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I recently purchased a 16” MBP despite significant personal concerns over the future of MacOS, being a strong open source advocate and Linux paying my mortgage.

I recently purchased a 16” MBP despite significant personal concerns over the future of MacOS, being a strong open source advocate and Linux paying my mortgage. I did this ultimately for a few reasons. MacOS lets me run Adobe (Photoshop, Lightroom, etc), Fusion360, has a good terminal (iTerm and zsh unix like shell) and Logic. Mac hardware is still some of the best in the business, no other vendors seem to be able to catch-up. The XPS line is a great example, the battery that Dell chose to put in that laptop can’t run the internals at full power when not connected to AC. There are plenty of other comments about Thinkpads here (I have a T480s through work) and find the overall experience just fine. The MacBook on the other hand, I use for 8+ hours every day. It’s the machine I reach for first. It sparks joy. It just works when roaming on WiFi, always. It just works with Bluetooth headphones, always. It just works with external displays, first time, every time. To put it simply, the machine gets out of my way and lets me get real work done. I can SSH to wherever I want and get ‘the Linux experience’. My personal desktop runs Arch and KDE but for a portable, annoyingly, I still think Macs are the only way to go. But damn do I wish they had a SD card slot.

krooj 6y ago
"It just works with external displays" - ಠ_ಠ
- bryanrasmussen 6y ago
  one of the most infuriating phrases in tech is the mac "just works" one
  - mtrovo 6y ago
    "It just works with external displays" using a $80 official Apple USB-C Digital AV Multiport Adapter or to a $180 AppleTV through AirPort, you choose
  - cytzol 6y ago
    I feel like that phrase was extremely accurate... before the buggy OSes, awful keyboards, and hordes of security prompts. If you're starting to use Apple devices in 2020 I can see why you'd think that phrase is infuriating, but believe me when I say things used to be so much better!
    - bryanrasmussen 6y ago
      I started in 2013. I have not noticed a significantly greater number of things just working on it then I have on Windows or Ubuntu over that time period. Maybe it just works for non-programmers.
- pmx 6y ago
  Yes, totally the opposite to my own experience with mac. Getting external displays to work properly has often required nasty EDID hacks and disabling SIP on the machine.
  - apetrovic 6y ago
    I'm on my third MacBook Pro (the current one is MBP 16"), always used various external monitors (24" FullHD back in the day, recently mostly 27" 4k), with either mini DP, USB-C to mini DP, or USB-C with recent LG monitors, and in eight years since I'm on Mac I never had any issue.
    - xenospn 6y ago
      Same. It always just works, no matter where you are or what you’re connecting to.
- tikhonj 6y ago
  I have a recent macbook for work. The only way I managed to get my 4k external monitor to run at >24 Hz—such a slow refresh rate it was painful to use—was with a $15 3rd-party utility[1]. And that was after failing to fix the problem with hours of debugging and switching from HDMI to DisplayPort. The same monitor worked perfectly without any configuration on both Windows and Linux. [1]: https://www.madrau.com/ https://www.madrau.com/
- _coveredInBees 6y ago
  Lol yeah. That is literally the worst thing about MacBooks. It's hard enough getting it to work properly in a dual monitor setup, but I can reproducibly generate forced power cycles by plugging into a dock when the lid is closed due to a kernel panic bug that still hasn't been solved despite numerous reports from users suffering the same fate on Catalina. I also just had to reboot my MBP 16 because every so often when the VPN connection drops, there is no way to resuscitate the WiFi network connection without a full reboot :-/ As someone who moved from an XPS to MBP to have a smoother experience with less hardware glitches, I have been sorely disappointed. Once WSL gets full support for running GUI apps and CUDA support, I will almost certainly be moving away from the MBP. The direction of OSX is concerning, and I find it insane that their sandboxing results in a 5 second wait to open a simple Word or CSV file. I booted up my 5 year old XPS a few weeks back and it felt so much snappier than my fully loaded MBP 16!
  - jldugger 6y ago
    >I can reproducibly generate forced power cycles by plugging into a dock when the lid is closed due to a kernel panic bug Crazy as it is, I've found this to be less common after upgrading the firmware on my monitors.
- esalman 6y ago
  The OP review is very patronizing of MBP but I could not take it after this. Colleagues at our lab meetings have been harassed by external display issue week after week at lab meetings. Some of them reported external display failing immediately after Catalina upgrade.
- deathanatos 6y ago
  My previous MBP and 4k monitor would, on every other connection, not recognize the USB devices. So every other time I plugged into the monitor, I had to un-plug & re-plug to get the peripherals. I also have a Linux Thinkpad. It's not perfect either, but it is definitely better. The Linux Thinkpad also more reliably associates with my Bose headphones. It was hard to pair them the first time around, but after that, they've auto-connected. The MBP will occasionally get into states where it won't find the headphones or the headphones don't find it, and I have to request they manually connect. The MBP does this with my old phone, too… I do have to agree with the article on the points about the touchpad (MBP's is superior) and on the emoji support. (It's getting there in Linux… but slowly.) I'd recommend Terminator over gnome-terminal, though.
  - se32point1 6y ago
    Alacritty + tmux is pretty good too, but not very user friendly. Although.. it's a lot faster.
- diehunde 6y ago
  I got the ivanky dock[1] for dual display and works like a charm. I have a MacBook Air and a MacBook Pro and I haven't had any issues with any of them so far. It's really just plug-and-play. I have a couple of other docks and connectors and I had issues with all of them. [1]https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B089GKTC5B/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B089GKTC5B/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b...
