29 ms·

Apple Surveying MacBook Pro Users About Headphone Jack and Other Ports

143 points by antouank 10y ago

f_allwein 10y ago
> "Do you ever use the headphone port on your MacBook Pro with Retina display?" Interesting - I thought they would know that anyway, as OS X should realize when I plug in a headphone. If Apple's vision is a world without wires, I'm all for it given the mess of wires on my desk.
- kalleboo 10y ago
  This isn't Microsoft, they don't upload your usage habits to the mothership. Even on iOS which does some of that it's a super-clear opt-in on first launch.
  - ekianjo 10y ago
    Doesn't iTunes upload users' habits to the mothership ? I would be very surprised if they did not.
    - UVB-76 10y ago
      Obviously if you are buying items from the iTunes Store, or using Apple Music, they are tracking those transactions and your listening habits. If you are listening to your own music locally, iTunes does not phone home on your usage.
- barrkel 10y ago
  It's only displacement of wires, though. You'll need more wires to charge all your wireless devices. For example, I still use a wired mouse because it never stops working. I use wired headphones with my work laptop and home desktop because I never have to hear those fatal words "Battery Low!" just when I want to settle in and focus on something for the next few hours.
  - muninn_ 10y ago
    Wireless chargers.
    - AstralStorm 10y ago
      More like charger mouse pad. Does not help with Bluetooth headphones, you'd need a wired charging headband or something.
  - muninn_ 10y ago
    Wireless chargers.
  - hobarrera 10y ago
    Yeah, but I have the mouse charger at home and use it once every 10-14 days. The rest of the time, it's one less cable, including on the road. Not to mention that cable in mice are extremely annoying during usage.
- drivingmenuts 10y ago
  I use wired devices on my desktop, where possible. The fewer batteries going to the landfill, the better. Rechargeable batteries are a real crapshoot, since I'm prone to recharging them overnight, when not in use, thereby shortening their lifespan (and it's a major PITA to figure out which ones suffer from that and which ones don't).
shaftoe 10y ago
I don't see HDMI on that list.
- kogepathic 10y ago
  It's okay, they'll make a $9 dongle for that.
  - saurik 10y ago
    They actually don't even bother to sell first party display port adapters for HDMI: you have to get a third party adapter.
    - test1235 10y ago
      in some ways, that's a good thing - third party accessories are usually a bit more reasonably priced.
      - saurik 10y ago
        That doesn't make any sense, because the existence of Apple selling an adapter doesn't mean you have to buy theirs: them not selling a first party adapter can thereby only be a bad thing (and in fact it is a pretty horrible thing as all the third party adapters are crap :/ the Apple adapters tend to last forever, while the third party HDMI ones I am forced to buy tend to literally crack into pieces after a rather short period of usage). But like: the point is that Apple doesn't always go "yay, an opportunity to make money on an adapter", as one of the most common adapters I see in the wild (to plug all but the largest MacBook into most modern projectors) is one Apple doesn't even bother selling.
        csydas 10y ago
        I was about to call you on this but checking the store it seems you're right, they're reselling another adapter, not an apple branded. However, I do disagree on the quality of third party adapters; there are many fine ones out there, and the cheap mini-dispay to HDMI I bought last time I was in the US works picture perfect. I think it was PNY but not at home so don't remember. Not to say all are good, but there are quite a few good adapters.
onion2k 10y ago
I listen to music on my Mac using bluetooth headphones, but I still leave a pair of ordinary wired headphones plugged in just in case the bluetooth pair aren't connected for some reason, otherwise the sound will play over the built-in speakers by default. I'd be happy to give up the headphone jack but only on the proviso that I have complete control over what happens in situations where the headphones aren't there.
- kalleboo 10y ago
  I use an iPhone headset with my Mac for Skype since while I've been using bluetooth headphones for music exclusively with my phones for a decade now, the headset profile hasn't kept up with audio codecs and it still sounds a lot worse for microphone voice.
- test1235 10y ago
  I'm sure I remember there being different volume settings for speaker vs headphones. If there's anything playing out of the speakers, it's at the volume you had used it last, before you plugged in your headphones, no?
  - arm 10y ago
    Yep, it’s possible to set different volumes for all sound output devices connected to the Mac (including the built-in speakers) in System Preferences → Sound → Output.
- rickyc091 10y ago
  Ugh, yes please! I think they'll end up licensing out the W1 chip technology making it easier to pair devices so the device doesn't drop out. My bluetooth speakers use to drop out and re-pair at max volume. It use to freak me out... to this day, I'm always very wary.
  - sneak 10y ago
    You don't need special silicon to improve over the shitshow that is the bluetooth pairing ritual, just better software and firmware.
ValleyOfTheMtns 10y ago
I rarely use the headphone ports on any device now. Wireless bluetooth headphones with active noise cancelling are one of the best tech-purchases I've made. Would never go back.
- gtirloni 10y ago
  If you don't mind crappy audio (music that skips, plays fast/slow depending on interference, etc) and terrible recording (handsfree car-like 8bit audio), Bluetooth is fine.
  - izacus 10y ago
    And having to charge all the things all the time.
    - kranner 10y ago
      And latency which makes monitoring live audio (e.g. playing a guitar through an effects processing app) unusable.
    - sosborn 10y ago
      This is my only real concern. Audio quality has gotten pretty good the past couple of years.
  - csydas 10y ago
    The audio recording hasn't been bad for long time, though with BT it really is a case of you get what you pay for. I had a fairly nice BT headset from Jabra back from about 2009, and it sounded good for playback and for talking to people on skype/vent/game chats. My cheapo chinese knockoff headset I bought for running has a horrible mic (but good audio) I'm not saying it's perfect and everyone should immediately love it, but wireless audio is good enough for most people right now. The fact that I have the option of getting a $10 pair of BT headphones for running is pretty cool, and it's a purchase I do not regret in the slightest - they've survived Russian winters, so they're good enough in my book.
  - 10y ago
wobbleblob 10y ago
Survey me about the damn screen. Make it less prone to scratching.
- chrisseaton 10y ago
  How does anything ever come into contact with a laptop screen to scratch it?
  - mschuster91 10y ago
    Well, animals with paws can scratch the screen. Cats and a bird video ("videos for cats" on youtube) are a particular vector on how to get your screen scratched...
    - djrogers 10y ago
      If you've got a problem with cat claws scratching glass, maybe you should return Battle Cat to He-Man. Normal earth cat claws are nowhere near hard enough to scratch glass...
      - mschuster91 10y ago
        It's the dirt under the cat's paws. Free-range kittys are very bad in this regard...
      - wobbleblob 10y ago
        Glass? This is not the iPhone we're talking about, it's the Macbook Pro. The top layer of the screen is the polarizing filter, it's plastic and really not very scratch resistant.
        djrogers 10y ago
        That doesn't appear to be the case - it's just very thin glass. http://www.anandtech.com/show/5998/macbook-pro-retina-display-analysis http://www.anandtech.com/show/5998/macbook-pro-retina-displa... https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+Retina+Display+Teardown/9493 https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+Retina+Display+T...
thescribe 10y ago
I wish there was a 'almost constantly' option, they by far my most common peripheral.
nicolas_t 10y ago
I use the optical digital out from the headphone port about 8 hours a day. It's connected to my audio technical dac/headphone amp. I'll only be interested in wireless headphones once they actually have decent quality. And even then, I already have very good Beyerdynamic headphones (the T90 and the DT880) and I don't see why I'd spend money to change them. I'd be rather annoyed at not having hdmi or sd card mostly because carrying dongles is a pain. It's kind of sad but Apple products just do not excite me anymore. I remember before I used to try and follow the keynote to see the new iphone or I looked forward to seeing the first intel macbook when it was unveiled... Now, I look at the iphone 7 and there's really nothing in it that makes me want to buy it. There hasn't really been anything new with their laptop either (ok, maybe the new small macbook is not bad it's a good travel notebook)...
- nitrogen 10y ago
  Things might be interesting again if Apple ever tells the world what they're doing with the PrimeSense (designer of the original Kinect) assets they bought. Consumer depth-sensing cameras took a major step backward when they pulled the plug on PrimeSense.
  - nicolas_t 10y ago
    Oh yes, that's a good point. I really hope they release something based on that.
  - soylentcola 10y ago
    I've been messing around with a RealSense depth cam lately and it's been somewhat interesting. In the past I played around with an old gen1 Kinect using stuff like TouchDesigner and ZVector but had to hold off on picking up a gen2 Kinect when the adapter needed for PC hookup was somewhat pricey and always on back order. I haven't gotten into the gritty details yet and have only been using it with TouchDesigner and ZVector Touch so far but it's fairly promising as a low cost, decent quality RGB+depth camera.
  - alasdair_ 10y ago
    I presume these assets were bought so they would have a competitor to Google's Project Tango if it takes off. The first Tango phone from LG is far too big and underpowered but future Android phones could have this stuff built in unobtrusively. Couple that with better AR games (a new version of Pokemon GO, for instance) and Apple will badly need something similar to compete.
kalleboo 10y ago
I think it's clear that Apple really does not care one whit about professionals anymore. Macs and OS X were always great since they combined great style with great function. Connecting 20 dongles is neither great style nor great function.
- chrisseaton 10y ago
  But don't all their own developers use MacBook Pros?
