
I returned my 2016 MacBook Pro with Touch Bar - geerlingguy
http://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2017/i-returned-my-2016-macbook-pro-touch-bar
======
ef4
If you've got the previous generation of macbook pro and are wondering whether
you should upgrade, here's an alternate suggestion:

I took my 2014 retina macbook pro to the Apple Store and got a "topcase
replacement" (because my keyboard was beat up with overuse and starting to get
flaky). That had the side benefit of giving me a completely new external case,
so it looks brand new again. And it includes a brand new battery. And I got a
new display for free, because there's a recall on that generation of retina
displays for delamination issues.

It feels like I just bought a new laptop at one fifth the price. And the specs
on it are still competitive with the 2016 models: 16GB ram, 3ghz core i7. Only
the very highest 2016 configuration even beats it, and that by only a little.

~~~
gthtjtkt
> 3ghz core i7

I hope Apple hasn't succeeded in reducing processor comparisons to these two
useless tidbits of information...

Based on just "3GHz core i7", a chip could either be painfully out of date or
current top of the line.

~~~
nerflad
> Based on just "3GHz core i7", a chip could either be painfully out of date
> or current top of the line.

This has always bothered me too. I suspect that the ambiguity is intentional
on the part of Intel and/or Apple marketing (though I'm not savvy enough to
know why exactly).

~~~
exergy
Linus mentions it in one of his videos. The idea is that Intel doesn't want
you worried about the generation, only whether it's i3/i5/i7. I guess this
helps them mask over the fact that, year on year, CPUs aren't really getting
any faster in single-threaded performance.

~~~
blhack
Linus Torvalds?

~~~
MiddleEndian
There's some YouTube tech review guy whose name is Linus.

------
rloc
I bought one when it was announced. I desperately needed to replace my 13',
128G MBA (couldn't change the disk).

My major concern about the touch bar is that it really makes things worse. I
second the author opinion.

I use Spotify a lot. Before, on my MBA, I could change the volume or hit
play/pause with one key tap, straightforward and easy.

Now I have to hit the tiny expand arrow to display these keys and then hit
play/pause etc.

It could get even worse because Spotify added their own touch bar buttons when
you use the mac native app. But the dynamic display is different depending on
whether the app is the front or in the background. When in the background it
becomes a shortcut you have to click to make a different set of keys appear.
You get lost very easily, plus it becomes redundant with Apple native
play/pause keys... So I'm always confused when I just want to hit pause/play.

From the settings, if I'd like to fall back to the always on standard set of
function keys then I lose the dynamic app keys. Which is weird. The OS should
be clever enough to expand the function keys when nothing else is available
instead of a black unused zone and a tiny shortcut zone on the right.

The esc key (as mentioned in the article) is really hard to reach most of the
times because you have to quit the current display (cross) before it becomes
available. Why not keep it always on the left ?

It feels like the touch bar hasn't been thought through very much. It needs
some more work... The good news is that it's mostly software improvements so
let's hope Apple / App developers can fix that quickly.

~~~
eeeeeeeeeeeee
I had the same issue with Spotify, so I switched the Touch Bar to only showing
my customized layout at all times, regardless of which app is backgrounded.

This effectively makes the touch bar a useless feature, but at least I can
customize the button mapping and always know the buttons will be where I
expect them to be.

~~~
paublyrne
I've done this also. I have found it buggy though. About once a day the volume
and brightness section stops responding until I do a restart of the machine. I
assume this will be fixed in an upcoming update.

~~~
eeeeeeeeeeeee
BTW if you have the issue with some of the buttons disappearing, killing the
agent has worked for me:

/System/Library/CoreServices/ControlStrip.app/Contents/MacOS/TouchBarAgent

------
geerlingguy
Even if you don't care about the rest of the review, if you're interested in
some real-world/empirical evidence about how the Touch Bar model's battery
life compares to the Function Key model, please read through the Battery
section of this post.

I open sourced the script and methodology I used to run heavy battery use
tests: [https://github.com/geerlingguy/macbook-pro-battery-
test](https://github.com/geerlingguy/macbook-pro-battery-test)

And I also published the raw results of the third full battery test on each
laptop:
[https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16H6TeKCOZRwzsd5bZJM2...](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16H6TeKCOZRwzsd5bZJM2IHVqN9fU6GZhUrDiu_SK2zU/edit?usp=sharing)

~~~
richardwhiuk
I'm confused:

    
    
      				# Builds completed	Total battery life	Avg. Build time
      2016 Touch Bar - 3.1 GHz i5	49			4:54:00			0:08:45
      2016 Fn key - 2.4 GHz i7	30			3:54:00			0:07:52
      2015 Retina - 3.1 GHz i7	24			3:30:00			0:06:02
    

suggests that the 2016 model did 19 more builds, and had a battery life of 1
hour longer, suggesting a _better_ battery life...

~~~
tcbawo
Looking at the data in his spreadsheet, I think he has the models and build
times switched.

~~~
geerlingguy
You're correct. Sorry about that, I fixed the table!

~~~
yabatopia
Ah, that makes so much more sense now!

------
sjtgraham
Apple should find it extremely disconcerting that developers are seemingly
beginning to abandon them en masse. Every day there is something posted here,
on Reddit, or Twitter by another developer moving to Linux and not looking
back. A oft-used retort is developers are not a priority demographic anymore.
Well who does Apple think will write software to run on their real cash cow
iOS? Developers are the thin end of a large wedge.

FWIW I switched to Linux on ThinkPad X220 on the day of the MBP announcement.
I've added 16GB ram and a SSD. I can't think of any reason to go back.

~~~
optimuspaul
> Apple should find it extremely disconcerting that developers are seemingly
> beginning to abandon them en masse.

You are reaching, I don't think there are all that many developers abandoning
them. I don't know of a single one personally. I've heard of some vocal
critics on the internet, but that's hardly representative of a movement.

