ATP

00:00:00 ◼   ► It's real and it's spectacular.

00:00:02 ◼   ► [Laughter]

00:00:04 ◼   ► I should probably watch "Leinfeld" at some point, shouldn't I?

00:00:07 ◼   ► No, you've heard all the lines.

00:00:08 ◼   ► Yeah, I know. I've effectively seen it from having heard all the lines.

00:00:12 ◼   ► [Laughter]

00:00:13 ◼   ► I can't decide if I want to, like, give Marco a chance to, like, talk about it and then do follow-up.

00:00:18 ◼   ► No, don't give Marco a chance to talk about it. That's the worst thing you can do.

00:00:21 ◼   ► [Laughter]

00:00:24 ◼   ► Don't worry, Marco will talk about it.

00:00:25 ◼   ► Yeah, fair, fair, fair. All right.

00:00:27 ◼   ► So, obviously we have some important things to talk about,

00:00:30 ◼   ► so let's just start by talking about the most important thing right at the top of the show.

00:00:34 ◼   ► The Holiday Store is still open, ladies and gentlemen.

00:00:37 ◼   ► [Laughter]

00:00:38 ◼   ► We've got to get through the important stuff first.

00:00:40 ◼   ► Shameless plug.

00:00:41 ◼   ► Yeah, of course, of course. This is how the professionals do it.

00:00:44 ◼   ► So, the ATP Holiday Store is still open. It will be for just a few more days.

00:00:50 ◼   ► If you're one of those people who thinks, "Oh, I've still got time. I've still got time," you don't still have time.

00:00:55 ◼   ► As this is being released, it is lucky number 13 of November,

00:00:59 ◼   ► you have until the 17th, which is this upcoming Sunday,

00:01:03 ◼   ► to do whatever purchasing you want to do so that you can make all your friends and family happy

00:01:08 ◼   ► with their sweet new ATP t-shirts and other merch.

00:01:11 ◼   ► So, ATP.fm/store. Please, if you're interested at all, please check it out.

00:01:17 ◼   ► We have some great shirts, some great hoodies, a great hat, some great pins, all the great merch.

00:01:23 ◼   ► ATP.fm/store.

00:01:25 ◼   ► Of course, you were kidding about the big announcement. Obviously, the big announcement today is the slightly more refined release date for the Mac Pro,

00:01:33 ◼   ► which is now, say it with me, everybody.

00:01:35 ◼   ► Make AirPods with your fingers when you say it. Ready? Mac Pro coming December.

00:01:41 ◼   ► All right, moving on. iOS 13.2.2 is now out.

00:01:49 ◼   ► Super important.

00:01:50 ◼   ► Multitasking issues solved? I did not see the issues quite as badly as many, many, many other people did,

00:01:59 ◼   ► but it seems that maybe this is better now? Marco, I think you were hitting this the most both from a user and a developer perspective.

00:02:08 ◼   ► How has 13.2.2 been for you?

00:02:10 ◼   ► I actually was not hitting it much as a user, but I heard from all of them because my app is one of the apps that,

00:02:18 ◼   ► if it gets killed in the background, it has a negative effect.

00:02:21 ◼   ► The main issue people were seeing was that if it got killed in the background, that it would no longer be the active app if you were paused,

00:02:28 ◼   ► and then you hit play, then it would default to the music app or whatever.

00:02:32 ◼   ► I would hear from all those people about that.

00:02:34 ◼   ► 13.2.2 was out, and the volume of those complaints that I've gotten has dropped substantially.

00:02:42 ◼   ► Apple specifically said they fixed multitasking issues with that, so it seems like they did.

00:02:49 ◼   ► I'm really happy that they got that out quickly because I was afraid I was going to have to wait until 13.3 was released,

00:02:54 ◼   ► and they got it out in a little point release.

00:02:56 ◼   ► Any new issues?

00:02:57 ◼   ► It seems like we have to ask that with every iOS 13 release.

00:02:59 ◼   ► Any new breaking you're out?

00:03:01 ◼   ► Not that I have heard about.

00:03:02 ◼   ► Knock on wood. Quickly, quickly.

00:03:04 ◼   ► Oh, man, I got some great news.

00:03:06 ◼   ► They quietly fixed the AirPlay 2 bugs I was running into in 13.1.

00:03:13 ◼   ► Oh, that's very exciting.

00:03:14 ◼   ► So I believe I now have what I need to build an AirPlay 2 engine.

00:03:19 ◼   ► I kind of brought back out my code that I wrote back in May that I had this huge roadblock of this bug, and I just couldn't proceed.

00:03:26 ◼   ► It works perfectly now.

00:03:28 ◼   ► Oh, that's excellent.

00:03:29 ◼   ► I'm very tentatively excited to finally build out my AirPlay 2 and Voice Boost 2 engines.

00:03:36 ◼   ► I have actually some promise in Overcast development land for the first time in months.

00:03:41 ◼   ► That's very exciting.

00:03:43 ◼   ► If only you had a computer with which you could take to the beach and do it on.

00:03:47 ◼   ► Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. I'm so excited.

00:03:49 ◼   ► Wouldn't that be nice?

00:03:50 ◼   ► I'm so excited.

00:03:51 ◼   ► Before we get too excited and talk about happy things, I need to be Debbie Downer for a moment.

00:03:54 ◼   ► Oh.

00:03:55 ◼   ► I know. I'm sorry.

00:03:56 ◼   ► I would like to know, and this probably sounds sarcastic, but I really mean it.

00:04:00 ◼   ► I would like to know if people, probably not you guys because I would have heard about it, but people in general have had a similar problem to me.

00:04:06 ◼   ► So on my beloved iMac, which is convincing me in ever different ways with each passing day why I need to replace it, but be that as it may,

00:04:15 ◼   ► when I upgraded to Catalina a little over a week ago, it was after my Walt Disney World trip, I got home and I was home for a couple of days,

00:04:22 ◼   ► and I thought, well, Catalina's been pretty good on the MacBook.

00:04:24 ◼   ► I haven't heard of many issues after the first few days, so, well, yeah, why don't I go ahead and upgrade?

00:04:29 ◼   ► And I upgraded in place on the Mojave install I had only done but like two or three weeks prior,

00:04:35 ◼   ► and since then, intermittently, I have been having the weirdest issues with my iMac,

00:04:44 ◼   ► and I think it's software for a couple of reasons, not the least of which is that it happened after I went to Catalina, as the best I can tell.