  - kalleboo 10y ago
    Looking at the state of Xcode I'm not sure they care much about their own developers either.
    - personjerry 10y ago
      XCode is pretty good in my experience, could you explain your opinion?
      - to3m 10y ago
        I'm not the same person, but I'll never turn down a chance to moan about Xcode ;) The main problems I had with it when I was using it, mainly Xcode 4/5/a bit of 6: - super-lame extensibility support - there was basically none. You could write addins for it, but you had to use undocumented everything. To figure out the APIs, one would run classdump on Xcode's private frameworks, guess based on the method and class names, and experiment in conjunction with gdb. Then every other version, stuff would break - inflexible window layout - yes, I know, Apple knows best, but, seriously, why do I have to have grep output share the same panel as compiler errors? And why does that panel have to be so tall and thin? - stupid missing functionality - no M-x back-to-indentation, no M-x shell-command-on-region, no keyboard shortcut for jumping to the matching closing brace, no function for jumping to the next function, etc. (Xcode 4 shipped without even search and replace in selection! - and it took them about a year to get it back in) - confusing rules about window layout - I used Xcode for 2 years and never figured out what was going to happen when I pressed Cmd+Shift+Y. I tried to set up a separate tab for the debugger, but it was 50-50 whether Xcode would use it. In the end I just gave up and let Xcode do what it wanted - no memory dump window in the debugger as I recall? - lame assembly language support - you can't step instruction by instruction using the standard keys (you have to dive into the lldb command line and do it the hard way), and the register display is shared with the locals, so you keep having to scroll (and thanks to the inflexible window layout you can't split them apart and have them separate) - seemingly no thought put into which files are per-project (and so live in version control) and which are per-user (and so want to be gitignored or whatever). The default is for per-user build configs, which is... well, not a crazy thing to support, but it's a poor default - when I was using it all the time, though this is going back a while now, half the time lldb never even worked properly: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5125210 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5125210 I've used numerous packages over the years, and I've ended up getting used to every single one... except Xcode 4.x and later. Xcode 3.x, after a fairly ordinary period of adjustment, I had no problem with. (I'll give Xcode 8 a quick spin this month; I used Xcode 7 a bit a couple of months ago and it suffered from many of the same problems. But is it my job to try using stuff that was awful in the past, just on the off-chance that it might have been improved, or is it Apple's to make software that doesn't suck so much that after using it every day for 2 years I basically resolve never to use it again and indeed to this day actively turn down work just on the chance I might have to use it? There are, of course, arguments for both... but I'm going to go for the latter myself.)
raverbashing 10y ago
I don't want to get bothered with batteries or similar hassles when I'm using my notebook (as a desktop) Yes, please let me add another short-life battery powered gizmo to my workflow I use the old trackpad (with AA batteries), I have no interest in some rechargeable crap that will bother me as much as other (mandatory) battery powered devices
- SyneRyder 10y ago
  That's the case for me as well. I love the old wireless keyboard & trackpad that take the AA batteries, because I can swap them over so quickly, no hours of downtime due to recharging. Same with my Bose QC25 headphones, which last for weeks on a single AAA battery - I just keep a couple of spare AAAs in my backpack, and if I'm travelling it's easy to buy AAA batteries anywhere. I do have a pair of Bluetooth headphones I use with my TV, but I never use them with my MacBook Pro, I always use the QC25s (and the media control cable would be awesome, if Apple hadn't hard-wired play/pause to only work with iTunes).
- eddieh 10y ago
  The new trackpad can be continuously plugged in. Same with the new keyboard. FYI.
- DashRattlesnake 10y ago
  > I use the old trackpad (with AA batteries), I have no interest in some rechargeable crap that will bother me as much as other (mandatory) battery powered devices Honestly, I think Apple is trying to figure out just how much stupid stuff they can pull off and still have people praising them left and right, just because they're Apple. Their new rechargeable wireless mouse has the charging connector on the bottom, so it's completely unusable when charging (http://www.geek.com/apple/design-before-function-apple-magic-mouse-2-cant-be-used-while-charging-1636939/ http://www.geek.com/apple/design-before-function-apple-magic...). The mind boggles. My mom got one with her new iMac. Needless to say it went in the trash and she kept using the old one that ran off of AA batteries.
kirkdouglas 10y ago
MBP is most widely used pro audio laptop. Some people I know do simple mixing without plugging an external audio interface, just using built-in audio. It seems that Apple does not care about those people anymore.
- kennell 10y ago
  Mixing via a 3.5mm headphone jack is not "pro audio"
  - whatsmyip 10y ago
    Neither is monitoring via Bluetooth.
  - kranner 10y ago
    It's not a plain analog headphone socket; it has an optical line out as well. http://i.imgur.com/V9QbH7I.jpg http://i.imgur.com/V9QbH7I.jpg http://www.apple.com/shop/product/H7048ZM/A/belkin-6-digital-toslink-optical-audio-cable-with-line-out-adapter http://www.apple.com/shop/product/H7048ZM/A/belkin-6-digital...
  - te_chris 10y ago
    It's also a reasonable quality DAC and more than good enough to do work on the move with. Your statement makes no sense, unless you measure "proness" by the girth of a connector?
- sneak 10y ago
  Adding a USB-to-3.5mm audio interface is $10. "Those people" spending several grand on a new laptop can make their audio-out cable 5" longer. Apple still cares about them, obviously, and will happily sell them computers, which they will happily still buy.
  - cr1895 10y ago
    Pro audio people probably won't be using a cheap in-line DAC.
jbmorgado 10y ago
<sarcasm>iPad sales are falling so Apple thinks the way to solve that is by making the MacBook more iPad like so that people don't feel temped to choose one over the other.</sarcasm>
wodenokoto 10y ago
I think getting rid of the magsafe connector is a much bigger deal. I love my macbook charger, but it is expensive as hell to replace. I really like the idea of a universal charger as well. So it seems weird that they are on the front line of the usb-c open standard on laptops, but use an incompatible plug on their phones. Plug-wise it will make android a better match than iPhone.
- gambiting 10y ago
  To me, using the same charger for your phone and a laptop is weird - after all, your average phone charger will only deliver 10-18W of power, while a macbook charger usually needs 45-65W. So if you use your phone charger on your laptop, it will be too weak to charge it while it's being used(and will take hours and hours to charge from 0% to full), and if you use your laptop charger on the phone it's a massive overkill. My point is - it's all about what the customers expect. If you tell them they can use the same chargers for both phones and laptops, they won't be happy, because their laptops won't perform as expected. As an anecdote I can offer an example of the Asus Transformer T100, which my mum has, and she constantly complains to me that it actually discharges while she is using it. I go and check, and of course she is using a 1Amp micro usb charger, instead of the 3Amp micro usb charger supplied in the box. Customers can't really be expected to know about this stuff(I mean, they can, but a certain group of them certainly won't).
  - dx034 10y ago
    Couldn't you build a charger with high capacity that detects the device and delivers the appropriate output? I can imagine it's not that much more expensive than a standard charger and would be a great selling point.
    - gambiting 10y ago
      That's not a problem - you can safely charge your phone even with a 100W charger, your phone is smart enough not to draw more power than it needs. The problem is, that a more powerful charger needs to be physically bigger. 65W Mac charger is definitely a lot bigger and heavier than a 5W iphone charger. So you can't make iphone chargers which are still very small, yet can charge MacBooks when needed.
adamlett 10y ago
I use the headphone jack fairly often, but I'm fine with them removing it. I seem to buy new semi-expensive headphones every other year, and if my next purchase must be a pair of wireless ones, so be it. I don't get all the angst over this. If you have a set of wired headphones that are irreplaceable to you, get an adapter. If not, get a set of new ones.
- UVB-76 10y ago
  The 3.5mm port on the MacBook Pro is not just for headphones. It doubles as an S/PDIF connector for outputting digital optical audio, so can be used to feed external DACs or other audio equipment with lossless audio. I don't want to have to carry around a bag full of adapters for my laptop to be useful, just for the sake of making the machine a couple of millimetres thinner.
  - adamlett 10y ago
    If there is not already a cable you can buy with lightning at one end and whatever is needed to connect to your audio equipment at the other end, surely it is only a matter of time before there is.
  - joeevans1000 10y ago
    Removing this port doesn't allow for a thinner laptop.
    - UVB-76 10y ago
      As per the iPhone 7, removing the 3.5mm port would free up a fair amount of internal space, which could be used for other purposes, and ultimately contribute to making the laptop thinner.
- driverdan 10y ago
  > I seem to buy new semi-expensive headphones every other year Why? Good headphones last tens of years. The alternative to a headphone jack is not wireless. Bluetooth audio and having more unnecessary batteries to charge suck. The alternative is a USB DAC + amp you can use with any standard pair of headphones.
SocratesV 10y ago