~~~
jcadam
The majority of the 20-something bearded hipsters sitting around the cafe
coding away on their MBPs aren't using them because they're the best solution.
They're using them because they're _fashionable_. When the trendsetters start
using something else, the herd will follow.

~~~
sleepybrett
I'm using them because they offer me a unix with a nice ui and more premium
software options (sorry guys, I'll take something like pixelmator over
something like gimp EVERY DAMN TIME)

~~~
jcadam
And that's exactly why I switched from Linux to OS X many years ago (back then
on a PowerMac G3). But the mac platform has taken on such a "consumer" focus
(both in hardware and software), and in the meantime Linux has come such a
long way, that switching back was a no-brainer.

------
rsync
The ironic thing is how much simpler it would have been for Apple to give
people what they actually wanted.

 _All anyone wanted_ was a retina macbook air. That's it. Everyone was
perfectly happy and just wanted a nicer screen.

 _All anyone wanted_ was a mac pro tower with updated SATA and USB speeds and
new processors, etc. That's it.

Instead, in both cases, we got silly weird things that nobody wants. I'm never
going to buy the non-tower mac pro. Similarly, when the new touchbar macbooks
were announced, I ran to the apple store and bought a nice, new max spec 11"
air to hold in reserve in my closet.

Now I'm covered on the laptop front for at least five more years and apple has
cumulatively lost out on 3-4 laptop and mac pro purchases from me.

~~~
che_shirecat
Apple has never been about what "everyone" wanted though - their whole shtick
has always been "the consumer doesn't know what they want until you show it to
them." This attitude worked in the Jobs era because of his product vision but
it's hard to sustain when you're continually regressing toward the mean in
innovation after a string of outlier hits

~~~
Damogran6
But every time they took something away, it felt like they were giving you
something in return. (Store your music library in our cloud, let your whole
family access all music for $15)

~~~
collyw
But every time they took something away, it felt like they were giving you
something in return _for more money_.

------
chmars
I actually like my 13" MacBook Pro with Touch Bar. Speed is fine with my
upgraded model and the display is great. Touch ID is very useful too.

I rarely use the touch bar and I still miss direct access to brightness /
loudness up and down, but I have also learnt that a barely use function keys
anymore. ESC on the Touch Bar is good enough, however, ESC has become less
important on Mac OS, Photos.App for example seems not be support ESC at all.

The battery is fine too. I use my MacBook mostly for long meetings, i.e., 5-6
hours, and up to now, there has always been plenty of battery left. That is of
course with a rather new battery and for light news (using a text editor,
viewing PDFs, some web browsing, distractions like e-mail / instant messaging
/ social media from time to time.)

The keyboard … well, I don't really like it, but whenever I use my old 13"
MacBook Pro (Retina), I don't like the old keyboard either. The real annoyance
is the noise resulting from my fast and obviously rather hard touch typing.

I am keeping my MacBook Pro with Touch Bar. On the other hand, I would
immediately buy a MacBook Pro without Touch Bar if it came with Touch ID and
more ports than the current MacBook Pro without Touch Bar.

PS: How do you call the effect that you are more likely to like expensive
products as a kind of self-deception? ;)

~~~
syrrim
That would be cognitive dissonance. There is dissonance between your action
(buying the laptop) and your thoughts (not liking the laptop). You either
change your action (return the laptop) or change your thoughts (actually, I
think I do like this laptop).

~~~
grzm
[Edit to add: Though I read the parent comment a number of times, I missed a
key line. Leaving my comment for context.]

I've read your parent comment a number of times. Where do they express general
dislike for the laptop? They say the keyboard is loud, and that if a non-Touch
Bar model were available, they'd buy one, but other than that, I read it as
them being happy with it:

 _I actually like my 13 " MacBook Pro with Touch Bar._

~~~
chmars
syrrim was answering my PS questions and not qualifying my comment.

~~~
grzm
Ah, that's it. Don't know how I missed that as I read yours a number of times
to see what I missing, but I very clearly did. Thanks for pointing it out!

------
grabcocque
FWIW, I kinda like the touch bar. I know, I know, I'm not according the the
Hacker News groupthink du jour, and am having my own, entirely unapproved
opinion. But there it is, I quite like it.

~~~
w0utert
I'll add my $0.02 as well. I didn't buy my MBP because of the touch bar and
would actually have bought a 15" MBP without it if it had been available,
because it seemed gimmicky and unnecessary.

I've had the laptop a few weeks now and I'm starting to like the touch bar
more and more, now that I've adapted to using ctrl-[ instead of ESC in Vim.
The touch menu's in most applications are still useless, but there are some
exceptions that show that the idea has potential. I like the player controls,
both the built-in ones and e.g. Spotify, for skipping, pausing, scrubbing and
volume. I also like how I can quickly change colors and styles in e.g. numbers
without having to use the trackpad/mouse to use the popover menu that may or
may not be open. Say what you want but these are improvements compared to the
static row of numbered F-keys.

When it comes to the 2016 MBP HN is the same echo-chamber it's always been.
There's a lot to complain about the MBP, primarily the price and battery life
issues (which I presume are a software fault considering the high variance for
similar workloads, and the fact that I regularly get 8+ hours on mine). How
people spin this here as if the thing is completely useless is comical though,
as if everyone needs more than 16 GB RAM, and carrying a C-to-A USB dongle
around kills you.

Pro OS X users that _actually_ need more RAM and better specs are probably
much more affected by the pitiable state of the current Mac Pro. If you
_really_ need to push a modern computer to its limits these days, chances are
that you're much better off with a desktop system anyway. The fact that the
Mac Pro is a much less popular topic to complain about on HN suggests that
most of the people complaining do not actually need more power than what the
MBP offers but just like to get on the current MBP sucks hype train.

~~~
alexkavon
> I didn't buy my MBP because of the touch bar and would actually have bought
> a 15" MBP without it if it had been available, because it seemed gimmicky
> and unnecessary.

You can still purchase a legacy MBP from Apple. Scroll down past the touchbar
MBPs.