- alexktz 6y ago
  One USB-C cable into an LG USB-C monitor. I'm not saying there aren't issues with MacOS and external displays but my experience on a daily basis is consistently good. The same cannot be said for my experience docking and undocking the T480s with the same monitor and cable.
toastal 6y ago
I'm not saying it's not possible, but if you're an open source advocate, why do you bother with Adobe and their subscriptions? As someone who dabbles in a lot of raster graphics on the side, after the learning curve of switth, I'm just as productive using GIMP, darktable, Hugin, Krita, and Inkscape.
- tupputuppu 6y ago
  Probably because they feel their time is too valuable for that learning curve, or because even by spending lots and lots of time on learning, you still can't match the productivity of somewhat usable software (please note that I hate Adobe as much as the next guy but they're lightyears ahead of Darktable or Gimp)
Upvoter33 6y ago
This matches my experience. I have been using macs for 20+ years, and have on occasion tried to switch to Linux. Linux is definitely way faster (sometimes, amazingly so), but that is it; almost all other parts of the experience are quite a downgrade, so I haven't really come close to switching.
zdragnar 6y ago
I am glad that you like your macbook, but your experience has been very different from mine. It has the worst WIFI radio in a laptop that i have used; one area of my house is basically off-limits to it despite every other Wi-Fi enabled device i own working there (phones and several laptop brands). The fancy metal case isnt properly grounded- I get occasionally a slight tingling /shock from it when I have it plugged in. Battery life is on par, at best, with my other laptops. Macos doesn't let me configure or change the things I want to configure or change. Some programs are usability / discoverability nightmares. Performance of most programs is, at best, similar to linux or Win10, and is frequently worse against other machines with similar hardware. I have used several models of MacBook and an Air, and personally will not purchase another again... I am tired of paying top dollar for a mediocre experience.
- kitsunesoba 6y ago
  I’ve experienced the grounding thing, but almost always only in houses with dodgy wiring. It never happens in office buildings or newer apartments. I’m not sure that is actually the MacBook’s doing.
  - fsh 6y ago
    USB-C and proprietary laptop chargers are double insulated Class II devices. This means that the metal chassis is essentially floating and can charge up if there is some leakage in the charger circuit. I don't see any way how the wiring of the building can influence this behavior.
    - justusthane 6y ago
      My anecdotal experience: I’ve never noticed this with my 2014 MBP until I was at my parents’ recently, plugged into an extension cord from their garage. With my feet on the ground, the metal body of my MacBook was “tingly” all over. Feet off the ground, no more tingling. I’d love to better understand what was going on (and whether it’s potentially dangerous). FWIW, I was using the Mac power cord with the ground pin. Does this just mean that the wiring in their garage isn’t properly grounded?
0xmarcin 6y ago
When it comes to Bluetooth headphones, I have a totally different experience with iPhone 11. I have Sony WH1000XM3 headphones. I really like them, yet every time I connect them to my iPhone the sound volume jumps to almost 100%. I reported the issue to Apple but got no answer (the headphones are working without any problems with my old android phone - Samsung Galaxy s7). The only solution so far was to enable EU sound volume limits to decrease the initial bang. The other problem that I had with my iPhone is that for the first few days it was getting really hot. I called the Apple support and they told me that it is "normal" - just wait for about a week. OK they where right, after a week problem was gone, but for something that costs a lot of money I would expect better. Macbooks (I got one at work and I own a small 13'' MBP) are OKish. My only complain is that they can heat up to really high temperatures (maybe I will appreciate it in the winter). When it comes to Linux, it a good OS but it still has troubles with hardware accessories. About I year ago, (I have a 4 year old PC with Ubuntu) I tried to connect Bluetooth headphones with it and it was a total disaster. I tried about 2 different Bluetooth dongles and installed at least 2 different BT stacks, without effect. After about 15 mins the BT disconnected. I searches the Internet but I couldn't make it work. It may be connected to the fact that I was running quite old Ubuntu 16 LTS back then.
- jalude 6y ago
  Strange about the WH1000XM3s I haven't had that problem with the same headphones and an iPhone X. I have however gotten the same heat issues from time to time.
- hashedout 6y ago
  That is because the integration is not there in the linux ecosystem. Apple has this very tight integration because it controls both the hardware and the software. But there are some companies which have started doing the same thing: - System76 - Tuxedo These companies test their devices well on a distro and well, it reflects in their pricing too!
  - boogies 6y ago
    Dell also sells an XPS “Developer Edition” with Ubuntu pre-installed and officially supported, and Lenovo recently announced a range of workstations and Thinkpads being certified to support Ubuntu and Fedora. There’s also Purism that created a custom PureOS to closely fit their custom hardware, eg. a TPM designed for user security instead of vendor lock-in.
boogies 6y ago
> laptop can’t run the internals at full power when not connected to AC How is this worse than a MBP that can’t “run the internals at full power” when it doesn’t take breaks to cool off (except maybe outside in winter?)? (Edit: my currently adjacent sibling comment claims that MBPs don’t run at full power off AC either, so their internal utilization seems strictly worse. Reminds me of how Apple arranged with Intel to buy a weaker (and presumably cooler and cheaper) variant of the Xeons available to anyone else for iMac Pros). > I can SSH to wherever I want and get ‘the Linux experience’. Depending on your definition of ‘the Linux experience’. For me X is half the GNU/Linux/*BSD experience: dwm, sxhkd, keynav, xcape, the Compose key, simple highlight + middle click/Shift+Insert copypasta. (Edit: xteddy, xeyes, xcowsay, buckle, etc. too).