To analyze and understand Apple's move (and it's not just Apple, they are probably the one people complain the most about because they tend to have a far smaller product range being used by a higher number of people), one must think 5-10 years ahead. By getting rid of all these different ports, they are making their product simpler, while still capable of interacting with devices that use them (via dongles). This means they have to build less into them making them also lighter, more portable and requiring a standard way to connect other devices. Dongles are a pain. Yes they are. But also one can argue that in a lot of situations, maybe the majority, if you are in need to use external devices, you're probably in a situation where your laptop is on the top of a desk, in which case maybe even using some kind of a HUB makes more sense (this applies both for home, office and meeting rooms). So why aren’t they doing this in 5-10 years time? Well, because by doing this (Apple and others), they’ll speed things up. They’ll create more need for devices compatible with USB-C, which means companies will start making peripherals for that market. However, think by now we’ve all understood that Apple is aiming for a wireless future. The last compact camera I bought mid-2015 already had Wi-Fi. Headphones are moving wireless (hopefully in a safe way, since there is a reasonable concern about the health effects). Wireless peripherals already exist. The reason why they still have USB-C is probably mostly because of charging, with the nice side effect of keeping other devices able to connect via a simple dongle (rather than a wireless HUB). I’m also not a fan of wireless keyboards and mice. Mostly because of the hassle of managing batteries/running out of juice and not finding other batteries. A good move from Apple would be to solve that problem: wireless charging becoming the norm instead of an expensive add-on, with longer lasting batteries, with the dream being on-the-fly wireless power feeding. tl;dr - Apple wants to make things simpler, lighter, more portable and they are not afraid of putting the weight of their whole range of products behind it and taking the plunge. There will be some pain. We’ll hopefully end up with a better experience after the transition period.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- iamben 10y ago
  You make a great point, but it's the charging that annoys me. I have Bluetooth headphones for the gym. They run out probably once a week and I have to exercise without music. The gym I can take. But in the office, I have headphones on for maybe 7 or 8 hours a day. I guess what I'm saying - the wireless future is great, but we're not their with batteries. I still only get a day from my phone. My first phone lasted all week.
some-guy 10y ago
I'm a weird use case: I don't use the audio jack on my Macbook Pro. As someone who still relishes their 10-year-old Apogee Duet audio interface on their 2015 Macbook Pro (Firewire 400 -> Firewire 800 -> Thunderbolt), I wonder if I can convert Thunderbolt now to USB-C? :)
- sneak 10y ago
  Is there USB3-FireWire yet?
  - ropiku 10y ago
    I doubt that's possible since they are totally different design: Firewire is daisy-chained while USB hub, Firewire has DMA while USB doesn't.
    - AstralStorm 10y ago
      USB does have DMA. In fact, OHCI standard mandates it. The hub topology is a problem as some devices ignore bandwidth allocation for isochronous transfers.
- SysArchitect 10y ago
  Thunderbolt 3 is rolled into the USB-C connector. So now USB-C will carry PCIe and USB 3... http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/io/thunderbolt/thunderbolt-technology-consumer.html http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/io/thunderbolt/thunde... So yes, "USB-C" will run your Firewire 800 ;-)
  - some-guy 10y ago
    Good to know! I guess I have another 10 years with this thing.
acranox 10y ago
Every day I put my MacBook Pro on my desk at work and the plug in, power, two thunderbolt connections, hdmi, usb, and my headphones. Sometimes I use the SD card reader. There isn't a free port on my computer. I would actually really like an extra thunderbolt or USB port. So I'm hoping they don't reduce the port count on these things any more.
- 2almalki 10y ago
  may i ask what you connect via thunderbolt? I connect the two thunderbolt to two monitors. I might actually connect to three now i think about it cause i still have an HDMI out that is not used
  - Macha 10y ago
    So my thunderbolt ports are: * One port dedicated to a monitor * The second has to do double duty, swapping between ethernet ports and another monitor as needed. I also have a USB->DVI adapter (https://www.engadget.com/2013/05/11/kensington-usb-3-0-multi-display-adapter/ https://www.engadget.com/2013/05/11/kensington-usb-3-0-multi...) when I need both the monitor and the ethernet port, but it's crappy. (Flickering cursor, occasionally cutting out, some applications like IntelliJ and Sublime Text have issues rendering on that monitor)
    - Symbiote 10y ago
      If you don't need the speed, Apple sell a USB to ethernet adapter. I think it's only 100 Mb/s. That could then go in a USB hub, which my Apple display includes. (I haven't tried this.)
  - unprepare 10y ago
    I have one constantly connected to an ethernet adapter because my MBP's wifi cuts out randomly throughout the day (which kills all my remote sessions of course).
    - jbmorgado 10y ago
jefe_ 10y ago
You know your laptop is truly 'Pro' when there are so many ports, you have to google some of them to figure out what they do (Thinkpad).
zaroth 10y ago
I love the optical output embedded in the headphone jack. I think it's awesome and extremely useful for playing movies on my older home theater which doesn't have the HDMI switching capability to get DD 5.1 that way. And it's a lot more reliable than trying to 'cast' the video, particularly when the codec may be unsupported by the receiver as well.
- mitchty 10y ago
  I gotta be honest, I had no idea there was an optical output in the MBP headphone jack. Been using OS X since 10.3 with almost exclusively MBP's the whole time. Shows how much I use audio stuff. >.<
snambi 10y ago
Headphone jack very useful. I use it everyday.
snambi 10y ago
Headphone jack very useful. I use it everyday.
phicoh 10y ago
After not having a VGA connector, making MacBooks clumsy for presentations, not having an ethernet connector, making it annoying for anything networking related, killing headphone, SD card and USB-A will turn those laptops into nothing more than iPads with keyboards.
- matt_wulfeck 10y ago
  While I agree with the sentiment, presentations via google hangouts/screen sharing has been absolutely wonderful. It's cross platform and in our experience usually "just works" and doesn't require any wires!
  - riskneural 10y ago
    If you have no confidentiality concerns at all in any way in your work, sure... My clients would not be happy with me blasting there stuff over the interwebs.
  - sandworm101 10y ago
    If you have a decent internet connect. If the screen you want to display on is connected to the network. If nobody in the room is playing around with the wifi just for kicks. If you want to present data that you do not mind sharing with google. If your client doesn't care one iota about security. If all the equipment involved was purchased in the last few years. If you are on an even-numbered street. Wait until you want to display a breakdown of a merger bid to a board of directors who each had to lock their cellphones in a box before entering the room. Sometimes Google hangouts isn't an option. Sometimes that physical wire is needed.
    - matt_wulfeck 10y ago
      Totally agree. It's been wonderful to have but I know it's not a fix-all. We're very close to a world where we only need to plug in the USB type-C connector and we'll get power, internet, and display all in one cable. To me that's the end-game. Up until this moment I actually believed Android/ChromeOS was ahead of the curve with USB type-C. I think we'll reach that moment as soon as we have Type-C laptops from Apple and Google.
acqq 10y ago
Scarier is http://www.macrumors.com/2016/05/31/macbook-pro-leaked-photos-oled-touch-panel/ http://www.macrumors.com/2016/05/31/macbook-pro-leaked-photo... "just 4 USB-C ports." That means not a single common USB stick can be inserted in the new MBP without an additional dongle.
- BinaryIdiot 10y ago
  While true USB-C is slowly becoming the standard connector so, eventually, there will be plenty of USB-C sticks until you no longer see USB-A at all. The dongle would be annoying but I would at least feel like it's moving in the right, universal direction [in this case].
  - kbob 10y ago
    I am not looking forward to it. I just looked around my office, and there are 55 USB ports within arm's reach. (both host and target ports.) I will never ever get around to replacing all those devices with USB-C, so I'll be carrying USB-C dongles for a decade.
    - BinaryIdiot 10y ago
      Standardizing on a single port will eliminate a lot of issues like this but the transition is never very easy. But you likely won't need dongles. Just like today where you can buy USB-C to USB-C you can also buy USB-A to USB-A. Likely we'll just have many cables like that. The only exception would be something like connecting 3.5mm to USB-C. But as devices keep moving towards USB-C you'll need fewer, different cords.
dperfect 10y ago
Bluetooth audio is often criticized for inferior quality, but the truth is, many of the people I talk to just have experience with cheap (or older) Bluetooth audio devices - often with inferior hardware and poor audio codecs. I've owned some really bad Bluetooth audio devices in the past, so I can understand the criticism. Still, I believe Bluetooth audio has come a long way. I personally use a pair of Sony Bluetooth headphones almost daily (with aptX on my MBP), and I've had absolutely zero issues with pairing or sound quality for consuming content - music, video, voice, etc. Granted, I don't use them for pro audio, but when I do occasionally need the additional benefits (lossless quality, low latency) for audio recording/mixing, I use what pretty much every other pro audio person uses: an external DAC with wired studio monitor headphones or speakers. The point is, I believe most people would be happy with decent Bluetooth headphones. Those who wouldn't be happy with Bluetooth are likely to be using external audio hardware already.
- Corrado 10y ago
  I agree. I'm using a brand new pair of Beats (I know, I know, but they came with the MBP) and they sound really good. A little bass heavy but that is not because of the Bluetooth connection. Now, maybe a BT connection won't satisfy the most professional audiophile, but they should probably be using an optical link anyway.
- 20yrs_no_equity 10y ago