~~~
w0utert
I've considered the 2015 MBP but decided against it. The old MBP cannot drive
the LG 5K screen I ordered alongside the MBP to replace my ageing iMac 27. I
also like the improved screen, and for future-proofing the improved graphics
and the 4 USB-C ports, so I went for the 2016 MBP. Apart from the price I see
few disadvantages to the 2016 MBP for my use case, the battery life might be
slightly lower but I don't travel a lot, so it's not a big deal. Besides, so
far battery life has been just fine for me, at 8+ hours at light load and
normal brightness.

------
awinder

      > Price: This is the kicker—you have to pay more for the
      > Touch Bar, even though it provides a worse computing 
      > experience. And you can't get Touch ID, two extra 
      > Thunderbolt ports, or a few other niche niceties without   
      > also taking the baggage that is Touch Bar along for the ride.
    

This has arguably been the worst part of Apple for many years. There's all
sort of little fringe price-cutting measures that push you to the top of the
line. They'll routinely kneecap the mid-tier in order to emphasize the top
tier. And things ebb and flow, sometimes Apple seems to understand the value
of the mac goes far beyond pure profit numbers (it's driving iOS profits,
after all), but it really seems that they've taken a strong turn away from
that especially in the past year.

------
consentfactory
You know, Lenovo tried reinventing the keyboard a few years ago with their X1
Carbons by putting on a touch bar with function keys, volume keys, etc. and it
was horrible. Trying to do any terminal work was horrible; for example, my
insert key was touchbar FN + I or something ridiculous like that.

AFAIK, they didn't reproduce that model. Surprised Apple didn't take note.

~~~
geerlingguy
Yeah, I remember reading all the comparisons to the Lenovo version, and
thinking that surely Apple must've improved from Lenovo's version, or added
something more compelling.

But instead, they may have made it worse, if that's possible, because the
escape key is indented, just to make the Touch Bar's graphical layout even on
both sides. Definitely the worst case of form over function I've encountered
with an Apple product.

~~~
joch
Even though the Esc key is indented, the empty space on the left still
functions as Esc, meaning that the key is quite wide in practice.

~~~
geerlingguy
Not in my testing—if I touched around the left side without any part of my
finger touching esc, it didn't register. And even when it did, the lack of any
kind of feedback (Haptic feedback would be so nice here) makes it
disconcerting at best.

------
jordigh
I love how these articles begin by listing their pro-Apple credentials. We're
so tribal that we have to say, guys, guys, I'm not an Apple heathen! I'm a
believer! A follower of Jobs! So please do not dismiss my bad news as the mad
ravings of a heretic.

~~~
geerlingguy
That's what makes it all the more painful. Irrational Apple fanatics like
burning you at the stake if you can't prove you were more irrational than they
at some point in your life.

~~~
matthewmacleod
Let's be fair though – this always happens with any kind of fanboyism. It's
nothing unique to Apple.

~~~
lmm
There are similar trends for many brands, but Apple fans seem to be more
extreme than most.

------
_stephan
The battery comparison with the 2015 MacBook Pro is not really fair, because
he turns the brightness "all the way" up for his benchmark, even though the
new models have screens with 500 nits brightness while the 2015 model only has
300 nits.

~~~
geerlingguy
I'm less concerned with the 2015 -> 2016 battery life regression (general use
with auto brightness bears this out as well, so the delta is there, it just
might not be as great), and more concerned with the fact that the Function Key
Pro gets 10% better battery life.

------
coldpie
The thing designers are failing to understand this decade is that touch
interfaces suck. Always. They are a _compromise_ , not a feature. This
includes touch screens and capacitive buttons, both in vogue for the past
decade.

Touch interfaces suck: they are too easy to press accidentally, and too
difficult to press on purpose. In college, I actually taped pieces of paper
onto my friend's TV with capacitive buttons so we could tell where the fucking
buttons were in the dark. If you were off by a half centimeter, you'd turn the
TV off instead of changing the volume. I regularly turn on my game consoles by
lightly brushing my arm against them because of their awful capacitive
buttons. Dumb, dumb dumb.

Touch interfaces provide no benefit over physical buttons except in cases
where you _cannot have_ physical buttons. Phones are a good example: physical
buttons add too much bulk to the phone or drastically reduce your screen size.
You also don't have a defined set of functionality. A touch interface makes
sense here.

But on a laptop keyboard? You've _already got_ a ton of keys there! Just add
ten more! Instead, they've added the suckiness of a touch interface for no
reason, since there was no compromise to make.

Touch interfaces aren't modern, they aren't stylish, and nobody likes them.
You use them when you must make a compromise for form factor. Otherwise, stick
with physical buttons.

~~~
christophilus
This is even more true in cars, where a touch interface is arguably dangerous.
Give me buttons, and I can fiddle while keeping my eyes on the road. Give me a
touch screen with heirarchical menus, and I've _got_ to look away from the
road in order to do anything at all.

~~~
base698
Seriously. My guess as to the reason Tesla did this was to skimp on
manufacturing costs. Now that they are established I wish they'd remove that
screen or reduce its size.