00:04:52 ◼   ► But the behavior I'm seeing, the symptom I'm seeing, is that often, but not always, I will have extreme lag with my mouse.

00:05:02 ◼   ► Now this is applicable with my Magic Mouse, it's applicable with my Magic Touchpad, or trackpad, whatever the heck it's called.

00:05:09 ◼   ► But what's most interesting is this Magic trackpad, it does the like faux clicks, you know what I mean,

00:05:15 ◼   ► like they have for the last few years, where the click is just something that's firing internally, it's like a taptic engine or what have you,

00:05:21 ◼   ► it's not a physical click of the glass. Well, what I've had happen to me on numerous times, which is both hilarious and also depressing,

00:05:29 ◼   ► is I'll go mousing around and try to click, and click, and click, and click, and click, wondering if anything is happening behind the scenes,

00:05:36 ◼   ► and then I'll realize what's happening, and I'll wait for like, I don't know, two to five seconds,

00:05:41 ◼   ► and then I'll give you one guess what this Magic trackpad finally decides to start doing. Clicking.

00:05:46 ◼   ► So, what I'm doing is I'm mashing on glass that's not moving, there's no click whatsoever, mash, mash, mash, mash, mash, mash, mash, mash,

00:05:52 ◼   ► and then I wait three or four seconds, and it's like a friggin' machine gun is attached to my desk, and it goes brrrrrt, and fires all those clicks.

00:05:58 ◼   ► That had been queuing up in the background. So, I am the only person I'm aware of that has had these sorts of problems,

00:06:05 ◼   ► and I wanna, I was kind of hoping that a Catalina update would come soon, since all these updates seem to be happening on an hourly basis,

00:06:13 ◼   ► and it would magically make my problems go away, but I'm almost wondering, especially since this build, you know, this OS installation is only a few weeks old now,

00:06:21 ◼   ► and I've done so many OS reinstallations over the last two months that I'm getting really good at it, it's like Windows all over again.

00:06:27 ◼   ► I almost wonder if I should wipe the iMac and bring it back to Mojave for, you know, a more extended length of time,

00:06:34 ◼   ► and see if that fixes the problem, but I don't, this is more for the audience than it is for the two of you guys,

00:06:40 ◼   ► but since you're here, any thoughts, advice, input, anything?

00:06:44 ◼   ► This sounds like it's like a firmware level type issue, 'cause like, the fact that the trackpad was not responding with the physical click sensation,

00:06:52 ◼   ► I don't even think that, that probably doesn't even get to the OS. Like, I'm guessing this is a lower level issue.

00:06:58 ◼   ► Normally I would love to throw, you know, Apple's recent software releases under the bus here, but your iMac has been weird for a while, so I think it's probably your iMac.

00:07:07 ◼   ► Eh, could be. Jon, thoughts?

00:07:09 ◼   ► I have not seen that one before, and I have the same question as Marco, exactly where, I don't know what the input path is,

00:07:15 ◼   ► you know, what thing decides to fire the little engine, does it go all the way back to the computer?

00:07:18 ◼   ► My guess would have been the opposite to Marco, that it goes all the way back to the computer, but I don't actually know.

00:07:21 ◼   ► I think it does too.

00:07:22 ◼   ► I don't actually know though, so I, you got me.

00:07:25 ◼   ► I don't know either, but the reason I think it goes back to the computer is because, you know, when you do like a force click, that occasionally has, it makes a difference, occasionally it doesn't, I believe.

00:07:35 ◼   ► Second of all, you should have force clicked disabled. Second of all, I don't think it does go back to the computer because you can click it before it has paired via Bluetooth.

00:07:42 ◼   ► Uh, interesting, okay, okay, I'll allow it. That is interesting, I hadn't considered that.

00:07:47 ◼   ► Huh, well, it's worth, it's worth keeping an eye out.

00:07:50 ◼   ► So anyway, so if you have had or heard about anything like this, please do tweet at me, I'd be curious to hear.

00:07:55 ◼   ► Or if you happen to be like a Mac technical specialist person, then, and you have a magical fix, I'd love to hear it,

00:08:02 ◼   ► because I'm very confused and I'm, even though it's become fairly quick for me to reload this, you know, OS from scratch, I'd rather not.

00:08:09 ◼   ► So, uh, do let me know please.

00:08:10 ◼   ► Well, the good thing is, if you need to take that thing to the Apple Store, it's way easier to carry than your iMac.

00:08:15 ◼   ► I'm talking about my iMac, not my MacBook.

00:08:17 ◼   ► No, the, the trackpad.

00:08:19 ◼   ► Oh, no, it's happening, it's happening with like all input, with like keyboard input, it's happening with the mouse.

00:08:25 ◼   ► Well, I mean, but we were just talking about the trackpad firing up the series of clicks or whatever.

00:08:28 ◼   ► I understand that the lag is happening. When do you ever get to like, you know, you've got those friggin' things in your menu bar showing you, are the CPUs pegged?

00:08:36 ◼   ► Like, do you have activity monitor open of, you know, something?

00:08:39 ◼   ► I understand what you're saying, I have not noticed anything.

00:08:42 ◼   ► But I should also mention, I don't think I stated this earlier, that the mouse cursor itself will also refresh at like a couple of hertz.

00:08:49 ◼   ► You know, as opposed to like a full 60 hertz or whatever the normal is, it's going like, you know, it'll, it'll start to slow down,

00:08:55 ◼   ► and then it'll jump halfway across the screen, jump back halfway across the screen, and it is clearly in the, in reaction to the mousing that I'm doing.

00:09:02 ◼   ► But it's doing so, it's such a horrendous refresh rate and, and just with incredible latency.

00:09:08 ◼   ► And so, I, I'm kind of really confused why this would be happening, and, and my gut tells me it's software based on almost zero facts.

00:09:16 ◼   ► And, and in no small part because I really just don't want to replace the iMac yet.

00:09:21 ◼   ► I just want an iMac Pro refresh, and then I'll probably pull the trigger.

00:09:24 ◼   ► Because it's your iMac, I keep thinking, like, one of the things that can cause, that historically on Macs has caused, you know, things like stutter of cursors is getting swamped with IO, or other IO-related issues or errors.

00:09:36 ◼   ► Agreed, agreed, that is what it feels like.

00:09:38 ◼   ► And, you know, shouldn't really happen in normal circumstances, but if your SSD is throwing errors or something, or if there's some process grinding away at it or something, I don't know.

