Thunderbolt ports gives the most headroom for the things you will be doing in the years ahead. And the trade-off is for a few traditional media types like SD card readers means using an adapter but there are USB-C adapters, I carry one for that. And ultimately, that gives you the highest performance and most flexibility with this arrangement. So after a lot of soul searching, we think we’ve done the best thing for customers with the I/O we have, meaning we don’t have every port type in the world on it.”
You’re presenting it as an ‘either/or’ proposition. It’s not. Why not keep the USB C ports and include an HDMI, or get rid of one of them? How many people need 4 - thunderbolt 3/USB 3 ports? And, as many people here are so fond of pointing out, if you actually need 4 ports but only have 3 (or 2 or 1,) just buy a hub.
My point is that a very common use of laptops is to take with to give presentations, and an HDMI port is integral to that use. Is it possible to make do without the HDMI port? Absolutely, but it is also absolutely more convenient and reliable to have one built in. Not only that, for a portable device you run the very real risk of not having the proper adapter with you, making it useless for the desired task. In any device like a laptop, it’s impossible to include ‘everything’ but Apple has gone the opposite route and included only one thing.
I'm using all four of my TB3 ports right now. I have never once in my life owned a Mac with an HDMI port (skipped that generation of MBP), nor have I needed one.
And, if we're being honest, that was the ONLY generation of MBP that ever had HDMI, for a total of FOUR YEARS, EVER. Note that there are a gazillion users out there with MacBook Airs and those never even had HDMI, ever. Strange that I don't recall ever hearing them freaking out about not having HDMI.
We'll see if it still has the keyboard/battery/ top case melded together design like the previous generations but in the EU it starts at 2,699€ and quickly blasts past 3,000€.
PS: what the heck are ' force-cancelling woofers'?
Marketing lingo for “we decided to use six 4 cent greeting card quality speakers to accommodate the design and needed to make this deficiency sound cool”.
In other words - the sound will be garbage as they couldn’t put in a decent sized speaker cone physically capable of producing sound waves - so jammed in 6 small deficient ones and using harmonic algorithms to give the impression of full sound through volume.
In in other words, it will sound like a louder iPhone.
A keyboard reboot we all saw coming. Here’s one I did not: the new 16-inch MacBook Pro has radically improved built-in speakers. This is the audio equivalent of going from chunky pixels to retina displays. It’s that big a difference.
It’s not simply about being louder, although they are louder at maximum volume. They just sound impossibly better. They don’t merely sound like good laptop speakers — they sound like good dedicated portable speakers, period. In a small room, you can credibly use the 16-inch MacBook Pro to play music as though it’s an entertainment speaker system. And at maximum volume they really are a lot louder — without the sort of distortion we’ve all come to expect from laptop speakers at high volume.
Comparing to a standalone speaker system, yes, because it's physics, but good luck comparing the majority of notebooks.
SUre, if giving a presentation in a conference room is a ‘specialized use case’ for you. For much of the world, it’s THE use case.
You spelled "some people" wrong. The vast majority of users have never connected their laptop to HDMI.
It’s also ironic how you blast people for whining about having to carry adapters with just after you blast them for not being prepared when they don’t have all their adapters with. I guess you’ve never had anything happen that you didn’t expect? Here’s one - I had my laptop at a meeting at work. A coworker pulled out his USB stick (with the ‘obsolete’ USB A connector. I couldn’t do a thing other than try to explain why my ‘state of the art’ laptop failed to have the single most common connector in technology.
If you stick that USB stick in your Mac, your Mac is sleeping with every other computer that USB stick has been in.
If someone handed me one of those, I'd roll my eyes but then just use this thing:
And then I'd make fun of them for not Airdropping it or Dropboxing it or emailing it or messaging it to me, because it's 2019.
No listing of all the ports and connectors? THAT is what separates a pro computer from the incapable POS’ we’ve been getting called MacBook Pro.
I can't tell if you're being serious or not. This remains a crazy take on Thunderbolt 3.
Wow. Nice insult, Mike. Real people don’t expect to invest in all new accessories and adapters every time they eventually replace their old outdated MacBook Pro. There should be an expectation of some backward compatibility.