~~~
jp555
I hope they move it to a full windscreen HUD and add dashboard hardware
controls.

~~~
andai
Wow, that sounds neat

------
alexkavon
I recently purchased a Dell XPS 15. I was caught between purchasing a Macbook
Pro 15 (legacy/non-touchbar, which is still available on their site) and the
Dell. You can't upgrade the RAM on the new machines or the old machines now. I
wanted a Macbook Pro 15 because of how great they are for development (being
all Unix based and what not), but "non-upgradability" is just a no go. I don't
mind paying for the extra RAM even, but no dice. Since Windows 10 has the
Ubuntu subsystem, my decision is so much easier.

------
blisterpeanuts
The developer world isn't going to immediately switch _en masse_ to Microsoft
or Linux laptops because of this. They're probably just going to hold onto
their legacy Macbooks for an extra year or two, and it's likely the used
market for pre-2016 Macbooks will be competitive.

But gradually, as the imitators catch up to the Macbook in weight and
usability, we will see some migration away from Apple.

I hope and believe Apple's not so dumb as to suffer major attrition among
power users and developers. They're a big enough company that they could come
out with a "Macbook Classic" that restores some of the lost functionality
(function keys at least, maybe non-welded components).

If you examine a pre-2016 MBA or MBP, there seems to be enough real estate
above the function keys to squeeze in the touch strip thing as an additional
feature rather than a replacement. Why not provide both, and let the users
decide?

I wish there were a new Retina MBP with optical disk drive, USB, USB-C,
Thunderbolt, and memory card slot. Also, make it easier to upgrade internal
components. Is this really so hard? I'd pay extra. Even if the masses are
going another direction, there ought to be a power user's version that has it
all, and price it accordingly.

There's a certain cachet in being known as the power user's platform of choice
and Apple really should try harder to hold onto that.

------
gbog
Never owned a Mac but I have just bought a LG V20 phone which has a second
always on screen that looks like the touch bar. On a phone it is actually very
useful, for instance having the last five apps you opened readily accessible
is excellent, it brings the alt-tab power to your mobile. Also I use the
flashlight often and it's just right there. Maybe, probably it's a bad idea on
a laptop, but having another screen that apps cannot fight for above the main
screen on a smartphone or phablet is great.

~~~
anexprogrammer
The v20 always on screen is _right where you 're always looking_ on a phone,
unlike MBP touchbar. I'd buy one tomorrow but LG feel Europeans are unworthy
of them.

------
smohare
As a data scientist who spends most of my time in the terminal, I do not
regret losing function keys. In fact, I find the touchbar to be vastly more
useful and easier to operate in most contexts. That being said, I tend to
eschew function keys in favor of key sequences.

~~~
mattlevan
What do you find yourself using the TB for in your context?

------
Corrado
I think the most telling part of the story was that Apple seems to have lost
the Good, Better, Best split. Way back in the olden days of Apple you had to
really pay attention and work to find out which system would be best for your
needs. Then Jobs came along with the 4 quadrants of computers (Personal
Portable / Personal Desktop / Professional Portable / Professional Desktop)
and suddenly everything was much clearer. Over the seasons that morphed
slightly into Good, Better, Best laptop or desktop, but it was still pretty
easy to pick your system. Fast forward to today and the Apple ecosystem is a
soup of MacBook / Air / Pro / Retina / TouchPad machines that are nearly
impossible to tell apart. And that's just the laptop line; forget talking
about phones, tablets, and desktops!

I used to be able recommend the perfect device for almost anyone, right off
the top of my head, without doing much (any) research at all. Now, I don't
think I could recommend anything in the Apple lineup with confidence. This to
me is a huge failing and saddens me beyond whatever particular piece of
hardware Apple has built lately. :(

------
techterrier
I must be the only person that has no issues with their touch MBP other than
the price I paid for it. Which was a joke.

~~~
dabit3
Programmers are the only professionals in the world who complain about having
to pay for quality tools. Can you imagine a dentist, truck driver, or doctor
complaining about having to pay $2500 for a machine that would bring her
hundreds of thousands of dollars over the next 5 years? Of course not.

~~~
steverb
I've heard doctors, truck drivers, construction workers and any number of
other people complain about the cost of quality tools. For the same reason
that people complain about the cost of Apple machines, they don't perceive
enough quality difference to justify the price difference.

------
pm24601
My review of the Mac Book Pro (w touch bar):

I am a developer at Evernote (we are hiring fyi)

1\. Touch bar - By far and away this is the most annoying thing ever. IDEs use
function keys all the time ... and the touchbar does not know how to display.
> defaults write com.apple.touchbar.agent PresentationModeFnModes -dict-add
appWithCOntrolStrip 'functionKeys'

> defaults write com.apple.touchbar.agent PresentationModePerApp -dict-add
> org.eclipse.platform.ide 'functionKeys'

> defaults write com.apple.touchbar.agent PresentationModePerApp -dict-add
> com.jetbrains.intellij 'functionKeys'

I hate that I get no tactile feedback when trying to use the function keys. I
can no longer touch type the function keys.

2\. Keyboard - without the full travel I have to constantly readjust my typing
pressure between my detached keyboard and the laptop keyboard. Painful on the
fingertips.

3\. Memory size: 16g! WTF - my 5 year-old 17" MBP has the same amount of
memory

4\. Performance - here is the kicker. I play a multiplayer game: World of
Warships. The performance on the new MBP is WORSE than on my 5 year-old MBP.
Mind you the 5 year-old computer does not have a SSD drive and its battery is
EOL.

5\. No ports - seriously? I can't hook my laptop to any display in a
conference room without a dongle. I have to haul the powerbrick around with
me. So instead of just the laptop, I have to take a backpack of gear with the
various dongles to meetings. Looks very unprofessional. I can't hook my
external ethernet RAID drive to it. Nothing.

6\. Other missing things: you no longer get an extension cord with the power
brick. This means you have to be right on top of the power outlet to use it.
Like I can't use the power outlet right behind me at the dining room table.

7\. Siri - really. Like the last thing I am going to do is talk to my computer
at the office.

Based on my personal experience with the new MBP, I am not spending my
personal money to buy a new mac at this time.

I will just keep my older macs functioning as long as possible.

------
neximo64
This was surprising succinct with the issues. I'm not going to get one, I
thought it was a bit of HN overdo as usual but the 200ms delay is clear a
symptom of a bad Apple product from the point of their quality, not the
perception of the user.

------
coldtea
Why couldn't they just add OLED programmable physical keys -- defaulting to
the same layout/feature set as now?

They'd lose the ability to do sliders etc, but they have a huge bloody
trackpad they could use for that.

Or make the trackpad a touch-screen itself.