- boogies 6y ago
  Addendum: And of course you can get ‘the macOS experience’ with Adobe products, etc. on a Thinkpad (making a Hackintosh seems easier than ever with OpenCore &c). Not that I as someone who has used Adobe products on macOS for a class and prefers free-as-in-freedom alternatives ever would.
  - GekkePrutser 6y ago
    Easier than ever now yes. Once they finish the move to ARM... :'(
    - boogies 6y ago
      Yep, now’s just the time to try elementaryOS or any free/libre OS and get weaned off Apple before addiction to macOS becomes more of a restrictive/oppressive/heavy burden than ever.
cma 6y ago
My experience: External displays of variable DPI unusable without a paid app like switchresx. Suspend always drains the battery if using any kind of usb or microscope drive. Endless hacks to finally get it to fully hibernate when closing the lid. Updates break it over time and a new way has to be figured out. x86 support suddenly thrown away in new updates, decimating game libraries. Out of date OpenGL and heavy push into proprietary Metal. App notarization that was promised to just be used for security now being used for iOS related business punishments, bleeding into the desktop. Windows with WSL gets all the advantages of the terminal in OS X and finally was enough for me to move. With the WSL 2 GPU integration gets rid of the remaining issues, especially as it moves into GPU display application support and not just GPU compute.
- comex 6y ago
  > App notarization that was promised to just be used for security now being used for iOS related business punishments, bleeding into the desktop. Source?
  - noisem4ker 6y ago
    Apple’s Epic retaliation: Unreal Engine on iOS and Mac in jeopardy https://venturebeat.com/2020/08/17/apples-epic-retaliation-unreal-engine-on-ios-and-mac-in-jeopardy/ https://venturebeat.com/2020/08/17/apples-epic-retaliation-u...
- striking 6y ago
  > External displays of variable DPI unusable without a paid app like switchresx. Hold Option and click the Scaled radio button again. You'll see a list of options. Yes, I realize that's silly.
  - cma 6y ago
    Even those weren't enough for what I needed. I think it was getting around 1440p sizes at high dpi by downscaling (2880p -> 4K).
jillesvangurp 6y ago
Well, macs don't run at full power either if you don't plug them in. And thermal issues are definitely a thing on macs. I have a friend who is complaining about stability issues on his 16" mbp already. And there is of course the whole notion with the uncertainty around ARM and their commitment to supporting what they are selling right now. So, I'm not super keen on buying that just yet though I probably will eventually. I've had lots of silly issues with bluetooth, wifi and other things not quite "just working" lately on my 2017 MBP. Don't get me started on the keyboard situation. Apple's standards have been slipping on that front. But they are undeniably still very good laptops overall. If it wasn't for the weird keyboards, they'd make pretty decent linux laptops too. As it is, the touchbar is a PITA for that, even if you do manage to get that working (apparently it is doable). I actually wouldn't mind a linux laptop except that seems to involve a lot of compromises on form factor, sucky touchpads, plasticky/fugly designs, screen resolution, driver compatibility, and manufacturers with not so great reputations on the quality and support front. Apple is also problematic for support lately of course. I recently bought a new camera and the ability to take the usb-c power cable and plug that into the camera to quickly transfer some photos is quite nice. I don't really miss the memory card slot that much. I also charge my phone of my laptop via usb-c when on the road. I once watched 8 hours of offline netflix on my phone on a transatlantic flight and left the plane with a full charge on my phone and 80% charge on my mac. I've been considering a linux laptop for ages but there are not a lot of models that meet my requirements of having a form factor that isn't hideously ugly (no "gaming" laptops please), has decent specs for CPU, memory, ssd (this eliminates 98% of the market), an hdpi screen (now we are talking 2, maybe 3 models), and a touchpad that comes reasonably close to what I'm used to. There are not a lot of things in the market that come close enough that I would consider them and none that I'm aware off that don't involve compromising on at least a few things I care about.
- alexktz 6y ago
  They don't? I just ran Cinebench R20 and Unigine Heaven benchmark plugged and unplugged (10x each) and got the same scores each time. This is the 16" MBP with the 5600m with HBM2 memory.
  - 6y ago
funkaster 6y ago
how can you be an open source advocate and still work with adobe & friends? - no question on the quality/productivity of those, just on your argument. A more consistent argument would’ve been: “open source advocate, Gimp, Inkscape and others run even better on my mac than on linux” (would disagree on that, but at least it would be a more consistent argument)
- tristor 6y ago
  You can be an open source advocate while not exclusively using open source software. I've been an open source advocate for most of my life, during the early days I predominantly used Windows, but I was aware of Linux and skilled with it and worked to ensure it was used where appropriate and possible on servers in my workplaces. It's a given that Linux dominates servers in 2020, but that wasn't always the case. The way now is really not even on the desktop, Linux lost there and now the world has moved on. The war is on mobile, and Android isn't truly open in the way that Linux upstream is due to binary blobs and baseband. Hopefully someday we'll see a truly open mobile platform rise to supremacy, but right now we have two separate walled gardens on mobile and not much else. Within those walled gardens, advocacy can be to use apps which are open source vs proprietary options (e.g. to use andOTP instead of Authy, or Bitwarden instead of LastPass, as a simple example). Existing inside the walled garden we're all forced to exist in is not hypocrisy, it's pragmatism. Using the best tool for the job and acknowledging the deficiency of open options is just being realistic, not an example of a fall from purity. Not everyone is Richard Stallman.