00:09:48 ◼   ► That's a good point. I didn't think about my SSD, which is already, yeah, it is haunted.

00:09:52 ◼   ► You don't even know that meme because you don't play video games.

00:09:54 ◼   ► Alright, so I'll keep an eye out. Maybe, maybe I'll do some disk utility repairs and then cry when it tells me they're all wrong.

00:10:02 ◼   ► Alright, so I guess we should probably move on to the main topic.

00:10:07 ◼   ► And, you know, Marco had talked about how he didn't want to talk about the Apple Card, so should we talk about that first?

00:10:12 ◼   ► We should not, God.

00:10:14 ◼   ► I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding.

00:10:15 ◼   ► You're killing me.

00:10:16 ◼   ► So, Marco, I guess we should talk about where you went and what you did and what you have in your possession.

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00:12:00 ◼   ► So, I have finally the 16" MacBook Pro.

00:12:09 ◼   ► It's real.

00:12:10 ◼   ► It's so awesome.

00:12:12 ◼   ► I don't even know where to start.

00:12:14 ◼   ► So Apple was holding briefings.

00:12:17 ◼   ► I attended one of these briefings and I have a review unit here.

00:12:20 ◼   ► As we record this, I've had it for about half a day.

00:12:25 ◼   ► Consider this initial impressions, first impressions after half day use.

00:12:29 ◼   ► There was a presentation that was fully on the record done by Shruti Haldia,

00:12:36 ◼   ► who is the MacBook Pro product manager.

00:12:39 ◼   ► It was kind of like a little keynote for groups of journalists.

00:12:42 ◼   ► I've got to say, it was really well done.

00:12:45 ◼   ► I kind of think it's a shame that they didn't do this publicly,

00:12:50 ◼   ► because if they would have done this presentation publicly,

00:12:53 ◼   ► it would have gotten such massive applause for the things that it addressed and how it addressed them.

00:13:00 ◼   ► I think this is a really big deal.

00:13:02 ◼   ► So I just wanted to quickly throw out there, Shruti Haldia did a really good job presenting it.

00:13:06 ◼   ► They started out, she said, they asked what do Pro customers want.

00:13:12 ◼   ► People who buy the 15" MacBook Pro, which is their most popular Pro product,

00:13:17 ◼   ► which I'm not surprised to hear that, but that's good to know.

00:13:21 ◼   ► So she said people want a larger display, fast performance, the biggest battery possible,

00:13:27 ◼   ► "the best notebook keyboard ever, massive amounts of storage, and an awesome sound system."

00:13:34 ◼   ► And of course, then went through and she went through each of those points

00:13:38 ◼   ► and just how they delivered on that with the 16".

00:13:42 ◼   ► Almost everything I believe that was rumored about this machine ended up being true.

00:13:47 ◼   ► And that's a very good thing.

00:13:49 ◼   ► So start out, obviously, the screen, it is 16".

00:13:53 ◼   ► Now the last one I believe was 15.4 so it's not like a whole inch increase.

00:13:57 ◼   ► You do notice it, it seems bigger, the margin seems slimmer.

00:14:00 ◼   ► The footprint of the machine has only grown a little tiny bit, like barely grown at all.

00:14:06 ◼   ► And the weight is up from 4.3 to 4.3 pounds.

00:14:10 ◼   ► It's got like a millimeter thicker.

00:14:12 ◼   ► But if you're looking at this thing on a table, they had a hands-on afterwards

00:14:16 ◼   ► and they had it next to their older machines also, if you compare.

00:14:20 ◼   ► At a glance, it just looks like a 15" MacBook Pro.

00:14:23 ◼   ► And you start using it and you pick it up and it just feels like a 15" MacBook Pro.

00:14:27 ◼   ► This doesn't feel like a bigger machine, even though it technically is a little bit bigger.

00:14:31 ◼   ► But it just kind of looks and feels just like the size we've had for a while now.

00:14:35 ◼   ► And in fact, there were parts where I was looking at different ones on the table

00:14:39 ◼   ► and I had to look at the inverted T arrow keys.

00:14:43 ◼   ► - Oh yeah!

00:14:45 ◼   ► - I had to look at the arrow keys to know whether it was this model or not.

00:14:48 ◼   ► In some cases.

00:14:50 ◼   ► Like that's how similar the overall package looks to what we've had.

00:14:54 ◼   ► - Did they tell you where the 0.3 pounds went?

00:14:57 ◼   ► Obviously they shaved a little weight making those arrow keys smaller.

00:15:00 ◼   ► And the screen, I mean the screen is a little bit bigger, but the glass is the same size, right?

00:15:06 ◼   ► So 0.3 pounds, I'm hoping it all went into battery, but did they make that pitch?

00:15:10 ◼   ► - They did.

00:15:11 ◼   ► So the 2015 generation, that one, the battery size slowly increased on that one.

00:15:16 ◼   ► The actual model year 2015, which I considered the best one ever,

00:15:20 ◼   ► that had a 99.5 watt hour battery.

00:15:24 ◼   ► And actually they described this in the presentation that the FAA in the US

00:15:30 ◼   ► limits the size of carry-on batteries for planes to 100 watt hours.

00:15:35 ◼   ► They were at 99.5.

00:15:37 ◼   ► They went almost right up to that and didn't cross that because if you have a battery that big

00:15:41 ◼   ► you gotta check it in your bag and nobody wants to check their laptop.

00:15:44 ◼   ► The previous generation, the 2016, you know the first touch bar generation,

00:15:47 ◼   ► actually dropped the battery capacity down to somewhere around like 80 or 76, something like that.

00:15:53 ◼   ► And I think they've tweaked it a little bit over time here, like in the revisions since then.

00:15:56 ◼   ► So the previous one was 84 watt hour.

00:16:00 ◼   ► The 2019 revision, 84 watt hour.

00:16:03 ◼   ► They have now brought it back up to exactly 100.

00:16:06 ◼   ► So they said it's the largest battery ever in a Mac notebook, which is true by 0.5 watt hours,

00:16:12 ◼   ► but it's true.

00:16:15 ◼   ► So I would say that seems like where most of the weight has gone.

00:16:19 ◼   ► To increase the battery size by whatever that is, about 20%,

00:16:24 ◼   ► that's probably where most of it goes because batteries are really heavy.

