Detnator

I can’t see it going any other way. 

Still, I agree with the article and the speculation that the ASi MBP’s are coming very soon, and the inference that they will be long before they get to the high end iMac and then Mac Pro. Those two will be the last two, and not till next year. 

And sure, my inferences are no more your responsibility than other people’s preferences are. Not asking for them to be, (although I’d potentially argue that “responsibility” isn’t really what we’re going for in a forum discussion, but perhaps jot today).

I haven’t done a full analysis of all your comments but I guess you’re right, nothing I can find in a brief review just now seems to show you saying “Apple should do…”, only things like “I’d definitely prefer it if Apple did…” (I wonder if that’s very careful and deliberate, or just your nature. Just curious). 

So fair enough. I guess if anything, in mine and others’ defense, we’re looking - preferably - to discuss solutions and ideas that might work for everyone or most. Sure, your preference is as valid as anyone’s but the enthusiasm with which you express yours, especially in the context of a thread in which others with similar arguments to yours (eg. Mr H and MplsM in this conversation) express them in a “Apple should…” way — it’s hard not to take it as “this is the way it should be”, unless we simply take it as rather self absorbed. Again in my/our defense, your comments like this also often come in threads where others are in fact narrow-mindedly saying “Apple should…” and without careful analysis it’s difficult not seeing your comments as supporting that. 

But before you take offense at those last statements (especially “self-absorbed — note I didn’t say you are, only that it can be hard not to take your comments that way) again you’re right. If I read your words exactly and take them exactly as they are, anything beyond that is inference (including any suggestion of self-absorbed) and so that’s on us — you’re right that that’s not your problem or responsibility. Forgive me/us if I/we fail to make that analysis every time we reply to you. (And i don’t mean that sarcastically, or anything like that. Im serious).

PS. I added a lot to my post you replied to (didn’t change or take away anything). Your take on the rest of it could be interesting. 

Meanwhile…

thedba said:

MplsP said:

fastasleep said:

crowley said:

thedba said:

crowley said:

thedba said:

fastasleep said:

commentzilla said:
If you cannot remember to bring your USB-C hub on the go, you'll probably forget your power supply, wallet and keys too.

Exactly. They have little USB-C to HDMI keychains, and if it were my job to give presentations regularly I'd just have one of those on me at all times. Anyone complaining about forgetting stuff that's required for their job, well not sure that's Apple's problem.

I'll take the HDMI port return if it doesn't reduce the number of other TB3 ports, I'll never ever use it but it won't offend me by being there.

While the sensationalist internet punditry likes to present a hell on earth that looks like this





Real professionals will find an elegant solution like this for home/office use, where with just one cable you get power and all the legacy ports your heart desires



Or if you don't want to pay Thunderbolt prices, maybe something like this will do the trick.




It even has a VGA port. 

But in the end, the 1st image above generates clicks while the latter two are just boring SOLUTIONS. 

Boring solutions that can end up costing a fair chunk on top of your MacBook price, take up a load of space in your bag, and because of the port layout end up making a cable mess.

I say that as a CalDigit TB3 Hub user, who also has an Anker 5 port dongle for away from  home work.  They're both great bits of kit, but if I could get the ports on a MacBook I'd definitely prefer it that way.

A fair chunk? The TB3 dock $299 the USBC hub $99. The combinations are too numerous to mention here and the prices vary anywhere from $49 to $349. You only buy what you need. 

As for the cable mess you speak of, connecting 5 peripherals total, sticking out from the sides of your laptop does not create one? 

I know how much my hubs cost thanks.  Point is, if the ports had been on my MacBook I wouldn't have needed to buy them, and probably wouldn't have, saving myself a significant amount of money.

Cables that all stick out from the side of your laptop are easy to manage, can even be cable tied together possibly.  Take a look at the UtechSmart hub that you posted a picture of.  If it's fully loaded then cables will be splayed out in all directions, making a mess.

The ability to have a single cable to your laptop that provides power and breaks out several cables you'd otherwise be plugging and unplugging every time you switch locations is a life changing thing for the positive. Not sure why you'd fight that.

First, if a cable is ‘life changing,’ you need a better life, but to the point, what USB C does is trade the convenience of one port for the inconvenience of using adapters for everything. 

You also fail to note that USB C is not all roses. There is one port, but the function of that port is undefined so you never know what features that port has. Beyond that, you don’t know what capabilities any given USB C cable has. USB 3? Power delivery? How much power? TB? TB 3 or 4? In some ways, one can argue that USB C is worse because of the added confusion. 

There are some people on this site who’ve evidently never forgotten anything, for whom spending an extra $300 on a hub to make that life changing cable actually do what they need it to do is a negligible sum of pocket change, and for whom carrying around extra equipment is more convenient than just carrying their laptop. For the rest of the world it’s an inconvenience at best and even more frustrating when you consider it’s functionality that virtually every other laptop has, even a POS $250 Lenovo chrome book. 

So if I understand you correctly, your ideal high end MBP would have what?
2 or 4 TB4 ports, 1 or 2 USBA ports, one HDMI port, one SD Card slot and one ethernet port.  So in total 6-9 ports. 

I suggest then you stop looking at Apple laptops because I doubt they’ll ever make everyone happy. 

mr. h said:

fastasleep said:

MplsP said:

fastasleep said:

crowley said:

thedba said:

crowley said:

thedba said:

fastasleep said:

commentzilla said:
If you cannot remember to bring your USB-C hub on the go, you'll probably forget your power supply, wallet and keys too.