  For me, personally, anywhere that I want to plug in my ATH-M50x is somewhere that I'm not moving, so I don't mind a dongle. USB-c provides enough wattage to power an external DAC and if Apple does get rid of the headphone port on the next MacBook Pro, then that's what I'll buy. (Currently I plug the headphones into the headphone port at work, but at home I have a DAC/Amplifier plugged into my monitor's digital audio out, thus the mac's audio goes over HDMI.) I care enough about sound quality that these headphones are the only ones I'm interested in using for awhile. Apple has enough of a track record of getting rid of things, and people thinking it's absurd for them to do so, only within a few years for it to be obviously the right move. So I trust them a fair bit. One of the biggest examples of this is releasing a phone without physical keyboard. How absurd! There were several years of people insisting the iPhone was going to fail, or was inferior because it didn't have a physical keyboard like the Blackberry.
BinaryIdiot 10y ago
Honestly I would be completely fine with just about everyone doing away with the 3.5mm jack but only if there is a good plan to move onto something just as universal like, say, USB-C AND there are already compatible headphones out there for it. Yes it will suck for many who have older headphones but if it truly helps in the miniaturization effort of technology I would be willing to bite the bullet if it's universal. Wireless right now kinda sucks. I've gone through 5 different pairs of wireless headphones ranging from cheap $30 Amazon ones to fairly expensive $150 ones* and pretty much all of them have connectivity issues regardless of the phone I use even when they're in my pocket. Plus battery life isn't very good. So we need a good, wired solution here. Now moving it to lightning? Absolutely no way. * Surprisingly the cheaper the bluetooth headphones the better audio and connectivity I've had. Go figure. My latest $70 LG headphones are MILES above the $150 ones I bought and broke a few years ago (can't even remember the brand at this point).
- adrianN 10y ago
  I think most technology is already small enough. I don't really care whether my laptop is a centimeter thick or seven millimeters; phones getting thinner doesn't really help me either. What's the point of making everything thinner? Saving weight is useful, but you quickly hit diminishing returns.
  - BinaryIdiot 10y ago
    You're speaking of the comparisons of yesterday's computer with today's. These are minimal changes that add up. If you looked at computers 8 years ago to today the difference is absolutely astounding. But 1 year ago to today? Underwhelming. Making things smaller have a lot of benefits. - Axing analog components allow for smaller, digital components that can contain more capabilities - Lighter weight - Typically better battery life / efficiency. You can fit more battery in it and the signals have less to travel. - Research / betterment of humankind. The more we can shrink things the better, easier and faster we'll be able to use the same type of technology in smaller devices possibly even ones that embed into your body.
    - 10y ago
intoverflow2 10y ago
There is an excuse for the removal of jack rolled out by a lot of people: "Apple has data on jack usage, they know what they are doing" Clearly they do not have data on it...
- sosborn 10y ago
  How does this prove that they don't have data? All it says is that they are seeking more data.
Roboprog 10y ago
Dear Apple, Here is my list of things your laptop should have: * A headphone jack that supports the built-in microphone (conferencing, anyone?) * The magsafe power connector - my kids are rough on stuff, even my stuff. * USB ports, perhaps at least one of each old and new plug. As many as you can fit on the sides, cuteness be damned. * an ethernet plug. * function keys on the keyboard. E.g. - I use F1 and F6 A LOT in Jetbrains IDEA. Here are things I could live without: * an SD card reader * any particular video plug form, as long as I can hook a monitor to something with an inexpensive adapter plug. * CD/DVD drive - nice to have, but I understand about space and cost. This is for work, not a fashion show. It's not supposed to be a tablet. I already have an iPad mini, and want something more, a lot more, in my work computer.
- spdustin 10y ago
  You can use options in Keyboard preferences to default the combo-function keys to actual function keys (where you'd press fn to use them as hotkeys rather than the other way around) The built-in mic can be set as the audio input in Audio & MIDI settings. Hope that helps with some of that list.
  - Roboprog 10y ago
    Thanks for the F key toggling tip!
- illumin8 10y ago
  Sorry to break this news to you: you are not Apple's target market. I agree about your points, but ask your average consumer when the last time they used a Cat5 Ethernet connection was and you'll probably get a blank stare. Likewise, function keys. Anyone that's not a developer is likely to not even care about them.
  - kaffeemitsahne 10y ago
    Doesn't everyone use F5 daily when browsing?
niels_olson 10y ago
Dear Apple: I abandoned my unlimited-data-for-life AT&T plan and jumped on Google Fi the last day they were offering phone discounts, just to avoid buying an iPhone 7. Yes, I actually use my SD card slot and my headphone jack. And my USB ports. The retina macbook is as close to perfection as I have ever imagined a laptop could be. Please, stop.
- joeevans1000 10y ago
  I can't concur more. They are taking this in an awful direction.
Zigurd 10y ago
I'm using an MBP I recovered from a wine spill. It also has a headphone jack broken off in the headphone socket. I'm currently using a bluetooth receiver connected to my audio source switch to connect it. It's not an ideal solution because the audio management in OS X appears to not want to reconnect to Bluetooth audio after sleep, etc. But it will prefer a monitor with HDMI over the internal speakers. I'm not sure why, and I don't know how to change it so that it reconnects to and prefers a Bluetooth audio device. So, for now, I'll be connecting the audio-out on the monitor to my source switch.
kennell 10y ago
I don't get it. They have the Macbook Air and the "Macbook" (12") that target the casual-ish consumer-ish market for people that want a fancy, shiny Facebook machine. So why do they have to dumb down the Macbook Pro. It is used, as the name suggests, by professionals.
cobookman 10y ago
Why would apple even need to ask these questions. I'd assume they'd have software which phones home usage information.
AstralStorm 10y ago
Is the purpose of this survey schadenfreude?
gjolund 10y ago
I feel like Apple has been sending me signals for years that I'm not their target demographic. I don't see myself buying another mbp ever again.
chetanahuja 10y ago
For phones, I'm an Android user but for laptops, I've loved MacBook Pro's (and personally bought three of them other than the work provided ones) for the last 10 years at least for their premier hardware and solid, Unix based OS. In between, I've taken a cursory look at premier chromebooks or ubuntu based laptops as possible replacements but have found them short on one pretext or another. But if the minimalism fundamentalists from Apple win out and start stealing required ports (and Yes, I need the mini port, the HDMI port and the SDCard slot ... along with USB), I'm gone. No more macbooks for me.
appleiigs 10y ago
I wish they would refresh the product line soon. I need to replace a laptop, but I refuse to pay the Apple premium for old products. If you look at Macrumor's buyers guide, it's all over due except for the Macbook. (http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#Mac http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#Mac) Days since refresh: 149 - Macbook 338 - iMac 485 - MBP 556 - MB Air 700 - Mini 1001 - Mac Pro
ccvannorman 10y ago
"Dear Apple, Please remove all USB ports, headphone jacks, and other extraneous ports. It's more important to build for a functional ideal of simplistic beauty than for any kind of real world usability. That is what I really want as an Apple consumer." /sarcasm I wonder if there truly exist people like this who are ruining Apple products for the rest of us.
coderjames 10y ago
I use the headphone port on my rMBP (2013) daily. Frequently use it at the same time as both USB ports and the mag-safe charging port. HDMI port used often enough that I wouldn't buy a laptop without one. I've never used either Thunderbolt port and would actually prefer to swap those out for more USB ports. [edit: Thunderbolt, not lightning. See, I never use it.]
mark_l_watson 10y ago
For unhappy reasons, I feel like at least a minor expert on the lack of audio jacks: I bought a Note 4 a little over two years ago and mine was part of a batch they sold without an audio jack; these is a bolt in the hole. Verizon quickly stopped selling the jack-less Note 4. My wife's, which she bought after mine has an audio jack. So, I have over two years experience of a phone without and audio jack. It sucks. I dislike using Bluetooth headphones. I also use audio jacks on my laptops. This seems like a profit thing for Apple, selling their own expensive wireless headphones.
taylodl 10y ago
Ports I've used: * Thunderbolt * USB * HDMI That's it! All my music is on my iPhone so I never listen to music on my MPB so I've never used the audio jack. Having said that, unlike the iPhone, I don't really see what's to be gained by removing the audio jack. Especially as some folks have pointed out they use the digital optical out to go into a DAC and then into their headphones. That's not how I work but having the audio jack there to support them for that doesn't hurt me any. In fact I would argue that's the case for all the ports I don't use: it's a PRO machine. It needs to be able to handle all kinds of diverse scenarios not applying to me. Let the MBA be the razor-thin, portless machine and leave the MBP alone.
joeevans1000 10y ago
For developers, the MacBook Pro is becoming less and less useful as Apple increasingly configures it for casual and business users. I've been hearing increasing grumbling about all the adapters and dongles you have to buy and carry. The prospect of no 1/8" jack is another step in this direction. I've noticed devs moving increasingly toward the lenovo/linux combo, or equivalent, as a result. I'm not sure if Apple realizes how important it is to their business to have developers choosing their laptops, or the loss when the tide starts pulling away. It's been a difficult line for Apple to walk... between offering what developers want, and what consumers want, but you actually need both for a full functioning ecosystem. They are now beginning to make it all a consumer and business line, and I think they don't realize the importance of the ecosystem. Very worrisome.
joeevans1000 10y ago
I suspect the survey is just to show that they supposedly polled the community. It seems any decisions this big would have been resolved quite a while ago in order to be able to ship when it seems they will.

