
Ask HN: What's your experience with the new macbook? - nyddle
I&#x27;m about to buy the new 12 inch macbook, primarily for webdev work while traveling. Would be interested in any experiences with this device.
======
cvburgess
I recently purchased one for the same thing: web dev, travel, and iOS
development too. I had a 2014 MacBook Pro Retina that was stolen and decided
to "downgrade" for the replacement. I'm honestly really happily surprised with
the little silver box. Its paper thin, the keyboard is really nice after you
get used to it (takes a few days). The battery lasts seemingly forever and it
runs _really_ smoothly.

Compared to my MBPR it feels just as fast if not occasionally faster. However,
streaming video to the TV over airplay hasn't been as nice. If you do video
heavy things like gaming or video production, its not for you. But as a
programmer, I'm really, really happy.

Note: I would recommend the 1.2 GHz configuration or the 1.3 - I have the 1.2
and a lot the the reviews are saying that there is a noticeable difference
between the 1.1 and 1.2 in terms of computing power.

Edit: fixed spelling and grammar.

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Cacti
It's great. Keyboard and trackpad work surprisingly well (and is highly
underrated... other manufacturers are going to have a really hard time getting
this right on devices this thin... use one in a store if you haven't). Screen
is great. Battery life is as expected. Size is obviously incredible. CPU
performance is as expected (1.1) or slightly above (1.3, which is the one I
have, is actually fairly fast). It's a superb machine.

As far as actual use, well that depends on who is using it. The role that this
laptop fits really well IMO is use as a secondary device for consistently mid-
level computing tasks (with some burst activity) in an environment where
mobility is important. "webdev work while traveling" is exactly this role so
as long as you are OK with the form factor then you will like this laptop. If
the form factor is an issue, you should consider the Air. If power is an
issue, you should consider the Pro. If price is an issue, look at other
manufacturers (new Surface and new XPS are both great machines, for example,
though neither are really that cheap).

The reviews on this device have been mixed but I think a lot of reviews are
acting on the premise that it's a one-stop machine, but it's not. It's not
perfect. It's a bit pricey. You aren't going to be running a new game at max
settings on it. The one port thing is odd and you will need to wait for the
adapter market to catch up for some of this oddness/clumsiness to disappear. 8
gig ram isn't quite enough if you are expecting to be running big VMs on it a
lot. The CPU is relatively underpowered (though, honestly, I think this is
overrated and the 1.3 in particular is quite good... even with the 1.1 you
will likely never even notice).

For me, this device is replacing a 13" 2011 Air and so far I consider it to be
superior in just about every way and my experience has been great. If I need
to sit down and do some "serious" computing for a decent stretch of time (new
game at max settings for a couple hours, large data crunching, long
programming stretch where I really need a desk and several monitors) then,
well, that's what my desktop is for (or a powerful, bulky, docked laptop which
amounts to the same thing).

In other words, what you are buying when you buy this machine over something
else is this: the keyboard, the trackpad, the screen, the efficiency of the
CPU, the battery form factor, the fanless design, and the entire form factor
to bring this all together in such a tiny laptop. In return, the tradeoff is
slightly less RAM, slightly less CPU power, and a lack of extension ports.

~~~
akg_67
Can this MacBook handle Windows VM with VirtualBox? My wife is considering
this MacBook. She is not a power user/developer, mostly browsing, emails, word
processing, and spreadsheets. But she also wants Windows VM for programs that
don't have OSX versions or experience on OSX is not that good.

~~~
Cacti
I haven't tried this yet but as a regular VirtualBox user now on several
different platforms, I would suspect that under a situation where you're not
depending on the VM for a lot of graphics acceleration or sub-ms-level latency
(games, for example, or _possibly_ video editing/composting), this macbook
would handle it just fine. So for the uses you're describing she should be
happy.

FYI the new version of Office for Mac will be out soon (preview is available
now for free) if that's what you're referring to when you say "bad OSX
experience."

~~~
akg_67
Thanks for the feedback. I have a 2012 rMBP 15". I use Windows 7 VM in
VirtualBox primarily for Tableau and large Excel files. I noticed the fan runs
continuously and MBP gets hot while using VM. I am concern that if something
similar happens on new MacBook w/o fans, it might be cooked. Both MS Office
and Tableau are terrible on OSX. My wife is more concerned with Quicken. She
prefers Quicken for Windows.

