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MacBook gets a Skylake speed boost, 8GB of memory, longer battery life
- HNcow 11y agoThis really is a neat machine for consumers. I would never buy one, but I'm always really impressed at the size / build quality whenever I see one. The price tag is definitely up there for what it is hardware wise, but I think it's one of a kind build makes it justified. Just not my cup of tea :)
- nicolas_t 11y agoI love it as a backup machine when I'm traveling but still need to be able to respond to emergencies. It's light and perfect for this.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoIt seems like the ultimate lightweight on-the-go machine.
- crb 11y agoWe said the same of the MacBook Air when it first came out of its gimmicky manila envelope on stage. Or, for that matter, when the iMac came out with no floppy drive, and only USB ports!
- ghshephard 11y agoBut, none of us did buy that MacBook Air - it was too expensive at the time. It was later generations that hit the sweet spot.
- kennywinker 11y agoI knew a couple non technical people who bought and loved the first gen Air. The appeal broadened with later revisions, for sure. I also know a bunch of developers who bought and love the MacBook. Not sure how they're making do with that single port but apparently it works for some.
- ghshephard 11y agoHold on - are you sure we're talking about the first gen Air - that device was more like a concept prototype than anything people actually bought/used. It came with a slow spinning disk by default, and the SSD was hellishly expensive. It was also pretty slow, particularly if you didn't upgrade to SSD. I know some people who did purchase latter generations once the SSDs were within reach.
- kgwgk 11y agoI did buy and use it. I know other people who bought and used it. Of course the subsequent iterations were better, but the first gen was not unusable.
- dzhiurgis 11y agoI used it too. Skype and Youtube was unusable unless it was cold that day.
- kgwgk 11y agoOverheating was indeed an issue, but I think it didn't affect all the units to the same extent. It was a problem for me, and increasingly so if I remember correctly with later macosx releases, but another machine bought at the same time worked much better.
- IkmoIkmo 11y agoExpensive!? Only $2.8k with a 64gb SSD, and a processor slower than the regular Macbook :) Could get an extra .2 ghz for $300, too!
- cloverich 11y agoI think its a great fit for traveling too; other than price, I can't see a reason to bring an iPad over something like this.
- bitsoda 11y agoThis is shaping up to be a nice machine. Now if only the keyboard travel weren't so shallow...
- tdsamardzhiev 11y agoWell, I guess we can wait a little longer for the retina MacBook Air :)
- masklinn 11y ago> I guess we can wait a little longer for the retina MacBook Air :) I expect the next major thing to happen to the MBA to be its discontinuation.
- DonHopkins 11y agoThey're hard to find, but I've finally tracked down a place in Australia (mechkb.com) that will internationally ship me one of these convertible Cherry MX key babies, that supports both Mac and Windows, both bluetooth (pairing with four devices) and USB (for low latency gaming and charging): Filco Majestouch Convertible 2 review: the quest for a Mac-compatible, wireless, mechanical keyboard: http://johnscullen.com/filco-review/ http://johnscullen.com/filco-review/
- ekmartin 11y agohttp://www.keyboardco.com/ http://www.keyboardco.com/ sells the Filco Convertible 2 [0] and a few other Filco keyboards - they also ship internationally. Bought from them before, would definitely do it again. [0] - http://www.keyboardco.com/keyboard/filco-convertible-2-usa-ascii-keyboards.asp http://www.keyboardco.com/keyboard/filco-convertible-2-usa-a...
- DonHopkins 11y agoThat's a great store, but they were out of stock, and nobody selling them on Amazon would ship to the Netherlands. Maybe they're easier to find in Japan, where they're made. I made sure to lock in my order from Australia where they had one in stock, before blabbing about it on Hacker News. ;) It seems so sensible, I don't understand why there aren't more convertible keyboards like that! Together with a convertible bluetooth mouse like the Razer Orochi that also supports multiple bluetooth pairings, it's the best of both worlds for low latency USB gaming, charging, and wireless switching like a KVM between Macs, PCs, tablets, phones, GearVR, etc. I wish there were more convertible devices like that to choose from. The KBTalKing Pro looked wonderful, but never made it to regular production ("factory issues"). http://kbtalkingusa.com/ http://kbtalkingusa.com/ http://www.keyboardlover.com/kbtalking_review.php http://www.keyboardlover.com/kbtalking_review.php Be careful shopping for convertible devices that actually use Bluetooth and not some proprietary dongle, and that actually use USB for fast low latency data instead of just charging!
