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I bought a new 13" MBP with touchbar and I'm returning it on Monday. I don't like the keyboard and I _really_ don't like the touch bar, and I seem to only get a
by jrheard 10y ago
I bought a new 13" MBP with touchbar and I'm returning it on Monday. I don't like the keyboard and I _really_ don't like the touch bar, and I seem to only get about 3 hours of battery life. I'm going to stick with my early 2014 MacBook Air until Apple figures their stuff out.
- chmars 10y agoThe smaller battery is disappointing. Yep, the CPU uses less power but that only counts if your MBP is more or less idle. In the end, footprint matters and not thickness … Apple abandoned too much battery capacity IMHO.
- akhilcacharya 10y agoThe non-TB version is nice with a lower power CPU and a higher capacity battery, BUT only has 2 ports instead of 4, which is nothing short of absurd. They really screwed up on this front IMO.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- vidoc 10y agoHell yeah! I sincerely regard those 2 ports on the cheaper model simply as hardware crippling. Much like AV manufacturers punish you by giving you less audio/hdmi ports if you go for their entry models.
- sliken 10y agoWhat's the use case for needing 3 USB? Wherever you sit normally (home or work) just get a usb hub/dock and use the single connection to the laptop for keyboard, mouse, charging, and driving a monitor. When out and about, when do you need 3? Can't ever recall seeing someone at a coffee shop, conference, etc needing 3 USBs.
- p10_user 10y agoSometimes I work at home and hook my laptop up to my keyboard, mouse, monitor, and outlet at the same time. Admittedly I don't do this very often but it's nice to be able to do this as I need to.
- tomwilson 10y agoI think the idea is you would have a USB-C hub that has all of those ports on it, so you come to your desk to work and plug in a single plug and away you go with charging/monitor/keyboard/mouse/ethernet.
- akhilcacharya 10y agoCharge + peripherals makes 2 useless and even makes 4 difficult unless you go with a new TB3 monitor that also provides power. As I speak I'm using magsafe + thunderbolt2 + HDMI + 2 USB, 1 for peripherals and the other for playing back video.
- Groxx 10y ago3 seems like a minimum to me. Power, mouse (yeah, bluetooth, but the only ones I like require a dongle), and phone. My current laptop has two USB ports, and it covers about 99% of my needs, but it's also frequently full.
- kylec 10y agoI don't really mind 2 ports instead of 4, but I wish they put one on each side so I could charge from either side.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- pacomerh 10y agoYes, I've been hearing about the battery life from several people now. I was very excited to get one but I tried it at the store and really didn't like the keyboard. If, in the future apple just decides to do the whole keyboard as a screen, then I guess I'll just have to always use an external keyboard.
- chmars 10y agoThe keyboard feels like a plastic tube – including about the same noise. I'm glad that my student days are over and I don't use my MBP in the library anymore!
- jerrysievert 10y agoI have one of those: Lenovo Yoga Book - the virtual keyboard uses haptic feedback, and I actually like it less than the new MacBook Pro keyboards. That said, while I feel that the new keyboard is slightly better than the last new keyboard, the sound of it makes me want to rip the keys out - it is very loud in a not-so-good way.
- ggregoire 10y agoIs the keyboard like the one on the Macbook? I tried it once in an Apple Store and didn't like it either. It feels weird to not really press the keys.
- camillomiller 10y agoIt is only slightly better
- greglindahl 10y agoIt took me a couple of days to get used to the Macbook keyboard. I had a similar transition time the last time Apple made a major change in their keyboards. I'm kind of astonished at how many people turn their noses up at different things based on a first impression, even in groups that you might consider early adopters of tech.
- npongratz 10y ago> I'm kind of astonished at how many people turn their noses up at different things based on a first impression, even in groups that you might consider early adopters of tech. Some early adopters of tech don't enjoy enduring regressions, and can see the regression from a mile and a month away. I'm especially grumpy when I see absurd, hyperbolic marketing used to sell anti-consumer regressions.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- nilkn 10y agoDoesn't this just support his point? You're more or less saying that you wrote off the keyboard as a regression at least a month before having the opportunity to even try it. I've used the keyboard for a week at this point and at this point have completely adapted to it. It doesn't feel like a regression to me at all.
- 10y ago
- toss1941 10y agoWhen I first saw the touchbar, I immediately thought of a plastic, overheating, underpowered piece of crap laptop you find at any Retail store. Literally looking at that touchbar makes me think of having to uninstall 20 HP bloatware apps from a family's shiny new craptop.
- bjelkeman-again 10y agoApple say about 10 hour battery life on their website. Three hours seems like something is really wrong.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- hollander 10y agoMaybe initial Spotlight indexing.