143 points by antouank 10y ago

> "Do you ever use the headphone port on your MacBook Pro with Retina display?" Interesting - I thought they would know that anyway, as OS X should realize when I plug in a headphone. If Apple's vision is a world without wires, I'm all for it given the mess of wires on my desk.

kalleboo 10y ago
This isn't Microsoft, they don't upload your usage habits to the mothership. Even on iOS which does some of that it's a super-clear opt-in on first launch.
- ekianjo 10y ago
  Doesn't iTunes upload users' habits to the mothership ? I would be very surprised if they did not.
  - UVB-76 10y ago
    Obviously if you are buying items from the iTunes Store, or using Apple Music, they are tracking those transactions and your listening habits. If you are listening to your own music locally, iTunes does not phone home on your usage.
barrkel 10y ago
It's only displacement of wires, though. You'll need more wires to charge all your wireless devices. For example, I still use a wired mouse because it never stops working. I use wired headphones with my work laptop and home desktop because I never have to hear those fatal words "Battery Low!" just when I want to settle in and focus on something for the next few hours.
- muninn_ 10y ago
  Wireless chargers.
  - AstralStorm 10y ago
    More like charger mouse pad. Does not help with Bluetooth headphones, you'd need a wired charging headband or something.
- muninn_ 10y ago
  Wireless chargers.
- hobarrera 10y ago
  Yeah, but I have the mouse charger at home and use it once every 10-14 days. The rest of the time, it's one less cable, including on the road. Not to mention that cable in mice are extremely annoying during usage.
drivingmenuts 10y ago
I use wired devices on my desktop, where possible. The fewer batteries going to the landfill, the better. Rechargeable batteries are a real crapshoot, since I'm prone to recharging them overnight, when not in use, thereby shortening their lifespan (and it's a major PITA to figure out which ones suffer from that and which ones don't).

shaftoe 10y ago

I don't see HDMI on that list.

kogepathic 10y ago
It's okay, they'll make a $9 dongle for that.
- saurik 10y ago
  They actually don't even bother to sell first party display port adapters for HDMI: you have to get a third party adapter.
  - test1235 10y ago
    in some ways, that's a good thing - third party accessories are usually a bit more reasonably priced.
    - saurik 10y ago
      That doesn't make any sense, because the existence of Apple selling an adapter doesn't mean you have to buy theirs: them not selling a first party adapter can thereby only be a bad thing (and in fact it is a pretty horrible thing as all the third party adapters are crap :/ the Apple adapters tend to last forever, while the third party HDMI ones I am forced to buy tend to literally crack into pieces after a rather short period of usage). But like: the point is that Apple doesn't always go "yay, an opportunity to make money on an adapter", as one of the most common adapters I see in the wild (to plug all but the largest MacBook into most modern projectors) is one Apple doesn't even bother selling.
      - csydas 10y ago
        I was about to call you on this but checking the store it seems you're right, they're reselling another adapter, not an apple branded. However, I do disagree on the quality of third party adapters; there are many fine ones out there, and the cheap mini-dispay to HDMI I bought last time I was in the US works picture perfect. I think it was PNY but not at home so don't remember. Not to say all are good, but there are quite a few good adapters.

onion2k 10y ago

I listen to music on my Mac using bluetooth headphones, but I still leave a pair of ordinary wired headphones plugged in just in case the bluetooth pair aren't connected for some reason, otherwise the sound will play over the built-in speakers by default. I'd be happy to give up the headphone jack but only on the proviso that I have complete control over what happens in situations where the headphones aren't there.

kalleboo 10y ago
I use an iPhone headset with my Mac for Skype since while I've been using bluetooth headphones for music exclusively with my phones for a decade now, the headset profile hasn't kept up with audio codecs and it still sounds a lot worse for microphone voice.
test1235 10y ago
I'm sure I remember there being different volume settings for speaker vs headphones. If there's anything playing out of the speakers, it's at the volume you had used it last, before you plugged in your headphones, no?
- arm 10y ago
  Yep, it’s possible to set different volumes for all sound output devices connected to the Mac (including the built-in speakers) in System Preferences → Sound → Output.
rickyc091 10y ago
Ugh, yes please! I think they'll end up licensing out the W1 chip technology making it easier to pair devices so the device doesn't drop out. My bluetooth speakers use to drop out and re-pair at max volume. It use to freak me out... to this day, I'm always very wary.
- sneak 10y ago
  You don't need special silicon to improve over the shitshow that is the bluetooth pairing ritual, just better software and firmware.

ValleyOfTheMtns 10y ago

I rarely use the headphone ports on any device now. Wireless bluetooth headphones with active noise cancelling are one of the best tech-purchases I've made. Would never go back.

gtirloni 10y ago
If you don't mind crappy audio (music that skips, plays fast/slow depending on interference, etc) and terrible recording (handsfree car-like 8bit audio), Bluetooth is fine.
- izacus 10y ago
  And having to charge all the things all the time.
  - kranner 10y ago
    And latency which makes monitoring live audio (e.g. playing a guitar through an effects processing app) unusable.
  - sosborn 10y ago
    This is my only real concern. Audio quality has gotten pretty good the past couple of years.
- csydas 10y ago
  The audio recording hasn't been bad for long time, though with BT it really is a case of you get what you pay for. I had a fairly nice BT headset from Jabra back from about 2009, and it sounded good for playback and for talking to people on skype/vent/game chats. My cheapo chinese knockoff headset I bought for running has a horrible mic (but good audio) I'm not saying it's perfect and everyone should immediately love it, but wireless audio is good enough for most people right now. The fact that I have the option of getting a $10 pair of BT headphones for running is pretty cool, and it's a purchase I do not regret in the slightest - they've survived Russian winters, so they're good enough in my book.
- 10y ago

wobbleblob 10y ago

Survey me about the damn screen. Make it less prone to scratching.

chrisseaton 10y ago
How does anything ever come into contact with a laptop screen to scratch it?
- mschuster91 10y ago
  Well, animals with paws can scratch the screen. Cats and a bird video ("videos for cats" on youtube) are a particular vector on how to get your screen scratched...
  - djrogers 10y ago
    If you've got a problem with cat claws scratching glass, maybe you should return Battle Cat to He-Man. Normal earth cat claws are nowhere near hard enough to scratch glass...
    - mschuster91 10y ago
      It's the dirt under the cat's paws. Free-range kittys are very bad in this regard...
    - wobbleblob 10y ago
      Glass? This is not the iPhone we're talking about, it's the Macbook Pro. The top layer of the screen is the polarizing filter, it's plastic and really not very scratch resistant.
      - djrogers 10y ago
        That doesn't appear to be the case - it's just very thin glass. http://www.anandtech.com/show/5998/macbook-pro-retina-display-analysis http://www.anandtech.com/show/5998/macbook-pro-retina-displa... https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+Retina+Display+Teardown/9493 https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+Retina+Display+T...

thescribe 10y ago

I wish there was a 'almost constantly' option, they by far my most common peripheral.

nicolas_t 10y ago

I use the optical digital out from the headphone port about 8 hours a day. It's connected to my audio technical dac/headphone amp. I'll only be interested in wireless headphones once they actually have decent quality. And even then, I already have very good Beyerdynamic headphones (the T90 and the DT880) and I don't see why I'd spend money to change them. I'd be rather annoyed at not having hdmi or sd card mostly because carrying dongles is a pain. It's kind of sad but Apple products just do not excite me anymore. I remember before I used to try and follow the keynote to see the new iphone or I looked forward to seeing the first intel macbook when it was unveiled... Now, I look at the iphone 7 and there's really nothing in it that makes me want to buy it. There hasn't really been anything new with their laptop either (ok, maybe the new small macbook is not bad it's a good travel notebook)...

nitrogen 10y ago
Things might be interesting again if Apple ever tells the world what they're doing with the PrimeSense (designer of the original Kinect) assets they bought. Consumer depth-sensing cameras took a major step backward when they pulled the plug on PrimeSense.
- nicolas_t 10y ago
  Oh yes, that's a good point. I really hope they release something based on that.
- soylentcola 10y ago
  I've been messing around with a RealSense depth cam lately and it's been somewhat interesting. In the past I played around with an old gen1 Kinect using stuff like TouchDesigner and ZVector but had to hold off on picking up a gen2 Kinect when the adapter needed for PC hookup was somewhat pricey and always on back order. I haven't gotten into the gritty details yet and have only been using it with TouchDesigner and ZVector Touch so far but it's fairly promising as a low cost, decent quality RGB+depth camera.
- alasdair_ 10y ago
  I presume these assets were bought so they would have a competitor to Google's Project Tango if it takes off. The first Tango phone from LG is far too big and underpowered but future Android phones could have this stuff built in unobtrusively. Couple that with better AR games (a new version of Pokemon GO, for instance) and Apple will badly need something similar to compete.

kalleboo 10y ago

I think it's clear that Apple really does not care one whit about professionals anymore. Macs and OS X were always great since they combined great style with great function. Connecting 20 dongles is neither great style nor great function.