~~~
kalleboo
A slim touchbar above the trackpad would have been amazing. All the use cases
for a touchbar I can think of are when I'm trackpad mode, not typing mode.
Replacing the function keys makes way less sense.

~~~
addicted
My first indication that the touch bar was probably not gonna be very good was
thinking that there is no way that the function keys just happened to be in
the ideal spot for a touch surface.

------
bertomartin
What's the rationale behind offering the 13" pro the option of not getting the
touch bar, but not offering that option on the 15"? I want to buy a 15" but I
do not want that silly touchbar

~~~
pyrophane
The rationale is that they needed something to replace the low-end Air models
that they are phasing out of the line-up.

------
eapelgren
One concern with the Touch Bar, is the low adoption rate among applications in
my daily usage. Chromium development has not ramped up, forcing users with
Safari if they want the touch bar experience on websites.

And maybe never will Chrome allow for full customization for webapps or
extensions. Rendering it useless in many contexts. The Chromium bottleneck
also restricts developer tools such as VS Code to adopt touch bar features.

None the less, I find myself looking down the keyboard more often than with
the old fn keys, not really improving my workflow. This making me question my
purchase.

But as stated earlier, software issues can always be fixed.

[1]
[https://github.com/electron/electron/issues/7781](https://github.com/electron/electron/issues/7781)
[2]
[https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=660126](https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=660126)

------
dgrealy
I love my 2016 Pro. Touchbar takes some getting used to. As far as speed,
battery and performance the thing is a beast. Very happy. I have 4 VMs running
at all times and many apps and browser windows and I haven't noticed it chug
once.

As for touchbar, I don't think it's just a novelty. I think this will only
become more apparent as apps start to implement features with it. It's great
for media scrubbing, for instance. I have started to adopt pressing the
buttons it shows for confirm/cancel and other dialogs.

The escape key no longer being a physical button feels odd to the finger and
took some adjustment, no question.

At first I didn't like the volume / brightness adjusters because I wasn't used
to them and much preferred the buttons, but the sliders that popup are just as
easy to use and I fiddle with them less to find the right level.

~~~
rickyc091
No issues with the escape. My biggest complaint is that I keep accidentally
toggling siri when I hit backspace. I'm just going to move siri over a bit or
disable it altogether as I don't even use it.

~~~
pyrophane
I had that problem a lot as well. I removed Siri and now I just accidentally
mute my machine. That being said, my typing accuracy has improved as I've
gotten used to the keyboard, so accidental touches are pretty infrequent now.
My girlfriend just received her TB machine and she does it all the time, so I
think it is something that improves over time.

------
mark_l_watson
I considered the 2016 MacBook Pro, but ended up buying a MacBook. I was
concerned about the M3 CPU, but it seems good enough running IntelliJ,
RubyMine, XCode, etc.

I have a 16 core, 60 GB RAM VPS that I start up for heavy processing, so a
less capable laptop, but one with a great screen, works well for me.

------
killerpopiller
OT: My display was flickering last week, black and back until I rebooted. Does
anyone had this problem as well? I filmed it and will ask apple what to do.

------
nshunter
This generation of MB hardware generally seems to have issues from trivial
through severe. I purchased my fiance one of the new Macbooks for school along
with one of the USB-C dongles to allow her to connect to an external monitor.

She constantly has flickering issues when it's connected without a reboot
after connecting. It seems to be an unacknowledged issues with video and the
macbook, which was attempted to be solved via a visit with Apple where the
replaced the dongle to no effect.

The machine is fantastic in terms of weight, screen, and layout. I don't
really mind the single USB-C and would love to have one, but the hardware
issues have made me decided to sit this generation out and wait for what's
next.

------
grabcocque
So, unless I'm missing something, the primary complaint is "I don't like the
position of esc on the touch bar". That's not a lot to hang a rant on, but
clearly that's all it takes to get to the top of Hacker News these days.

~~~
mikeash
That's rather odd, since the touch area for the escape key extends all the way
to the left edge of the bar, even though that's not visually covered. I wonder
if maybe the author just never realized that.

~~~
kalleboo
From Gruber's account (Apple sycophant #1), no it doesn't extend all the way
to the left edge.

~~~
mikeash
I don't own one, but it was one of the first things I tried when I was able to
test a friend's, and it worked exactly as I described.

~~~
kalleboo
Hopefully they fixed it in a software update

------
blakesterz
>> I have been using an 11" MacBook Air as my primary computer since 2011

So I think he's using this thing plugged into an external monitor most of the
time? Can anyone actually use an 11" monitor as a primary monitor? If so, what
do you do? I only ask because I struggle to work when I'm on the road using my
13" laptop and I can't imagine being able to get much done every day on an
11".

~~~
mojuba
Depends on what you do, but 13" or less means e.g. you won't be able to do
vertical split of windows in Xcode. Which is annoying, because at times you
have to have two windows open (such as one source and one IB storyboard or
XIB, plus the navigators on the left and right hand sides). But this is still
workable. I've written 3 or 4 iOS apps entirely on a 13" laptop. If there is
an itch to finish and release something, suddenly those limitations aren't
anymore.

~~~
blakesterz
>> If there is an itch to finish and release something, suddenly those
limitations aren't anymore.

Good point :-) Funny how things become less important when there's a push to
get it done no matter what!

------
kstenerud
What I like about my new MBP 15" with touch panel:

1\. The size is almost the same as my 2011 mbp 13"

2\. Retina screen

3\. I actually like the touch bar.

4\. No more magsafe! Finally I can get the damn thing to charge reliably!

5\. No more annoying illuminated logo on the lid.

6\. All usb-c is nice.

What I don't like about it:

1\. The keyboard is terrible. The older ones are FAR nicer. The keys get stuck
down randomly, then after a few days come unstuck, but even the very feel of
the keys is pretty gross.

2\. Trackpad isn't as nice as the one on the 2011 mbp. Drag and drop is flaky
at best, especially in Finder. Press feedback is simulated, and doesn't feel
as nice as an actual button.