~~~
Cacti
I don't think you have to worry about the chip getting too hot unless it turns
out there is a serious manufacturing defect. This chip is quite unlike the
ones in earlier MacBooks and is closer in efficiency and thermal performance
to a chip you'd find in a phone or tablet. So it'll just throttle down for a
bit, not fry, no matter what you throw at it.

Plus, once you have a chip that efficient, it simplifies your heat
dissipation... a lot of times you'll have people put chips that really aren't
made for laptops in because they are relying on the air flow to cool it to
compensate, but air flow can be very unreliable. And that is the exact
situation you have with some of the more notorious heat problems of other
laptops. If however you have a good chip, and know it can't exceed X heat
generation, and its low enough you can passively cool it, that's actually much
more reliable... there's nothing mysterious about how much heat can be
transferred from a chip to the piece of metal touching it, and the rate at
which it transfers (note sturdiness and looks is not the only reason the case
is metal). So in a lot of ways this device is actually far more thermally
dependable than most actively cooled laptops, even though it'd seem to be the
opposite at first glance.

As an aside, have you tried Win 8 for your VM? If you can deal with the UI,
Win 8 is about 20% more efficient than 7 due to changes made for tablet
support in 8. If you're running 8 in a VM and the VM is on a laptop and you're
having heat issues, switching might be particularly beneficial. Also, consider
VMWare Fusion or Parallels... I use VirtualBox myself but there's no question
that the native Mac versions of the 2 main commercial VMs are going to be more
efficient and give you less heat problems on day to day tasks.

~~~
akg_67
Thanks for clarification on toasted chips. You just persuaded me to buy the
new Macbook instead of 13"rMBP for her. We have been waiting for Retina to
come out on Air weight/size format to buy new laptop for her.

I just can't get used to Win 8 interface. My wife uses Win 8 desktop. Anytime
she asks me to troubleshoot issues on her desktop, I just cringe and become
frustrated. I used Parallels and VMware Fusion before switching to VirtualBox.
VMware asked for more money for compatible version with Yosemite. So, I
finally gave up and switched to VirtualBox. I don't use Windows/other VMs
often enough so VirtualBox is good enough.

~~~
Cacti
/edit P.S. Adding this one line, as I forget if you mentioned this, but have
your wife try out the laptop in the stores. The keyboard is awesome but may
not be for everyone. Someone who used an Air for a long time shouldn't have
any issues but I would definitely try it first just to be sure.

My pleasure.

I was in a similar situation, using the 2011 13.3 Air for years as a secondary
device (being what I guess others would consider a "power user" I have always
kept available a bitching desktop and/or (now) a bunch of cloud VMs, depending
on the task), super happy with it (my Air is the best laptop I've ever owned,
having started in about 1998), but wanting to upgrade, and watching the last
Apple keynote in anticipation of a Retina Air. And I'm very happy with the new
MB. It's not quite what I was expecting but if the form factor and power suits
your needs, it's great.

Whew. That a was quite the run-on sentence.

Anyway, regarding Win8, I have to use it at work a lot and I feel your pain,
it's pretty damned awkward at times. My experience so far is that the best way
to navigate it is to a) use the search facility on the Start Screen to access
your usual stuff (similar to OSX searchlight, so, Windows key to get to the
Start Screen and then just start typing out the application or file name...
its kind of awesome when it works) and b) set the OS to default to the desktop
view on boot, in which case it's almost exactly the same as 7. The best way to
look at it IMO is that Win8 = a more efficient Win 7 kernel + a
mobile/tablet/metro API + a new UI start screen. Once you get past that it's
surprisingly good.

But yeah, I feel your pain.

------
apricot13
Never buy first generation apple anything and never be the first to upgrade
software! (so many grey screens of death!)

As soon as the second generation of macbooks is out I will be upgrading!

~~~
beat
When has Apple ever released a bad product in the first generation? In the
21st century, at least?

I waited for second generation for the iPhone and iPad, both far more radical
steps than this little Macbook, but the first gen products were spectacular.

(edit: My most disappointing Apple product in the past 15 years has been my
iPhone 6. Jobs wouldn't let them make it wider due to handling issues. Without
his restraint, they made it wider. Now I have to have a case and drop the darn
thing all the time. Never had that problem with other iPhones.)