chrisseaton 10y ago
But don't all their own developers use MacBook Pros?
- kalleboo 10y ago
  Looking at the state of Xcode I'm not sure they care much about their own developers either.
  - personjerry 10y ago
    XCode is pretty good in my experience, could you explain your opinion?
    - to3m 10y ago
      I'm not the same person, but I'll never turn down a chance to moan about Xcode ;) The main problems I had with it when I was using it, mainly Xcode 4/5/a bit of 6: - super-lame extensibility support - there was basically none. You could write addins for it, but you had to use undocumented everything. To figure out the APIs, one would run classdump on Xcode's private frameworks, guess based on the method and class names, and experiment in conjunction with gdb. Then every other version, stuff would break - inflexible window layout - yes, I know, Apple knows best, but, seriously, why do I have to have grep output share the same panel as compiler errors? And why does that panel have to be so tall and thin? - stupid missing functionality - no M-x back-to-indentation, no M-x shell-command-on-region, no keyboard shortcut for jumping to the matching closing brace, no function for jumping to the next function, etc. (Xcode 4 shipped without even search and replace in selection! - and it took them about a year to get it back in) - confusing rules about window layout - I used Xcode for 2 years and never figured out what was going to happen when I pressed Cmd+Shift+Y. I tried to set up a separate tab for the debugger, but it was 50-50 whether Xcode would use it. In the end I just gave up and let Xcode do what it wanted - no memory dump window in the debugger as I recall? - lame assembly language support - you can't step instruction by instruction using the standard keys (you have to dive into the lldb command line and do it the hard way), and the register display is shared with the locals, so you keep having to scroll (and thanks to the inflexible window layout you can't split them apart and have them separate) - seemingly no thought put into which files are per-project (and so live in version control) and which are per-user (and so want to be gitignored or whatever). The default is for per-user build configs, which is... well, not a crazy thing to support, but it's a poor default - when I was using it all the time, though this is going back a while now, half the time lldb never even worked properly: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5125210 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5125210 I've used numerous packages over the years, and I've ended up getting used to every single one... except Xcode 4.x and later. Xcode 3.x, after a fairly ordinary period of adjustment, I had no problem with. (I'll give Xcode 8 a quick spin this month; I used Xcode 7 a bit a couple of months ago and it suffered from many of the same problems. But is it my job to try using stuff that was awful in the past, just on the off-chance that it might have been improved, or is it Apple's to make software that doesn't suck so much that after using it every day for 2 years I basically resolve never to use it again and indeed to this day actively turn down work just on the chance I might have to use it? There are, of course, arguments for both... but I'm going to go for the latter myself.)

raverbashing 10y ago

I don't want to get bothered with batteries or similar hassles when I'm using my notebook (as a desktop) Yes, please let me add another short-life battery powered gizmo to my workflow I use the old trackpad (with AA batteries), I have no interest in some rechargeable crap that will bother me as much as other (mandatory) battery powered devices

SyneRyder 10y ago
That's the case for me as well. I love the old wireless keyboard & trackpad that take the AA batteries, because I can swap them over so quickly, no hours of downtime due to recharging. Same with my Bose QC25 headphones, which last for weeks on a single AAA battery - I just keep a couple of spare AAAs in my backpack, and if I'm travelling it's easy to buy AAA batteries anywhere. I do have a pair of Bluetooth headphones I use with my TV, but I never use them with my MacBook Pro, I always use the QC25s (and the media control cable would be awesome, if Apple hadn't hard-wired play/pause to only work with iTunes).
eddieh 10y ago
The new trackpad can be continuously plugged in. Same with the new keyboard. FYI.
DashRattlesnake 10y ago
> I use the old trackpad (with AA batteries), I have no interest in some rechargeable crap that will bother me as much as other (mandatory) battery powered devices Honestly, I think Apple is trying to figure out just how much stupid stuff they can pull off and still have people praising them left and right, just because they're Apple. Their new rechargeable wireless mouse has the charging connector on the bottom, so it's completely unusable when charging (http://www.geek.com/apple/design-before-function-apple-magic-mouse-2-cant-be-used-while-charging-1636939/ http://www.geek.com/apple/design-before-function-apple-magic...). The mind boggles. My mom got one with her new iMac. Needless to say it went in the trash and she kept using the old one that ran off of AA batteries.

kirkdouglas 10y ago

MBP is most widely used pro audio laptop. Some people I know do simple mixing without plugging an external audio interface, just using built-in audio. It seems that Apple does not care about those people anymore.

kennell 10y ago
Mixing via a 3.5mm headphone jack is not "pro audio"
- whatsmyip 10y ago
  Neither is monitoring via Bluetooth.
- kranner 10y ago
  It's not a plain analog headphone socket; it has an optical line out as well. http://i.imgur.com/V9QbH7I.jpg http://i.imgur.com/V9QbH7I.jpg http://www.apple.com/shop/product/H7048ZM/A/belkin-6-digital-toslink-optical-audio-cable-with-line-out-adapter http://www.apple.com/shop/product/H7048ZM/A/belkin-6-digital...
- te_chris 10y ago
  It's also a reasonable quality DAC and more than good enough to do work on the move with. Your statement makes no sense, unless you measure "proness" by the girth of a connector?
sneak 10y ago
Adding a USB-to-3.5mm audio interface is $10. "Those people" spending several grand on a new laptop can make their audio-out cable 5" longer. Apple still cares about them, obviously, and will happily sell them computers, which they will happily still buy.
- cr1895 10y ago
  Pro audio people probably won't be using a cheap in-line DAC.

jbmorgado 10y ago

<sarcasm>iPad sales are falling so Apple thinks the way to solve that is by making the MacBook more iPad like so that people don't feel temped to choose one over the other.</sarcasm>

wodenokoto 10y ago

I think getting rid of the magsafe connector is a much bigger deal. I love my macbook charger, but it is expensive as hell to replace. I really like the idea of a universal charger as well. So it seems weird that they are on the front line of the usb-c open standard on laptops, but use an incompatible plug on their phones. Plug-wise it will make android a better match than iPhone.

gambiting 10y ago
To me, using the same charger for your phone and a laptop is weird - after all, your average phone charger will only deliver 10-18W of power, while a macbook charger usually needs 45-65W. So if you use your phone charger on your laptop, it will be too weak to charge it while it's being used(and will take hours and hours to charge from 0% to full), and if you use your laptop charger on the phone it's a massive overkill. My point is - it's all about what the customers expect. If you tell them they can use the same chargers for both phones and laptops, they won't be happy, because their laptops won't perform as expected. As an anecdote I can offer an example of the Asus Transformer T100, which my mum has, and she constantly complains to me that it actually discharges while she is using it. I go and check, and of course she is using a 1Amp micro usb charger, instead of the 3Amp micro usb charger supplied in the box. Customers can't really be expected to know about this stuff(I mean, they can, but a certain group of them certainly won't).
- dx034 10y ago
  Couldn't you build a charger with high capacity that detects the device and delivers the appropriate output? I can imagine it's not that much more expensive than a standard charger and would be a great selling point.
  - gambiting 10y ago
    That's not a problem - you can safely charge your phone even with a 100W charger, your phone is smart enough not to draw more power than it needs. The problem is, that a more powerful charger needs to be physically bigger. 65W Mac charger is definitely a lot bigger and heavier than a 5W iphone charger. So you can't make iphone chargers which are still very small, yet can charge MacBooks when needed.

adamlett 10y ago

I use the headphone jack fairly often, but I'm fine with them removing it. I seem to buy new semi-expensive headphones every other year, and if my next purchase must be a pair of wireless ones, so be it. I don't get all the angst over this. If you have a set of wired headphones that are irreplaceable to you, get an adapter. If not, get a set of new ones.

UVB-76 10y ago
The 3.5mm port on the MacBook Pro is not just for headphones. It doubles as an S/PDIF connector for outputting digital optical audio, so can be used to feed external DACs or other audio equipment with lossless audio. I don't want to have to carry around a bag full of adapters for my laptop to be useful, just for the sake of making the machine a couple of millimetres thinner.
- adamlett 10y ago
  If there is not already a cable you can buy with lightning at one end and whatever is needed to connect to your audio equipment at the other end, surely it is only a matter of time before there is.
- joeevans1000 10y ago
  Removing this port doesn't allow for a thinner laptop.
  - UVB-76 10y ago
    As per the iPhone 7, removing the 3.5mm port would free up a fair amount of internal space, which could be used for other purposes, and ultimately contribute to making the laptop thinner.
driverdan 10y ago
> I seem to buy new semi-expensive headphones every other year Why? Good headphones last tens of years. The alternative to a headphone jack is not wireless. Bluetooth audio and having more unnecessary batteries to charge suck. The alternative is a USB DAC + amp you can use with any standard pair of headphones.