3\. Not much speed improvement. It's a big improvement for compiles since I
went from 2 to 4 cores, but single core performance has hardly budged.

4\. Stability is iffy. Many apps just crash when you suspend (including
Sublime Text, VLC, Firefox. Even the Firefox crash reporter crashes). I also
get system freezes (where everything freezes except the mouse).

So upgrading was nice because of the 4 cores, but I'd probably have been
happier with a 2015 model.

------
bdcravens
> Even after two weeks' use, my pinkie could never find the escape key.

The touch bar accommodates this. The space to the left of the "key", as well
as the "key" itself, all triggers ESC. In other words, the escape key has a
target much larger than the physical key, about the size of the physical tab
key.

~~~
bartvk
That, and in System Preferences -> Keyboard tab -> Modifier Keys button, you
can map Caps Lock to Escape. Works great, in my opinion.

------
jacobsenscott
I'm happy with mine. I'm plugged in to power, and nice big monitor and an
external keyboard 99% of the time and it makes a fine dev machine. Do people
really spend a significant amount of time writing code directly on an
unplugged laptop? Sounds really painful no matter the model or brand.

~~~
pyrophane
I do, but I work from home and need to get out of my apartment from time-to-
time. I think there are a lot of people in that boat.

------
epaga
Just to add a data point as a developer - I bought the 15" second-tier tMBP
and absolutely love it, but have to agree the Touch Bar, though intriguing, is
currently a bit "meh".

But all the strong points he mentions in the article are more than just
"nice", they are really amazing. The big ones for me are:

The SSD speed - I scanned all 300 GB of my current usage with DaisyDisk in 8
seconds. 8. Seconds.

The keyboard - this is easily the most satisfying keyboard I have ever had.

I can see why you'd go for the "MacBook Escape", but the 15" model only comes
with Touch Bar, so that decided the issue for me. Plus, I think Apple may
still have some tricks up their sleeve for the Touch Bar - allowing us to
create our own custom touch bar buttons per app which run our own actions
would be incredibly useful, I think.

~~~
mbrookes
Thanks for mentioning DaisyDisk - I've been looking for something like that,
and all the alternatives I've tried are horrible!

------
DoodleBuggy
More terrible first hand reports about the Touch Bar Pro.

So it seems many power users are saying Touch Bar is useless at best and
annoying and interfering at worst. And the battery life is terrible. And you
pay more for less. Who is this thing built for?

I really hope Apple fixes this situation in the 2017 update.

------
voidr
These are my personal opinions:

I don't like the touch bar because it forces me to look at my keyboard, which
is inefficient and probably unhealthy(moving my neck like that).

I don't like the keyboard because it's too noisy.

I'm disappointed that Apple seemingly ceased to care about the professional
user. I'm expecting the top Mac Book Pro to be a machine that's optimized to
get work done, the touch bar and the overemphasis on making it thinner and
lighter suggest otherwise.

It seems that my next main machine will not be a Mac Book Pro, I will most
likely go with a Windows laptop, since Linux still has issues like Wayland vs.
Mir.

------
binaryapparatus
All different decisions from Apple in last 12 months made me clean up the dust
from my ancient linux pc. Reinstalled arch and I am feeling normal again.

I have few Mac / iOS apps to maintain but I use vnc or synergy to do that.

------
joeevans1000
Really, now that apple is only making products for the humans in WALL-E and
not developers, we only have one option. That's to stock up on the last good
developer MacBooks (up to 2015) and spare motherboards. Once those give out or
become too incompatible, load them with linux, or switch to better machines
from other companies who still care about developers.

I guess the era of MacBooks being the choice for professionals is over.
However, I guess all good things like this have to end sometime.

------
retreatguru
This is so funny. I just boxed mine up and shipped it via UPS back to apple
not 5 minutes ago and was thinking to post something here on hacker news!

I did not like the touch bar for programming. Maybe when my ide supports the
touch bar it will be better. But the clincher was the poor battery life.

I've been a mac user since the mac plus days. First time I retuned one.

~~~
lobster_johnson
Same here. Wrote about the experience here:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13098257](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13098257).

tl;dr: Touch bar is in the way, and provides near-zero utility; at best, it's
a distracting visual element for touch-typists. Other than that, the new
features are not worth the hassle/price. The only feature I really do like is
the fingerprint reader.

------
Spooky23
We get it, honestly. Enough with the dramatic MacBook articles.

There are literally thousands of laptops out there. Buy one.

~~~
scott_karana
There's a large captive audience who only wants to run Mac OS "properly", so
their only option is to complain loudly and hope Apple listens for the next
model.

------
soulhakr
so... long story short, a guy who repeatedly states that he was used to using
his MacBook Air and has used that and it's form factor and utility for five
years doesn't like the the new MacBook Pro - which is a differently-styled
product targeted at a different audience. Now this is not to say that he
doesn't have some (read: several) objectively valid points. ( __ _cough_
__battery-life __ _cough_ __) but it seems that chunks of his user experience
might have been improved by choosing a product marketed as being a little
closer to his most recent previous experience.

------
willtim
These machines are unfortunately already obsolete (relative to their premium
price) now that Intel Kaby Lake machines are starting to appear. Kaby Lake
offers significant battery life improvements over Skylake.

------
daveheq
What developer uses an 11" screen? Are you serious?

~~~
majewsky
Free business idea: Notebooks with tiny screens... that come with zooming
glasses. :)

------
caconym_
> Maybe it would work better as a neat gimmick in the 12" MacBook.