- lloeki 6y ago
  One can be an open source advocate and still not be a closed source detractor, recognising the usefulness and/or quality of some proprietary software. Things are not manichaean zero sum game.
  - criddell 6y ago
    Advocates can still be rational, zealots rarely are.
- alexktz 6y ago
bamboozled 6y ago
Sounds like you’ve not had Linux on a laptop for a while, it’s no where near as bad as you describe. I run NIxOs on a Thinkpad X1 Extreme Gen 2. I really love it and it “sparks joy” for me too. Especially because I understand how it’s lit together and sort of “built it” and contribute to the Platform. Very satisfying.
- alexktz 6y ago
  I have literally used Linux as my daily desktop driver at work for 6 years and counting. I'm not saying it can't be a great experience if you have a well defined use case such as development. But for an all-round, no compromises experience when stepping outside of development (and this does annoy me btw) I find MacOS to give the least worst set of compromises. I even watch DistroTube and read r/unixporn. I love Linux!
qppo 6y ago
Some people will take snipes at the battery life/performance impact but just to give concrete examples. I had a 2018 13" Macbook Pro and XPS 13 running Ubuntu. Former with Retina, latter with 4k. The Macbook's battery on a daily basis was never a huge problem for me unless running heavy applications like video chat. The XPS 13 has to be tethered to the power brick to run at 4k for more than a few hours. During normal dev work, I can't really get more than 90 minutes where the Macbook would last maybe 4-5 hours. I suspect it's deeper than better hardware. Linux laptops just have worse battery life (nb4 "just install X Y Z with apt", that's not an acceptable solution when the OS is installed by the OEM and driver stability is still a problem on Linux laptops)
jasonv 6y ago
I have a 2013 MacBook Air that I still love. Works fine for 90% of everything I want. Only recently started to feel sluggish for Camtasia & Premier Pro video editing. I love Linux, have used it from the very beginning, want to use it on the desktop more, may buy a small NUC to host it and some containers for development -- but I'm not sure I want to spend any time thinking about hardware compatibility and living with it 100% on the desktop. That said, all the recent reports of Mac hardware concern me. I'm really hoping their next product line is a return to the early 2000s form. We bought a lot of those at the company I was at, and it was a no-brainer. I could flip it -- convert to a Linux laptop and keep a Mac mini on the desk for media projects. A Lenovo Legion I bought recently for my kid is nice... but I don't see the hardware lasting as long as the MacBook Air has. I'll see if it even lasts 3-4 years. If it's like the Dells I've owned, it'll "work" but won't feel solid.
cleaver 6y ago
I've certainly been keeping my eyes open for a MacBook Pro alternative. On my last time looking, I thought I'd try to find something with: - retina-like resolution 15" screen - 32GB RAM - slim and light without a flimsy plastic case - good battery life - good trackpad - keyboard home row centred I could not find anything. I couldn't even find something with the first three items. I'm starting to think it might make sense to go with a cheaper MacBook and a little pocket server like this: https://liliputing.com/2020/08/first-look-gmk-nucbox-2-4-inch-mini-pc-hits-indiegogo-august-25-for-159-and-up.html https://liliputing.com/2020/08/first-look-gmk-nucbox-2-4-inc...
- petepete 6y ago
  Where does the XPS15 fall short?
  - cleaver 6y ago
    I could get the retina screen with 16GB RAM, or 32GB RAM with a lower res screen. It was a few months back, so hopefully that has changed. I'm no longer looking though. Other than that, the XPS15 was a front runner.
- sneak 6y ago
  For some reason (bad software support? tradition?) the PC laptop market seems to simply not care that much about extremely high resolution displays. There are some, but none in systems with the overall build quality of a MBP.
  - cleaver 6y ago
    That's what I found. Another pet peeve was extremely wide screens, although we don't see that as much these days. Not great for editing text or code.
  - fomine3 6y ago
    There are many laptops that has 4K display that's more resolution compared to MacBook Pro, if you choose correct product line. Cheap laptops don't care HiDPI displays because it's cheap. Gaming laptops less care HiDPI displays because it's too much resolution on current GPU. Most premium models provide both FHD and 4K model, FHD is for battery life and price.
biztos 6y ago
I'm glad it worked out for you. I so much wanted to love the 16" MBP but in clamshell mode I can hear the fan at least 80% of the time, and if I do anything at all involving the Xcode simulator the fan kicks up high enough I can't hear myself think. When open the fan's not so bad but it would fry my legs like an egg even through jeans. I look forward to going back to my old 13" which has an SD slot and MagSafe and all the rest, even though it'll feel crazy slow. The 16" is, for sure, a beast when it comes to performance, but I have found the downsides to be significant.
throwaway4715 6y ago
In my experience the 16" MBP is just bad. This is my first Apple laptop and it's pretty, but that's about it. Despite having a serious horsepower (on paper) the fan runs constantly while doing basic tasks, I get tons of beachballs, and my wireless mouse has to plugged into a specific port or it's janky as hell. It's not intuitive (for me) or performant. It's not even a good linux stand in. My takeaway from this whole experience is that computer people will give up practicality for fashion just as much as anyone else.
- reaperducer 6y ago
  wireless mouse plugged into a specific port So, is it wireless or not? Or is it one of those Bluetooth dongle things from the 1990's? If the mouse is Bluetooth, why not just have it connect directly to the computer? Every Mac since 2003 has had built-in Bluetooth.
reaperducer 6y ago
unix like macOS is certified Unix. Has been for over a decade.
- IncRnd 6y ago
  That's not correct. Unix, the operating sytem family, is different from systems that are certified as UNIX (uppercase) 03-compliant. Macos is a UNIX 03-compliant operating system certified by The Open Group.
m1cl 6y ago
Darwin is coming. No need for macOS