- curried_haskell 10y agoWhen have companies ever p published honest battery light estimates?
- freehunter 10y agoMy experience with two 2015 rMBPs and an Air has shown that for light work, 10 hours is a completely reasonable estimate, which matches what Apple estimates. Of course driving an external monitor, streaming video from the Internet, and using your computer for more than just word processing and web browsing, your system will use more power.
- 46Bit 10y agoDitto on the 2015 rMBP. The moment you get beyond light work you're looking at 5 hours but for light internet browsing it really does push towards 10. It's awesome.
- hashhar 10y agoWell, my almost an year and a half old Dell Inspiron 5558 gives me 5 to 6 hours (gave 7 to 8 when new) with just web browsing. I don't think that's all that great. And mind you, I am the kind of person who has managed to accrue about 13 months of hard disk head flying hours according to the SMART stats so the battery isn't exactly in a good condition.
- nilkn 10y agoDid you double check that Spotlight isn't still indexing, etc.? Also, for what it's worth, I love the new keyboard. It took me a few days to get used to it but just yesterday I measured myself typing on it at 130 wpm, the same speed I can do on normal keyboards. It's very satisfyingly clicky.
- tomwilson 10y agoThe internet decided the keyboard is terrible. Did you miss that memo? ...I actually really like it too.
- andrepd 10y agoNo, I decided that the keyboard is terrible. Does anyone that agree with you have hands-on experience and anyone that disagrees got its facts off the internet?
- abritinthebay 10y agoI have hands on experience: it's a great keyboard if you're not a clicky button-smasher. I am not, so... works for me. I'm guessing you're more heavy in terms of key strike?
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- tomwilson 10y agoIt was more a comment on internet group-think and how people on places like reddit become an echo chamber where people complain about things they haven't even tried themselves. It is a perfectly reasonable opinion to like or not like the keyboard, if you have actually tried it for a while.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- x3ro 10y agoThe keyboard immediately made me decide never to buy such a device. It is absolutely terrible.
- vidoc 10y agoSame here. I find it, on the other hand, very plausible that some people will like it, in theory, but a lot of the good things I heard about the keyboard seem to come from people who just received their computer. I generally take those kind of feedbacks with a grain of salt as the buyers remorse bias is now a very well understood phenomenon :D
- spacehacker 10y agoJust to add some anecdata: I tested the keyboard for 10 minutes with TypeRacer in an Apple Store and I found it to be OK. The clicking certainly does provide enough feedback and since I am used to mechanical keyboards it also does not bother me how loud it is (I actually like loud keyboards). I also liked the short key travel.
- visarga 10y agoI tried it too and I actually don't like the short key travel. It feels lower quality than the old keys.
- madeofpalk 10y agoI remember when I first got my MacBook with the Force Touch trackpad (that doesn't physically move but instead using haptics to simulate the 'click' feeling) and how much I hated it initially. The illusion of the click worked fine, it just wasnt nearly as strong enough. A week later and I love it and hate the previous buttons which just feel mushy and archaic. Similar story with iPhone 7 home button, except I've just come to accept it and ignore it but wish we still had a proper physical home button.
- Bud 10y agoMaking any judgments like this on battery life after a single day or even a few days of use is VERY unwise. The main reason is that your system needs to index your entire drive; this will require MUCH more power than typical power use until this process is complete. Should give a new system at least a week to shake out before freaking out about battery life.
- chrischen 10y agoI've also noticed the battery life is quite bad. My first one might have been defective as it only gave about 3 hours of battery life (from the in computer estimate), which is the same as my 4 year old 2012 macbook pro. Second 13" touch bar machine now reports about 5 hours, which is still not great.
- sliken 10y agoTry the non-touchbar. Much lower power parts (CPU takes half as much), no touchbar of course, a real ESC key, and a larger battery.
- imwally 10y agoBeen using the non-touch bar version for a little over a week now and I'm averaging 10-12 hours of battery life. This is one great machine.
- hobr 10y agoI've been on the non-touch 13" for about a week now and I'm really happy with it. I moved over from a 2012 11" MBA. The form factor of the 13" is great for grabbing 30 minutes here and there during travel to do some work. Battery life is good, and 16GB is a big step up from the 8GB I had on the MBA. I've been running a decent-sized system in minikube with no problems. The only issue I still seem to have is that Hangouts absolutely obliterates the battery. A one-hour call took battery life from 9:45 to 1:15!
- kylec 10y agoI bought a 13" MBP with the Touch Bar too, and I am also getting bad battery life, on the order of 3-5 hours depending on the workload. I've ordered a 13" without the Touch Bar in hopes that the lower wattage CPU, lack of the Touch Bar, and bigger batter will result in much more battery life.