Please no, my 12" Macbook is the best development machine I've ever owned.

~~~
csiegert
I chuckled at your defensive reaction. Apple’s TouchBar has such a bad
reputation that people genuinely fear it will spread to their beloved Mac
models.

------
calebm
Thanks for this review. The data is enlightening.

------
wodenokoto
I hadn't thought about this until I read this article, but what do you use the
FN-key for when there are no function keys?

------
Arkaad
About the battery issue, couldn't he buy an extra battery? That wouldn't be
too cumbersome.

------
vladimir-y
Someone has to make Apple great again.

------
antfarm
I wish Apple had figured out a good way to make the MBP touch pad double as a
touch screen.

------
dreamfactory2
> I nearly lost it when my laptop was under 10% battery remaining after only
> three hours of use. ... With my older 11" MacBook Air, I was used to 3-4
> hour battery life

does not compute

------
therealmarv
Would love to see the i7 Macbook Air 2013 also in the benchmarks (mainly
because this is my laptop too ;) Very interesting review for me.

~~~
geerlingguy
I still have it... might be able to do a test run.

------
hellothree23
best part of the whole article what how you named it the "Function Key Pro"

hahaha, gold.

------
chrisseaton
> I use a Mac as my daily driver

What does the author mean by 'daily driver'?

~~~
geerlingguy
Sorry about that, I try to use idioms that are a little more widespread, but
outside of car culture, you might not hear the term that often. It basically
means 'the computer I use for day-to-day work' (see this for example:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/nexus4/comments/2b7pm5/what_does_da...](https://www.reddit.com/r/nexus4/comments/2b7pm5/what_does_daily_driver_mean_exactly/)).

It would be opposed to an exotic car or computer I'd use only in certain
special circumstances (like the Raspberry Pis I use for testing cluster
configurations, at www.pidramble.com).

~~~
pyrophane
I really only ever hear the term from the tech press. Those folks might have 5
phones and 3 laptops sitting on their desk at any given time, so the term
"daily driver" makes sense to describe the one they actually use. For the rest
of us, we just have "a laptop" and "a phone."

------
muninn_
I don't understand why people are still going on about this

~~~
ebbv
There's several obvious reasons:

1\. Every time someone brings this up other people say "It's fine." and it
really isn't fine.

2\. We want Apple to hear that their core customers are unhappy and they
should rethink the current course for their hardware.

I love Apple computers but they currently don't provide a serious upgrade
option for my 2012 15" rMBP. The 2016 15" is a joke by comparison.

~~~
zimpenfish
> their core customers are unhappy

I honestly don't think HN posters (nor bloggers) are anywhere near Apple's
"core customers" \- that's the millions of people who just want something
workable from a shop they trust, not a few thousand (being optimistic) forum
posters and bloggers.

e.g. After 5 days, it was already crushing the competition and approaching 18
months of Macbook 2015 sales.

[https://www.cnet.com/uk/news/apple-macbook-pro-sales-
already...](https://www.cnet.com/uk/news/apple-macbook-pro-sales-already-set-
to-surpass-2015-macbook/)

~~~
ebbv
Developers are the core customers for MacBook Pros. In volume the Air used to
be the top seller, because yes there are more people who just want "a
computer" that works and don't care about specs and won't look at battery
life, etc. before buying.

But do you know what those people base their purchasing decisions on? The
recommendations of the developers and engineers they know who do care about
those specs.

I can't tell you how many people have moved over to Apple computers on my
recommendations over the years. It's a lot. Right now I have a hard time
recommending the 2016 models. If people can get a refurbished 2015 on the
cheap I honestly think it's a better choice.

> After 5 days, it was already crushing the competition and approaching 18
> months of Macbook 2015 sales.

This statistic is very popular but it's also extremely misleading. Everybody
knew the lineup was due for a refresh so 2015 sales were lagging because of
that, the higher numbers represent a dam of pent up purchases waiting for
upgrades bursting. It's like pointing out that the number of people
complaining about the 2016 models is way higher than the people complaining
about the 2015 models. Of course it is. That doesn't tell the whole story and
is somewhat misleading on its own.

My point is just because initial sales of the 2016 models is high, doesn't
mean that it will stay that way. Once they get into people's hands and people
find out "Oh the battery life is terrible and I really don't like the
TouchBar." those sales may plummet (if that indeed is people's reaction.)

Apple needs to really re-examine. The current 13" and 15" MBP models should be
the base "MacBook" models, and they should come out with a serious pro machine
and label it as such (which restores MagSafe and has higher battery life.) The
TouchBar should just be thrown off a bridge. It's a terrible gimmicky attempt
at stuffing a touch screen onto a laptop.

~~~
zimpenfish
> The recommendations of the developers and engineers they know who do care
> about those specs.

None of the non-technical people I know (and I'll admit that's a small number)
who buy Apple kit do not take recommendations from developers and engineers
because they're non-technical people - they don't read HN or tech blogs. They
look at things like Which? reviews or BBC think pieces or that glossy insert
that comes with the Sunday paper.

Or they go into an Apple store where they can touch the machines, use them for
browsing the web, get answers to their questions (ok, bit slow at peak times)
vs something like a PC World where you can't use the machine or they don't
have that particular model in stock despite it being on display or there's no-
one around to answer your question or you can't tell which particular
constellation of stickers on the laptop means it'll work for you or ...

> Apple needs to [...]

People have been saying this since 2005. They're still here, printing money.
_shrug_

------
rado
You hate the Touch Bar, even though the MacBook is closed most of the time?
Strange.

------
nailer
The 'Touch Bar' is a plainly stopgap measure that only exists because Apple is
delaying the painful transition to touch in OS X.

Microsoft underwent that pain early in Windows 8 and the first few not-
particularly-good Surface devices, and (with Windows 10 and the SP4) is there
now.

~~~
gst
> The 'Touch Bar' is a plainly stopgap measure that only exists because Apple
> is delaying the painful transition to touch in OS X.

The transition to touch already happened with iOS. Apple still needs to keep
macOS alive for a few legacy use-cases, but the long-term strategy is probably
to move the remaining applications over to iOS, instead of converting macOS to
iOS.

~~~
coldtea
People keep saying that, as if it means something.

Some huge breakthrough in CPU power and technology aside, including changes to
the laws of physics and basic ergonomics, we are not going to be doing
desktopy-style work on iOS style devices -- unless they get the ability to
drive large 4K+ monitors, connect to multiple peripherals at once, talk to
disk drives, etc.

