
The new MacBook - NickSarath
https://www.apple.com/macbook/
======
nkoren
This is a beautiful machine. Once again, Apple excels at hardware.

But what the living hell is going wrong with Apple's desktop software? OS X
and Apple's applications suite have been getting steadily worse with every
release. Look at the App store: the latest releases of OS X, iPhoto, iMovie,
Pages, and Numbers are (in stark contrast to earlier versins) all rated at
2.5/5 stars, with the plurality being 1-star reviews. People are LIVID -- and
not just for trivial NOOB reasons, either: the quality of the work is frankly
shoddy. Who's steering that part of the ship???

~~~
SiVal
Because you can't really tell how well software is working when looking at the
device edge-on, and that's apparently the way Apple looks at them most of the
time.

I mean this more metaphorically than literally, but I'm so tired of complaints
about the ridiculously primitive Finder being met with, "the edge of the iMac
now _appears_ even thinner, now that we've repositioned formerly convenient
connectors and such into a bulge behind the screen. Surely you agree that the
appearance of a thin edge is more important than usability of Finder or
connectors."

Or a yearning for more battery life, or even just a swappable battery? "The
bottom of our laptop looks better than the top of theirs!" Or, why is the text
on my iPhone suddenly so low contrast and hard to read? "Surely you agree that
having a fresh look matters more than readability! Look, the icons are flat.
Don't you realize how critically important that is?"

Or, the apps get worse, not better, over time, and you always have to ask
yourself whether each free OS upgrade is worth the risk of unreliable WiFi.
Can't you work on this, Apple? "Thinner!"

Apple used to emphasize software quality and usability. Now, it's all about
the style, about how the edges look in fashion magazines. And yet the rest of
the industry is so fragmented that they don't do any better in terms of
usability. The frustration is that unlike them, Apple _could_ do so much
better, but ever since the candy-colored iMacs, they've decided that Fernando
(Billy Crystal's old SNL character) was right. When it comes to look and feel,
"It's better to look good than to feel good!"

~~~
nsxwolf
Curious - what do Finder complainers consider the gold standard of file
browsers that Finder should aspire to be?

I do most of my file management at the command line so I don't experience the
pain of Finder very often, and I've generally been able to get Finder to do
what I want without much fuss. Windows Explorer is, to me, a painful
experience (but its 1980s DOS command line is so much worse)

I've found the various Linux desktop file browsers I've dabbled with clunky
but serviceable, but again, I'm a command line guy. Just wondering what is out
there that the Finder haters would prefer.

~~~
geophile
How about showing the actual filesystem? Instead of some restricted fictional
view? For example, how the hell do you get to /tmp from the Finder?

What's with the stupid column per directory level? This is an extremely bad
use of display space.

Haven't used Windows in a long time, and the equivalent in Linux is useless.
(Or, more precisely, I don't use it.) But there are a number of irritations
that have been there for a long, long time.

~~~
notsony
~/Library/Application Support

Keeps getting hidden and you have to set a preference option via the command
line to show it... only for it get hidden on the next OS update. Very
frustrating!

~~~
Tehnix
Right click in your home folder -> Show View Options -> Show Library Folder.

That said, I preferred that they never removed it, but for the common user,
they wont ever need it.

To get to it, you can also hold down Option when pressing the Go menu item.

------
mmastrac
USB-C as the "one connector to rule them all" is the big news. That's the end
of MagSafe and the exploding era of USB-C docking stations that work for
multiple devices.

I think we'll start to see an era of expandable computing coming up soon:
USB-C is a perfect connector to push your data and state into a larger desktop
experience. Why not carry around your laptop in tablet form when you are
mobile? [1]

[1] [https://grack.com/blog/2015/01/16/usb-31-ara-are-the-
converg...](https://grack.com/blog/2015/01/16/usb-31-ara-are-the-convergence-
end-game/)

~~~
Finbarr
Seems like there are some new $79 adapters to split out the USB-C port into
power, usb and av[1]/vga[2].

[1] [http://store.apple.com/us/product/MJ1K2AM/A/usb-c-digital-
av...](http://store.apple.com/us/product/MJ1K2AM/A/usb-c-digital-av-multiport-
adapter)

[2] [http://store.apple.com/us/product/MJ1L2AM/A/usb-c-vga-
multip...](http://store.apple.com/us/product/MJ1L2AM/A/usb-c-vga-multiport-
adapter)

~~~
nickysielicki
I'm sorry but when you ship a machine with ONE PORT for the purposes of
charging and peripherals, this absolutely needs to be in the box.

Nickel and $80'ering me on a $1400 computer is ridiculous. I'll stick with my
thinkpad.

~~~
pbreit
With Bluetooth, the cloud and AirPlay, who even needs those ports? People are
up in arms every time Apple changes/deletes ports and are almost always wrong.

Go ahead and stick with your thinkpad.

~~~
robotresearcher
Show up to give a presentation anywhere in the world. Standard plug-in? VGA.
Maybe HDMI. You can't count on an AirPlay connection being present and I
wouldn't want to rely on wireless video for important presentations with 20
seconds set up time anyway.

~~~
gedejong
True, but since Macs have lost the ports, better venues are finally starting
to cater to modern standards.

Personally, I think VGA is an abomination and people should react a bit
stronger to be invited to a venue and having to deal with standards from 1987.

~~~
robotresearcher
I think guests should graciously work with whatever hosts provide, as long as
it works.

~~~
largote
VGA has lower quality at high resolutions than something like DVI,
DisplayPort, or HDMI. Then again, if the place still has a VGA connector, it's
unlikely the projector is high-resolution.

~~~
robotresearcher
Yes. So as a guest do you make the best of it or whine that there are better
things available?

~~~
saraid216
Being a good host is also kind of a thing, FYI, and part of that is going to
the effort of making life nice for your guest.

If you're going to harp on hospitality, please remember it cuts both ways.

~~~
robotresearcher
This is the rudest politeness advice I've ever seen. Props!

------
jkot
I am bit disappointed. Dell has similar sized laptop, with bigger display,
smaller bezel and higher resolution.

[http://www.dell.com/us/p/xps-13-9343-laptop/pd](http://www.dell.com/us/p/xps-13-9343-laptop/pd)

~~~
dntrkv
If you're looking purely at specs, Windows laptops always were the better
deal. But only when you use those alternatives do you realize how much further
ahead Apple is.

~~~
pionar
Not really farther at all. Examples? Dell, HP, and Lenovo all have notebooks
out there that are as good as any Apple notebook.

~~~
dntrkv
Until you pick them up, use them, have them break, and try to get support. I
used to be the guy pointing out how there are Windows laptops that are just as
good as Macs. It wasn't until about 2 years ago that I just completely gave up
on the Windows market and just converted fully to Apple's ecosystem. Couldn't
be happier. The Windows market is in a constant state of "almost as good as
Apple."

~~~
eos_styx
The trackpad on my thinkpad broke. I spent 10 minutes on the phone with
technical support that actually knew what I was talking about and they mailed
me a whole new part. I replaced it and went on my way as happy as could be.

In contrast: By friend who owns a mac tried to set up a appointment because
her hard drive was making the sound of a grinder. They told her that they
could not make an appointment on the phone, she needed to use the iPhone app
to do that. Well, she doesn't have an iPhone so the only option she had was to
stand in line at the apple store 40 minutes away and wait. She spend two days
doing this since it closed before they got to her on the first day and then
the took her hard drive and replaced it while erasing all her personal data.
It's a good thing I made a backup first.

Great Customer Service for sure almost as good as Comcast.

~~~
dntrkv
Sure, every once in a while I'm sure someone has a bad experience with their
support but I feel it's a well-accepted notion that Apple has the best support
in the consumer tech industry. A few sources I found in a couple minutes of
searching:

[http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0%2c2817%2c2452946%2c00.asp](http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0%2c2817%2c2452946%2c00.asp)
[http://blog.laptopmag.com/tech-support-
showdown](http://blog.laptopmag.com/tech-support-showdown)
[http://www.thestreet.com/story/11366677/1/the-best-and-
worst...](http://www.thestreet.com/story/11366677/1/the-best-and-worst-of-
customer-support.html) [http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/news/2013/04/apple-
is-top...](http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/news/2013/04/apple-is-tops-when-
it-comes-to-computer-tech-support/index.htm)

I've dealt with Dell, Microsoft, Acer, Asus, and HP in the past on multiple
occasions for each, and it was always a headache. With Apple, it was always as
simple as walking into the store and walking out with my issues resolved. I've
even had them fix a keyboard that broke due to my fault on an out of warranty
machine for just the cost of parts. The fact that you can go to a physical
location and get service puts them on a different level.

~~~
sjs
I have to fly or take a ferry to get to an Apple Store. There isn't one on
Vancouver Island. So it's great when you can get to one, but if you can't the
support is not so good.

------
npalli
Looks like apple has finally introduced a netbook or iPad with a keyboard.
Frankly, I'm disappointed with this macbook as I was expecting a full scale
retina macbook air. After seeing the Dell XPS 13, I was hoping apple will take
the retinafy the regular air. Ah well, the wait continues. Let's see --

1\. Resolution of 2304x1440 which means at Retina this is 1152x720!. This is
worse than the 11 inch air, much less the 13 inch 1440x900. I don't think
people realize how cramped this will seem if you start doing work on this
laptop.

2\. single port might be cool, but I suspect everyone will have to pony up for
a usb multi-port dongle to make this work. everyone is saying single port will
suffice -- battery will last 9 hours but try driving a monitor and doing some
work. Don't be surprised if you get 3-4 hours. Then what do you do. Plug it
off and wait for 1 hour to recharge? What if you need to do development, how
do you plug your device. Yeah the usb dongle will be needed which kind of
defeats the point of having a single port.

~~~
dignati
> Resolution of 2304x1440 which means at Retina this is 1152x720!. This is
> worse than the 11 inch air, much less the 13 inch 1440x900. I don't think
> people realize how cramped this will seem if you start doing work on this
> laptop

You can still scale the screen resolution and get a higher resolution than the
Air's 1440x900.

~~~
npalli
yeah, i know you can scale it. Will it look good though? In addition, it has a
pretty weak processor, so we will have to see how the performance works out if
you scale it. Especially if you drive a monitor.