00:16:27 ◼   ► The quota battery life, I haven't had time to really get an idea of how good the battery life is.

00:16:31 ◼   ► The quota battery life has gone from 10 to 11 hours.

00:16:34 ◼   ► - They cranked it to 11.

00:16:36 ◼   ► - Yeah, and the processors are all the same that we got earlier this year.

00:16:39 ◼   ► Intel hasn't released new CPUs yet.

00:16:41 ◼   ► So the CPUs are all the same ones.

00:16:43 ◼   ► The six and eight core, i7 and i9s, the ninth generation ones.

00:16:48 ◼   ► The GPUs are new.

00:16:50 ◼   ► I don't know anything about GPUs, so I can't really tell you.

00:16:53 ◼   ► But the GPUs are new.

00:16:54 ◼   ► The Radeon Pro 5000M series, seven nanometers.

00:16:59 ◼   ► They have a lot of really cool sounding specs that I can't really describe why they're good.

00:17:03 ◼   ► So they're new, and that's good.

00:17:06 ◼   ► - Do you know if the previous GPUs were also seven nanometer,

00:17:08 ◼   ► or do they make a pitch for these GPUs being more power efficient?

00:17:11 ◼   ► - You know, I don't know.

00:17:12 ◼   ► I mean, it's a new series of GPUs from ATI, or AMD, rather.

00:17:15 ◼   ► So I don't really know how much better.

00:17:18 ◼   ► I don't follow GPUs. I don't follow that world at all.

00:17:20 ◼   ► - I'm also just thinking how much is it gonna eat your battery.

00:17:23 ◼   ► You mentioned seven nanometers, and I don't recall if the last ones were seven.

00:17:26 ◼   ► So if these are seven, that bodes well for battery life.

00:17:29 ◼   ► - Yeah, I mean, they might have been.

00:17:30 ◼   ► But it is pretty good.

00:17:31 ◼   ► Again, we've talked before about trying to update individual components

00:17:35 ◼   ► rather than waiting as things age.

00:17:37 ◼   ► And they've done that with GPUs.

00:17:39 ◼   ► Like, there was, we forgot, like, there was a 15 inch and 13 inch update in,

00:17:45 ◼   ► what was that, about May that they did the update before?

00:17:48 ◼   ► So like, there was already an update, like, six months ago to these machines.

00:17:52 ◼   ► So this is same CPUs, new GPUs.

00:17:55 ◼   ► And again, it's only 'cause it's Intel's fault that they don't have new CPUs as well.

00:17:59 ◼   ► I would guess the battery life is, you know, you have the same CPU,

00:18:03 ◼   ► probably a similar power envelope GPU, and a 20% ish bigger battery.

00:18:08 ◼   ► So that's probably where that comes from.

00:18:10 ◼   ► The power adapter is up to 96 watts instead of 87 watts.

00:18:14 ◼   ► Same size, though?

00:18:15 ◼   ► - That's a little annoying.

00:18:17 ◼   ► It's only annoying in the most ridiculous way.

00:18:19 ◼   ► When I bought a second power adapter for my MacBook,

00:18:23 ◼   ► I got the biggest USB-C power adapter I could,

00:18:26 ◼   ► the one for, like, the 15 inch at the time,

00:18:28 ◼   ► thinking, oh, maybe one day I will have a big boy again,

00:18:31 ◼   ► and I wanna just have, yeah, I don't wanna have to basically throw away

00:18:35 ◼   ► my existing power supply.

00:18:37 ◼   ► - You don't. You don't have to.

00:18:39 ◼   ► - Well, you know what I mean.

00:18:40 ◼   ► - That's only for, like, delivering maximum peak power,

00:18:43 ◼   ► if you're, like, rendering a video, a final cut.

00:18:45 ◼   ► Like, that's when you need all that power.

00:18:47 ◼   ► When you're sitting around, like, even doing coding,

00:18:49 ◼   ► like, I will almost always be traveling with a power brick

00:18:54 ◼   ► that's from some third party that is small and light,

00:18:57 ◼   ► that is nowhere near the full, like, previously,

00:18:59 ◼   ► my previous laptop was 60 watts,

00:19:01 ◼   ► and I would travel with a 45 watt brick,

00:19:03 ◼   ► because it was super small and it was fine.

00:19:05 ◼   ► And you hardly ever actually need that peak power,

00:19:09 ◼   ► so, like, if it's, like, your secondary one,

00:19:11 ◼   ► or your travel one, or whatever, like,

00:19:13 ◼   ► as long as you're not, like, rendering final cut

00:19:16 ◼   ► or playing high end games,

00:19:18 ◼   ► you don't need all that power all the time.

00:19:20 ◼   ► Like, you could get away easily with one of these machines,

00:19:22 ◼   ► probably with a 60 watt adapter most of the time,

00:19:24 ◼   ► and you'd be fine.

00:19:25 ◼   ► - Yeah, and that's fair, but you also forget

00:19:27 ◼   ► that I write exclusively in Swift,

00:19:29 ◼   ► so I know all the power I can get.

00:19:31 ◼   ► - Yeah, right.

00:19:32 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:19:33 ◼   ► Fair point.

00:19:34 ◼   ► - No, all kidding aside, though,

00:19:36 ◼   ► it is pretty nice that they have put so much power into,

00:19:39 ◼   ► like, battery and electricity power.

00:19:41 ◼   ► We will talk about, you know,

00:19:42 ◼   ► whether or not it's a fast processor and so on,

00:19:44 ◼   ► but it is nice to see all that power

00:19:47 ◼   ► and to see that battery life is such a big priority,

00:19:49 ◼   ► and to the point that they're willing

00:19:50 ◼   ► to make something heavier,

00:19:51 ◼   ► which, as we discussed a couple of months ago,

00:19:53 ◼   ► I can think around iPhone time,

00:19:55 ◼   ► we had all kind of thought that things never got bigger

00:19:57 ◼   ► and never got heavier,

00:19:58 ◼   ► and this computer is both bigger and heavier,

00:20:00 ◼   ► and I think for good reason, so that's kind of exciting.

00:20:02 ◼   ► - Yeah, like, it seemed like, I think so far,

00:20:04 ◼   ► and again, it's been not that much time yet,

00:20:06 ◼   ► but I think they spent that additional budget well.