And even that would require hooking them with keyboards, stands etc for
comfortable working.

People care for laptops/desktops for all the OTHER work and usage patterns
that are not good fit for iOS/iDevice form factors.

~~~
TorKlingberg
> drive large 4K+ monitors

Driving 4K screens from a tablet isn't that far off. It depends what you want
to show on them of course, but just outputting 4K isn't that hard.

> connect to multiple peripherals at once

You're not supposed to have peripherals any more. Your touch screen, the
cloud, and that's it. If necessary, hardware devices now connect to the cloud
directly (while joining a botnet).

> talk to disk drives

You're supposed to buy more iCloud storage and have an infinite throughput
connection.

~~~
coldtea
> _You 're not supposed to have peripherals any more. Your touch screen, the
> cloud, and that's it. If necessary, hardware devices now connect to the
> cloud directly (while joining a botnet)._

As I wrote, work that people can do with tablets, which fits with the above,
they already do. But people care for desktops/laptops for all the other work
you can't do without "peripherals", and with just "the cloud and that's it".

If we all just used web apps nobody would have cared for a desktop that much.

Besides, last time I've checked, the speed of light, which provides the lower
limit for latency, is not changing anytime soon.

> _You 're supposed to buy more iCloud storage and have an infinite throughput
> connection._

A, I get it, it's a mockery of some supposed Apple idea. I don't think they
are to that. If anything Google, with the Google office suite, Google run-
everything-within-Chrome chromebooks etc is.

Apple is not really about convergence on the iOS -- they get the different
uses cases for PC vs tablet-phone form factors and have made several
statements to that effect -- they just don't care that much for the former.

~~~
gst
> But people care for desktops/laptops for all the other work you can't do
> without "peripherals", and with just "the cloud and that's it".

I don't disagree. But is that market large enough for Apple to care about?
Apple is pretty focused with its product line and it might not make sense for
them to continue investing into the desktop market.

~~~
coldtea
Well, let's ensure their mobile offerings don't end that well then. It worked
for Microsoft.

------
Gorbzel
As Steve famously said, if you don't want a tbMBP, don't buy it. If you buy
one and you don't like it, take it back.

Since that is/always has been the working approach, any chance the HN hive-
mind could avoid posting EVERY single MBP->other laptop or macOS->*nix
article?

~~~
mikeash
OK, sure. What else do you suggest I buy?

When the best available product is no longer available, I don't think the
"just don't buy it" approach is really a good response.

(Full disclosure, I think the new MPB looks pretty decent, but for those who
don't like it there's often no good alternative now.)

~~~
Gorbzel
So, I reject the premise of your question & the groupthink, namely that the
best product "is no longer available." Just like every other Revision A 
product, people are considering the tradeoffs vs whether they still want to be
on the platform ("If you don't like the iPhone 4..." ). Cupertino also likely
needs to fix some bugs.

Since that's a normal part of life I'd fully agree if this were the first
time, but this is the 15th take or so on the tbMBP since it came out. Simply
going by my history, people seem to like the XPS 13 Developer edition,
machines from System76, the Thinkpad T460, as well as mentioning the Surface
Book and/or Studio in every article as incontrovertible proof that Apple is
doomed. Full disclaimer that YMMV, as ultimately, buying a machine is a
subjective decision that will always have tradeoffs (this stunningly
controversial take was flagged last time).

Perhaps, just maybe, people who chime in "I find this article useful" could do
the rest of the community who doesn't think Apple is dying on a daily basis a
favor and do a search when they're in the market for a new laptop. But now
we're just degrading into basic forum etiquette, a tale as old as time...

~~~
mikeash
If you understand that buying a machine is a subjective decision, then you
should also realize that you can't reject the premise that the best product is
no longer available, because "the best product" is likewise subjective.

A lot of people saw the old MBP as the best out there, and now it's gone, and
that upsets them. "Buy something else" is not a good response to that.

------
omfg
He says the only thing he wants is a better keyboard and retina display.

So he wants the 12" MacBook which has been out for over a year now... Why did
he even buy the new 13" MBP in the first place?

~~~
geerlingguy
Because the brand new MacBook is still slower than my 3-year-old i7 Air. I'm a
developer, and I need speed still, too. If Apple could fit a competent i5 or
i7 in the MacBook form factor, I'd be all in.

~~~
bananadonkey
I switched to the 2nd gen m5 Macbook from the '13 rMBP 13", and would argue
the m5 is surprisingly more than capable.

Granted it's not as fast on paper or benchmarks, but it's so capable I am
having a hard time trying to justify my next purchase (not enough screen real
estate in rarer circumstances: Chrome DevTools alongside the browser window is
impossible, OmniGraffle and other apps can feel cramped at times).

The machine did feel a little slower than the i5 when I first started using it
but nothing obnoxious.

Context: As a devops guy I regularly build large RPMs, run grunt against a
huge codebase, compile packages from source, and all the while with Docker
running OpenShift and a bunch of LEMP apps in the background.

------
thinkMOAR
Reads to me that,

You did not simply went to an apple store and tried it before you bought it?
You could have saved yourself a purchase & return and the internet a review of
which there are already uncountable amounts.

Also you write you build enterprise grade products, but you cannot find
alternative tools for covering that last 5 percent? Reads a bit strange. You
can come up with clever solutions for enterprise stuff, but you can't properly
get tools on linux to do what you need to do?

Soldered-in-everything.. vs "I wish Apple made enterprise SSD controllers for
my database servers—who needs RAM when disk I/O is so fast?!" make up your
mind please.

~~~
calvinlh
For him, the kicker was the battery life. How do you test battery life in the
Apple store? You're not allowed to unplug the thing. (And even if you could,
who's going to spend several hours there to assess the battery life?)

You also speak as if fast SSDs and replaceability are mutually exclusive.
They're not—check out the specs of the Samsung 960 Pro: 3.5 GB/s read, 2.1
GB/s write.