What are you talking about? Here’s a list of different ports on MacBook Pros going back to the original release:
Each release of the MacBook or MacBook Pro had different mixes of these ports. You have always needed to upgrade dongles or cables, depending on which model of device you were purchasing and the difference in time from your previous device to the new one.
USB-C is standardizing on the form-factor of multiple protocol and connection types. It makes it easier for manufacturing and device chassis and chip design.
I think for the majority of users they expect to upgrade cables or dongles on a new purchase.
Maybe because people in this forum are stubborn as hell, as it has become more of a talking point than a real-case scenario. Both sides.
It’s pretty simple. People like to complain. People can also be pretty cheap. Spend a couple of thou on a machine, and complain that you also have to spend $50 or a bit more for adapters—horrors! I literally have boxes of obsolete cables going back a few decades. I throw some away every now and then. Sometimes someone can use a few, for old machines. What’s the point of complaining? Every time SCSI was upgraded we’d need new cables, new external drive cases, and often, new Adaptec boards inside our machines. That’s the way technology works. If people don’t like it, they can go into basket weaving.
Part of the reason why we can't have a great discussion on every Apple forum. Most of them feel like stockholders than power users, repeating points that have been talked to death.
This. HDMI is THE standard when it comes to video connections for presentations. It’s simple and nearly universal. I have yet to see a video projector in a conference room that doesn’t have it and beyond that, none of these projectors can do 4K, so being able to connect 100 monitors via the thunderbolt 10 port is a completely moot point. My daughter needed a new laptop for college and her first question was “does it have an HDMI port, ‘cause that’s what I need to do presentations”
Now all of the Apple sycophants will go on and on about ‘just buy an adapter’ and ‘be prepared’ and how it’s obviously your fault for not having the right equipment with, and I assume that none of these people have ever forgotten anything or had an adapter break or have someone borrow it and not return it, etc. Nor have they had an adapter not work properly. The fact of the matter is, rather than have a couple of the most common ports available to people, Apple made a decision that ‘we can make USB C do everything’ and, user convenience be damned, they can go out and buy all the ports cables and docks and hubs.
As for “cables vs adapters” - that’s a completely semantic argument and ignores the point.
I'll byte.
What about the users who want this laptop, with 4 USB-C ports, and never ever want to do a presentation? Never in need of HDMI?
See Phil's take on ports: “Do you think there’s ever a chance that the SD card slot makes a comeback?”
Schiller replied:
“Probably not, again nothing about the future is in stone, and things can always change. But, as we’ve been spending a lot of time with MacBook Pro surveying what our customers use, what I/O they need, where their needs are growing and how they are changing, and did a lot of soul searching on it and asking ourselves about a lot of connectors about USB-A about SD card readers, about HDMI and requestioning everything. And really what we came down to is more and more customers are taking advantage of USB-C and Thunderbolt, love the incredible headroom in performance there is there, the higher power there is, the charging ability there is, and so we think having on the highest-end notebook four USB-C/Thunderbolt ports gives the most headroom for the things you will be doing in the years ahead. And the trade-off is for a few traditional media types like SD card readers means using an adapter but there are USB-C adapters, I carry one for that. And ultimately, that gives you the highest performance and most flexibility with this arrangement. So after a lot of soul searching, we think we’ve done the best thing for customers with the I/O we have, meaning we don’t have every port type in the world on it.”
Nice interview, at least much better than one of that 2016 Touch Bar with Craig.
No listing of all the ports and connectors? THAT is what separates a pro computer from the incapable POS’ we’ve been getting called MacBook Pro.
UPDATE: Four Thunderbolt 3 ports. That’s all. Good lord... from their web site:
” MacBook Pro is equipped with four ports, so you can do all of that from either side. Existing devices are easily connected with a cable or adapter. And Thunderbolt 3 is reversible, so no matter how you plug in, it’s always right side up.”
It’ll still be a massive shitpile of adapters on a regular desk. Hate this mentality of theirs. Is it really asking for too much to expect some actual USB, Ethernet or other kinds of ports to REDUCE the number of adapters?
It has USB. USB-C is the latest iteration of USB. You don’t need adapters, you just need the proper cables for your devices. Do you understand that? Cables. Plenty of A-to-C cables.
Are you honestly asking for an ethernet port!?
