scottw2

I can see an iPad Air / iPad Pro being laptop replacement one day. Imagine this: take the iPad with you wherever you go. Sit down at a desk, plug it into a dock and you get dual screen, keyboard and mouse. For that, the storage needs to get bigger and the iPad OS needs to move closer to macOS. Or they can just shrink down macOS now that the laptop and the tablet are sharing the same CPU.

Coming from a group that invented names such as USB 3.1 Gen 2, I sorta expect their branding to be "40Gbps Unidirectional 24A x 5W Gen 5 Revision 4" /s

Look like a good fit for my use case. I need a new machine for Lightroom and some coding. I'm going to slap a hub on it (because the Dongle Life is real) so 2 Thunderbolt ports doesn't really hamper it much. $1899 for 16GB RAM + 512GB SSD is pretty reasonable.

rob53 said:

scottw2 said:

Welcome to the MacHub Pro, a laptop that cannot connect to anything. The decision to include only USB-C ports is a huge mistake as there's virtually nothing that you can plug into them. Buying an Apple laptop these days means bunch of dongles and adapter to connect accessories to your computer. Budget an extra $300.

I hate giving time to a blatant Apple hater but you do realize that USB-C is the "current" specification for USB/Thunderbolt connections don't you? Try reading http://www.usb.org/channel and see that USB-C ports aren't a proprietary Apple product but the future of USB. Just because other companies, especially Windows-based, are slow to adopt new standards doesn't mean Apple is at fault for using them. There are more and more native USB-C peripherals coming on the market every week.

The use of a dock is not new, it's been around for a long time for both Macs and Window-PCs (mainly laptops). 

And I similarly hate to explain obvious Apple failings to the apologists. Every criticism of the company and I'm branded a hater. I've been an Apple fan since my poor student day. Over the years I've moved to a die hard Apple fan to a more practical mind, Apple-liking developer. There's nothing wrong with having a hub or dock at your desk. In fact I much prefer them when sitting down at my desk. However, a major function of a laptop is connectivity on mobile. Got a USB key or external HDD? Chances are that they are gonna be USB-A. Need to connect to a projector? That's HDMI or VGA. Need to transfer files from a camera or camcorder? SD card. The MacBook Pro needs adapters for each of these. Even if I swallow the costs, what if I forget to bring an adapter? I'm left with a machine that can't connect to anything. The previous gen MacBook Pro have all of these things out of the box. I didn't have anything to plug into the Thunderbolt port but that's not a problem since I can use the other ports. The fact the new iMac still keep the USB-A ports are positive signs and I'm looking forward to Apple bringing them (along with a few other ports) back to the MacBook Pro.

I use a Mac Mini as my main computing machine. I'm an advanced user and would like to see the following feature:

(1) Upgradable RAM & SSD. Apple can make a Mac-not-so-Mini (or call it just a Mac!) to accommodate that

(2) More ports on the front

(3) Discrete GPU option (hey, Apple is making its own graphics chips soon)