~~~
m_mueller
> Will it look good though?

Yes, I scale my 15'' rMBP all the time according to what I currently need and
the quality difference is hardly noticeable.

> performance

That one I'm also curious about. My takeaway from this new MB however is that
it's pretty much unusable as a business laptop anyways. For a serious laptop I
still need power, display, ethernet and at least one USB port available at the
same time as an absolute minimum, plus connectivity to both HDMI and VGA when
needed. Even if they offered all the dongles for that, it would still be a
mess to work with on a daily basis. So, really, even if the performance were
good, it wouldn't change anything for me. I'm curious how version 2 of that
machine will be - didn't we already have a similar situation with the first
macbook air and then they readded more ports later, because you know, they'd
also actually like to _sell_ these things rather than just having Jony talk
about them in a soothing voice?

~~~
delsalk
Unfortunately scaling becomes useless if you need todo any graphical related
work, where you really do need 1:1 (retina) resolution.

~~~
m_mueller
One thing to keep in mind though is that you can comfortably read text that is
quite a bit smaller on retina, so you can work at a higher application zoom
level, which gives you back some space. Not sure whether the interface
elements are too big for this display size, but intuitively the resolution
sounds about right, it's about the same as the old (beloved) Powerbook 12'' as
far as I remember.

------
sytelus
I'm actually quite unhappy with this obsession with "thinner and lighter"
mantra which throws away features at the expense of saving 0.01mm of
thickness. These new computers don't have interfaces like Ethernet, DVD
player, common interfaces for video. All of these is supposed to be outdated
while it is very clearly not. You can't even do trivial upgrades like RAM let
alone putting in new bigger SSD. These things are way too expensive to be
entirely replaced just because you need 8GB of more RAM.

When you travelling and wireless is painfully slow in places like hotels,
wired Ethernet connection is truly a life saver. I hate to carry so many
dongles and even worse, they are so easy to lose which can be devastating when
traveling. I hate even more carryieng external DVD players because running
Netflix is too choppy. When I'm presenting, I hate to carry dongles for VGA,
DVI, HDMI etc to connect to projectors. Just few years ago, all of these were
built-in to laptops and I used to carry zero dongles. Most people carry
laptops in backpack which are often heavier and combined with the weight of
all dongles it diminishes any weight reduction done on these devices. So these
whole obsession looks pretty stupid to me and detrimental to getting work done
for users.

~~~
sliverstorm
There are still many laptops with all the interfaces and features, right?
Beauty of choice, and all that.

~~~
bobbles
People are acting like Apple reps are travelling around soldering all their
ports closed

------
rareEarth
I can't believe the new MacBook has no internal fans.

[0] Fanless architecture

The new MacBook is the first Mac notebook ever without a fan. Since the Intel
Core M chip draws only 5 watts of power and therefore generates less heat, no
fan or heat pipe is required. Instead, the logic board is seated on top of an
anisotropic graphite sheet, which helps disperse any heat that is generated
out to the sides, all while your Mac stays virtually silent.

I've had issues in the past with macbook pro fans failing, so it's great to
remove that potential mechanical failure. But I've also had issues with my
macbook pro outputting an unreasonable amount of heat. I'm curious if they've
solved that issue, especially now with no internal fans.

[0]
[https://www.apple.com/macbook/design/](https://www.apple.com/macbook/design/)

~~~
jd3
Exactly. My daily driver is still a mid-2009 macbook air whose CPU actually
actually hit its TJMAX for the first time ever last week.

I've asked Apple in the past to clean out the hardware with compressed air and
re-apply the thermal paste, but I don't think they did, and they told me that
they can't re-apply the thermal paste because they don't have the tool to do
it anymore [Bethesda, Maryland store]. I've never had an Apple product that
hasn't had overheating issues at some point in its lifecycle, and this new no-
fan architecture honestly has me worried for this product in the long run.

~~~
abrowne
> they can't re-apply the thermal paste because they don't have the tool to do
> it anymore

They don't have the same screwdriver they use on the latest MacBook Airs, some
alcohol wipes, and the same thermal grease they use on everything except
today's MacBook? Try an Apple Authorized Service Provider – i.e. an
independent shop that repairs Macs – they should be able to help you out.

------
jfernandez
Accidentally clipping the power cable is something I definitely got used to
not worrying about anymore. I'm loving the single mother-of-all ports USB-C
will provide but I highly appreciated the magnet component of MagSafe..

~~~
stcredzero
I wonder if someone can come up with a "mag-breakaway" adaptor for USB-C? It's
a "null" adaptor -- it has USB-C female and USB-C male -- but it splits down
the center and is held together by magnets. You can just put one on the end of
your USB power adaptor. There you go: you have your Magsafe back again.

~~~
Someone1234
That sounds really cool. I'd buy that.

Off the top of my head the only concern is: How do you turn on/off the flow as
the magnets lose contact? Last thing you want is arching as it comes apart.

~~~
danpat
All connections arc as they come apart, it's just that the arc size is a
function of the dielectric medium (air?), potential difference (voltage) and
current. You design for "number of disconnects" and choose materials and power
design so that the connector will survive as long as specified.

Apple MagSafe connectors are on the same voltage (20V) as these new Type C
connectors, although Type C seems rated for a higher current (5A).

Looking at the pinout, the GND and VBUS are a bit longer, so will disconnect
last upon removal. This may be to allow for the voltage to be dropped in
anticipation of a disconnect, but you'd need enough intelligence at the power
supply end to notice that. Lowering the voltage prior to disconnect would
reduce the arc size.

------
jader201
Is the world really as obsessed with smallness as Apple thinks it is? From
what I keep hearing (and this is anecdotal, of course), it seems that most
people would prefer to (reasonably) maximize the battery life with the
downside of adding a bit more heft. Of course, there's always a balance that
has to be stricken, but it seems like Apple always pushes much more to the
side of size over battery vs. what seems to be the desired balance (leaning
more towards improved battery life).

~~~
bithush
I would love a bigger battery for a slightly bigger device but this isn't what
Apple is aiming for.

Apple design the hardware to work with what they want it to look like not
design a device around the hardware.

I used to think that was stupid but it clearly works for Apple. Their business
is not making the best device spec wise but the "best" device design wise (in
their view obviously).

~~~
jader201
This makes sense, but when designing the new MacBook, they still have to take
battery life into account. For example, if Apple truly wanted the best device
design at any expense of hardware, it would be even thinner with only 1 hour
battery life.

But they knew customers would want more battery life than 1 hour. So rather
than make it as thin as possible, they figure out: what is the best battery
life:heft ratio?

 _That_ is what I was questioning in my OP: is this ratio, in the eyes of
Apple, out of sync with this ratio in the eyes of the consumers?

Obviously, Apple knows how to build products. But it would be naive to assume
that Apple _always_ strikes this balance perfectly. I'm just suggesting that
they may be pushing slightly more towards design over function.

~~~
ionforce
I think the logic is that this particular chassis is constant, and we are to
assume that battery technology will only get better.

So while the laptop may be underpowered/under ratio _today_, it won't be in
its next incarnation, i.e. same chassis but better batteries.

So it's more of a bet/investment/concept car. This first gen isn't where the
ratio is satisfied. It's v2 and onwards.

------
jrochkind1
Do I understand right that it's got _one_ port, which can be used for either
power _or_ USB, but not both at once? Man, that's the future? I was hoping
they'd give it two USB ports, if it was supposed to serve as the new full
powered macbook. It never occured to me they'd actually take away a port, and
give you charging or USB peripheral but not both at once. Bah humbug.

~~~
tjl
You can do both at once over the port, you'd just need a hub.

It's not really the new "full powered" MacBook. Look at the processors it
uses. It's intended to a a good performance, lightweight laptop.

Realistically, they can't support 2 USB-C ports as it's unlikely it could
support a full power draw on both ports (100W each).

~~~
chacham15
> Realistically, they can't support 2 USB-C ports as it's unlikely it could
> support a full power draw on both ports (100W each).

Its not uncommon for machines to have only one usb controller with multiple
ports (i.e. a usb controller + hub which connects externally)

~~~
tjl
But, with one controller you could run into problems if you had two high speed
devices on both ports.

~~~
moe
You could make one port a USB 3.0 port.

~~~
wyager
That would be too wide for the laptop.

------
mdeslaur
Seriously? Couldn't they have put _two_ ports in it so you can plug something
in while it's being charged without lugging around a usb hub?

~~~
acomjean
This won't work well when using an air to do presentations and you can't
switch between a monitor and power....

The slightly cynical me tends to think the thunderbolt port was great and on
every mac. now new adapters...

~~~
look_lookatme
Presumably accessory manufacturers will create peripherals that allow video
out + power at the same time?

~~~
exprL
That's the stopgap solution, I think. Looking at the larger picture, it's
silly that a projector only looks for video-in, instead of video-in/power-out,
considering it's already plugged to a wall outlet.

~~~
JshWright
You think the end game is "We'll improve the hardwire connection to the
project so it can backfeed power" rather than "We'll just get rid of the
wire"?

------
DIVx0
I'm really sorry to see magsafe go. Between my dogs and kids I would have gone
though a dozen macbooks without magsafe.

I sincerely hope this no magsafe or single port thing goes into the MBPs as
well.

~~~
ben174
I've seen a lot of people disappointed by this, but - correct me if I'm wrong
- If you were to trip over a micro USB cord it would simply disconnect as
well, similar to MagSafe, right? I mean, it's not as elegant as magsafe but it
certainly wouldn't drag your whole laptop off the table, would it?

~~~
ssunstruck
Try pulling directly down on a cord connected in a usb port. It won't just
pull out. The magsafe would just disconnect after a little bit of resistance.

------
bryanlarsen
The obvious end game for USB 3.1 type C is replacing your laptop with a phone.
USB 3.1 type C is the "universal docking station", providing power, data &
display over a single cable. Obviously useful for a laptop, but even more
useful to a phone. Apple obviously could merge OSX & iOS into a single OS, but
I have real difficulty seeing them doing that. (It also seems unlikely that
they'll replace Lightning with USB 3.1 type C). It seems much more likely that
Ubuntu, Microsoft and possibly Google are going to go there first. By pushing
USB 3.1 type C, Apple really seems to be opening doors for their
competitors...