00:20:09 ◼   ► Like, it's always a trade-off, you know,

00:20:11 ◼   ► everybody wants them to be thin and light,

00:20:13 ◼   ► and everyone complains like crazy

00:20:14 ◼   ► that their laptops are too heavy,

00:20:15 ◼   ► even though, like, they'll put, like, a four pound laptop

00:20:18 ◼   ► into an otherwise 16 pound bag

00:20:20 ◼   ► that has all sorts of crap they don't need to carry,

00:20:22 ◼   ► and they're like, "Oh, this laptop's too heavy."

00:20:24 ◼   ► It's like, "No, that's not the problem, like,

00:20:26 ◼   ► "empty your bag."

00:20:27 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:20:28 ◼   ► Anyway, or like, you know, you're an adult, who cares?

00:20:30 ◼   ► These things used to be 10 pounds, like, it's fine.

00:20:32 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:20:33 ◼   ► But anyway, so before I leave the CPU area,

00:20:36 ◼   ► they've also changed,

00:20:38 ◼   ► or they've improved the thermal architecture.

00:20:41 ◼   ► So they've made the heat sink bigger,

00:20:44 ◼   ► redesigned the heat pipe,

00:20:46 ◼   ► made the fans bigger and higher capacity,

00:20:48 ◼   ► and 20% better blades and all sorts of stuff.

00:20:51 ◼   ► So they said that they have raised the

00:20:54 ◼   ► sustained workload heat output level by 12 watts

00:20:57 ◼   ► of, like, how much the thermal system can cool.

00:21:00 ◼   ► It's now 12 watts higher.

00:21:01 ◼   ► I asked, I wasn't able to find out, like,

00:21:03 ◼   ► what it was before,

00:21:04 ◼   ► but I would estimate that before,

00:21:07 ◼   ► it was probably somewhere around maybe 80, 90 watts,

00:21:10 ◼   ► something like that,

00:21:11 ◼   ► so to be a little bit higher than that is pretty good.

00:21:13 ◼   ► - Real time follow up on the GPU,

00:21:15 ◼   ► as far as I can tell, in 20 seconds of Googling,

00:21:18 ◼   ► the previous GPUs were 14 nanometers,

00:21:20 ◼   ► so these being seven bodes well for power.

00:21:23 ◼   ► And I like the fact that the cooling is upgrading,

00:21:25 ◼   ► 'cause that's what I was talking about a couple shows ago,

00:21:27 ◼   ► the iMac pro-ification of this thing in one respect

00:21:30 ◼   ► in terms of, on the outside it looks the same,

00:21:33 ◼   ► and it's got the same CPU and, you know, an updated GPU,

00:21:36 ◼   ► but the experience of using it,

00:21:38 ◼   ► you know, how often are the things screaming?

00:21:39 ◼   ► How often are the CPUs throttling?

00:21:42 ◼   ► I'm not sure if you had a chance to test that,

00:21:43 ◼   ► but I'm sure people will.

00:21:44 ◼   ► Like, this is the upgraded sort of pro experience.

00:21:47 ◼   ► Even if the CPU is exactly the same,

00:21:49 ◼   ► if it is quieter and cooler and can run heavier loads

00:21:54 ◼   ► and has a bigger battery, that is a pro experience.

00:21:56 ◼   ► - Yeah, and like, I haven't spent really any time

00:21:58 ◼   ► with the 2019 previous 15 inch models,

00:22:01 ◼   ► like the ones that went six and eight core.

00:22:03 ◼   ► I spent very little time with those,

00:22:04 ◼   ► and so I don't really know how much the fans spun up on those.

00:22:08 ◼   ► But so far, in my testing of this so far,

00:22:12 ◼   ► which again, admittedly, is not like super heavy,

00:22:14 ◼   ► but I've heard the fans here and there

00:22:16 ◼   ► as I really push it or as Dropbox runs.

00:22:19 ◼   ► It seems so far to be very similar to the previous ones,

00:22:23 ◼   ► maybe a little bit more tame in the fan noise department.

00:22:26 ◼   ► So like, I haven't heard the fans very loudly

00:22:29 ◼   ► and I haven't heard them for very long.

00:22:31 ◼   ► And that includes doing things like my overcast build test,

00:22:34 ◼   ► which is like, you know, max out the CPUs for about a minute.

00:22:36 ◼   ► And it's, it doesn't, it was like barely registering for that.

00:22:40 ◼   ► So I think any time you heard the fans

00:22:43 ◼   ► on a recent MacBook Pro,

00:22:44 ◼   ► you will probably hear them here too,

00:22:46 ◼   ► but maybe a little bit quieter

00:22:47 ◼   ► and a little bit, for a little bit less time.

00:22:49 ◼   ► Before I leave the performance area,

00:22:51 ◼   ► I will say I did that test and again,

00:22:54 ◼   ► these are the same CPUs you've had for six months,

00:22:56 ◼   ► but I didn't have one.

00:22:57 ◼   ► So this was the maxed out 2.4 gigahertz i9 eight core,

00:23:01 ◼   ► and it builds overcast almost exactly

00:23:04 ◼   ► as fast as my 10 core iMac Pro.

00:23:07 ◼   ► - Wow.

00:23:08 ◼   ► - So 'cause the CPUs are, I believe,

00:23:10 ◼   ► one or two microarchitecture generations

00:23:13 ◼   ► ahead of the Xeons in the iMac Pro currently.

00:23:16 ◼   ► So, you know, this, again, this has been the case

00:23:18 ◼   ► for a little while now with these laptops,

00:23:20 ◼   ► but truly, like this, what they've made here

00:23:23 ◼   ► performance wise is in very many ways like a mini iMac Pro.

00:23:27 ◼   ► Or like a mini Mac Pro.

00:23:29 ◼   ► And in fact, they did a lot of demos

00:23:30 ◼   ► where they would do something on a new Mac Pro

00:23:33 ◼   ► and then do something very similar on the MacBook Pro.

00:23:36 ◼   ► Kind of do the same displays, like the same,

00:23:38 ◼   ► like they had a million of these Pro display XDRs

00:23:40 ◼   ► in this, in the demo rooms and everything.

00:23:42 ◼   ► And they were, you know, it was very similar

00:23:45 ◼   ► to that hands-on area at WVDC this year.

00:23:48 ◼   ► Where there's just Mac Pros and Pro display XDRs everywhere

00:23:51 ◼   ► and people doing really cool stuff

00:23:52 ◼   ► that I will never do on them.

00:23:54 ◼   ► Like, not a single person had like

00:23:56 ◼   ► a three-track podcast project in Logic Open.