I give at lot of customer presentations and they all, without exception, give me a HDMI cable for the big screen in the meeting room. So it is not the proper cable that is the issue but the proper port on my laptop. And don't make me "educate" my customers.
This. HDMI is THE standard when it comes to video connections for presentations. It’s simple and nearly universal. I have yet to see a video projector in a conference room that doesn’t have it and beyond that, none of these projectors can do 4K, so being able to connect 100 monitors via the thunderbolt 10 port is a completely moot point. My daughter needed a new laptop for college and her first question was “does it have an HDMI port, ‘cause that’s what I need to do presentations”
Now all of the Apple sycophants will go on and on about ‘just buy an adapter’ and ‘be prepared’ and how it’s obviously your fault for not having the right equipment with, and I assume that none of these people have ever forgotten anything or had an adapter break or have someone borrow it and not return it, etc. Nor have they had an adapter not work properly. The fact of the matter is, rather than have a couple of the most common ports available to people, Apple made a decision that ‘we can make USB C do everything’ and, user convenience be damned, they can go out and buy all the ports cables and docks and hubs.
As for “cables vs adapters” - that’s a completely semantic argument and ignores the point.
How absurd. Nope, that’s not being a sycophant, that’s just using common sense. Not so common, I guess...
Just because you have a specialized use case is absolutely no reason to start packing in single-use ports on every single machine for the vast majority of people who don’t need them. Your problem isn’t a difficult one to solve. At all. Remotely.
And no, the difference of cables and adapters isn’t semantic. The whiners are acting and pretending like they will need to carry adapters for all use case at all times, when really for most people most of the time a simple cable will remain in place. For edge cases, use an adapter. Problem solved.
SUre, if giving a presentation in a conference room is a ‘specialized use case’ for you. For much of the world, it’s THE use case.
It’s also ironic how you blast people for whining about having to carry adapters with just after you blast them for not being prepared when they don’t have all their adapters with. I guess you’ve never had anything happen that you didn’t expect? Here’s one - I had my laptop at a meeting at work. A coworker pulled out his USB stick (with the ‘obsolete’ USB A connector. I couldn’t do a thing other than try to explain why my ‘state of the art’ laptop failed to have the single most common connector in technology.
It absolutely is a special use case, as a pro-MB it’s a beefier machine for doing work primarily, as any notebook can play back slides. I’m a software developer, which is the most common pro customer per Craig. I want a thin, light machine to code, render, and compile on. I don’t want single-purpose ports I don’t need just to make your job easier.
Again, whining about not being prepared to do your job doesn’t make any sense. Carry the tools you need. It really isn’t as difficult as you think. Multipurpose ports that can readily adopt the use case of single-purpose ports are more flexible for more people. EOS.
SUre, if giving a presentation in a conference room is a ‘specialized use case’ for you. For much of the world, it’s THE use case.
You spelled "some people" wrong. The vast majority of users have never connected their laptop to HDMI.
It’s also ironic how you blast people for whining about having to carry adapters with just after you blast them for not being prepared when they don’t have all their adapters with. I guess you’ve never had anything happen that you didn’t expect? Here’s one - I had my laptop at a meeting at work. A coworker pulled out his USB stick (with the ‘obsolete’ USB A connector. I couldn’t do a thing other than try to explain why my ‘state of the art’ laptop failed to have the single most common connector in technology.
If you stick that USB stick in your Mac, your Mac is sleeping with every other computer that USB stick has been in.
Use an adapter, or don't buy it. @MplsP ; Vote with your dollar, it's a free market.
Buying something without full preparation, then complain about it only shows you aren't a fully-prepared person.
This update is awesome. It's rare that I get new Mac envy when I've still got a newish machine (top end 2018 MBP with Vega 20), but this thing is a beast. Looking forward to seeing benchmark comparisons, especially the GPU versus the Vega.
My only keyboard complaint is the arrow keys are hard to discern by touch, so this is a welcome return. I'm okay with the ESC key return too, for touch purposes — but usability wise the Touch Bar version didn't bother me much.
Two wildcards that I had in the back of my brain were a) whether they'd come up with some kind of upgradable storage ala the Mac Pro "cards" or whatever those are and b) if they'd offer an anti-glare option with the micro-etching ala the XDR. Those two things would be awesome and would shut a lot of people up.