~~~
Brakenshire
But improving life for their customers.

So good on them.

------
gcr
Is this laptop aimed for the high-end Macbook Pro users, or is it poised as
the spiritual successor to the Macbook Air?

According to the tech specs, this has the slowest processor (1.1 Ghz Intel
Core M) of all of their models and the oldest graphics card (Intel HD Graphics
5300).

Granted -- I know I shouldn't commit the cardinal sin of "The number is lower
so it's worse." My words aren't meaningful. I guess I'm just confused about
who this product is aimed for.

EDIT: After looking around, this machine seems less powerful than the Air. I'm
guessing it's aimed for those who want something more stylish with pizzazz at
the expense of higher specs. The target user wants to own a machine that feels
futuristic and magical. This machine is just certainly not targeted toward my
needs.

In terms of specs, it's This machine < Air < MBP. In terms of style, it's this
machine > Air > MBP (?). In terms of price, it's Air < this machine < MBP.

~~~
bobbles
As a non-mac owner, this and the 5K retina imac are the first machines to
really make me consider the switch.

~~~
gcr
Interesting! What qualities won you over?

~~~
bobbles
I have a work laptop (chunky ass dell from 2010 '1366x768') and a gaming rig
at home (built early 2012 '1920x1080'). Both are on windows 7.

There are a few things:

* I've had iPhones since they came out, love them, but nothing has compelled me to go to the Mac. (also have retina ipad mini)

* I don't want to upgrade one of my main machines to retina if my other machines don't have it. It's bad enough switching back from the phone/tablet.

* I've also just recently gotten into photography and video editing.

I've been waiting for a laptop to be 'good enough'. The retina macbook pros
are excellent machines, but if I upgraded I really wanted it to be to an air-
like device. My main tasks for the laptop are using the web, using skype and
using email. (& I might add, carrying it ALL THE TIME)

As my main 'need' for my desktop has essentially transitioned from gaming into
photography / video.. the 5K iMac is just.. i mean.. have you seen the screen
in person? Goddam its nice. The games I would play will run on it at 1440 with
no problem whatsoever. I have seen the scaling issues on windows at 4K and am
just not interested in dealing with that crap these days.

OSX Pre-Yosemite just never appealed to me. (although I had used macs
previously at various jobs) It feels like the OS and the Hardware have each
now hit their point where the effort of switching is going to pay off much
sooner than any time prior.

I have a feeling the mac market is going to continue growing, as there will be
more and more people in a similar position (main PCs need an upgrade, etc)
that will finally be saying 'time for a mac'

------
ocdtrekkie
It befuddles the mind that you would develop a laptop that defeats the entire
point of being a thin laptop, by ensuring you must carry a bag full of
adapters and dongles.

The MacBook Air may fit in envelope, but does all it's cables and adapters fit
in that envelope with it?

Terrible design.

~~~
Eric_WVGG
I don't understand people who complain about dongles. What is the difference
between carrying around a corded peripheral, and a corded peripheral with a
two-inch extension that solves your legacy connector problems?

~~~
ocdtrekkie
To me the biggest case is going places where I might have an unexpected
peripheral need. For instance, it's not uncommon for someone to need to
transfer me some files with a flash drive.

If I were to buy this thing, I'd have to carry a USB Type-A dongle _all the
time_ , just in case. Rather than have say... an extra millimeter of
thickness, and the USB port just built right in.

~~~
cweiss
I'm fairly sure it wont be too long before they come out with USB/USB-C flash
drives. I've already seen several USB/Micro-USB drives.

~~~
Macha
How long until everyone you know (include non technical people) upgrade to
them? I personally don't carry flash drives around, but I occasionally need to
get files from non technical friends who do, and many of them are still using
old 128mb or less USB 1.1 flash drives.

Why would they go out and buy new ones to fit in certain models of laptop if
the limited capacity and slow speed hasn't already gotten them to replace it?

------
colinramsay
Are there things here where Apple is _significantly_ further ahead than the
competition? Innovating on keyboards, trackpad, battery life, power usage and
form factor - there just seem to be innovating simultaneously on more levels
than the competition.

Another thing - that vibrating trackpad gizmo feels like a couple of
innovations away from true touch feedback on an iPhone? Any thoughts?

~~~
jameshart
Apple's role here is often to be more opinionated, or braver, than others.
They were the first to adopt USB, first to stop shipping floppy drives, first
to ditch optical drives, first to make high-DPI ('retina') displays a standard
feature... they are willing to be the one who goes out there and says 'we all
know this is where things are going - so let's quit pussy-footing around and
just do it'.

This new MacBook announcement was just item after item of taking things to the
next logical step, and it's setting a new bar which every other laptop
manufacturer out there will now have to meet.

~~~
cma
Plenty of laptop manufacturers had laptops without optical drives before
Apple, so I'm guessing you mean across the whole line?

~~~
jameshart
I said first to ditch optical drives, not first to add them. The MBA was, at
the time of its launch, controversial for its lack of a DVD drive. The 'air'
referred to the fact it got all its software over the network - which was
wireless, because it also lacked ethernet (also controversial).

~~~
Tiksi
Netbooks around well before the air were also lacking optical drives, so Im
not sure how it was controversial.

~~~
jameshart
Macbook Air - announced January 2008. Netbook - well, okay, I'll give you that
the Eee PC came out in October 2007 (Asus have always been the outlier in
experimental PC form factors) - but other manufacturers weren't seriously
playing in the netbook space before the Eee sales numbers came in, so I don't
think you can say 'everybody' had legacy-free optical-driveless netbooks out
before the MBA.

But more to the point, a netbook was optical-drive-free because you weren't
expected to use it for more than just web browsing; you weren't going to need
to load software onto it. The MBA was optical-drive free in spite of it being
intended to be a fully-functional notebook computer. You would install
software onto it over wi-fi. And you wouldn't need to rip CDs because you
would buy all your music from the iTunes store. In 2008 that was still a bold
idea.

~~~
mmarx
My old Thinkpad X41 didn't have an optical drive ten years ago, back in 2005,
and, unlike a netbook, was very much a fully-functional laptop computer.

~~~
megablast
The x21 didn't have an optical drive either, nor the x31 before it.

Of course, one could argue they were specialist laptops which never had a
large market. But maybe the same could be said of the MBA?

------
james-skemp
A search against the comments returns no results: 2304×1440 resolution and
16:10 aspect ratio?

Showing a few co-workers and a quick suggests what I thought: a bit of
amazement at 16:10. Does anyone have any insight into why they didn't go with
a 16:9 ratio?

~~~
tenfingers
16:10 is a much better ratio for working compared to 16:9.

~~~
news_to_me
Can you explain? I'm interested why this is. Is there any research into this?

~~~
Xorlev
Do you need research to appreciate vertical screen real-estate? I have two
16:10 monitors and love the extra space. I loved it enough that I then flipped
one of my 16:10s into portrait.

It's occasionally problematic in that pages I make sometimes pack the perfect
amount in on my display, and get cut off on 16:9s.

~~~
Maome
I don't disagree with you but your argument seems to promote the idea that 4:3
would be even more ideal for the same screen size because it has more vertical
screen real-estate. I don't think you answered the question at all.

~~~
scarhill
Obviously it's subjective, but I'd prefer a machine with a 4:3 display,
because when I'm coding or reading I need vertical real estate much more than
horizontal.

I always assumed that the move to 16:9 for computers was driven mostly by
either manufacturing economies of scale or the coolness factor of HDTV's.

~~~
pkamb
Lots of good info about ThinkPad's switch to 16:9 here:

[http://web.archive.org/web/20111030050311/http://www.lenovob...](http://web.archive.org/web/20111030050311/http://www.lenovoblogs.com/insidethebox/2009/04/display-
ratio-change-again/)

------
api
Why wouldn't they include 4G/LTE in this?

It's a serious question. It's basically a "mega-tablet," a high-end mobile
device with a "real OS." It's designed for doing serious work in an ultra-
portable fashion.

I can tether to my phone of course, but this seems like an option they should
have considered.

~~~
grinich
Because they also sell a phone.

~~~
josefresco
...that for an additional fee (paid to your carrier), can broadcast a local
wifi signal

~~~
baby
I'm gonna brag: here in France I pay 10€/months for unlimited calls, unlimited
texts, unlimited internet (5Gb of "fair use"). I can do whatever I want with
the internet, be it VOIP or hotspot station. And I can cancel my plan whenever
I want.

~~~
thesimon
Is this an old grandfathered plan or could anyone get something like that
right now? Sounds really awesome.

~~~
api
This is what you get in countries where good infrastructure isn't considered a
communist conspiracy and where one of the major political parties is not
overtly anti-infrastructure. France, Germany, etc. also have public transit in
most places.

~~~
tim333
I'm paying about 5 euro / month in Vietnam where the infrastructure actually
is a communist conspiracy, kinda.

------
MBCook
Noticed the changed the headline?

The Air still exists and is NOT replaced by this. I believe it's staying
because it's non-retina, but I may be wrong.

Either way, they seem to have made a call a bit too early when posting this.

~~~
United857
It seems they've reintroduced the MacBook (no suffix) branding. So there's now
three lines: MacBook Air, MacBook, and MacBook Pro.

Interesting the MacBook is lighter than the MacBook Air.

~~~
Someone1234
Their branding has become very confusing. In particular when some people are
still buying the old Macbook Pro because they prefer it over the latest one,
so really one of the highest end laptops they sell is "last years" model of
the MBP.

------
koof
Man, there's something about a gold laptop that just makes me want to never
give money to a company again.

~~~
mahyarm
There are market segments (hint: china & others) that LOVE the gold color. You
don't have to buy it.

~~~
koof
Yep, I was saying that too!