00:23:59 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:24:00 ◼   ► Everyone's like, here's like a 200 track

00:24:02 ◼   ► like orchestral composition of my professionals

00:24:05 ◼   ► and I'm like, all right, how is this gonna run

00:24:07 ◼   ► like denoising my air conditioner out of a recording?

00:24:11 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:24:12 ◼   ► - Did any of them get that?

00:24:13 ◼   ► But I don't know the exact wording.

00:24:14 ◼   ► You'll have to insert this for me.

00:24:16 ◼   ► The system busy or disk too slow dialog from Logic?

00:24:18 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:24:19 ◼   ► That'd be great.

00:24:20 ◼   ► - I did not see that dialog once.

00:24:22 ◼   ► - Question for, you said that they had MacBook Pros

00:24:26 ◼   ► hooked up to Cinema Display XDRs.

00:24:29 ◼   ► - Pro Display XDRs?

00:24:30 ◼   ► - Do we know if they can drive that at the full native res?

00:24:34 ◼   ► - Full native res and they can drive two of them.

00:24:36 ◼   ► - Mm-hmm, very nice. - Wow.

00:24:38 ◼   ► - Is that new for like the 2019s

00:24:40 ◼   ► or new for the 16 inch?

00:24:41 ◼   ► - I don't know that offhand.

00:24:42 ◼   ► - All right.

00:24:43 ◼   ► - But yeah, they can drive two of them at full res

00:24:46 ◼   ► and I saw many of them that did.

00:24:48 ◼   ► And of course, in addition to their built-in display

00:24:50 ◼   ► doing its own resolution, so yeah, it was quite impressive.

00:24:53 ◼   ► Yeah, and there were some times when

00:24:56 ◼   ► during some of the demos where I did hear the fans spin up

00:24:59 ◼   ► 'cause they were, totally understandable,

00:25:01 ◼   ► they were like running like Maya and stuff.

00:25:03 ◼   ► It sounded very similar to the way they've always sounded

00:25:05 ◼   ► when they're pushing the GPU and CPU really hard.

00:25:07 ◼   ► So I would say fan noise, don't expect significant differences.

00:25:11 ◼   ► It's a little bit better just 'cause it has more capacity.

00:25:14 ◼   ► But otherwise, it's fairly similar in that area.

00:25:17 ◼   ► We'll get to the keyboard in a minute.

00:25:19 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:25:20 ◼   ► I swear, I wanna knock out the other stuff

00:25:22 ◼   ► 'cause I have a lot to say about the keyboard.

00:25:24 ◼   ► - No.

00:25:25 ◼   ► - Yeah, surprisingly.

00:25:26 ◼   ► Let's see, what else?

00:25:27 ◼   ► So the SSD, I believe it's roughly the same performance,

00:25:31 ◼   ► but there's now an eight terabyte option.

00:25:34 ◼   ► - That's bananas.

00:25:35 ◼   ► - Well, if you're gonna buy your two XDR displays,

00:25:38 ◼   ► you have to get the eight terabyte model.

00:25:40 ◼   ► - Yeah, right.

00:25:41 ◼   ► - Just to match the price.

00:25:42 ◼   ► - And they've raised the RAM ceiling to 64 gigs.

00:25:45 ◼   ► - That's nice.

00:25:46 ◼   ► - So, and that's nice.

00:25:47 ◼   ► Like, you know, one of the big complaints

00:25:50 ◼   ► about the 2016 Touch Bar laptop generation

00:25:53 ◼   ► was that, like that RAM ceiling,

00:25:55 ◼   ► I believe it was 16 in the 2016 generation, right?

00:25:58 ◼   ► - Yeah, it was 16 for a while.

00:26:00 ◼   ► It was ridiculous.

00:26:01 ◼   ► - And pros were just like, I can't fit my stuff in 16.

00:26:04 ◼   ► And so that was a big point of contention,

00:26:06 ◼   ► and like, over the last few revisions,

00:26:08 ◼   ► they have raised that to 32 at some point.

00:26:10 ◼   ► But still, like, anytime you can raise that,

00:26:13 ◼   ► you raise the limit of what people can do with these things,

00:26:15 ◼   ► and who needs a desktop and who needs a laptop.

00:26:17 ◼   ► And so to have, you know, eight terabyte SSD

00:26:20 ◼   ► and up to 64 gigs of RAM as options,

00:26:22 ◼   ► I know they're gonna cost probably a fortune.

00:26:24 ◼   ► At the time of this recording,

00:26:25 ◼   ► I don't know how much they cost.

00:26:27 ◼   ► That was not disclosed yet.

00:26:28 ◼   ► - Yeah, it really is like, it's like a mini iMac Pro.

00:26:32 ◼   ► And I'm very happy about that.

00:26:34 ◼   ► 'Cause the fact is, we've had,

00:26:36 ◼   ► we've had really good laptop performance for a while now.

00:26:39 ◼   ► You know, not only did the SSD revolution

00:26:42 ◼   ► kind of usher that in, but also, like,

00:26:44 ◼   ► as Intel's been terrible at delivering

00:26:46 ◼   ► on their new process nodes,

00:26:48 ◼   ► they've been upping the core counts

00:26:50 ◼   ► and really refining the micro-texture

00:26:52 ◼   ► of their CPUs and everything.

00:26:53 ◼   ► So like, the processor performance

00:26:55 ◼   ► and the disk performance and GPUs have gotten so good

00:26:57 ◼   ► that if it weren't for the stupid butterfly keyboard,

00:27:01 ◼   ► I would have loved to do lots of work on laptops

00:27:03 ◼   ► for all these years.

00:27:04 ◼   ► But I haven't because of that.

00:27:06 ◼   ► Before I get to that, the last major area

00:27:08 ◼   ► that they wanted to touch on,

00:27:10 ◼   ► which I think is worthy of it,

00:27:12 ◼   ► is the audio subsystem.

00:27:14 ◼   ► So they've upgraded both the speakers and the microphones.

00:27:19 ◼   ► And this is, you know, not only as an audio nerd,

00:27:21 ◼   ► like, this is cool, but it's also just cool,

00:27:23 ◼   ► as like a Mac fan, they don't really touch

00:27:25 ◼   ► the speakers or microphones in ways that are announced

00:27:29 ◼   ► very often, like, you get an upgrade, like,

00:27:32 ◼   ► every five years, maybe, where they'll say,

00:27:34 ◼   ► oh, we've also changed the microphones.