So much for the pre-griping about pricing. With a deal like the one from Expercom that AI posted, the maxed out one is a full $2K less than a maxed out 2018 MBP (2019 brought the significant storage price drops) with twice as much RAM, twice as much storage, 2 more cores: 16-inch MacBook Pro 8C (2.4GHz, 64GB, 8TB, 5500M 8GB): $5,661* ($438 off)
Is there a single person in the entire world who would NOT buy this new machine if it had one HDMI and one legacy USB port in addition to the four TB3 ports? Even if the machine had a slight taper at the rear to accommodate the additional port thickness? I say no.
Are there people who won't buy this machine, say for a daughter going to college, because it does NOT have an HDMI port? Yes.
This update is awesome. It's rare that I get new Mac envy when I've still got a newish machine (top end 2018 MBP with Vega 20), but this thing is a beast. Looking forward to seeing benchmark comparisons, especially the GPU versus the Vega.
My only keyboard complaint is the arrow keys are hard to discern by touch, so this is a welcome return. I'm okay with the ESC key return too, for touch purposes — but usability wise the Touch Bar version didn't bother me much.
Two wildcards that I had in the back of my brain were a) whether they'd come up with some kind of upgradable storage ala the Mac Pro "cards" or whatever those are and b) if they'd offer an anti-glare option with the micro-etching ala the XDR. Those two things would be awesome and would shut a lot of people up.
So much for the pre-griping about pricing. With a deal like the one from Expercom that AI posted, the maxed out one is a full $2K less than a maxed out 2018 MBP (2019 brought the significant storage price drops) with twice as much RAM, twice as much storage, 2 more cores: 16-inch MacBook Pro 8C (2.4GHz, 64GB, 8TB, 5500M 8GB): $5,661* ($438 off)
I wasn't expecting inverted-T is making a come back, maybe because that's what Pro users wanted.I got used to the new arrow key layout pretty quick.
sudden outbreak of common sense, maybe finally a decent keyboard again to replace the pieces of shit they put in over past years and a proper "esc" key is the right call ... excellent! its progress in the right direction but it looks like it still needs $100+ dollars of adapters to do anything useful.
how hard is it to make a "pro" machine that does not need an adapter to plug into HDMI (essentially what is required by any presentation in business or education) .
but non butterfly keyboard and a decent 'esc' key is already a good first step to get back to the formerly brilliant mac book pros.
you are welcome to use my dell when you rock up to a presentation with the "adapter" cable you linked to, because what you really need is the female side. 9 of 10 times you cant get to the projector. besides linking to an "adapter" cable to support your claim no adapter is required is weird.
To counter your apocrypha, I have some of my own. Just in 2019, I have done many, many presentations with a cable (not adapter) identical to this one, and every single time I've been able to get to said projector.
Sure, if you have some kind of strange setup with a hardwired HDMI connector and no access to the projector, then you may need an adapter, and it is absolutely on the presenter to make sure you have the tools you need to get the job done, so I wouldn't need to use your Dell anyway.
And, in older conference rooms, your HDMI out on your Dell may need a DVI adapter or HDMI to DVI cable which is still not an adapter -- the abject horror.
You must never have been in a conference room with the projector mounted in the ceiling.
As for the the DVI, what’s your point? No one is claiming the MBP should have every port, just the single most common one that’s been standard for the last 5 years. The few conference rooms that I’ve been in that have DVI connectors also had either HDMI jacks or a DVI - HDMI adaptor (= short cable, since you’re hung up on the length)
Some have been in the ceiling, but there's been a female HDMI port in a wall or desk for me to plug my cable into. Regardless if you're responsible for giving a presentation, regardless of what hardware or ports you have, it is absolutely your responsibility to make sure you have what you need. I'm not precisely sure still what the hangup is here, given that USB-C contains HDMI. It's not like you need an powered active converter or anything, here.
What's an adapter and what's a cable is very, very clear. If you have to plug another cable into it, it is an adapter. If you don't and you can connect to a peripheral with no other connections, it is a cable.