krooj 6y ago

"It just works with external displays" - ಠ_ಠ

bryanrasmussen 6y ago
one of the most infuriating phrases in tech is the mac "just works" one
- mtrovo 6y ago
  "It just works with external displays" using a $80 official Apple USB-C Digital AV Multiport Adapter or to a $180 AppleTV through AirPort, you choose
- cytzol 6y ago
  I feel like that phrase was extremely accurate... before the buggy OSes, awful keyboards, and hordes of security prompts. If you're starting to use Apple devices in 2020 I can see why you'd think that phrase is infuriating, but believe me when I say things used to be so much better!
  - bryanrasmussen 6y ago
    I started in 2013. I have not noticed a significantly greater number of things just working on it then I have on Windows or Ubuntu over that time period. Maybe it just works for non-programmers.
pmx 6y ago
Yes, totally the opposite to my own experience with mac. Getting external displays to work properly has often required nasty EDID hacks and disabling SIP on the machine.
- apetrovic 6y ago
  I'm on my third MacBook Pro (the current one is MBP 16"), always used various external monitors (24" FullHD back in the day, recently mostly 27" 4k), with either mini DP, USB-C to mini DP, or USB-C with recent LG monitors, and in eight years since I'm on Mac I never had any issue.
  - xenospn 6y ago
    Same. It always just works, no matter where you are or what you’re connecting to.
tikhonj 6y ago
I have a recent macbook for work. The only way I managed to get my 4k external monitor to run at >24 Hz—such a slow refresh rate it was painful to use—was with a $15 3rd-party utility[1]. And that was after failing to fix the problem with hours of debugging and switching from HDMI to DisplayPort. The same monitor worked perfectly without any configuration on both Windows and Linux. [1]: https://www.madrau.com/ https://www.madrau.com/
_coveredInBees 6y ago
Lol yeah. That is literally the worst thing about MacBooks. It's hard enough getting it to work properly in a dual monitor setup, but I can reproducibly generate forced power cycles by plugging into a dock when the lid is closed due to a kernel panic bug that still hasn't been solved despite numerous reports from users suffering the same fate on Catalina. I also just had to reboot my MBP 16 because every so often when the VPN connection drops, there is no way to resuscitate the WiFi network connection without a full reboot :-/ As someone who moved from an XPS to MBP to have a smoother experience with less hardware glitches, I have been sorely disappointed. Once WSL gets full support for running GUI apps and CUDA support, I will almost certainly be moving away from the MBP. The direction of OSX is concerning, and I find it insane that their sandboxing results in a 5 second wait to open a simple Word or CSV file. I booted up my 5 year old XPS a few weeks back and it felt so much snappier than my fully loaded MBP 16!
- jldugger 6y ago
  >I can reproducibly generate forced power cycles by plugging into a dock when the lid is closed due to a kernel panic bug Crazy as it is, I've found this to be less common after upgrading the firmware on my monitors.
esalman 6y ago
The OP review is very patronizing of MBP but I could not take it after this. Colleagues at our lab meetings have been harassed by external display issue week after week at lab meetings. Some of them reported external display failing immediately after Catalina upgrade.
deathanatos 6y ago
My previous MBP and 4k monitor would, on every other connection, not recognize the USB devices. So every other time I plugged into the monitor, I had to un-plug & re-plug to get the peripherals. I also have a Linux Thinkpad. It's not perfect either, but it is definitely better. The Linux Thinkpad also more reliably associates with my Bose headphones. It was hard to pair them the first time around, but after that, they've auto-connected. The MBP will occasionally get into states where it won't find the headphones or the headphones don't find it, and I have to request they manually connect. The MBP does this with my old phone, too… I do have to agree with the article on the points about the touchpad (MBP's is superior) and on the emoji support. (It's getting there in Linux… but slowly.) I'd recommend Terminator over gnome-terminal, though.
- se32point1 6y ago
  Alacritty + tmux is pretty good too, but not very user friendly. Although.. it's a lot faster.
diehunde 6y ago
I got the ivanky dock[1] for dual display and works like a charm. I have a MacBook Air and a MacBook Pro and I haven't had any issues with any of them so far. It's really just plug-and-play. I have a couple of other docks and connectors and I had issues with all of them. [1]https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B089GKTC5B/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B089GKTC5B/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b...
alexktz 6y ago
One USB-C cable into an LG USB-C monitor. I'm not saying there aren't issues with MacOS and external displays but my experience on a daily basis is consistently good. The same cannot be said for my experience docking and undocking the T480s with the same monitor and cable.

toastal 6y ago

I'm not saying it's not possible, but if you're an open source advocate, why do you bother with Adobe and their subscriptions? As someone who dabbles in a lot of raster graphics on the side, after the learning curve of switth, I'm just as productive using GIMP, darktable, Hugin, Krita, and Inkscape.