------
dang
We changed the url from [http://techcrunch.com/2015/03/09/apple-introduces-a-
reinvent...](http://techcrunch.com/2015/03/09/apple-introduces-a-reinvented-
macbook-air/) to Apple's page for this product, since it was making the front
page repeatedly and there shouldn't be two threads on the same thing.

~~~
alain94040
HN really needs a feature where you can combine multiple links into one
discussion. Techmeme does this very well.

------
mrinterweb
Macbook $1299 "Up to 1.3GHz dual-core Intel Core M processor"

Macbook Air $899 "Up to 2.2GHz dual-core Intel Core i7 processor"

Seems like a big step down in processing power at a higher price.

~~~
serve_yay
If all else were equal, sure. But it's not, starting with RAM and display and
continuing on from there.

~~~
mrinterweb
The retina screen is definitely better, but the Air can be upgraded to 8GB of
RAM. The overall design of the new MacBook is revolutionary, but I can't
believe they chose a CPU that is considerably less powerful and charge a
premium price. If you can stand 1.5 lbs more, you can have a MacBook Pro for
the same price which is considerably more powerful (also with a retina
display).

~~~
gambiting
I disagree. As someone who used an Air and then MacBook Pro Retina 13", the
weight difference is small but definitely noticeable for the worse. If you
walk a lot it makes a difference.

------
dchuk
What's interesting to me as well is that they don't seem to have announced any
sort of dock or usb hub or even really mentioned what the charging brick looks
like right? That seems like a really important thing to cover when announcing
you have 1 port for all peripherals now.

~~~
jameshart
right - if the charging brick has a conventional USB port and a displayport
out on it, a lot of people's concerns go away.

------
thesimon
1.2Ghz processor seems like a dealbreaker for professional applications
(Coding, Video editing) but for applications the Air was used before it
actually seems okay.

~~~
AmVess
The 1.2 GHz Core M has a maximum frequency of 2.9 GHz with turbo boost. The
1.1 GHz model will spool up to 2.6 GHz.

Further, both processors are dual cores with hyperthreading. It'll be about 5%
less performant than the previous Macbook Air while using vastly less energy
(4.5 watts vs 15 watts).

~~~
contergan
Are you sure about that 5% claim? According to
[http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Processors-
Benchmarklist...](http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Processors-
Benchmarklist.2436.0.html) the performance difference should be quite a bit
worse.

------
lucio
I understand the benefits of a single connector, but, Isn't this a security
nightmare? Today you can avoid plugging an usb drive as a security measure,
but with a single connector you're exposing your laptop when charging or when
connecting a proyector in a conference room.

~~~
carlesfe
Interesting take. Maybe somebody will write a kernel extension to easily
disable the USB subsystem/hub on demand?

------
dchuk
Say what you will about the logic behind a single port for everything (as far
as I know this is the first computer to do this so there's nothing to compare
it to), this Air is a pretty drastic change from what we're all used to when
it comes to laptops. We're basically hitting the limits of thinness at this
point right?

~~~
drblast
I'd hate to have to worry that I'll cut myself on my laptop.

Is there anyone that's super-excited about a thinner Air? My preference is
always for greater battery life. I'm curious if there are people that wish
their already thin laptop were even thinner, and if so, why?

~~~
dchuk
The combo of thinner/lighter/no fan is pretty awesome in my opinion. These
aren't for peopled doing hardcore computing, they're for people doing hardcore
commuting really.

~~~
mwcampbell
Do you have a source for the "no fan" bit? If the Core M processor can deliver
the same performance as a Haswell ultrabook processor (i.e. the previous Air)
without requiring a fan or getting unreasonably hot, I think that's a pretty
nice feature.

~~~
sz4kerto
It's much less powerful in terms of computing power than a Haswell.

~~~
hsitz
For my needs I would say the Core M is a good compromise between performance
and energy efficiency. E.g., the Dell XPS 13 some have mentioned this thread
as alternative has a faster processor than I need.

Also, the fan is a big issue for me. You're not likely to see fanless systems
with Haswell or the more powerful Broadwell processors. With Core M Broadwell,
though, I expect fanless will be the norm. I expect I'll be getting the
relatively new Asus UX305 soon; for me it compares favorably to new Macbook
but is only $699. It's a little heavier (2.6 lbs), but has larger 13.3" 1080p
screen, runs Windows and/or Linux well, quality aluminum build, same 8GB RAM,
256GB SSD, etc. I suppose I'd prefer the new Macbook, but I'm not an OS X guy
and the Asus is barely half the cost.

~~~
phaemon
How well does the Asus UX305 run Linux? I have a Macbook Air at the moment,
but it has a couple of annoyances that I'd like to be rid of. However, I do
like the build quality and the trackpad especially.

~~~
hsitz
I don't have one yet, but there is a guy who left comments on Amazon who has
good experience with Ubuntu:
[http://www.amazon.com/review/R2UHFYMBSR02RT/ref=cm_srch_res_...](http://www.amazon.com/review/R2UHFYMBSR02RT/ref=cm_srch_res_rtr_alt_1)

Amazon has temporarily inflated prices for this low-availability item. I'm
waiting for NewEgg to get them back in stock.

Trackpad does seem to be one of the lowpoints of ux305fa. esp. if that's
something that's important to you. I tend to adapt to trackpads and like
whatever I use most.

I have a different Asus machine, the super-cheap X205, which I got for $180 at
a Microsoft Store. It's plastic, but surprisingly well made. 2.2 lbs and
fanless is great experience. Main problem is it's a pretty slow processor and
has just 2 GB RAM, 32GB flash drive, basically tablet specs in a laptop form.
I've extended it with 64GB microSDHC. I do find myself using more powerful
machines at home (Lenovo X200 and X220) but even there I'm enjoying the X205
quite a bit.

------
currysausage
For people interested in typography: It seems like the Apple Watch UI font
(San Francisco) replaced VAG Rounded as keyboard font. This is interesting
because it would be the first time (AFAICT) that Apple uses the same font for
keyboard and UI.

See also:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typography_of_Apple_Inc.#Keybo...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typography_of_Apple_Inc.#Keyboards)

------
pwenzel
Corrected headline should read "Apple: Fuck everything, we're doing one
connector."

------
xienze
There were "artist renderings" of this thing that leaked a while back. They
were pretty much 100% on the money, the big thing being the USB-C port.

~~~
jzelinskie
IIRC, the leaked renderings had the power key where the esc key is -- so they
were close, but not final.

------
niels_olson
I'm confused: did someone dislike MagSafe? It's gotta be one of my favorite
parts of my MacBook. I hear the guys complaining about iron build-up in the
port, but they've gotta be in the minority, and a far smaller demographic
than, say, parents.

Somebody should make a low profile magsafe charger adapter. That would solve
both problems: easy to replace the rare-earth magnet and preserves the utility
of magsafe. If you want to charge _and_ use multiple ports, stick the adapter
in.

Frankly, I think the one-port decision was wrong, but I doubt Ive and company
care.

------
quaunaut
I'm just supremely disappointed in the Macbook itself- I have a 3 year old
Macbook Air, that is more powerful than this Retina. That's just absurd, that
it's that much of a step back in terms of raw CPU.

Luckily however, the new 13inch MBP is actually perfect. I'm rather excited
about it.

~~~
eropple
"More powerful" is a little hard to isolate as tightly as you are doing here.
The 1.1GHz model will burst a single thread at 2.9GHz.

I'm disappointed there's no 16GB RAM model, and that'll keep me from buying
it, but CPU perf is not on the list of my worries.

~~~
moe
_" More powerful" is a little hard to isolate_

Not really. Just look at the Passmark scores:

    
    
      Macbook Air (Early 2014): 4159 [1]
      Macbook                 : 3096 [2]
    

The new Macbook is 25% slower than the MacBook Air.

[1]
[http://cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i7-4650U+%40+...](http://cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i7-4650U+%40+1.70GHz)

[2]
[https://cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+M-5Y70+%40+1...](https://cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+M-5Y70+%40+1.10GHz)

~~~
eropple
Where are you getting those specs? AFAIK the 2014 MacBook Air doesn't come out
of the box with an i7 4650U, but rather an 4260U, which has a Passmark score
of 3617. Also note that the Apple presentation noted a Turbo Boost top of
2.9GHz, not the 2.6GHz of the Core M 5Y70 that you linked.

It's the difference between horsepower and 0-60. There are other factors
involved. (This is largely academic, though, because I doubt anybody who owns
one is going to really care.)

~~~
moe
_Where are you getting those specs?_

I googled, for the MBA 2014:

[http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/macbook-
air/specs/macb...](http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/macbook-
air/specs/macbook-air-core-i7-1.7-13-early-2014-specs.html)

For the new Macbook you are right that Apple appears to use a slightly faster
variant of the 5Y70 that doesn't seem to have a benchmark on cpubenchmark.net
yet (at least I couldn't find it).

I'd be surprised if these 300MHz made a significant difference, though.

------
coryfklein
How about this as a solution to the 1-port problem: Integrate the USB-C hub
into the brick of the power charger.

Then when you are charging, you can plug your USB or display devices into the
power brick, and you don't have any extra hubs to carry around.

~~~
wingerlang
But then you have to keep the brick close.

------
scelerat
Loss of MagSafe is huge. I can't count how many times it's prevented a mangled
receptacle or saved a laptop from flying to the floor.

------
thomasfoster96
I'm currently looking for a new laptop, which will probably be a Mac, given
I'm not familiar with using Linux nor have I liked using Windows lately.
Looking at the pricing for this, I can't see much of a reason for why I'd get
this over a Macbook Air or Macbook Pro w/ Retina.

Using Australian prices -

This - $1799 11" Air - $1249 13" Air - $1399 13" Retina - $1799 (I've seen
$1599 in authorised reseller stores) 13" Pro - $1549

Is a retina display and losing a third of a pound worth paying $400-$550 for?
Nope. Paying the same price for less ports (if you're getting a Macbook Pro,
ports are likely important) and and less speed? Nope.

I think Apple must be hoping this new Macbook is going to eat into 13' Macbook
Pro sales (just as the 13" Pro ate into the old Macbook sales), because I
can't see it eating into Macbook Air sales.

~~~
paradite
It will not replace Pro series.