I don't think that there's an argument to be made that more connections in a cable length are a good thing. Having a cable from point A to point C is better than having an adapter from point A to point B, then a cable to point C. So, it's good news that cables from USB-C to anywhere exist, then, huh?
Even if I had to have an adapter or dongle for something, it's not any different than what we've had to do as computer users for four decades. Thus, the remark about the DVI.
I’m really happy to see Apple paying attention to the needs of professionals!
(to clarify — by “professionals” I mean people who use their Macs for paid work.)
Except the SD card slot and optical audio didn’t come back. The former is still widely used by professional photographers and I’m not sure how much space and cost Apple saved for the latter, but it can’t have been much; it’s something that some people really loved. Apple cutting the ports seemed more about trying to push the adoption of USB+C, but I don’t think that was necessary because although it got off to a slow start it was the natural progression for USB anyway.
So for me this new MacBook is a mixed blessing. I like the bigger screen, slimmer bezels and improved battery and keyboard, but if those two former interfaces/ports returned it would’ve been perfect.
sudden outbreak of common sense, maybe finally a decent keyboard again to replace the pieces of shit they put in over past years and a proper "esc" key is the right call ... excellent! its progress in the right direction but it looks like it still needs $100+ dollars of adapters to do anything useful.
how hard is it to make a "pro" machine that does not need an adapter to plug into HDMI (essentially what is required by any presentation in business or education) .
but non butterfly keyboard and a decent 'esc' key is already a good first step to get back to the formerly brilliant mac book pros.
you are welcome to use my dell when you rock up to a presentation with the "adapter" cable you linked to, because what you really need is the female side. 9 of 10 times you cant get to the projector. besides linking to an "adapter" cable to support your claim no adapter is required is weird.
To counter your apocrypha, I have some of my own. Just in 2019, I have done many, many presentations with a cable (not adapter) identical to this one, and every single time I've been able to get to said projector.
Sure, if you have some kind of strange setup with a hardwired HDMI connector and no access to the projector, then you may need an adapter, and it is absolutely on the presenter to make sure you have the tools you need to get the job done, so I wouldn't need to use your Dell anyway.
And, in older conference rooms, your HDMI out on your Dell may need a DVI adapter or HDMI to DVI cable which is still not an adapter -- the abject horror.
You must never have been in a conference room with the projector mounted in the ceiling.
As for the the DVI, what’s your point? No one is claiming the MBP should have every port, just the single most common one that’s been standard for the last 5 years. The few conference rooms that I’ve been in that have DVI connectors also had either HDMI jacks or a DVI - HDMI adaptor (= short cable, since you’re hung up on the length)
Some have been in the ceiling, but there's been a female HDMI port in a wall or desk for me to plug my cable into. Regardless if you're responsible for giving a presentation, regardless of what hardware or ports you have, it is absolutely your responsibility to make sure you have what you need. I'm not precisely sure still what the hangup is here, given that USB-C contains HDMI. It's not like you need an powered active converter or anything, here.
What's an adapter and what's a cable is very, very clear. If you have to plug another cable into it, it is an adapter. If you don't and you can connect to a peripheral with no other connections, it is a cable.
I don't think that there's an argument to be made that more connections in a cable length are a good thing. Having a cable from point A to point C is better than having an adapter from point A to point B, then a cable to point C. So, it's good news that cables from USB-C to anywhere exist, then, huh?
Even if I had to have an adapter or dongle for something, it's not any different than what we've had to do as computer users for four decades. Thus, the remark about the DVI.
And? Your point? Nobody ever said it can't be an adapter.
Are there people who won't buy this machine, say for a daughter going to college, because it does NOT have an HDMI port? Yes.
You're gonna send your daughter to college with a PC because of an HDMI port? What kind of monster are you? I'm calling CPS.
I don’t know, if I had a parent who’d seriously consider buying a wet behind the ears college freshman a true Pro level MacBook Pro, a machine that most seasoned engineers lust after, I'd tell them to get over the port phobia and assure them that I’m willing to suck it up and make do with “only” four TB3 ports, i.e., take one for the team. Such are the gut wrenching travails of the oh so challenged 1 percenter offspring.
Are there people who won't buy this machine, say for a daughter going to college, because it does NOT have an HDMI port? Yes.