Exactly. They have little USB-C to HDMI keychains, and if it were my job to give presentations regularly I'd just have one of those on me at all times. Anyone complaining about forgetting stuff that's required for their job, well not sure that's Apple's problem.

I'll take the HDMI port return if it doesn't reduce the number of other TB3 ports, I'll never ever use it but it won't offend me by being there.

While the sensationalist internet punditry likes to present a hell on earth that looks like this





Real professionals will find an elegant solution like this for home/office use, where with just one cable you get power and all the legacy ports your heart desires



Or if you don't want to pay Thunderbolt prices, maybe something like this will do the trick.




It even has a VGA port. 

But in the end, the 1st image above generates clicks while the latter two are just boring SOLUTIONS. 

Boring solutions that can end up costing a fair chunk on top of your MacBook price, take up a load of space in your bag, and because of the port layout end up making a cable mess.

I say that as a CalDigit TB3 Hub user, who also has an Anker 5 port dongle for away from  home work.  They're both great bits of kit, but if I could get the ports on a MacBook I'd definitely prefer it that way.

A fair chunk? The TB3 dock $299 the USBC hub $99. The combinations are too numerous to mention here and the prices vary anywhere from $49 to $349. You only buy what you need. 

As for the cable mess you speak of, connecting 5 peripherals total, sticking out from the sides of your laptop does not create one? 

I know how much my hubs cost thanks.  Point is, if the ports had been on my MacBook I wouldn't have needed to buy them, and probably wouldn't have, saving myself a significant amount of money.

Cables that all stick out from the side of your laptop are easy to manage, can even be cable tied together possibly.  Take a look at the UtechSmart hub that you posted a picture of.  If it's fully loaded then cables will be splayed out in all directions, making a mess.

The ability to have a single cable to your laptop that provides power and breaks out several cables you'd otherwise be plugging and unplugging every time you switch locations is a life changing thing for the positive. Not sure why you'd fight that.

First, if a cable is ‘life changing,’ you need a better life, but to the point, what USB C does is trade the convenience of one port for the inconvenience of using adapters for everything. 

You also fail to note that USB C is not all roses. There is one port, but the function of that port is undefined so you never know what features that port has. Beyond that, you don’t know what capabilities any given USB C cable has. USB 3? Power delivery? How much power? TB? TB 3 or 4? In some ways, one can argue that USB C is worse because of the added confusion. 

There are some people on this site who’ve evidently never forgotten anything, for whom spending an extra $300 on a hub to make that life changing cable actually do what they need it to do is a negligible sum of pocket change, and for whom carrying around extra equipment is more convenient than just carrying their laptop. For the rest of the world it’s an inconvenience at best and even more frustrating when you consider it’s functionality that virtually every other laptop has, even a POS $250 Lenovo chrome book. 

"Life changing" is a figure of speech. If you move between multiple desks on a near-daily basis, sometimes multiple times a day, having a single cable where previously you had say three or four in my case is most definitely an *improvement*. 

Figuring any of those things out has not been difficult by any means — maybe you find it confusing, but I don't.

I'm talking about a dock you have at your desk(s) with everything set up once and stays where it is,  I don't carry anything around with me. My power source, display and its USB-A power (for the ACD 30" DVI to mDP adapter), my audio interface, headphones/SD card/Ethernet/extra USB ports if I need them — are all in a single box under my monitor with cables tucked out of the way out of sight except for the single cable going to my MBP. Why you'd want to have to manually plug all that shit in every time when there's a simple tidy solution is beyond me. I set this all up once and generally never have to touch it, and it saves me a LOT of time and frustration messing with cables, so the "inconvenience" is really manufactured outrage here. Enjoy your POS Lenovo Chromebook and it's "functionality" lol.

What you're doing here is demonstrating quite nicely what thunderbolt is best at - allowing a connection of a plethora of stuff with a single cable - I agree it's a great solution. However, it's not so helpful if you frequently need to connect to *other people's stuff* like a projector or other display where the display-end of the HDMI cable is captive so you can't use your own cable, or someone gives you a usb memory stick to put a file on to, or a memory card to read some picture off. In these cases, having the port directly on the MBP is unquestionably more convenient, cheaper, tidier, more portable, and immune to problems with user's memory (forgetting to bring the crucial dongle).

Hence, clearly the optimum solution is to have thunderbolt ports AND the other ports. I don't recall ANYONE ever complaining that 2 thunderbolt 2 ports weren't enough on the older-generation Pros. I think the ideal would be four thunderbolt ports, one USB-A, one (full size) HDMI, a MagSafe power connector (but device can also be charged via any of the thunderbolt ports), and an SD card slot. This would annoy considerably fewer people. From the rumours, it seems that this is quite likely what we're going to get, probably minus the USB-A port.

Each of you have arguments that are fair enough for what YOU want, but the approach Apple would have to take to accommodate what YOU want compromises what many others want, and vice versa. There exists no combination of ports that will satisfy everyone without including a bunch of extra ports that others don’t want. 

My challenge to each of you:  

Let’s go beyond expressing personal opinions, and look past just your own wants. Considering your wants and everyone else’s, what should Apple actually do?  What is an actual solution to this issue that will give everyone what they want without compromise, or if not that then give the vast majority what’s most useful with the least compromise to everyone else.  Oared we just ranting about our own personal preferences (fine if that’s what it is and we’re honest about it) Or is a sensible conversation about real solutions possible?