~~~
emidln
That first gen iPhone that came with EDGE was spectacular?

~~~
soylentcola
Don't forget lack of third party native apps, GPS, MMS, live video
streaming/calling, copy/paste, and backgrounding of tasks. You know...all that
stuff that had made smartphones "smart". You couldn't even change your
wallpaper or ringtone.

First gen iPhone was a big deal because they put all resources into providing
the one or two things all the others sucked at: a smoother and more user-
friendly interface and a more pleasant mobile web browser.

But it wasn't until the second or third gen that people coming over from
previous smartphones could really get most of those things we took for granted
already. If you were coming from a flip phone you were just adding some cool
stuff. But if you had become accustomed to the typical features of a smart
phone, you had to choose between smooth scrolling and pinch/zoom on a nice
capacitive screen and being able to install software, stream music (in the
background no less), get live navigation in the car, and operate on the latest
high(er) speed networks.

I don't think the new Macbook has nearly as far to go as the first iPhone did.
They'll iterate with faster processors, a better GPU, and maybe an extra port
next round.

~~~
beat
Right. The iPhone was a fundamentally new kind of product. The new Macbook is
just an incremental refinement of a 15+ year old product line. The only thing
that even remotely makes it more than "a better Air" is the single port. And
the single port solves other problems.

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slamus
I advise you to wait for the 2d generation. Like the first iteration of the
Macbook Air, it looks beautiful but terribly lacks functionnality (one port
only & a weak processor being the most problematic things yet). My advice: Buy
a 13-Inch Pro Retina if you absolutely want the Retina Experience. Otherwise,
go buy an Air.

~~~
grandalf
the 13" pro retina is an amazing laptop.

~~~
jaxbot
I disagree, only on the grounds that Chrome will max out the tiny GPU in that
machine when HTML5 videos or CSS3 animations play. Even simple video effects
like Expose will stutter. It's a great machine, but the video card is much too
weak for the pixels it has to push. Take it with a grain of salt, of course.

~~~
mosselman
Yesterday I ran into this gem:
[https://github.com/unixpickle/FreeRez](https://github.com/unixpickle/FreeRez)

It allows you to set the resolution to the 'true' resolution of your retina
screen. This way you have more screen, but it also fixes the performance
issues when playing video, virtualbox virtualisation, etc. Truly recommend.

~~~
grandalf
Does that mean it's not "retina" resolution anymore for things like fonts,
etc?

~~~
mosselman
It does mean that somewhat, but fonts still look fine. I find the huge load of
extra screen space very handy when programming on 'just' my laptop screen.

~~~
grandalf
Does it behave differently from just scaling the display in preferences? On
Yosemite I can scale mine so that everything is too small, and several levels
in between that and the default resolution. It would surprise me if Apple
didn't leverage native resolution where possible with this scaling.

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spotman
It's a great machine. Very happy with my purchase.

it really depends on your needs though. I use it as my portable machine and it
goes wherever I go when I'm on the go, which I previously had an 11 inch air
for. Coming from that it's an enormous upgrade.

The battery lasted me 7 hours yesterday of constant use, and the screen is the
best screen of any laptop I have personally used. it's not really a widescreen
anymore which helps with my terminal experience greatly.

My normal workload includes 50% terminal.app, 30% Xcode and the rest is split
up between instant messaging and emailing. so I don't desire or need to run
things like video editing or VMware. I use an iMac for that stuff,
infrequently.

so for an OS X based machine that is ultra portable and runs terminal well,
I'm not sure why you would be better off waiting. it's a great product.

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bischofs
I used one for a week and kind of had the same problems I had with other tiny
laptops...it is nice that is so portable but unless you use it really close to
your face you have to hunch over in any other position then on a desk right
next to your face. I found myself constantly having to straighten my posture
when I was doing any sort of work on it for longer than 20 minutes - and when
you do you inevitably start to hunch again as the screen is just too small. I
would say this is really just for rich people who want to carry around a fancy
email machine rather than someone who uses it for work.

~~~
Eric_WVGG
I don’t get this. Text and widgets on the screen render at the same size as on
other Apple laptops, nothing is shrunk. When adjusted for viewing distance,
everything displays basically the same as on a monster 27" iMac. Are you using
System Prefs to render the content smaller? Why not reverse that?