tupputuppu 6y ago
Probably because they feel their time is too valuable for that learning curve, or because even by spending lots and lots of time on learning, you still can't match the productivity of somewhat usable software (please note that I hate Adobe as much as the next guy but they're lightyears ahead of Darktable or Gimp)

Upvoter33 6y ago

This matches my experience. I have been using macs for 20+ years, and have on occasion tried to switch to Linux. Linux is definitely way faster (sometimes, amazingly so), but that is it; almost all other parts of the experience are quite a downgrade, so I haven't really come close to switching.

zdragnar 6y ago

I am glad that you like your macbook, but your experience has been very different from mine. It has the worst WIFI radio in a laptop that i have used; one area of my house is basically off-limits to it despite every other Wi-Fi enabled device i own working there (phones and several laptop brands). The fancy metal case isnt properly grounded- I get occasionally a slight tingling /shock from it when I have it plugged in. Battery life is on par, at best, with my other laptops. Macos doesn't let me configure or change the things I want to configure or change. Some programs are usability / discoverability nightmares. Performance of most programs is, at best, similar to linux or Win10, and is frequently worse against other machines with similar hardware. I have used several models of MacBook and an Air, and personally will not purchase another again... I am tired of paying top dollar for a mediocre experience.

kitsunesoba 6y ago
I’ve experienced the grounding thing, but almost always only in houses with dodgy wiring. It never happens in office buildings or newer apartments. I’m not sure that is actually the MacBook’s doing.
- fsh 6y ago
  USB-C and proprietary laptop chargers are double insulated Class II devices. This means that the metal chassis is essentially floating and can charge up if there is some leakage in the charger circuit. I don't see any way how the wiring of the building can influence this behavior.
  - justusthane 6y ago
    My anecdotal experience: I’ve never noticed this with my 2014 MBP until I was at my parents’ recently, plugged into an extension cord from their garage. With my feet on the ground, the metal body of my MacBook was “tingly” all over. Feet off the ground, no more tingling. I’d love to better understand what was going on (and whether it’s potentially dangerous). FWIW, I was using the Mac power cord with the ground pin. Does this just mean that the wiring in their garage isn’t properly grounded?

0xmarcin 6y ago

When it comes to Bluetooth headphones, I have a totally different experience with iPhone 11. I have Sony WH1000XM3 headphones. I really like them, yet every time I connect them to my iPhone the sound volume jumps to almost 100%. I reported the issue to Apple but got no answer (the headphones are working without any problems with my old android phone - Samsung Galaxy s7). The only solution so far was to enable EU sound volume limits to decrease the initial bang. The other problem that I had with my iPhone is that for the first few days it was getting really hot. I called the Apple support and they told me that it is "normal" - just wait for about a week. OK they where right, after a week problem was gone, but for something that costs a lot of money I would expect better. Macbooks (I got one at work and I own a small 13'' MBP) are OKish. My only complain is that they can heat up to really high temperatures (maybe I will appreciate it in the winter). When it comes to Linux, it a good OS but it still has troubles with hardware accessories. About I year ago, (I have a 4 year old PC with Ubuntu) I tried to connect Bluetooth headphones with it and it was a total disaster. I tried about 2 different Bluetooth dongles and installed at least 2 different BT stacks, without effect. After about 15 mins the BT disconnected. I searches the Internet but I couldn't make it work. It may be connected to the fact that I was running quite old Ubuntu 16 LTS back then.

jalude 6y ago
Strange about the WH1000XM3s I haven't had that problem with the same headphones and an iPhone X. I have however gotten the same heat issues from time to time.
hashedout 6y ago
That is because the integration is not there in the linux ecosystem. Apple has this very tight integration because it controls both the hardware and the software. But there are some companies which have started doing the same thing: - System76 - Tuxedo These companies test their devices well on a distro and well, it reflects in their pricing too!
- boogies 6y ago
  Dell also sells an XPS “Developer Edition” with Ubuntu pre-installed and officially supported, and Lenovo recently announced a range of workstations and Thinkpads being certified to support Ubuntu and Fedora. There’s also Purism that created a custom PureOS to closely fit their custom hardware, eg. a TPM designed for user security instead of vendor lock-in.

boogies 6y ago

> laptop can’t run the internals at full power when not connected to AC How is this worse than a MBP that can’t “run the internals at full power” when it doesn’t take breaks to cool off (except maybe outside in winter?)? (Edit: my currently adjacent sibling comment claims that MBPs don’t run at full power off AC either, so their internal utilization seems strictly worse. Reminds me of how Apple arranged with Intel to buy a weaker (and presumably cooler and cheaper) variant of the Xeons available to anyone else for iMac Pros). > I can SSH to wherever I want and get ‘the Linux experience’. Depending on your definition of ‘the Linux experience’. For me X is half the GNU/Linux/*BSD experience: dwm, sxhkd, keynav, xcape, the Compose key, simple highlight + middle click/Shift+Insert copypasta. (Edit: xteddy, xeyes, xcowsay, buckle, etc. too).

boogies 6y ago
Addendum: And of course you can get ‘the macOS experience’ with Adobe products, etc. on a Thinkpad (making a Hackintosh seems easier than ever with OpenCore &c). Not that I as someone who has used Adobe products on macOS for a class and prefers free-as-in-freedom alternatives ever would.
- GekkePrutser 6y ago
  Easier than ever now yes. Once they finish the move to ARM... :'(
  - boogies 6y ago
    Yep, now’s just the time to try elementaryOS or any free/libre OS and get weaned off Apple before addiction to macOS becomes more of a restrictive/oppressive/heavy burden than ever.