- venomsnake 11y agoPSA: If you intend to use it for Linux - don't buy it yet. I have the old generation. There is problem with recognition of the SPI keyboard and trackpad. There are lots of kernel org bugs open for the 8,1 and no solutions as of yesterday.
- xd1936 11y agoGood to know, thanks. If there was full hardware support, this would be a really awesome Linux laptop.
- blumentopf 11y agoThere's some progress on the keyboard and trackpad, but it's still a WIP: http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.linux.acpi.devel/82025 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.linux.acpi.devel/82025 At least a patch to recognize the WildcatPoint PCH is in 4.6: https://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=caba248db2863466a886735cb8d5704048063ac9 https://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux....
- caleblloyd 11y agoIf you're looking for a similar size and spec laptop for Linux, I've thoroughly been enjoying Ubuntu on the Dell XPS 13 developer edition. It comes with core i5/i7 so it's snappier but also has a fan. And you can charge via USB-C or the included power adapter. http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/xps-13-9350-laptop-ubuntu/pd http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/xps-13-9350-laptop-ubuntu/...
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- karmajunkie 11y agoHow's the power management on it? That's always been the weak spot for me with Linux on a laptop.
- voltagex_ 11y ago
- xchaotic 11y agoRose gold, finally. This will do wonders to my code
- stewartbutler 11y agoBeing unable to stand looking at your computer for extended periods of time will probably do wonders for combating code bloat.
- smitherfield 11y agoHey, I kinda like it!
- melling 11y agoI also don't get it. Why don't more tech people run companies? Are we too busy amusing ourselves by making fun of things we don't understand? http://appleinsider.com/articles/16/03/28/iphone-se-preorders-top-34m-in-china-gold-rose-gold-most-popular---report http://appleinsider.com/articles/16/03/28/iphone-se-preorder...
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoWhat makes you think a “tech person” would be less likely to offer products in a range of colours? ”Tech people” also have æsthetic sensibilities, surely?
- melling 11y agoThe point is that it's a popular color in a very important market. Someone looked at a market then chose the color. The comment to which I was replying was just one of many comments you'll see from tech types. Don't we want to have a better understanding of why decisions are made?
- smitherfield 11y agoBecause "tech people" aren't always the best at judging consumer tastes. I thought the iPad was going to be a failure, because I considered (and consider) the tablet form factor to offer a worse usability/portability tradeoff than laptops.
- spiffistan 11y agoNow, if they only could bump the MBP to skylake as well...
- masklinn 11y agoThe chance that it would come with WWDC would actually be a pretty good sign towards significant evolution rather than just internals update: the 13" MBP was added to the lineout at WWDC 2009 (Apple's first sub-15" "pro" laptop since the 12" G4), the rMBP range was unveiled at WWDC 2012 and the new Mac Pro at WWDC 2013.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoI'm wondering if, at some point, they'll ditch the headphone jack for a second USB-C port. But that would require having USB-C headphones, which Apple might not be willing to make.
- jonnycowboy 11y agoActually it would just mean only supporting wireless bluetooth headphones from now on...
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoAre Bluetooth headphones practical, though? Does Apple even make any of their own?
- m_eiman 11y agoThese are awesome, IMHO: https://usa.denon.com/us/product/portableaudio/noisecanceling/ahgc20 https://usa.denon.com/us/product/portableaudio/noisecancelin... Too bad they're expensive. Interestingly they're $275 here in .se, but listed as $399 on the US page.
- masklinn 11y ago> Does Apple even make any of their own? Kinda? Apple owns Beats so http://www.beatsbydre.com/headphones/browse-headphones/wireless-headphones/ http://www.beatsbydre.com/headphones/browse-headphones/wirel...