00:27:35 ◼   ► Now there's two of them or whatever.

00:27:37 ◼   ► Typically, microphones that are built into anything

00:27:39 ◼   ► are terrible. (laughs)

00:27:41 ◼   ► And they're, like, not usable.

00:27:43 ◼   ► And so one of the most common tragedies

00:27:46 ◼   ► in podcast recording is when somebody, like Casey,

00:27:49 ◼   ► accidentally uses their built-in mic.

00:27:51 ◼   ► Maybe in Skype they had their real mic selected,

00:27:54 ◼   ► but like, in the recording app they were using

00:27:56 ◼   ► to record their track, maybe they accidentally

00:27:57 ◼   ► had their built-in mic selected.

00:27:59 ◼   ► - Hypothetically.

00:28:00 ◼   ► - Yeah, hypothetically.

00:28:01 ◼   ► It happens all the time with podcasts,

00:28:02 ◼   ► especially podcasts that have guests that aren't

00:28:04 ◼   ► necessarily, like, doing this a lot.

00:28:06 ◼   ► And so you'll have somebody, you'll hear their built-in mic

00:28:08 ◼   ► and they sound like they're talking at the bottom of a well

00:28:11 ◼   ► and you'll hear, like, their pets and their neighbors

00:28:14 ◼   ► and lawn mowers and you'll hear everything

00:28:16 ◼   ► and they sound distant and echoey and it's terrible.

00:28:20 ◼   ► They've actually, Apple's actually really improved

00:28:23 ◼   ► the built-in microphone, which I didn't think

00:28:26 ◼   ► that was something that was ever gonna be done.

00:28:30 ◼   ► It's like, whenever they touch audio,

00:28:32 ◼   ► it's kinda like when they make the screens better.

00:28:36 ◼   ► No one was asking for that, but once you have it,

00:28:40 ◼   ► you're like, oh my god, this is amazing.

00:28:42 ◼   ► How do we ever do without this?

00:28:43 ◼   ► You know, like, no one ever really asks to have

00:28:46 ◼   ► these areas pushed forward.

00:28:47 ◼   ► They just, you know, occasionally somebody does it

00:28:50 ◼   ► and then it, like, sets this new standard

00:28:52 ◼   ► and you're like, oh my god.

00:28:53 ◼   ► Like, and in the realm of audio, Apple has really

00:28:58 ◼   ► kicked butt in recent years with their audio engineering.

00:29:01 ◼   ► Like, the built-in speakers, I remember,

00:29:03 ◼   ► I think what kicked it off for me was the first iPad Pro,

00:29:06 ◼   ► where it had those, they had the four speaker array

00:29:09 ◼   ► and the iPad Pro, at that time, not only sounded,

00:29:12 ◼   ► like, almost unbelievably good for a tablet

00:29:14 ◼   ► that was, like, sitting on a table,

00:29:16 ◼   ► but it embarrassed all their laptops

00:29:19 ◼   ► and one of the ways that the touch bar generation

00:29:22 ◼   ► kind of painfully embarrassed my beloved 2015 generation

00:29:25 ◼   ► was that they made the speakers a bit better.

00:29:28 ◼   ► And now, in the 16 inch, these speakers are a lot better.

00:29:33 ◼   ► And the microphones are a lot better.

00:29:35 ◼   ► In fact, so I'll drop in here a clip of me

00:29:38 ◼   ► testing the microphone and so this is,

00:29:40 ◼   ► I'm sitting at the same desk using, you know,

00:29:42 ◼   ► from the same position that I'm talking to you now

00:29:44 ◼   ► through my, like, big desktop mic.

00:29:45 ◼   ► This isn't going to replace a studio microphone,

00:29:49 ◼   ► but if you are somewhere where this is all you have

00:29:52 ◼   ► or if you accidentally record your built-in mic

00:29:55 ◼   ► for a podcast, it's now way better.

00:29:57 ◼   ► So here, here's that clip.

00:29:59 ◼   ► So this is me at the built-in mic.

00:30:01 ◼   ► It's just on my desk.

00:30:02 ◼   ► I'm sitting in front of it, like, at regular desk height,

00:30:04 ◼   ► so I'm probably about, I don't know,

00:30:05 ◼   ► a foot and a half away from it, something like that.

00:30:07 ◼   ► Yeah, I don't know how this sounds yet.

00:30:09 ◼   ► I'm going to listen back to it,

00:30:10 ◼   ► but I think it's going to probably sound pretty good.

00:30:12 ◼   ► - That sounded incredible.

00:30:13 ◼   ► Like, it doesn't replace your big, fancy mic,

00:30:17 ◼   ► just like you said,

00:30:18 ◼   ► but when somebody like me screws up

00:30:21 ◼   ► and records from the onboard mic,

00:30:23 ◼   ► that would sound passable.

00:30:25 ◼   ► Now, the only thing is, you didn't, like,

00:30:28 ◼   ► type or click or anything as you were recording that, right?

00:30:30 ◼   ► So I kind of wonder how bad that interference would be,

00:30:34 ◼   ► but from the clip that you sent and played,

00:30:38 ◼   ► front, let me try that again.

00:30:39 ◼   ► From the clip that you played, it sounded good.

00:30:42 ◼   ► It sounded surprisingly good.

00:30:44 ◼   ► - Yeah, like, the only thing that it really,

00:30:46 ◼   ► you know, doesn't compete on is, you know,

00:30:49 ◼   ► that your mouth is physically more distant from the mics.

00:30:53 ◼   ► You know, the mics are over there,

00:30:54 ◼   ► like by the escape key.

00:30:55 ◼   ► The escape key, oh my god, we'll get there.

00:30:57 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:30:58 ◼   ► And so, like, you know, normally,

00:30:59 ◼   ► when you're using, like, a studio mic

00:31:01 ◼   ► for, like, a good podcasting,

00:31:02 ◼   ► the mic is, like, a couple inches from your mouth,

00:31:04 ◼   ► and when you're using something that builds into the laptop,

00:31:06 ◼   ► it's like a foot and a half from your mouth,

00:31:08 ◼   ► and no matter, like,

00:31:10 ◼   ► I've had lots of really nice high-end microphones,

00:31:12 ◼   ► all different price points.

00:31:13 ◼   ► None of them sound good when they're far away.