The CPU for the new MacBook (1.1GHz dual-core Intel Core M processor) cannot
even out-perform current MacBook Air, let alone MacBook Pro.

~~~
thomasfoster96
Well if you're looking at CPU speed when buying it won't, but a suzeable
number of Apples market probably doesn't.

------
beedogs
Wow, so a $1300 laptop with no USB ports?

Why does Apple keep making their new products worse -- less features but
subjectively more "beautiful" \-- than the ones before? Somewhere in the attic
at One Infinite Loop, is there a painting of Steve Jobs that slowly gets
younger as time passes?

~~~
supercoder
It has one USB port.

------
neillyons
It's amazing how small they made the circuit board
[http://images.apple.com/v/macbook/a/overview/images/internal...](http://images.apple.com/v/macbook/a/overview/images/internals_layer_start_large.jpg)

~~~
JBiserkov
I believe at least some of the credit should go to Intel
[http://www.anandtech.com/show/8355/intel-broadwell-
architect...](http://www.anandtech.com/show/8355/intel-broadwell-architecture-
preview/5)

------
twright
I think one subtle change is the Apple icon will no longer glow, it's been
chromed like it is on all the iDevices. No need to cut a plastic translucent
Apple logo => fewer parts? (Furthermore, how will I know what computers people
are using in a dark room now?)

------
djrogers
This is actually called simply MacBook (no Air). The Air remains a lower cost
alternative.

------
Opossum
They actually introduced a new line of laptops called the MacBook (so the
title is technically incorrect). The existing MacBook Airs and 13" MacBook Pro
got minor refreshes. Interestingly no refreshes on the 15" Pros.

------
cheesedoodles
Something that doesn't seem to get mentioned in the comments is the placing of
the trackpad; so near the keyboard. This was one the first things I recognised
as a potential err.

I once had a ASUS notebook which had a similar design. The problem was that my
tip of one or both thumbs or part of it, often touched the touchpad in a
fashion that it selected text if working in a editor. This would happen so
fast that my typing replaced the text. Very annoying, so annoying that I
bought a new notebook of different brand.

I imagine something similar could happen on the Macbook Notebook.

~~~
robmcm
I imagine there is a lot of software in the new trackpad to detect palms when
typing and ignore the input.

Hopefully you won't even notice you are resting on it.

------
sauere
If i was to buy a new MacBook today it would definitely be the 13" Air or Pro.
It's a cool device, but not for anyone doing serious dev work.

The DO-IT-ALL-USB-C might be a neat idea, but it practice it means that i have
to carry a ton of (expensive!) adapters around with me for the next few years.
And then there is performance. I can live with 1,5GHz /w Turbo or whatever....
but 1,1GHz? That is painful.

~~~
olso
I want to buy the updated 13". How much RAM does Yosemite take up? Not sure if
I should go for the 16 GB version.

~~~
ghshephard
OS X is pretty good about sharing memory, so 8 GB is fine. I routinely run
about 15-20 Apps on my MacBook Air, including a VMware instance with Windows
XP, Aperture, Google Earth, Excel/Word/Powerpoint/Outlook/Mail.app.

The only people who require more than 8 GB on OS X are those who have Apps
that _specially_ require a lot of memory to perform - Image Processing,
Databases, etc...

I used to be in the "Buy as much memory as you can afford" \- but I really
would never buy more than 8 GB on a Mac (with the caveat about memory hungry
apps above)

~~~
calinet6
It got a lot better in Mavericks with compression and better subsystems, but
I'm sorry, I still push the limits with 16GB. 8 isn't enough for OSX at this
point.

~~~
ghshephard
Ironically - I'm still on 10.8.5 (Mountain Lion) - My system is rock solid, no
longer kernel faults, and I rarely have to reboot it more than once every two-
three weeks because of a system hang.

Only specialists, or people with massive, massive data sets require more than
8 GB on OS X - I push my system really, really hard, and I rarely (if ever?)
come close to maxing out memory.

This isn't to say there isn't a subset of people who can make do with more
than 8 GB - but 95%+ of the average knowledge worker running the Office Apps,
Google Earth, Safari, etc... will be fine for several years with that much
memory.

~~~
calinet6
Correct, 95% of the average knowledge worker will be fine with 8GB, but only
5% of the skilled knowledge workers who run specialized software, development
stacks, VMs, etc.

In a software company I wouldn't stick anyone with an 8GB mac. But then, that
is a specialist application technically.

------
crystaln
I've been considering upgrading from an Air to a Pro for the retina display
and was waiting for this update. Now this has me a bit confused because the
new MacBook has a retina display.

It seems like Pro may yet be the best choice for anyone doing demanding work,
because the processor is 2x+ faster. While the 13" Pro may be a brick compared
to this new MacBook, it's still incredibly light.

~~~
ghostly_s
It's looking like this new MBAir will actually perform 20% _worse_ than the
current-gen Airs due to the Core M processor. If performance is at all a
factor in what you do I don't think it's even worth considering.

[http://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare.php?cmp%5B%5D=2465&cmp%5...](http://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare.php?cmp%5B%5D=2465&cmp%5B%5D=2238)

~~~
jcomis
This is not an Air. This is a "Macbook".

The Air line was also upgraded to core i5 and i7 today.

------
vvpan
It's hard for me to believe that somebody actually likes the no-ports
philosophy. In some offices where I worked it seemed like every 10 minutes
somebody would run around asking for some dongle for their macbook. And again,
not to sound to grumpy-cynical, the whole thing to me looks like a fad. A lot
of inconvenience just to shave off a few grams and look sexy.

------
azinman2
So in switching from thunderbolt to usb-c, I'm wondering about the technical
reasons. They went from 20-40g/s of thunderbolt to 5 in this version of usb-c,
which is quite a reduction by itself. My understanding of previous USB specs
is that USB is poll (and thus creates a lot of CPU load), versus firewire
which was push. Is USB 3.1 now finally push?

~~~
jpgvm
They weren't delivering power over Thunderbolt (though technically possible I
think).

By moving to USB-C they are now on tech the rest of the world is likely to
pickup.

It's also pretty likely that it's more power-efficient than Thunderbolt and
less complicated. (The Intel Thunderbolt controller is a mean looking IC that
gets pretty hot)

------
cies
Noooo! See the cursor-arrow keys? They dont leave out the two bits over the
left and right keys anymore. I've always hated keyboard maker to do that (many
laptop keyboards do this), as you will not have a tangible cue on where the
cursor keys start.

Well, I guess that since they are so much on the edge of the device you can
simply use the corner of the device as a cue...

------
Tehnix
I see a lot of people hating much on the one port. Arguably, I wouldn't have
minded just one on each side, but to be honest, I operate all most all of my
connected things wirelessly. Bluetooth mouse, bluetooth keyboard, wifi sync of
iOS devices etc.

If I had the use for more things connected, I'm either sitting down and
connecting an external screen, in the same place always or I'm not doing it
for long enough time for power to be an issue. Thus, a dock or dongle at that
place would be natural (hell, I use one atm just to convert from HDMI to mini-
DVI).

I see this as a good and pleasant move to pressure more things to go wireless.
Still waiting for Airtame[0] to get out, so I can get rid of that annoying
cable from monitors to my Air :)

The one gripe I do have, is the rather low GHz on those CPUs :( Max of 1.3GHz?
Ugh...

[0] [https://airtame.com](https://airtame.com) (I know other products _like_
it exist)

------
kendallpark
Yeah, it looks pretty. I'm way more interested in news about the 15" Macbook
Pro. It really is the only developer laptop I'd consider at this point. Given
the fresh reviews about the new Macbook and the trackpad update to the 13"
model, I'm a little worried they're going to do something screwy with the 15"
model. Haptic feedback? Do I want this? I think it would be rather frustrating
to have wikipedia entries popping up when I'm trying to highlight my code.

Touch pressure is such an individual thing. I tend to pound on my keys and
trackpad. It's the way I am. This Force click business (while reminding me of
Force Push and Force Pull) seems very different from a binary "click" vs "no
click." Even if you can adjust the sensitivity, it doesn't help when someone
else has to use your laptop.

------
Dofuss
Apparently my current Macbook Pro Retina has better power than "the new
macbook" \--
[http://www.apple.com/mac/compare/results/?product1=macbook&p...](http://www.apple.com/mac/compare/results/?product1=macbook&product2=macbook-
pro-retina-13)

~~~
saddestcatever
Appears as if the new Macbook is sitting in between the Air and the Pro...

Air < Macbook < Pro

~~~
IkmoIkmo
The confusing thing is that it doesn't.

Looks like it's

MB < Air < Pro.

The Intel M chip at 1.1gh certainly doesn't beat the air's 1.6 gh i5. Nor does
the HD 5300 beat the HD 6000. Let alone if you max out both, it'll be 1.3gh vs
2.2gh for the MB and Air respectively.

Sure the MB starts with more mem/ssd. But you can configure the air to have
just as much without spending more.

With the air 13' having an extra inch, 3 hours more battery, more ports,
better performance, the only thing the MB has going for it is resolution. And
that doesn't seem to override all its cons and put it ahead of the air in my
opinion. (11' is a different story, but even that has better CPU/Graphics)

------
ComputerGuru
No new 15" MacBook Pro? I wonder when that will be coming.

~~~
mhuffman
Thank you! It is hard for me to believe that macbooks (that receive all the
attention) are always getting the royal treatment, when macbook pros are more
expensive, and are (regularly) paid for by a business. Furthermore, my niece
in college does not need a new macbook as often as I (as a professional) need
a new macbook pro!

------
niix
Still seems to be that the 13 in MBP w/ retina is best compared to the new
Macbook.

[http://www.apple.com/mac/compare/results/?product1=macbook&p...](http://www.apple.com/mac/compare/results/?product1=macbook&product2=macbook-
pro-retina-13)

------
reilly3000
I found it telling that nothing about iCloud has changed. It seems that Apple
has decided to be a hardware company, and frankly they are damn good at it.

I wish that they would own that and unlock the iDrive so we can all interface
with their amazing hardware.

~~~
SG-
Give it time. For one this isn't WWDC, this was a special event for specific
products. iCloud has been getting better over time for users and devs and
gaining new features, I'm sure it will continue to do so.

And while Apple continues to make money from hardware, they are not just a
hardware operation, they provide an entire platform and ecosystem which iCloud
is part of.