SocratesV 10y ago

To analyze and understand Apple's move (and it's not just Apple, they are probably the one people complain the most about because they tend to have a far smaller product range being used by a higher number of people), one must think 5-10 years ahead. By getting rid of all these different ports, they are making their product simpler, while still capable of interacting with devices that use them (via dongles). This means they have to build less into them making them also lighter, more portable and requiring a standard way to connect other devices. Dongles are a pain. Yes they are. But also one can argue that in a lot of situations, maybe the majority, if you are in need to use external devices, you're probably in a situation where your laptop is on the top of a desk, in which case maybe even using some kind of a HUB makes more sense (this applies both for home, office and meeting rooms). So why aren’t they doing this in 5-10 years time? Well, because by doing this (Apple and others), they’ll speed things up. They’ll create more need for devices compatible with USB-C, which means companies will start making peripherals for that market. However, think by now we’ve all understood that Apple is aiming for a wireless future. The last compact camera I bought mid-2015 already had Wi-Fi. Headphones are moving wireless (hopefully in a safe way, since there is a reasonable concern about the health effects). Wireless peripherals already exist. The reason why they still have USB-C is probably mostly because of charging, with the nice side effect of keeping other devices able to connect via a simple dongle (rather than a wireless HUB). I’m also not a fan of wireless keyboards and mice. Mostly because of the hassle of managing batteries/running out of juice and not finding other batteries. A good move from Apple would be to solve that problem: wireless charging becoming the norm instead of an expensive add-on, with longer lasting batteries, with the dream being on-the-fly wireless power feeding. tl;dr - Apple wants to make things simpler, lighter, more portable and they are not afraid of putting the weight of their whole range of products behind it and taking the plunge. There will be some pain. We’ll hopefully end up with a better experience after the transition period.

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iamben 10y ago
You make a great point, but it's the charging that annoys me. I have Bluetooth headphones for the gym. They run out probably once a week and I have to exercise without music. The gym I can take. But in the office, I have headphones on for maybe 7 or 8 hours a day. I guess what I'm saying - the wireless future is great, but we're not their with batteries. I still only get a day from my phone. My first phone lasted all week.

some-guy 10y ago

I'm a weird use case: I don't use the audio jack on my Macbook Pro. As someone who still relishes their 10-year-old Apogee Duet audio interface on their 2015 Macbook Pro (Firewire 400 -> Firewire 800 -> Thunderbolt), I wonder if I can convert Thunderbolt now to USB-C? :)

sneak 10y ago
Is there USB3-FireWire yet?
- ropiku 10y ago
  I doubt that's possible since they are totally different design: Firewire is daisy-chained while USB hub, Firewire has DMA while USB doesn't.
  - AstralStorm 10y ago
    USB does have DMA. In fact, OHCI standard mandates it. The hub topology is a problem as some devices ignore bandwidth allocation for isochronous transfers.
SysArchitect 10y ago
Thunderbolt 3 is rolled into the USB-C connector. So now USB-C will carry PCIe and USB 3... http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/io/thunderbolt/thunderbolt-technology-consumer.html http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/io/thunderbolt/thunde... So yes, "USB-C" will run your Firewire 800 ;-)
- some-guy 10y ago
  Good to know! I guess I have another 10 years with this thing.

acranox 10y ago

Every day I put my MacBook Pro on my desk at work and the plug in, power, two thunderbolt connections, hdmi, usb, and my headphones. Sometimes I use the SD card reader. There isn't a free port on my computer. I would actually really like an extra thunderbolt or USB port. So I'm hoping they don't reduce the port count on these things any more.

2almalki 10y ago
may i ask what you connect via thunderbolt? I connect the two thunderbolt to two monitors. I might actually connect to three now i think about it cause i still have an HDMI out that is not used
- Macha 10y ago
  So my thunderbolt ports are: * One port dedicated to a monitor * The second has to do double duty, swapping between ethernet ports and another monitor as needed. I also have a USB->DVI adapter (https://www.engadget.com/2013/05/11/kensington-usb-3-0-multi-display-adapter/ https://www.engadget.com/2013/05/11/kensington-usb-3-0-multi...) when I need both the monitor and the ethernet port, but it's crappy. (Flickering cursor, occasionally cutting out, some applications like IntelliJ and Sublime Text have issues rendering on that monitor)
  - Symbiote 10y ago
    If you don't need the speed, Apple sell a USB to ethernet adapter. I think it's only 100 Mb/s. That could then go in a USB hub, which my Apple display includes. (I haven't tried this.)
- unprepare 10y ago
  I have one constantly connected to an ethernet adapter because my MBP's wifi cuts out randomly throughout the day (which kills all my remote sessions of course).
  - jbmorgado 10y ago

jefe_ 10y ago

You know your laptop is truly 'Pro' when there are so many ports, you have to google some of them to figure out what they do (Thinkpad).

zaroth 10y ago

I love the optical output embedded in the headphone jack. I think it's awesome and extremely useful for playing movies on my older home theater which doesn't have the HDMI switching capability to get DD 5.1 that way. And it's a lot more reliable than trying to 'cast' the video, particularly when the codec may be unsupported by the receiver as well.

mitchty 10y ago
I gotta be honest, I had no idea there was an optical output in the MBP headphone jack. Been using OS X since 10.3 with almost exclusively MBP's the whole time. Shows how much I use audio stuff. >.<

snambi 10y ago

Headphone jack very useful. I use it everyday.

snambi 10y ago

Headphone jack very useful. I use it everyday.

phicoh 10y ago

After not having a VGA connector, making MacBooks clumsy for presentations, not having an ethernet connector, making it annoying for anything networking related, killing headphone, SD card and USB-A will turn those laptops into nothing more than iPads with keyboards.

matt_wulfeck 10y ago
While I agree with the sentiment, presentations via google hangouts/screen sharing has been absolutely wonderful. It's cross platform and in our experience usually "just works" and doesn't require any wires!
- riskneural 10y ago
  If you have no confidentiality concerns at all in any way in your work, sure... My clients would not be happy with me blasting there stuff over the interwebs.
- sandworm101 10y ago
  If you have a decent internet connect. If the screen you want to display on is connected to the network. If nobody in the room is playing around with the wifi just for kicks. If you want to present data that you do not mind sharing with google. If your client doesn't care one iota about security. If all the equipment involved was purchased in the last few years. If you are on an even-numbered street. Wait until you want to display a breakdown of a merger bid to a board of directors who each had to lock their cellphones in a box before entering the room. Sometimes Google hangouts isn't an option. Sometimes that physical wire is needed.
  - matt_wulfeck 10y ago
    Totally agree. It's been wonderful to have but I know it's not a fix-all. We're very close to a world where we only need to plug in the USB type-C connector and we'll get power, internet, and display all in one cable. To me that's the end-game. Up until this moment I actually believed Android/ChromeOS was ahead of the curve with USB type-C. I think we'll reach that moment as soon as we have Type-C laptops from Apple and Google.

acqq 10y ago

Scarier is http://www.macrumors.com/2016/05/31/macbook-pro-leaked-photos-oled-touch-panel/ http://www.macrumors.com/2016/05/31/macbook-pro-leaked-photo... "just 4 USB-C ports." That means not a single common USB stick can be inserted in the new MBP without an additional dongle.

BinaryIdiot 10y ago
While true USB-C is slowly becoming the standard connector so, eventually, there will be plenty of USB-C sticks until you no longer see USB-A at all. The dongle would be annoying but I would at least feel like it's moving in the right, universal direction [in this case].
- kbob 10y ago
  I am not looking forward to it. I just looked around my office, and there are 55 USB ports within arm's reach. (both host and target ports.) I will never ever get around to replacing all those devices with USB-C, so I'll be carrying USB-C dongles for a decade.
  - BinaryIdiot 10y ago
    Standardizing on a single port will eliminate a lot of issues like this but the transition is never very easy. But you likely won't need dongles. Just like today where you can buy USB-C to USB-C you can also buy USB-A to USB-A. Likely we'll just have many cables like that. The only exception would be something like connecting 3.5mm to USB-C. But as devices keep moving towards USB-C you'll need fewer, different cords.

dperfect 10y ago

Bluetooth audio is often criticized for inferior quality, but the truth is, many of the people I talk to just have experience with cheap (or older) Bluetooth audio devices - often with inferior hardware and poor audio codecs. I've owned some really bad Bluetooth audio devices in the past, so I can understand the criticism. Still, I believe Bluetooth audio has come a long way. I personally use a pair of Sony Bluetooth headphones almost daily (with aptX on my MBP), and I've had absolutely zero issues with pairing or sound quality for consuming content - music, video, voice, etc. Granted, I don't use them for pro audio, but when I do occasionally need the additional benefits (lossless quality, low latency) for audio recording/mixing, I use what pretty much every other pro audio person uses: an external DAC with wired studio monitor headphones or speakers. The point is, I believe most people would be happy with decent Bluetooth headphones. Those who wouldn't be happy with Bluetooth are likely to be using external audio hardware already.

