
A Week with the New Macbook Pro with Touch Pad - monort
https://medium.com/@housecor/a-week-with-the-new-macbook-pro-with-touch-pad-126eebb89ac
======
simonswords82
I've had my MBP 2016 with Touch Bar since Tuesday. Some additional thoughts
for anybody who cares:

Re: the speakers.

I was watching something on Netflix on my chest lying on my back (you know the
position) and the speakers were so good they _almost_ sounded like surround
sound.

I had to turn the sound off because I was convinced somebody had walked in to
the room behind me. Seriously good speakers.

The keyboard is also excellent, if not a bit noisy for my fat fingers but it
doesn't bother me.

Touch bar - meh. It's good when it works but it's not life changing. When more
apps (I'm looking at you spotify) get on board I expect I'll use it more. It
definitely doesn't detract from the experience.

Battery life is a real bug bear of mine. I come from a MacBook Air 2013 model
and could _easily_ get 6+ hours even if I was using Chrome heavily. Now my
average run time is closer to 4 hours. Those two hours make all the
difference.

The trackpad in my opinion is not too large. Having said that I was happy with
the size of the previous track pad, I don't know why they increased the size
but it hasn't lessened the track pad experience.

Finger print to login and siri a touch bar click away is neat, I hope to use
siri more now.

------
rayiner
Re: battery life. VSCode (and the underlying Electron shell) is likely to
blame. I can get 10 hours on my 2015 MBP if I'm just tooling around in Safari
and Emacs. Having anything Electron based (or Chrome) drops that to about 6.
It's somehow more power hungry than MS Office, which is saying a lot.

~~~
extra88
Yep. I tried Atom for a little while last year until I tried using it while
running on battery. It dramatically reduced how long I could run on a charge
(15-inch Mid 2012 MBP).

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crazygringo
Very true about the speakers -- I never cared either, until now. They're so
good. Also true about the trackpad -- not a big problem, but it does sometimes
move my cursor when typing, and there's just no need for it to be this huge.

As for the keyboard, I've been using mine (sans Touch Bar) at home for four
weeks now, and it's _great_. It took a while to adjust, but now when I use my
Air at work, the keyboard just feels so... suboptimal. It really is a pleasure
to use. (In contrast to the Macbook keyboard, which was terrible.)

~~~
itsdrewmiller
Totally agree with this - that was my main divergence from the article. I have
a late 2013 15" rMBP and when I go back to it the (physical in addition to
normal-size) trackpad is like an old friend, but the keyboard feels unbearably
mushy.

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nicky0
The author is confused over terminology. The control strip above the keyboard
is called the Touch Bar. The main pointer input device is the Trackpad.
Neither is called Touch Pad.

~~~
mindo
Normal users literally don't care. It was invented as touchpad so touch pad it
is, no matter what Apple wants users to call it now. Don't see a point get
butt hurt about that.

~~~
h4waii
He isn't a normal user. He's someone who claims to be a software architect and
Microsoft MVP -- yet doesn't know/can't care enough to use the correct
terminology when he's writing a blog post from his "developer's point of
view"?

~~~
swsieber
I'm a developer, and I still call things by the first thing I heard them
called.

I don't think he's obligated to use the "proper" terminology unless he was a
software _engineer_ /sarcasm.

Snarkiness aside though, I really don't think using the original term
decreases his credibility at all.

~~~
saurik
Yeah. I mean: one could even make the argument that Apple is the one that
often insists on using "creative" terminology for marketing reasons, and there
is no reason to be sympathetic to them; I also remember this device being
called a "touch pad" a long time ago--the device which had "track" was the
"trackpoint" from IBM--but I also remember the device had always been stalled
different things by different people.

In the article for this device, which Wikipedia canonically calls a
"touchpad", we see comments on its terminology and the only place in the
history section where the device is called a "trackpad" is jarring and happens
to be in a sentence about Apple (where I would argue it should be corrected).

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touchpad](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touchpad)

"""Apple Inc introduced touchpads to the modern laptop in the PowerBook series
in 1994, using Cirque’s GlidePoint technology;[8] later PowerBooks and
MacBooks would use Apple-developed trackpads."""

"""As touchpads began to be introduced in laptops in the 1990s, there was
often confusion as to what the product should be called. No consistent term
was used, and references varied, such as: glidepoint, touch sensitive input
device, touchpad, trackpad, and pointing device.[9][10][11]"""

"""Apple's PowerBook 500 series was its first laptop to carry such a
device,[citation needed] which Apple refers to as a "trackpad"."""

~~~
soneil
You've pretty much made the opposite point you intended to. What the author is
calling the 'touchpad', isn't the trackpad - it's the touch bar.

This is precisely the confusion that's causing people to raise eyebrows at the
term.

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cygned
I am using the 13" (maximum possible configuration) for a couple of days now.
So far:

\- At first, the keyboard felt very different, but now I really enjoy working
with it and the may Air's keyboard feels like a toy

\- Screen and speakers are gorgeous

\- USB-C is nice given you have all the adapters you need

\- I find the TouchBar actually useful for some things, e.g. easier formatting
in Keynote

But it looks like, there are still some bugs:

\- The first adapter I plugged in caused a kernel panic

\- After reboot, the login screen is hardly usable. Very slow and looks weird
sometimes

\- Three finger drag works only from time to time

Edit:

Two things I forgot:

\- the media controls in the expandable bar simply do not work - nothing
happens when they are pressed

\- in Safari, the TouchBar allows to play/pause and advance HTML5 videos. I
took a photo of it:
[http://i.imgur.com/pbYdhMi.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/pbYdhMi.jpg)