You're gonna send your daughter to college with a PC because of an HDMI port? What kind of monster are you? I'm calling CPS.
I don’t know, if I had a parent who’d seriously consider buying a wet behind the ears college freshman a true Pro level MacBook Pro, a machine that most seasoned engineers lust after, I'd tell them to get over the port phobia and assure them that I’m willing to suck it up and make do with “only” four TB3 ports, i.e., take one for the team. Such are the gut wrenching travails of the oh so challenged 1 percenter offspring.
Yeah, no shit. If I had kids and they asked me to buy them a fucking 15" MBP but only if it had HDMI because waaaaaahhhh I'd tell them to suck it up and go mow some lawns and buy a used model from the ONLY FOUR YEARS ANY MACBOOK OF ANY KIND EVER HAD HDMI. And then I'd tell them about how back in my day, I had to get a student loan which I had to work a job to pay off just to buy a giant beige G3 tower and CRT monitor which weighed like fifty pounds and how hard that was to carry (uphill both ways mind you) to Presentations 101.
I feel bad for all those poor kids who failed out of college and ended up working the coal mines because their parents only got them a MacBook Air.
Comments
The majority of users have no use for HDMI. Get that keychain adapter I posted on the previous page and take it with you to your presentations. Why the rest of the world is responsible for you being prepared for your job is beyond me.
Go away, troll.
It's not like Apple is purposely leaving it out when everyone wants it in. If it were really that big of a deal and Apple was losing massive amounts of sales because of the lack of those ports then you can bet your ass Apple would put them back in. You do not single handedly represent the mass base of Apple Pro users who buy this laptop. Pretty much 99% of us in face do not. Some people just don't realize this.
And, if we're being honest, that was the ONLY generation of MBP that ever had HDMI, for a total of FOUR YEARS, EVER. Note that there are a gazillion users out there with MacBook Airs and those never even had HDMI, ever. Strange that I don't recall ever hearing them freaking out about not having HDMI.
If you stick that USB stick in your Mac, your Mac is sleeping with every other computer that USB stick has been in.
If someone handed me one of those, I'd roll my eyes but then just use this thing:
And then I'd make fun of them for not Airdropping it or Dropboxing it or emailing it or messaging it to me, because it's 2019.
Again, whining about not being prepared to do your job doesn’t make any sense. Carry the tools you need. It really isn’t as difficult as you think. Multipurpose ports that can readily adopt the use case of single-purpose ports are more flexible for more people. EOS.
Vote with your dollar, it's a free market.
Buying something without full preparation, then complain about it only shows you aren't a fully-prepared person.
My only keyboard complaint is the arrow keys are hard to discern by touch, so this is a welcome return. I'm okay with the ESC key return too, for touch purposes — but usability wise the Touch Bar version didn't bother me much.
Two wildcards that I had in the back of my brain were a) whether they'd come up with some kind of upgradable storage ala the Mac Pro "cards" or whatever those are and b) if they'd offer an anti-glare option with the micro-etching ala the XDR. Those two things would be awesome and would shut a lot of people up.
So much for the pre-griping about pricing. With a deal like the one from Expercom that AI posted, the maxed out one is a full $2K less than a maxed out 2018 MBP (2019 brought the significant storage price drops) with twice as much RAM, twice as much storage, 2 more cores:
16-inch MacBook Pro 8C (2.4GHz, 64GB, 8TB, 5500M 8GB): $5,661* ($438 off)
Is there a single person in the entire world who would NOT buy this new machine if it had one HDMI and one legacy USB port in addition to the four TB3 ports? Even if the machine had a slight taper at the rear to accommodate the additional port thickness? I say no.
Are there people who won't buy this machine, say for a daughter going to college, because it does NOT have an HDMI port? Yes.
Sometimes Apple succeeds in spite of itself.
Except the SD card slot and optical audio didn’t come back. The former is still widely used by professional photographers and I’m not sure how much space and cost Apple saved for the latter, but it can’t have been much; it’s something that some people really loved. Apple cutting the ports seemed more about trying to push the adoption of USB+C, but I don’t think that was necessary because although it got off to a slow start it was the natural progression for USB anyway.
I feel bad for all those poor kids who failed out of college and ended up working the coal mines because their parents only got them a MacBook Air.