Corrado 10y ago
I agree. I'm using a brand new pair of Beats (I know, I know, but they came with the MBP) and they sound really good. A little bass heavy but that is not because of the Bluetooth connection. Now, maybe a BT connection won't satisfy the most professional audiophile, but they should probably be using an optical link anyway.
20yrs_no_equity 10y ago
For me, personally, anywhere that I want to plug in my ATH-M50x is somewhere that I'm not moving, so I don't mind a dongle. USB-c provides enough wattage to power an external DAC and if Apple does get rid of the headphone port on the next MacBook Pro, then that's what I'll buy. (Currently I plug the headphones into the headphone port at work, but at home I have a DAC/Amplifier plugged into my monitor's digital audio out, thus the mac's audio goes over HDMI.) I care enough about sound quality that these headphones are the only ones I'm interested in using for awhile. Apple has enough of a track record of getting rid of things, and people thinking it's absurd for them to do so, only within a few years for it to be obviously the right move. So I trust them a fair bit. One of the biggest examples of this is releasing a phone without physical keyboard. How absurd! There were several years of people insisting the iPhone was going to fail, or was inferior because it didn't have a physical keyboard like the Blackberry.

BinaryIdiot 10y ago

Honestly I would be completely fine with just about everyone doing away with the 3.5mm jack but only if there is a good plan to move onto something just as universal like, say, USB-C AND there are already compatible headphones out there for it. Yes it will suck for many who have older headphones but if it truly helps in the miniaturization effort of technology I would be willing to bite the bullet if it's universal. Wireless right now kinda sucks. I've gone through 5 different pairs of wireless headphones ranging from cheap $30 Amazon ones to fairly expensive $150 ones* and pretty much all of them have connectivity issues regardless of the phone I use even when they're in my pocket. Plus battery life isn't very good. So we need a good, wired solution here. Now moving it to lightning? Absolutely no way. * Surprisingly the cheaper the bluetooth headphones the better audio and connectivity I've had. Go figure. My latest $70 LG headphones are MILES above the $150 ones I bought and broke a few years ago (can't even remember the brand at this point).

adrianN 10y ago
I think most technology is already small enough. I don't really care whether my laptop is a centimeter thick or seven millimeters; phones getting thinner doesn't really help me either. What's the point of making everything thinner? Saving weight is useful, but you quickly hit diminishing returns.
- BinaryIdiot 10y ago
  You're speaking of the comparisons of yesterday's computer with today's. These are minimal changes that add up. If you looked at computers 8 years ago to today the difference is absolutely astounding. But 1 year ago to today? Underwhelming. Making things smaller have a lot of benefits. - Axing analog components allow for smaller, digital components that can contain more capabilities - Lighter weight - Typically better battery life / efficiency. You can fit more battery in it and the signals have less to travel. - Research / betterment of humankind. The more we can shrink things the better, easier and faster we'll be able to use the same type of technology in smaller devices possibly even ones that embed into your body.
  - 10y ago

intoverflow2 10y ago

There is an excuse for the removal of jack rolled out by a lot of people: "Apple has data on jack usage, they know what they are doing" Clearly they do not have data on it...

sosborn 10y ago
How does this prove that they don't have data? All it says is that they are seeking more data.

Roboprog 10y ago

Dear Apple, Here is my list of things your laptop should have: * A headphone jack that supports the built-in microphone (conferencing, anyone?) * The magsafe power connector - my kids are rough on stuff, even my stuff. * USB ports, perhaps at least one of each old and new plug. As many as you can fit on the sides, cuteness be damned. * an ethernet plug. * function keys on the keyboard. E.g. - I use F1 and F6 A LOT in Jetbrains IDEA. Here are things I could live without: * an SD card reader * any particular video plug form, as long as I can hook a monitor to something with an inexpensive adapter plug. * CD/DVD drive - nice to have, but I understand about space and cost. This is for work, not a fashion show. It's not supposed to be a tablet. I already have an iPad mini, and want something more, a lot more, in my work computer.

spdustin 10y ago
You can use options in Keyboard preferences to default the combo-function keys to actual function keys (where you'd press fn to use them as hotkeys rather than the other way around) The built-in mic can be set as the audio input in Audio & MIDI settings. Hope that helps with some of that list.
- Roboprog 10y ago
  Thanks for the F key toggling tip!
illumin8 10y ago
Sorry to break this news to you: you are not Apple's target market. I agree about your points, but ask your average consumer when the last time they used a Cat5 Ethernet connection was and you'll probably get a blank stare. Likewise, function keys. Anyone that's not a developer is likely to not even care about them.
- kaffeemitsahne 10y ago
  Doesn't everyone use F5 daily when browsing?

niels_olson 10y ago

Dear Apple: I abandoned my unlimited-data-for-life AT&T plan and jumped on Google Fi the last day they were offering phone discounts, just to avoid buying an iPhone 7. Yes, I actually use my SD card slot and my headphone jack. And my USB ports. The retina macbook is as close to perfection as I have ever imagined a laptop could be. Please, stop.

joeevans1000 10y ago
I can't concur more. They are taking this in an awful direction.

Zigurd 10y ago

I'm using an MBP I recovered from a wine spill. It also has a headphone jack broken off in the headphone socket. I'm currently using a bluetooth receiver connected to my audio source switch to connect it. It's not an ideal solution because the audio management in OS X appears to not want to reconnect to Bluetooth audio after sleep, etc. But it will prefer a monitor with HDMI over the internal speakers. I'm not sure why, and I don't know how to change it so that it reconnects to and prefers a Bluetooth audio device. So, for now, I'll be connecting the audio-out on the monitor to my source switch.

kennell 10y ago

I don't get it. They have the Macbook Air and the "Macbook" (12") that target the casual-ish consumer-ish market for people that want a fancy, shiny Facebook machine. So why do they have to dumb down the Macbook Pro. It is used, as the name suggests, by professionals.

cobookman 10y ago

Why would apple even need to ask these questions. I'd assume they'd have software which phones home usage information.

AstralStorm 10y ago

Is the purpose of this survey schadenfreude?

gjolund 10y ago

I feel like Apple has been sending me signals for years that I'm not their target demographic. I don't see myself buying another mbp ever again.

chetanahuja 10y ago

For phones, I'm an Android user but for laptops, I've loved MacBook Pro's (and personally bought three of them other than the work provided ones) for the last 10 years at least for their premier hardware and solid, Unix based OS. In between, I've taken a cursory look at premier chromebooks or ubuntu based laptops as possible replacements but have found them short on one pretext or another. But if the minimalism fundamentalists from Apple win out and start stealing required ports (and Yes, I need the mini port, the HDMI port and the SDCard slot ... along with USB), I'm gone. No more macbooks for me.

appleiigs 10y ago

I wish they would refresh the product line soon. I need to replace a laptop, but I refuse to pay the Apple premium for old products. If you look at Macrumor's buyers guide, it's all over due except for the Macbook. (http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#Mac http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#Mac) Days since refresh: 149 - Macbook 338 - iMac 485 - MBP 556 - MB Air 700 - Mini 1001 - Mac Pro

ccvannorman 10y ago

"Dear Apple, Please remove all USB ports, headphone jacks, and other extraneous ports. It's more important to build for a functional ideal of simplistic beauty than for any kind of real world usability. That is what I really want as an Apple consumer." /sarcasm I wonder if there truly exist people like this who are ruining Apple products for the rest of us.

coderjames 10y ago

I use the headphone port on my rMBP (2013) daily. Frequently use it at the same time as both USB ports and the mag-safe charging port. HDMI port used often enough that I wouldn't buy a laptop without one. I've never used either Thunderbolt port and would actually prefer to swap those out for more USB ports. [edit: Thunderbolt, not lightning. See, I never use it.]

mark_l_watson 10y ago

For unhappy reasons, I feel like at least a minor expert on the lack of audio jacks: I bought a Note 4 a little over two years ago and mine was part of a batch they sold without an audio jack; these is a bolt in the hole. Verizon quickly stopped selling the jack-less Note 4. My wife's, which she bought after mine has an audio jack. So, I have over two years experience of a phone without and audio jack. It sucks. I dislike using Bluetooth headphones. I also use audio jacks on my laptops. This seems like a profit thing for Apple, selling their own expensive wireless headphones.

taylodl 10y ago

Ports I've used: * Thunderbolt * USB * HDMI That's it! All my music is on my iPhone so I never listen to music on my MPB so I've never used the audio jack. Having said that, unlike the iPhone, I don't really see what's to be gained by removing the audio jack. Especially as some folks have pointed out they use the digital optical out to go into a DAC and then into their headphones. That's not how I work but having the audio jack there to support them for that doesn't hurt me any. In fact I would argue that's the case for all the ports I don't use: it's a PRO machine. It needs to be able to handle all kinds of diverse scenarios not applying to me. Let the MBA be the razor-thin, portless machine and leave the MBP alone.

joeevans1000 10y ago

For developers, the MacBook Pro is becoming less and less useful as Apple increasingly configures it for casual and business users. I've been hearing increasing grumbling about all the adapters and dongles you have to buy and carry. The prospect of no 1/8" jack is another step in this direction. I've noticed devs moving increasingly toward the lenovo/linux combo, or equivalent, as a result. I'm not sure if Apple realizes how important it is to their business to have developers choosing their laptops, or the loss when the tide starts pulling away. It's been a difficult line for Apple to walk... between offering what developers want, and what consumers want, but you actually need both for a full functioning ecosystem. They are now beginning to make it all a consumer and business line, and I think they don't realize the importance of the ecosystem. Very worrisome.

joeevans1000 10y ago

I suspect the survey is just to show that they supposedly polled the community. It seems any decisions this big would have been resolved quite a while ago in order to be able to ship when it seems they will.