cma 6y ago

My experience: External displays of variable DPI unusable without a paid app like switchresx. Suspend always drains the battery if using any kind of usb or microscope drive. Endless hacks to finally get it to fully hibernate when closing the lid. Updates break it over time and a new way has to be figured out. x86 support suddenly thrown away in new updates, decimating game libraries. Out of date OpenGL and heavy push into proprietary Metal. App notarization that was promised to just be used for security now being used for iOS related business punishments, bleeding into the desktop. Windows with WSL gets all the advantages of the terminal in OS X and finally was enough for me to move. With the WSL 2 GPU integration gets rid of the remaining issues, especially as it moves into GPU display application support and not just GPU compute.

comex 6y ago
> App notarization that was promised to just be used for security now being used for iOS related business punishments, bleeding into the desktop. Source?
- noisem4ker 6y ago
  Apple’s Epic retaliation: Unreal Engine on iOS and Mac in jeopardy https://venturebeat.com/2020/08/17/apples-epic-retaliation-unreal-engine-on-ios-and-mac-in-jeopardy/ https://venturebeat.com/2020/08/17/apples-epic-retaliation-u...
striking 6y ago
> External displays of variable DPI unusable without a paid app like switchresx. Hold Option and click the Scaled radio button again. You'll see a list of options. Yes, I realize that's silly.
- cma 6y ago
  Even those weren't enough for what I needed. I think it was getting around 1440p sizes at high dpi by downscaling (2880p -> 4K).

jillesvangurp 6y ago

Well, macs don't run at full power either if you don't plug them in. And thermal issues are definitely a thing on macs. I have a friend who is complaining about stability issues on his 16" mbp already. And there is of course the whole notion with the uncertainty around ARM and their commitment to supporting what they are selling right now. So, I'm not super keen on buying that just yet though I probably will eventually. I've had lots of silly issues with bluetooth, wifi and other things not quite "just working" lately on my 2017 MBP. Don't get me started on the keyboard situation. Apple's standards have been slipping on that front. But they are undeniably still very good laptops overall. If it wasn't for the weird keyboards, they'd make pretty decent linux laptops too. As it is, the touchbar is a PITA for that, even if you do manage to get that working (apparently it is doable). I actually wouldn't mind a linux laptop except that seems to involve a lot of compromises on form factor, sucky touchpads, plasticky/fugly designs, screen resolution, driver compatibility, and manufacturers with not so great reputations on the quality and support front. Apple is also problematic for support lately of course. I recently bought a new camera and the ability to take the usb-c power cable and plug that into the camera to quickly transfer some photos is quite nice. I don't really miss the memory card slot that much. I also charge my phone of my laptop via usb-c when on the road. I once watched 8 hours of offline netflix on my phone on a transatlantic flight and left the plane with a full charge on my phone and 80% charge on my mac. I've been considering a linux laptop for ages but there are not a lot of models that meet my requirements of having a form factor that isn't hideously ugly (no "gaming" laptops please), has decent specs for CPU, memory, ssd (this eliminates 98% of the market), an hdpi screen (now we are talking 2, maybe 3 models), and a touchpad that comes reasonably close to what I'm used to. There are not a lot of things in the market that come close enough that I would consider them and none that I'm aware off that don't involve compromising on at least a few things I care about.

alexktz 6y ago
They don't? I just ran Cinebench R20 and Unigine Heaven benchmark plugged and unplugged (10x each) and got the same scores each time. This is the 16" MBP with the 5600m with HBM2 memory.
- 6y ago

funkaster 6y ago

how can you be an open source advocate and still work with adobe & friends? - no question on the quality/productivity of those, just on your argument. A more consistent argument would’ve been: “open source advocate, Gimp, Inkscape and others run even better on my mac than on linux” (would disagree on that, but at least it would be a more consistent argument)

tristor 6y ago
You can be an open source advocate while not exclusively using open source software. I've been an open source advocate for most of my life, during the early days I predominantly used Windows, but I was aware of Linux and skilled with it and worked to ensure it was used where appropriate and possible on servers in my workplaces. It's a given that Linux dominates servers in 2020, but that wasn't always the case. The way now is really not even on the desktop, Linux lost there and now the world has moved on. The war is on mobile, and Android isn't truly open in the way that Linux upstream is due to binary blobs and baseband. Hopefully someday we'll see a truly open mobile platform rise to supremacy, but right now we have two separate walled gardens on mobile and not much else. Within those walled gardens, advocacy can be to use apps which are open source vs proprietary options (e.g. to use andOTP instead of Authy, or Bitwarden instead of LastPass, as a simple example). Existing inside the walled garden we're all forced to exist in is not hypocrisy, it's pragmatism. Using the best tool for the job and acknowledging the deficiency of open options is just being realistic, not an example of a fall from purity. Not everyone is Richard Stallman.
lloeki 6y ago
One can be an open source advocate and still not be a closed source detractor, recognising the usefulness and/or quality of some proprietary software. Things are not manichaean zero sum game.
- criddell 6y ago
  Advocates can still be rational, zealots rarely are.
alexktz 6y ago

bamboozled 6y ago

Sounds like you’ve not had Linux on a laptop for a while, it’s no where near as bad as you describe. I run NIxOs on a Thinkpad X1 Extreme Gen 2. I really love it and it “sparks joy” for me too. Especially because I understand how it’s lit together and sort of “built it” and contribute to the Platform. Very satisfying.