~~~
gambiting
I'm surprised people are getting theirs so quickly. I ordered the 13" max spec
on the day of announcement and it only shipped today - and should arrive in 2
weeks time. What gives?

~~~
cygned
I ordered 30mins after the keynote and paid with PayPal. Location: Germany.

------
chmaynard
It's great to read some informed comments about this wonderful new laptop by
someone who has actually used it. I disagree with his opinion about the size
of the touchpad, but that's a matter of personal preference.

~~~
Fiahil
> Needless to say, for a nearly $3,000 machine, this list is hard to accept.
> So much so that I’m seriously considering returning the machine.

It seems, "wonderful", wouldn't be the author's word of choice to describe
this new laptop. I kind of share his point of view, as we've just order a new
set of 2013 MBP at work. Those are great machines and I will probably buy the
next one if Apple starts making laptops for developers again. Otherwise, it
will be Lenovo or Dell xps.

~~~
chmaynard
Well, I bought one and I think it's wonderful. My other laptop is a 15" 2013
Retina MBP. The new model is an improvement in almost every respect. Also, the
space gray case is stunning.

FYI, I'm planning to sell my old one. Let me know if you're interested.

------
hartator
> I chose the maxed out “standard” model for $2,799 at the local Apple store:
> 15" i7/2.7/16gb/512gb

I might be nit picking, but maxed out normally means you've picked the very
best config (2.9/2T/Radeon 460), not that you picked one of the standard
configuration.

PS: Also, they are selling better configuration than the author's at local
Apple stores, no need to order necessarily online.

~~~
housecor
I was using an Apple store employee's term. He claimed the "standard"
configurations listed on the website are what we should typically expect in
the store initially. Later, they'll stock popular customizations. FWIW, I've
been unable to find a single "non-standard" machine in stock at a store in my
cursory checks.

------
ttub
I got a maxxed out 13 inch (touch bar) a couple of days ago, and I hate the
new keyboard (I never got used to the shallow keyboard on the 12", after
having one for almost a year).

The Touch Bar is also pretty much a useless gimmick.

Besides that it's a neat machine, though I think Apple is getting close to
what is worth paying the Apple tax for (inconsistent product lineup: no USB-C
on the iPhone 7, no USB-C on the external trackpads/keyboards, etc). My
employer paid for my machine, I do not think I would have spent my own money
on this.

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wkrause
I have the new 13 inch model and one of my main frustrations is that if I
apply pressure to the area just the the side of the track pad, it prevents two
finder scrolling from working. Basically if I rest my palm to the right of the
trackpad, it interferes with the track pad movement. This isn't a palm
detection issue because I'm definitely resting my hand to the right of the
track pad, and I think it's a result of the pressure from the weight of my
hand.

Wondering if anyone else is seeing this?

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satysin
Having used one for a few days I have found that while disk I/O is an
impressive gain on the already amazing speeds in the previous model the CPU
gains are minimal and disappointing. And the GPU is already dated. It has a
lovely screen and better speakers but I had hoped for a greater increase in
CPU and GPU performance.

Also the keyboard just isn't as good.

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curiouscat321
Anybody had any issues with the keyboard? I've heard rumors of some ergonomic
issues and it worries me.

~~~
chmaynard
The keyboard on my 2013 MBP had too much play in the keys, and the new
keyboard is better in that respect. In general, I'm not fussy about keyboards
-- I usually adapt to a new one quickly. I'd recommend that you try out the
new keyboard at an Apple Store and decide for yourself.

~~~
AlphaSite
I had a fiddle around with one yesterday and compared to my 2011 Air they
keyboard is far more crisp and, as you said, reliable.

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albertgao
an overall experience after reading: the new model seems only has 2 real pros:
brighter screen and faster ssd... Damn, such a pity.

------
jasonjei
What does the Touch Bar look like with Boot Camp?

~~~
kogir
It has the normal function keys by default, and the hot keys when you hold fn.

------
wyclif
I don't know much about the new MBP specs, but I was a little surprised to
read this:

 _This taxed the system hard and it was very hot, with fans running_

I was under the impression that these didn't have fans.

~~~
delinka
Definitely have fans. The design video[1] has a segment at 2:30 about thermal
management.

1 - [http://images.apple.com/media/us/macbook-
pro/2016/b4a9efaa_6...](http://images.apple.com/media/us/macbook-
pro/2016/b4a9efaa_6fe5_4075_a9d0_8e4592d6146c/films/design/macbook-pro-design-
tft-cc-us-20161026_1536x640h.mp4)