------
akhilcacharya
I'm anticipating a large market for wireless USB adapters using AC/WifiDirect.

------
cseelus
Very interesting device overall, might replace my Air.

The resolution seems quite low though. 2304x1440 at 226 ppi might sound not
too bad, but straight pixel doubling would yield a pretty small screen real
estate of 1152x720 in terms of logical pixels.

~~~
IkmoIkmo
It supports the 1440x900 too though if you want it.

------
72deluxe
I'm not sure if I'm an old fart or something (I'm 31) but this has to be the
daftest MacBook I've ever seen. I have a 2012 MacBook non-retina, with DVD
writer and all the ports I need (MagSafe, Gigabit ethernet, FireWire,
ThunderBolt (also Mini DisplayPort so I don't need fiddly adapters to connect
to TVs), 2 USB ports, an SD card slot, as well as headphone output, and line
input (both switchable to digital optical S/PDIF), and a decent sized screen
with plenty of space to rest my hands on the device. I truly believe I have
the last decent model! The RAM is upgradable and the battery and hard disk
replaceable (but it's impossible to plug in two USB dongles next to each
other, silly or what).

This new MacBook is firstly tiny (nowhere to rest my hands), a screen size
that is the same as a Samsung Note (the big 12" one), everything is along the
edges, and THERE IS ONE PORT. Do I now need to carry along a hub in addition
to all of the adapters???? It's so stupid I am struggling to comprehend who
their target audience is? They mention the USB-C and that you can plug
screens, power and devices into it - but the big question is: can I do all
three things at the same time?? Or would I need to eject my USB stick just to
power my device? Even my monochrome 386SX Amstrad laptop from 1991 had more
ports (only 4MB of RAM mind you).

My first monitor that I could get was a 10" IBM CGA screen which was tiny -
this is competing for the most ridiculous sized screen on a daily use machine.
Perhaps they are converging with the Apple Watch?

When I saw it I thought it was a funny joke and then I realised that it was
actually true and on Apple's site; I realised that Apple in their pursuit of
extreme thinness have abandoned all the reasons why people bought a laptop in
the first place (a portable computer, you know, with ports that you can use).
I frequently use a MacBook Air at work and it makes me angry pretty quickly -
tiny screen, no ports. I have to wander around with a bunch of dongles to use
it with other devices (I need ethernet for AVB audio and sometime must
demonstrate on a TV). This new MacBook looks like the plasticy bendy laptops
you see in the budget range of PC shops - not a good look to be going for.

I was saddened to see that the ordinary applications that are part of the OS
are labelled "apps" at the bottom of the screen, and truly hope this isn't a
move towards the merging of OSX and iOS as has been feared for some time,
starting with the merging of styles. I develop software for OSX as my day job
on a Mac Pro (the ones you could drive over) and this saddens me.

This is truly the daftest thing I've seen, and I'm an Apple fan and OSX/iOS
developer with a stash of Apple gear, a daily Mac OSX development job and
sideline OSX job too. Disclaimer: I thought I'd best add that because there is
a sad tendency here on HN to behave like "slashdot" and ridicule other people
for having opinions.

And about Force Touch: I would prefer Force Invisibility or Force Persuasion,
like in Jedi Knight please.

EDIT: Just noticed they're still doing the MacBook Pro and I have engaged in
much confusion, but still it's a crazy device that won't be able to compete
with ordinary PC laptops with ports, methinks.

~~~
chipotle_coyote
I don't honestly know whether the new MacBook is something that I'd want --
but I do know that _for my purposes_ my late-2013 MacBook Pro kicks your MBP's
butt. It's lighter, _much_ faster, has a much better screen, and I don't
really care much about the fact that I can't replace the battery. I'm still
regularly getting eight hours offline.

And _realistically,_ when I'm traveling with my laptop it's rare that I'm
plugging anything into it besides a power cable. When it's "docked" it has the
power cable, a Thunderbolt cable, and an audio out cable because I'm kind of a
nerd and want to use my own speakers. That's all I need: the external hard
drive and (non-wifi) printer hang off the monitor's built-in hub, as does
external Ethernet. What would I lose with this new weirdo laptop? I'd plug one
less cable in docked.

"But if you're traveling with it you'd need to bring a hub with you!" Well, if
I was traveling _and I expected to need to plug in USB stuff on the road,_
yes. But it's very clear that they're treating that as an edge case, making
the assumption that many users can go almost entirely wireless, or will be
able to in short order. And they're probably right. Maybe it'll be "daft" for
you, but Apple has a history of doing daft things that more often than not
drag the industry forward. (And keep pundits employed.)

~~~
72deluxe
Hey, mine's a quad core 2.6GHz i7 with 16GB of RAM; it isn't a slouch and
isn't anywhere near needing replacing - that's why the user-replacable battery
means that this isn't a throwaway item after a few years. If I bought a car
with a battery in it that I couldn't replace, it'd be stupid, but the same is
being accepted on laptops.

Admittedly the disk is a major slowdown on this but I have a LOT of data to
cart around (VMs, dev environments, and recorded audio and video).

I can take this thing all over the world and not worry about a bag of cables
and adapters. It replaced my desktop machine and still fits that need, which
is a good thing I think.

You're right about the screen though :-(

~~~
rconti
Another post covered the battery thing. $130 battery replacement on Air and
$199 replacement on MBP, in Apple store, while you wait. Granted, who knows
how long they'll provide that service.. for a 3 year old laptop? 5? 7?

I've got a 2012 Retina MBP and 2011 Air and battery life is not something I
even think about. These things last ages these days.

~~~
72deluxe
You're right about the battery - I expect it to last for ages, but it'd be
nice to be able to replace it without much hassle. The same cannot be said for
the ones with built in batteries, or even my phone (which is irritating as the
constant drain / recharge cycle has destroyed its ability to hold charge).

------
rohunati
Anybody know how the headphone jack will work?

~~~
chockablock
The MacBook appears to have a standard headphone jack on the side opposite the
USB-C connector.

(Can be seen in the picture of the space black model at the very bottom of the
linked page.)

------
ryanisinallofus
Missed opportunity to place an HDMI port and a USB port on the power brick.

------
Animats
_" designed for a world where your primary computing device is your
smartphone, not your laptop."_

So it's a laptop for people who don't do any real computing on their laptop?

------
gabamnml
Think they did a great job but I think they are pointing to a slightly more
general public leaving out developers, musicians where they use plenty of
peripherals working in parallel without being dependent on a multipurpose
adapter which by the large amount of workload this has little duration of life
for the multiple use is given much is to connect power, monitor, external
sound plate, mechanical keyboard, etc ... all this to make it flatter slopes
of implementing the USB-C

------
enahs-sf
Really hoping this can at least be bumped to 16gb of RAM. Processing power
seems diminutive to say the least. I guess this will just be a good looking,
fancy SSH machine for me.

------
nsxwolf
So someone had it nearly exactly right with those renders that were floating
around, except the power and escape key are not reversed. Glad that turned out
not to be the case.

------
CHY872
This seems like an obvious prelude to ARM CPUs in MacBooks.

~~~
trishume
This actually looks to me like a huge win for Intel. A full fast Intel CPU,
with no fan! The ability to be passively cooled was previously one of ARMs
serious advantages.

~~~
CHY872
No one actually cared that a laptop needed a fan, though. Apple could have put
a fan in this and no one would have seen it as a huge deficiency.

~~~
IkmoIkmo
Still it's massively useful. It means more space for the battery and it also
indirectly means that if you need no fan, you probably generate very little
heat, which means you have a crazy efficient CPU meaning even more battery.

Which is how they can do the same amount of battery life as the 11', despite
having a bigger screen and a retina display.

And a big part of that equation is probably the fanless chip. But it's true
it's not like users were complaining about e.g. the MBA lineup being so noisy.

~~~
CHY872
Yes - and what they've achieved is a CPU that's much closer to the ARM state
of the art, and has a much more ARM-like power profile, and would generally be
easier to replace with ARM a couple of years down the line.

This coincides with being fanless.

Had Apple made this (say) the same thickness as the MacBook air, they'd have
increased their volume by a measurable amount, they'd have been able to have a
much more powerful processor, and no one would be able to say that ARM is a
good proposition for them for the foreseeable future.

Now they have a fairly weakly performing computer, with an ARM-sized logic
board, which is going to be bought by people who don't care about bottom line
performance.

This is going to be the slowest Mac in a number of years - and if it's a
success then making the next-slowest Mac be ARM wouldn't be such a jump.

~~~
IkmoIkmo
I agree it's a definite possibility. They did it before with the iPad lineup
when everyone thought they'd bring a decent chip to the table, and went with
low-end phone chips. Of course very good low-end chips, running highly
optimized software, but still.

I just don't really follow their path here. First they make the MB more
expensive than the air, but run slower. They also make it lighter, smaller,
thinner and quieter than the air (air having light-as-a-feather connotations).

I mean, what's the deal in 2 years? If it's the lowest powered device, it'll
probably be the thinnest and lightest etc, too. So what about the Air? Will
they just throw that powerful brand name out of the window?

Will they expect people to buy 12' and not the 13' MBA with a bigger screen, 3
hours more battery, more ports and a bunch more (20-30%) powerful yet equally
less expensive?

In short, it's a bit of a strange lineup. And while I agree with you that it
obviously is, and may likely remain the slowest Macbook (slowest Mac period,
the Mini notwithstanding), I don't necessarily see how that means ARM as
opposed to continuing with refreshed Intel Ms, or hell even an updated Atom
lineup. Is there any indication they want to move away from Intel again? I
mean, weak performance is one thing, but this is OS X we're talking about, for
a device that costs beyond $1k, which probably has good enough profit margins
on an Intel M, would they really underpower it even more with a weaker chip?

I'm not very familiar with CPUs though, would love some more of your thoughts
on this. It's definitely true that it's now very feasible, and so it all comes
down to who can deliver the best low-power CPU the next few years.

------
sliken
Kickstarter for magsafe type c connector in 3...2...1..

------
beloch
One thing I'd love to see Apple do is waterproof their laptops. There are
coatings available, such as liquipel, that can make laptops highly water
resistant, so why doesn't Apple use such a coating? A coffee spill is probably
the most likely cause of early death for a laptop, and all Apple has done is
put water sensors inside their laptops so they can deny warranty coverage.

------
sergiotapia
I'm disappointed that this has only one port. I shouldn't have to choose
between charging my laptop and using my USB port for something.

Having said that, battery power is my number 1 priority when buying a laptop.
My 2013 Macbook Air is great in this regard, it charges to full in 40 minutes
and lasts for a long ass time. If this new model has even better battery tech,
I'm all for it.