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- 11526666 11y agoApple owns Beats, so technically, yes, Apple makes the Beats Solo2 Wireless, the Beats Studio Wireless, and the PowerBeats Wireless. I have a pair of Sony BT headphones and they are fine. Audiophiles will complain because of the compression, but they are great for everyday use for the regular folks.
- ghshephard 11y agoIt is starting to look like the MacBook Air may not get processor/PCIe Flash refresh, and if that's the case, I'm going to be very upset - that laptop is perfect in almost every conceivable way for me. I am very much not interested in the MacBook, despite wanting to like it. The weird keyboard, smaller screen, Mobile/slower Processor, 2 hours less battery life, Just a single port; other than being lighter, zero value and they are charging an extra $300 for it. Note - The Retina screen, despite a lot of A/B testing by me, is not anything I really care about. I get, and respect, the desire to move everything to USB-C, and I'm willing to take the hit with dongles to help move things forward - but couldn't we do that on the MacBook Air? I know, everyone will say, "MacBook Pro" - but, once again, I don't care about the Retina, and the MacBook air is a monster of a system, awesome processing power - I'm running 31 Apps right now on my MBair, including two Virtual Machines (one of them Windows), full office suite, Aperture - and it's not even spinning up the fans. The MacBook released today is a less useful system for me in almost every way than the MacBook Air released three years ago.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago> they are charging an extra $300 for it. The MacBook comes with a base configuration of 256GB SSD and 8GiB of RAM. The MacBook Air comes with a 128GB SSD and 4GiB of RAM (Edit: came with. Apparently this year they finally upped them to 8GiB RAM, so the price difference may have widened.). For the MacBook Air 13" and MacBook Pro 13" upgraded to 256GB SSD and 8GiB of RAM, the price is closer IIRC. (I'd check, but Apple's website is amusingly broken right now.)
- ghshephard 11y agoThanks - I've been trying to click on the "Buy" button for the last 45 minutes for the MacBook and 13" MacBook Air to get some pricing details. No Luck. So - pricing may not be that far off then, but, of course, it means that if you want a $999 Mac laptop, you'll need to go with an outdated processor.
- masklinn 11y agoFWIW the 13" Air was updated to 8GB RAM standard (non-upgradable). The 11" remains at 4 (upgradable to 8)
- seba_dos1 11y ago8GB RAM? When I was buying my Yoga 2 Pro with 8GB RAM I already hesitated, it is a bare minimum these days. Browsers alone can eat it all with ease. Today I wouldn't buy a new laptop without more RAM or at least upgrade options.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago8GiB RAM sounds like luxury to me with my 4GiB RAM MacBook Air. Which Apple still sells.
- dineshp2 11y agoApple finally offers 8GB RAM as standrard with 13 inch Macbook Airs[1] from this year. [1] http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2016/04/19Apple-Updates-MacBook-with-Latest-Processors-Longer-Battery-Life-New-Rose-Gold-Finish.html http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2016/04/19Apple-Updates-MacB...
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoThank goodness for that.
- Keyframe 11y agoI still run an Air (mid 2011) with 4GB of RAM and 256GB. Still great for browsing, lots and lots of text (Word and FadeIn), lots of Adobe Premiere editing on the go and occasional Photoshop and After Effects. I've been eyeing for a new laptop for quite some time now, but I am not in a hurry. This thing just keeps going and I can't justify new purchase yet.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoMy Air can survive with 4GiB of RAM, but if I watch YouTube videos in Firefox for long periods of time, the thing starts to use 3GiB+ of swap and I have to quit the browser.
- alderz 11y agoIf only they offered Blue Gold...
- cmiller1 11y agoI found this statement interesting. >The new guts are getting you better performance but also better battery life with what Apple says is 10 hours of web browsing or 11 hours of iTunes movie playback. Movie playback used to be considered the de facto test of the most rigorous power use a computer would go through. Spinning DVDs and hard drives have been replaced with SSD, hardware accelerated decoding of video has replaced maxing out your CPU. On the other hand, web browsing used to be considered a light use of power. Pull some network content into memory, parse some basic html, etc. Now with javascript EVERYWHERE and the rising complexity of web pages, web browsing has become one of the most taxing things you can do as far as power use is concerned. In fact, on my MacBook Pro now that OS X tells you which processes are using the most power, web browsers like Safari and Chrome are the only thing I ever see show up in "Apps using significant energy"
- massysett 11y agoIndeed, I use Safari because it seems neither Firefox nor Chrome are optimized at all for battery usage. Chrome is a huge power hog. I wonder if it's the same on the Windows side; has Microsoft optimized IE (or the new browser, whatever it's called) for power usage?