~~~
cma
I think he is comparing it vs 13 and 15 inch Apple laptops.

~~~
kenrikm
The jump between 12 and 13 inches is not really that big however 12 to 15 is.
I think apple was more targeting the spot right between the 11 and 13inch that
used to be occupied by the 12in powerbook which had a semi-cult following and
was widely regarded as one of the best laptops Apple made.

------
bdon
Can anyone with this machine comment on their experience charging it with a
standard smartphone/tablet battery pack through USB-C?

If this actually works, it's a pretty killer feature over the MBA/Pro.

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ebbv
I have to echo the other commenters advising against buying the first
generation of the 12" rMB. There's a lot of short comings that will certainly
be addressed in a second generation model within a year.

Right now the 13" rMBP seems like the better purchase in every way right now.
I wouldn't buy a current MBA either as they are really showing their age.
Their screen is the worst in Apple's line up by a long shot.

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ghshephard
39 responses so far, and so far only two people with experience - but lots of
opinions. :-)

I would love, also, to hear from people who have been using it. Thinking about
purchasing it for my personal system to go along with my work computer which I
travel with, so I can keep email, photos, all personal stuff off the corporate
system. Portability is key - would love to know if anyone is using it in that
fashion.

------
johladam
I agree with everyone here. On a side note, I've just purchased a Lenovo
ThinkPad T450s, had them throw an i7, 8 GB of RAM, and an SSD in it an it's a
great machine. I'm running Ubuntu on it right now, it seems to have pretty
good support, though the keyboard backlight is a bit finicky.

~~~
badloginagain
The problem I've had with Ubuntu is that a lot of things are finicky, although
every time I try the OS is gets better.

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danso
In addition to the OP's question, if you are moving from an Air to the
Macbook, I would especially love to hear direct comparisons. I was very
tempted to get the new Macbook, but couldn't justify it given that the 13-inch
Air was substantially faster and not much heavier/thicker...and the Retina
screen isn't a huge deal to me for on-the-road work.

I ultimately didn't buy anything because I already have a 15-in Retina pro,
and on further reflection, it didn't seem that much thicker than the Air...so
I just replaced my stolen iPad instead.

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rickyc091
It really depends on what your web dev work looks like. It's a sleek computer,
but the specs are pretty weak for development if you need to run vagrant, a
database, a server, etc. The computer specs are similar to a 2012 MBA. The
keyboard will take a bit getting use to as it doesn't have the same tactile
feel. Accuracy will probably drastically drop. Having a single port isn't
horrible, but it's sure annoying when I need to charge my phone.

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blisterpeanuts
I bought a Macbook Air 13" about six months ago and it's been great. But I
especially like the SD slot and multiple USB ports (which I need for my work
-- android and iOS app development), and of course the 9 hour battery. This
new Macbook seems like a downgrade. Seriously, why didn't they build on the
Air instead of what looks like chopping out features to achieve an impractical
thinness?

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unme009
watch the new tested podcast. their advice: do not buy a macbook this
iteration.

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biafra
I am very happy with my 11" MBA. Except I could use a larger screen and a
higher screen resolution. I wonder if the 12" is noticeable slower than the
(1.7GHz i7) 11" MBA.

~~~
kenrikm
From what I've read it is about the same speed as a last gen macbook air.

~~~
falcolas
In short bursts, but for any prolonged computing, the air will pull ahead due
to the active cooling.

I use an air as a development machine, and it works great.

~~~
Cacti
Well, to be fair, any prolonged, heavy computing will also kill the Air's
battery. And the fan sounds like a freaking plane taking off.

~~~
falcolas
Shorter battery life vs. significantly reduced computing power (due to reduced
heat dissipation). Personally, for the development use case, I'll take the
reduced battery life; I can mitigate that problem with a power cable.

------
thecolorblue
I would like to know how the new macbook compares to the new chromebook pixel.
At first glance, the specs look similar but the pixel has more ports, which I
think I would like.

~~~
marknow
I'm working on a MBP, but also really interested in the pixel. We tend to now
work in the cloud more than ever, and like the lower cost and simplicity of
the chromebook.

------
payamrastogi
my experience so far :
[https://github.com/WhenAppleBites/iBugs/issues/1](https://github.com/WhenAppleBites/iBugs/issues/1)