alexktz 6y ago
I have literally used Linux as my daily desktop driver at work for 6 years and counting. I'm not saying it can't be a great experience if you have a well defined use case such as development. But for an all-round, no compromises experience when stepping outside of development (and this does annoy me btw) I find MacOS to give the least worst set of compromises. I even watch DistroTube and read r/unixporn. I love Linux!

qppo 6y ago

Some people will take snipes at the battery life/performance impact but just to give concrete examples. I had a 2018 13" Macbook Pro and XPS 13 running Ubuntu. Former with Retina, latter with 4k. The Macbook's battery on a daily basis was never a huge problem for me unless running heavy applications like video chat. The XPS 13 has to be tethered to the power brick to run at 4k for more than a few hours. During normal dev work, I can't really get more than 90 minutes where the Macbook would last maybe 4-5 hours. I suspect it's deeper than better hardware. Linux laptops just have worse battery life (nb4 "just install X Y Z with apt", that's not an acceptable solution when the OS is installed by the OEM and driver stability is still a problem on Linux laptops)

jasonv 6y ago

I have a 2013 MacBook Air that I still love. Works fine for 90% of everything I want. Only recently started to feel sluggish for Camtasia & Premier Pro video editing. I love Linux, have used it from the very beginning, want to use it on the desktop more, may buy a small NUC to host it and some containers for development -- but I'm not sure I want to spend any time thinking about hardware compatibility and living with it 100% on the desktop. That said, all the recent reports of Mac hardware concern me. I'm really hoping their next product line is a return to the early 2000s form. We bought a lot of those at the company I was at, and it was a no-brainer. I could flip it -- convert to a Linux laptop and keep a Mac mini on the desk for media projects. A Lenovo Legion I bought recently for my kid is nice... but I don't see the hardware lasting as long as the MacBook Air has. I'll see if it even lasts 3-4 years. If it's like the Dells I've owned, it'll "work" but won't feel solid.

cleaver 6y ago

I've certainly been keeping my eyes open for a MacBook Pro alternative. On my last time looking, I thought I'd try to find something with: - retina-like resolution 15" screen - 32GB RAM - slim and light without a flimsy plastic case - good battery life - good trackpad - keyboard home row centred I could not find anything. I couldn't even find something with the first three items. I'm starting to think it might make sense to go with a cheaper MacBook and a little pocket server like this: https://liliputing.com/2020/08/first-look-gmk-nucbox-2-4-inch-mini-pc-hits-indiegogo-august-25-for-159-and-up.html https://liliputing.com/2020/08/first-look-gmk-nucbox-2-4-inc...

petepete 6y ago
Where does the XPS15 fall short?
- cleaver 6y ago
  I could get the retina screen with 16GB RAM, or 32GB RAM with a lower res screen. It was a few months back, so hopefully that has changed. I'm no longer looking though. Other than that, the XPS15 was a front runner.
sneak 6y ago
For some reason (bad software support? tradition?) the PC laptop market seems to simply not care that much about extremely high resolution displays. There are some, but none in systems with the overall build quality of a MBP.
- cleaver 6y ago
  That's what I found. Another pet peeve was extremely wide screens, although we don't see that as much these days. Not great for editing text or code.
- fomine3 6y ago
  There are many laptops that has 4K display that's more resolution compared to MacBook Pro, if you choose correct product line. Cheap laptops don't care HiDPI displays because it's cheap. Gaming laptops less care HiDPI displays because it's too much resolution on current GPU. Most premium models provide both FHD and 4K model, FHD is for battery life and price.

biztos 6y ago

I'm glad it worked out for you. I so much wanted to love the 16" MBP but in clamshell mode I can hear the fan at least 80% of the time, and if I do anything at all involving the Xcode simulator the fan kicks up high enough I can't hear myself think. When open the fan's not so bad but it would fry my legs like an egg even through jeans. I look forward to going back to my old 13" which has an SD slot and MagSafe and all the rest, even though it'll feel crazy slow. The 16" is, for sure, a beast when it comes to performance, but I have found the downsides to be significant.

throwaway4715 6y ago

In my experience the 16" MBP is just bad. This is my first Apple laptop and it's pretty, but that's about it. Despite having a serious horsepower (on paper) the fan runs constantly while doing basic tasks, I get tons of beachballs, and my wireless mouse has to plugged into a specific port or it's janky as hell. It's not intuitive (for me) or performant. It's not even a good linux stand in. My takeaway from this whole experience is that computer people will give up practicality for fashion just as much as anyone else.

reaperducer 6y ago
wireless mouse plugged into a specific port So, is it wireless or not? Or is it one of those Bluetooth dongle things from the 1990's? If the mouse is Bluetooth, why not just have it connect directly to the computer? Every Mac since 2003 has had built-in Bluetooth.

reaperducer 6y ago

unix like macOS is certified Unix. Has been for over a decade.

IncRnd 6y ago
That's not correct. Unix, the operating sytem family, is different from systems that are certified as UNIX (uppercase) 03-compliant. Macos is a UNIX 03-compliant operating system certified by The Open Group.

m1cl 6y ago

Darwin is coming. No need for macOS