- allcentury 11y agoIf I'm traveling I also use Safari but prefer Chrome when doing web dev.
- freehunter 11y agoThat's why I use Safari as well. The difference in power usage is enormous between Safari and Firefox. I have Windows on Bootcamp but I don't know if Microsoft breaks down power usage like Apple does. I could compare Firefox to Edge, otherwise.
- Caprinicus 11y agoIt's almost purely a function of CPU usage especially if you have an SSD. I don't think the mac power usage thing takes into account GPU usage but for that you'd probably want to download something third party to check the watt usage itself.
- post_break 11y agoI wish Apple would transition all computers to USB C to allow for easier charging. Being able to buy an Anker battery for cents on the dollar vs the three batteries on the market that support magsafe would be a godsend. I love magnets, saved my ass quite a few times, but I want to be able to charge my laptop on the go cheaply.
- feld 11y agoConsidering the number of faulty/dangerous USB-C cables and chargers out there I don't expect to see Apple to do this.
- viraptor 11y agoIt's not like the magsafe story is all great (http://www.righto.com/2016/03/counterfeit-macbook-charger-teardown.html http://www.righto.com/2016/03/counterfeit-macbook-charger-te...). They'd just sell their own branded cables.
- fredsted 11y agoThis is the perfect home computer for me. I wouldn't do much work on it – I don't think it supports 2 4K monitors – but it would be great for casual use while not at the office where I don't need a lot of power.
- joesmo 11y agoI see Apple completely ignored customers' demands to add another port. Hardly surprising but rather disappointing.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoWhere would they put it? They could replace the headphone jack, but that would require inventing USB-C earphones or pushing customers to go wireless.
- iagooar 11y agoSo they pushed everything, really everything so hard and you think they couldn't make customers use wireless, bluetooth headphones? Why are headphones treated specially? I can't even connect my 27'' Thunderbolt Display, that's a major bummer. Not leaving out the minijack port.
- ropiku 11y agoThe Thunderbolt display wouldn't work anyway since they decided to not support Thunderbolt. It would require an additional controller and power for it.
- rkho 11y agoI don't understand why you're disappointed at all. Apple has never caved to "customer demand" for things like this. I own a 12" Macbook as a secondary machine and frequently bring it with me to travel. I have never felt the need for a second USB-C connector. What would a second USB-C connector do for you?
- joesmo 11y agoExternal monitor + power at once. I highly doubt that battery's going to drive a 4k for 8+ hours. Actually, I doubt it can drive a 4k @ 60hz at all but mostly because Apple has not released the full specs even though it's been over a year since the Macbook has been released. Even @ 30hz though or 1440p @ 60hz, this can often be taxing on an MBPro let alone the regular Macbook. There might be an adapter that provides both power and Displayport 1.2 or greater, but after months of research I stopped looking. I can barely find regular USB C cables and accessories that people have had good luck with as it is.
- yeureka 11y agoI wonder how this performs under XCode. Currently I lug around a 15" MPBr and I would like something lighter to do development on the train but I wonder about performance. Has anyone tried to do C++ builds on XCode using one of these machines?
- izacus 11y agoYeah, pretty horribly. XCode compile times are about 200 - 300% of those on a rMBP 15" for the same project. Those machines are very very very very slow.
- charlesdm 11y agoI do all my C++ / Objective-C development on a 13" mid 2012 MBA, and it works perfectly. If you have to do a complete recompile it takes a bit longer, but overall, for me it's pretty good. I'm now getting this new Macbook. Can't beat portability.
- fpoling 11y agoI do my development inside a Linux VM running on MacBook 2015 with fastest CPU option. It is not a speed daemon, but various IDE works very OK. The lightness of the notebook is amazing, I never thought I would appreciate it that much.