~~~
IkmoIkmo
Battery is about 3h worse than the MBA 13'.

The port sucks but usually anything you want to plug in for longer periods of
time are not a problem.

i.e., a USB stick? Take out charger, plug in, transfer files, put charger back
in. No problem.

A mouse or keyboard or monitor? Well you're probably at home or work, so you
buy a usb hub and stick it on your desk. Problem solved.

It sucks as the new MB is supposed to be the lightest most portable Mac in the
lineup, dedicated hubs don't fit that story. And it's another $50-150
depending on if you need 1 or 2, or a fancy slick one.

Me I'm just gonna go with the refreshed 2015 MBA 13'. Better battery, 1 inch
bigger screen, a lot cheaper with all the ports I need and hey, a better
processor, too (1.6gh instead of 1.4 and HD 6000 instead of HD 5000 on the new
2015 version versus the older 2014 one).

------
aikah
Specs are interesting - 8gb ram,256 gb flash drive,1.1/2.4 turbo ghz, but
1300$ ? way too expensive,as it cost as much as the mb pro.A price under 1000$
would have made way more sense for a macbook. But I guess they have the data
that show people are ready to pay that price for that item. Still , the
pricing strategy between mb,mb air and mb pro is a bit confusing. \-----

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Recall that the MacBook Air originally cost way, way more than the MacBook Pro
and was way, way less powerful. The price'll fall in two years or so.

~~~
IkmoIkmo
True, but you had a radically improved form factor that was actually light and
had a nice battery, while the performance was fine for the type of users it
marketed to.

Meanwhile this thing takes away ports from your 13 inch MBA, takes away 1 inch
of screen, takes away 3 hours of battery, takes away CPU performance, and it
gives back? It's not like the MBA is heavy, thick or noisy. The retina screen
is really nice but to me it doesn't really look like a good deal.

Not saying it won't be popular, I think it'll be very. Just don't see it being
so interesting right now myself even if I had $100m to spend, there's some big
tradeoffs with this new MB.

Strangest thing to me wasn't really the pricing fit, I think I would've done
the same. But that we ended up with an 'Air' line that's heavier, bigger,
thicker and noisier, and hell better performing, than the regular MB line. At
least it's still got better battery life, well the 13' that is!

Looking forward to 2016's edition!

~~~
svachalek
I think the naming points to the future. In a couple of years, the changes
that seem daring and unforgivable in this version will seem bland and expected
and there will be no reason to hold on to the current MBA line with its fans
and obsolete connectors. Then it quietly disappears and we are back to two
lines, the MB and MBP.

~~~
IkmoIkmo
Definite possibility but it feels like the 'air' name is like 'Pro'. Something
that's building up a lot of brand value, awareness, understanding, culture, a
segment is forming around it etc. They've adopted it now for the ipad lineup,
too, I think it's here to stay. The air has been a massive success at
capturing teenagers and college age adults who also have an iPhone, literally
a new generation of Apple users. For them the Air is a big brand.

Don't forget Regular vs Pro might not be as powerful as Air vs Pro, as Air
doesn't just differentiate it from Apple's Pro, but also from competitors
'normal' laptops. i.e. a consumer might reason: even if I don't get Apple's
pro product, I still want to get their Air, as that's better than the
competitor's 'regular', as air means lighter, more battery, more portable.

That sounds really simplistic and silly, but I think these processes are a
genuine part of people's buying decisions in the non-professional sector that
the regular/air line caters to.

Which is why it surprised me a bit that they didn't go for naming it the 12'
Air, especially it being the lighest and most portable and quiet. Of course
that would've been a very tricky lineup as some Airs are on the Intel M chip
and fanless and expensive and retina, while others are not, and with just 1
inch difference between them it'd have been too busy.

But yeah I agree, definite possibility. Had kind of expected the Air not to
get a refresh, and for the Air 12' to be the Macbook Air Retina, and that in 2
years the 11 and 13 would be discontinued while the 12 kept getting updated,
reduced in price and with 10h battery and decent performance for anything not
professional. Would make a very simple lineup. 12' air, 13'/15' Pro, and
iMac/Pro/Mini for any bigger form factors.

We'll see!

------
vidoc
I can't wait for Audioquest USB Type-C cables!

------
JustSomeNobody
I'm surprised they introduced colors. Even three SKUs seems excessive for
something that doesn't sell as hotly as an iDevice.

~~~
DerekL
I don't think so, Apple has made Macs in multiple colors before. Once the iMac
and iBook were available in four or more colors, but that was way back in
2000.

------
XorNot
Less ports is not what I want in a laptop. At all.

Dongles and whatnot are a plague on portability, and take up more space then
whatever gains are made in the hardware usually.

The laptop I want? One which has it's entire power supply, and the 110/240VAC
cable and plug able to coil up inside it so I can literally just carry "the
laptop" and not have to worry about chargers.

~~~
ant6n
I'd want one that uses an USB for charging. Same charger as phone. Charging
from a USB plug in an airplane. ... I guess this is actually it. Except it
needs more than one connector.

------
Ezhik
No (standard) USB port. Weird. I wonder if it'll ship with a USB cable?

To be honest, the one USB device that I use the most is my mouse, and I
suppose Apple expects me to get a wireless one, and that is fine. But what
about stuff like USB drives? I am not looking forward to not being able to
just give somebody a file on a USB drive because they forgot their OTG cable.

~~~
sharth
USB Type C to USB Standard A Receptacle adapters are supported by the USB
specification.

As I understand things, the desire from the USB-IF is to basically have USB
Type A and Type B start to disappear.

Until we get to that critical mass point... Yeah. It'll be annoying. But
hopefully we will get to enjoy this standard for at least a few years before
it is replaced.

------
dismal2
I remember in collage (2000's) when everyone just started to get laptop and
before magsafe macbooks the broken power ports were THE cause for people
breaking their laptops. Sometimes repair shops could fix this but usually the
motherboard was damaged and you just had to get a new machine. Sad to see it
go, it was a brilliant idea.

~~~
notphilip
OEMs (generally) eventually started making the power ports a replaceable part
to make it a cheaply resolvable issue. Hopefully they will apply that wisdom
to USB-3c ports on devices that use it exclusively for their power connection.

------
jpalomaki
Apple's product lineup keeps on growing and growing. Wonder if this is a good
direction? Now there are five different iPad models, five different laptops
and three desktops.

Sometimes choice is good, sometimes not. It used to be that buying an Apple
did not require too much thinking because there were not that many to choose
from.

------
hobbe80
I wonder if it would be possible to build a USB-C charger where the tip is
connected to the rest of the cord with magnets. I don't see why we would need
to give up the disconnect-when-tripping-on-the-cord just because the final
connector now becomes more solidly connected to the laptop?

~~~
akhilcacharya
That depends on how magnetic the body is. Unless you mean a magnetic breakaway
cable, but that would mean a dongle that would stick out all the time.

I think both could be marketable if this gets big in a generation or two.

------
mattmaroon
I really wish someone made a Windows notebook with this kind of hardware build
quality. I realize mobile is the new sexiness, but people still buy notebooks.
There were a few hundred million PCs sold last year.

I have to believe Dell could at least come close. I have an XPS13 and it just
doesn't.

~~~
paulrouget
What's wrong with the XPS13? I'm looking for a new notebook. Hesitating
between this new Macbook and XPS13.

------
nodesocket
Are there any performance benchmarks of the Intel Core M (Macbook) vs 2.5GHz
dual-core Intel Core i5 (MacBook Pro). The new keyboard, new touchpad, new
design, improved battery are awesome, but for nearly the same price, you can
get a MacBook Pro.

~~~
IkmoIkmo
Eh well the M isn't even as performing as the MBA lineup, let alone the MBP
lineup. I wouldn't expect the MB to be anything near a powerhouse.

And the MBP 13' has better battery life by 1-2 hour than the MB. (not the non-
retina MBP, which is 2 hours worse), but the retina (which is priced the same
as the MB. (although you'd need to add 128gb storage to make it equal which
increases the price a bit).

The keyboard doesn't actually seem any better. Yes it's backlit by individual
button and yes the buttons are a bit bigger than normal with a new system. Is
that better? I'd say it looks like they did a good job of not making the
keyboard suck more. After all, they have less space for the keyboard as it's
12' big, less travel for the keyboard as it's thinner. But less travel is
generally worse, less space between keys (more mistakes) is generally worse,
keys right next to the touchpad is generally worse.

So I'd prefer the MBP keyboard and battery, the MBP screen, CPU and Graphics,
magsafe charger and ports.

The MB's pros is the touchpad (will have to try it first, looks interesting
but I doubt the 3rd click will see much software support the first year
anyway, beyond that it's nothing new). And the fact it comes with 256gb at the
same price. But it doesn't make up for a shitty CPU and graphics, tight
keyboard with little travel, 1 port requiring externals, 1-2 hours less
battery and 1 inch less screen.

If I wanted the smaller form factor I'd still go for the MBA 13'. 3 hours more
battery, extra inch, a lot cheaper, better performance.