- kennywinker 11y ago
- jmuguy 11y agoWe have a few executives that would love one of these systems. But you cannot connect them to any of Apple's displays. Which is sort of insane to me.
- cletus 11y agoApple is annoying the crap out of me with their Macbook line. I bought a 13" Macbook Air in 2011 that I still use. It was and is an amazing laptop. It's really in a sweet spot for size and power. For years buyers including me have wanted a retina display and (ideally) the option for 16GB of RAM. The Macbook is just too much of a compromise. Crappy keyboard. Only one port that's also used for power. Really low power CPU. Why can't I just get the Macbook's display on a Macbook Air?
- jxy 11y agoI feel for you. I'm typing on my 13" Macbook Air from 2011. Apple wants to banish 5-year-old PCs, so I'm all in to banish my trusted Air. But what's my next option? Pro is too hefty for me and '' is underwhelming, while Air is left behind.
- illumin8 11y agoThe problem is that your use case (retina + 16GB) is easily satisfied by the 13" rMBP, and the vast majority of Apple's consumer customers will not need more than 8GB of RAM for the next few years. Apple made the design decision to focus on consumer for the Macbook, making 8GB RAM standard across the board. This probably works well as they can optimize the size to fit the exact memory modules required, but leaves a few high-end people like yourself out in the cold. I guess Apple assumes (probably correctly) that if you really need 16GB of RAM, you can afford an rMBP.
- rconti 11y agoYup, I use the same machine as my main home system. I have a 15" MBPr (late 2012) as a work machine, but the Air gets all the use. Sadly, with El Cap and modern browsers, it's starting to feel a big long in the tooth. Too many beachballs the past few months....
- ikeboy 11y agoWhat's up with that URL? skylake-when-it-crumbles-we-will-stand-tall-face-it-all-together-at-skylake
- basch 11y agohttp://www.metrolyrics.com/let-the-sky-fall-lyrics-adele.html http://www.metrolyrics.com/let-the-sky-fall-lyrics-adele.htm...
- _JamesA_ 11y agoIt is a cheeky reference to the theme song to the movie Skyfall by Adele. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skyfall_%28song%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skyfall_%28song%29
- 6d65 11y agoI am really looking forward for an VR headset as a replacement to a laptop for on the go working. Something like a GalaxyVR with an VR first DesktopEnvironment. That will have a huge 3d floating code editor. This and a lightweight/wireless keyboard. Could be perfect, and mean less slouching. Unfortunately smartphones aren't probably high resolution enough, yet.
- technofiend 11y agoNot that I number myself among them, but I'm sure the hackintosh people will be happy if this refresh adds support for things found in skylake NUCs like bluetooth and networking.
- tiffanyh 11y agoStill only a 480p camera [1] in the year 2016? Reminds me of this funny video from last year [2]. [1] http://www.apple.com/macbook/specs/ http://www.apple.com/macbook/specs/ [2] http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KHZ8ek-6ccc http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KHZ8ek-6ccc
- bischofs 11y agoWhy don't they just drop in the new gen (6) intel cpus? Or did they?
- yohui 11y agoIt's in the title: "Skylake" is the codename for Intel's latest desktop CPU microarchitecture.
- meerita 11y agoI am waiting for the Macbook Pro. Yes. I believe it will kick ass upgrade compared with 2015 models.
- B1FF_PSUVM 11y ago"You can also get Apple’s Rose Gold finish on a Mac for the first time ever, if that’s your sort of thing." Bro. They left off the 'bro' at the end. Pussies.
- eugeneionesco 11y agoIt seems even with Skylake it still can't power a 4k monitor at 60Hz, oh well, next year maybe :)
- satysin 11y agoShame they didn't drop the 3.5mm jack on the right for a second USB-C port. That is the only flaw for me.
- nodesocket 11y agoI'd be interested in seeing a CPU benchmark between the new MacBook (Skylake) and existing MacBook Pro's (Core i5).
- BooneJS 11y agoI'm torn. I don't know if I want a MB or a 12.9" iPad Pro. Most of my "fun" development is done in a cheap GCE instance on the command-line.