Sorry couldn't answer your specific question, haven't seen benchmarks, just
know the M sits between their low-power low-performance chips and the i5/i7
core chips. The fact it draws 5 watt and is fanless tells you enough :P

------
ZanyProgrammer
I think the single port is a deal breaker for me-I really like the 12 inch
form factor (finally!) but this is too. But at least it starts out with 8GB of
RAM-I wouldn't have put it past Apple to put only 4 in the base model.

~~~
mironathetin
Apple supplies an adapter with usb, vga or hdmi ports. From there, we are back
to the usb hub on the desk. The adapter costs only 79$ (:o)

------
moe
I love it. It pains me that I can't use my YubiKey with it, which is a
dealbreaker for me.

Guess I'll have to wait for the next iteration, which will hopefully "change
everything, again" and add a second USB port...

------
Red_
Is it really that good?

[http://venturebeat.com/2015/03/15/why-i-changed-my-mind-
abou...](http://venturebeat.com/2015/03/15/why-i-changed-my-mind-about-the-
new-macbook/)

------
cheshire137
No MagSafe, a single port for USB, more expensive than an Air with worse
specs. If I wanted a simple machine just for browsing the web, I'd use my
iPad. I don't know who this laptop is aimed at.

------
barumrho
I'm curious if this machine will be able to drive a 5k monitor when Apple
makes one. The tech spec says the USB-C port will support DisplayPort 1.2 (not
1.3), so it doesn't seem promising :(

------
paulornothing
I think this is the most important announcement from the event. Sadly all the
click bait news will be about how expensive the Gold Watch will be. This
laptop is extremely light and has good specs.

------
wz1000
> Taptic engine

> Force Touch trackpad

I'm annoyed by senseless techno-marketing jargon.

~~~
amyjess
"Force touch" sounds like something you _wouldn 't_ want to advertise.

~~~
ZanyProgrammer
It sounds like a Jedi power.

------
carlosyasu91
I don't like the gold color, everything else seems nice.

------
yehat
About magsafe - I wonder why they didn't move it to the charger side? Any
thoughts? It could work for what concerns most people who like it.

------
dsg42
So I'm not allowed to use thumb drives anymore?

------
rwhitman
Seems like Apple is trying to evolve the Macbook Air into some sort of large
iPad. Single port, no fan, guts are mostly battery etc.

------
dankohn1
Like the Macbook Air, it does not offer a 16 GB RAM option. That's a bummer
for web developers who keep lots of tabs open.

~~~
ElCapitanMarkla
I know right, it's so frustrating because I would happily pay the extra for
it.

------
laacz
Does USB type-C in Macbook mean that on all other slim devices (namely - iPad
and iPhone) lightning will be replaced with USB?

------
usaphp
It's not MacBook Air, its called Macbook.

------
vinceyuan
I hope there will be a 14-inch version with the sd card reader and more USB
ports. Will we see it this fall?

------
c0wb0yc0d3r
I see they are pushing tethering to an iPhone. Does you still have to pay the
carrier for that feature?

~~~
dceddia
I know that at least AT&T isn't charging for this right now. In fact, my bill
went DOWN when I switched from a 250mb/450minute/limited texts plan to a
1gb/unlimited talk/texts plan that included tethering. The tethering isn't a
separate item on the bill. But it's possible that older plans won't "support"
it - I think that was the case with mine.

------
muyuu
I think no magsafe and just 1 port is a bit excessive. Also, what's the niche
for MBA now?

~~~
IkmoIkmo
The MB is far from cheap, especially for such an underpowered device.

Comparing it to the 11' MBA, I see the MB as being better in virtually every
way. But the MBA 11 is the cheapest in the macbook lineup, the price
difference with the 12' is so big that its niche is essentially catering to a
lower-end price segment.

For the 13' the price difference is still there, but not as big. But the 13'
has 3 hours more battery, better ports and an extra 1 inch, while again being
cheaper.

Add to that the fact that the MB is actually quite underpowered (1.1ghz, HD
5300), the MBA 1.6 Ghz, HD 6000 is a significant step up. Meaning for any dev
work for which you don't need a MBP (probably the majority of web stuff both
front/back end, and a fair bit of development outside of that), you're going
to want to more powerful MBA.

The MB to me feels like a replacement for the 11' for rich peeps who want a
slick device for school, entertainment, office work (e.g. PR, marketing,
management), while the MBA 11' is in the cheap macbook niche and the MBA 13'
is in the 'all-day aspiring workhorse that's not quite as powerful as a MBP,
but very affordable' niche. The new MB is certainly not in the cheap niche,
and it's not quite all-day or an aspiring workhorse.

Longer-term though, I have no clue. It's a confusing lineup for sure. MB is
less powerful than the air. What? Air is thicker, bigger, noisier than the MB,
what? The Air/Pro was a great lineup, the new MB is a weird one in the story.

------
sunflowerdeath
This is not a real laptop, as they claim it is. 2 core 1.2Ghz no discrete
video, it has only ONE extension port. Really, u cannot connect at the same
time mouse, screen and external drive, WTF? It is not suitable for most of
professional tasks, it is like an iPad with keyboard and multitasking, thats
all.

~~~
nfoz
This comment is ridiculous. What is it about "laptop" that makes you think
"professional tasks with a mouse and external drive"?? That's not how most
people use their laptops.

Given that it runs OS X and not iOS it seems more comparable to the Surface
than to Androids-tablets-with-keyboards, so I'm not sure why you'd say this is
more like an iPad+keyboard than simply a low-power mac laptop.

------
azimuth11
Are the individual LEDs under the keys controllable with software?

~~~
Tepix
That's what I was wondering. Would allow for some fun games.

------
itsbits
One only port...Data Vs Power??..I hope they thought it through..

------
seaghost
Steve would never approve this product.

------
kzrdude
This link changed after I voted.

------
errorr42
ultimate facebook machine basically

annihilate Google pixel 2 sales (if anyone expect any) before start

------
unicornporn
So this be replacing the 11" Airs? If so I'll be the first to get a grab the
old machine. No ports no buy.

~~~
jjcm
Nope, old air line was updated with faster processors as well. This is being
released in addition to the old style airs.

------
X-combinator
Can't wait to get it.

------
icantthinkofone
OT but, on Chrome and Firefox on FreeBSD, all the images and most of the text
have the opacity of the images set to zero in their CSS and I can only see a
couple of headlines. I presume their javascript is not detecting something
correctly and not doing this right. Interesting. I've never seen that before.

EDIT: I just now noticed that the link above goes to /macbook/ but, if you go
to the Apple site and click on Mac, the pathname is /mac/ and now I can see
and read everything. Also interesting.

EDIT2: Ah but the Macbook link still doesn't show everything.

------
joesmo
Is there a USB-C to thunderbolt adapter/hub that would work with existing
Cinema displays as well as power the laptop? Or a similar adapter/hub for
HDMI?

------
irascible
But will it bend?

------
joesmo
The specs list 8gb as the only option which is a bit of a disappointment. I
was hoping they would offer 16gb and up the rMPBs to 32gb. Otherwise it looks
fantastic. I can't wait to try it.

~~~
IkmoIkmo
It has the worst CPU in the entire Mac lineup as far as I know, worse than the
11 inch MBA (which is such a confusing brand message. The MB Air is heavier
and more noisy than the regular MB, but the MB isn't as powerful as the Air,
bit strange right?)

In any case, it doesn't really scream '32gb' to me. i.e. what could you
possibly need 32gb of ram for where you won't get bottle-necked to hell and
back by a processor more often used in tablets and small 2-in-1s than laptops.

Let me know what you were planning to use the memory for, genuinely curious!

~~~
joesmo
I was hoping it could replace the Air as an all-purpose laptop. 32gb might be
a bit overkill, but 16gb is not unheard of, especially considering a life of
5-8 years. If it is roughly as fast as a 2012 Air (which some sites compare it
to), it's plenty fast enough for everyday tasks as well as work where I need
to run a few VMs. Thus the memory. Still, I'm more interested to see if there
will be a DisplayPort dongle and if it could output 4k @ 60hz. If not, the new
Air / Retina upgrades are much more interesting.

------
blawa
I love my Surface Pro 3, thank you very much :-)

~~~
fit2rule
How does Linux run on the SP3? I'm considering moving from Apple one my rMBP
bites the dust - is the SP3 fully Linux-compatible, do you know by chance?

~~~
blawa
Sorry, I don't know about that. Would this help:
[http://www.geek.com/microsoft/linux-users-rejoice-heres-
ubun...](http://www.geek.com/microsoft/linux-users-rejoice-heres-ubuntu-on-
the-surface-pro-3-1594864/) ?

------
brador
I didn't even know there was a show today. From a long time Apple fanboy, I
think that says a lot about what this company has left in free marketing from
the internet channels.

I would say the free ride is over for Apple and they're now just another
company doing things in the mosh pit.

~~~
gress
So you read no technology blogs or news sources? This has been anticipated for
months.

~~~
brador
I believe the market that anticipates an Apple keynote is shrinking. Maybe I'm
wrong, but I don't think I am.

~~~
gress
I think you're wrong - it was in all the major news outlets and blogs.

~~~
brador
Looking at the number of comments left on news article sites. It used to be in
the 500's within an hour, now it's around 10-30. That's what I'm basing my
judgement on...Again, maybe I'm wrong.

~~~
walkingolof
Yea, but it was fixed when someone said that the finder sucked and now we got
1200 comments... ;)

------
X-combinator
More insight from FastCompany:

[http://www.fastcompany.com/3043324/tech-forecast/apple-
intro...](http://www.fastcompany.com/3043324/tech-forecast/apple-introduces-a-
super-thin-12-inch-macbook-with-retina-display)

~~~
ciupicri
What insight? I don't see anything new on that page.

~~~
Xoxox
Maybe he/she met is a promoter of FastCompany.

~~~
X-combinator
I just met to show FastCompany's story on it. Cuz I liked it.

(Disclaimer) Not a sponsor/promoter of them.

~~~
ciupicri
I can understand that, but if it doesn't bring anything new, there's no point
in mentioning it here.

~~~
X-combinator
OK chief.

------
higherpurpose
They messed up the resolution. No more "4x the resolution" as "retina" anymore
for Apple devices, it seems. It's the end of that, as we've seen with the new
iPhones.

So now developers will have to target those resolutions _exactly_ as they are.
No more "elegant scaling" and whatnot.

~~~
rsynnott
> So now developers will have to target those resolutions exactly as they are.

People writing MacOS software do not typically target a particular number of
pixels; it's a windowed operating system. One point will be 2x2 pixels, as on
the retina MBP and iMac, and on all retina iOS devices except the big iPhone
(where one point is 3x3 pixels).