00:31:16 ◼   ► You have to have proximity to the person

00:31:19 ◼   ► to really make it sound good.

00:31:21 ◼   ► And so, considering how far it is from my mouth,

00:31:25 ◼   ► it sounds really good.

00:31:27 ◼   ► Like, I don't think there's any other mic

00:31:29 ◼   ► I could put at that distance

00:31:31 ◼   ► and have it sound that good that's below maybe $1,000.

00:31:35 ◼   ► - I don't know, man.

00:31:36 ◼   ► I've spent a lot of money on this microphone,

00:31:38 ◼   ► and you'll notice that as I go away from it,

00:31:40 ◼   ► there's no problems whatsoever.

00:31:41 ◼   ► It sounds just great.

00:31:42 ◼   ► - Yeah, right.

00:31:43 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:31:45 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah.

00:31:46 ◼   ► No, that actually is very impressive.

00:31:48 ◼   ► - Yeah, and then the speakers are also, like,

00:31:51 ◼   ► really, really good.

00:31:52 ◼   ► I mean, this is something you kind of have to, like,

00:31:54 ◼   ► experience it to hear.

00:31:55 ◼   ► I can't really play it for you in a useful way,

00:31:57 ◼   ► but when I went to the beach for my last work trip

00:31:59 ◼   ► where I brought the iMac Pro,

00:32:02 ◼   ► I didn't bring any speakers on the trip.

00:32:04 ◼   ► I just figured I'd wear headphones,

00:32:05 ◼   ► so I just brought a pair of headphones and my iMac Pro.

00:32:08 ◼   ► Before I plugged the headphones in,

00:32:09 ◼   ► I decided, let me try the built-in speakers

00:32:11 ◼   ► on the iMac Pro, which I had, like, never heard,

00:32:13 ◼   ► 'cause I don't use them at home,

00:32:14 ◼   ► and the built-in speakers on my iMac Pro filled the room.

00:32:18 ◼   ► This was, like, a big living room in this rental.

00:32:20 ◼   ► It filled the room.

00:32:21 ◼   ► It was amazing.

00:32:22 ◼   ► I never used the headphones the whole trip.

00:32:23 ◼   ► I just listened to music from my built-in speakers

00:32:25 ◼   ► of my iMac Pro,

00:32:27 ◼   ► and the new MacBook Pro is almost that good.

00:32:30 ◼   ► It can't quite fill the room that well,

00:32:32 ◼   ► 'cause, you know, it's a lot smaller,

00:32:33 ◼   ► but, like, it's almost that good.

00:32:35 ◼   ► It's surprising how good music sounds.

00:32:39 ◼   ► The only weird little niggle about it is that

00:32:41 ◼   ► if I'm using, if I'm, like, waving my hands around

00:32:43 ◼   ► above the laptop as I'm using the laptop,

00:32:45 ◼   ► if I hover my hand so that it partially covers

00:32:47 ◼   ► the path between, like, one of the speakers and my ear,

00:32:51 ◼   ► I can hear the difference.

00:32:53 ◼   ► Like, the music sounds noticeably worse,

00:32:55 ◼   ► because my hand is blocking it from getting

00:32:57 ◼   ► all the way unobstructed in my ear.

00:32:59 ◼   ► Like, that's, so, in a way, it's a little bit weird.

00:33:01 ◼   ► I'm sure I get used to that, but, yeah,

00:33:03 ◼   ► when you're not waving your hand over the speaker,

00:33:05 ◼   ► it really sounds very good,

00:33:07 ◼   ► and it goes very loud, surprisingly loud.

00:33:09 ◼   ► You know, every other laptop, you play music

00:33:11 ◼   ► from the built-in speakers,

00:33:12 ◼   ► and it sounds like built-in speakers.

00:33:14 ◼   ► Like, it sounds terrible, and you can kind of tell, like,

00:33:17 ◼   ► this is not a high priority for any other manufacturer,

00:33:20 ◼   ► because nobody cares about how good

00:33:22 ◼   ► their built-in speakers are, and people don't care,

00:33:25 ◼   ► and the manufacturers don't care.

00:33:26 ◼   ► Well, you know what, Apple cares,

00:33:28 ◼   ► and sometimes when I need it, I care.

00:33:30 ◼   ► Huge upgrade in the quality of the speakers,

00:33:33 ◼   ► even from the 2016 generation,

00:33:36 ◼   ► which itself was a huge upgrade over the 2015 generation.

00:33:39 ◼   ► So, I am very pleased with the speakers,

00:33:42 ◼   ► and the microphones, like,

00:33:44 ◼   ► as good as a built-in mic I've ever heard.

00:33:46 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:33:47 ◼   ► So, it's still a built-in mic,

00:33:49 ◼   ► but it's surprisingly good for what it is and where it is.

00:33:54 ◼   ► - I wonder if any of those monster PC gaming laptops

00:33:57 ◼   ► might have good speakers, have you tried tips to see if that,

00:33:59 ◼   ► you know, 'cause they're so big and so, you know.

00:34:01 ◼   ► - Yeah, they're crappy.

00:34:03 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:34:04 ◼   ► It's simple as that.

00:34:05 ◼   ► I don't think this is like a huge downside,

00:34:07 ◼   ► 'cause most people don't use their built-in speakers

00:34:09 ◼   ► that much, but when you do use them,

00:34:11 ◼   ► you want it to sound good, and until now,

00:34:14 ◼   ► I just thought it was impossible.

00:34:15 ◼   ► Like, I just assumed, like, oh,

00:34:17 ◼   ► built-in speakers will always sound terrible,

00:34:18 ◼   ► just like until the AirPods Pro.

00:34:20 ◼   ► I thought, like, well, earbuds will always sound like crap.

00:34:22 ◼   ► But yeah, turns out, you can make things sound good,

00:34:24 ◼   ► and that's pretty cool, and Apple has.

00:34:26 ◼   ► (laughs)

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00:36:07 ◼   ► - Before you move on to the keyboard,

00:36:12 ◼   ► one thing we skipped over is the screen.

00:36:14 ◼   ► We know it's 16-inch.

00:36:16 ◼   ► It's a little bit bigger than it was before,

00:36:18 ◼   ► but what more can you tell me about it?

00:36:20 ◼   ► It's changed in other ways, has it not?

00:36:22 ◼   ► - So it is the same brightness, 500 nits.

00:36:24 ◼   ► It's still P3 wide color.

00:36:26 ◼   ► It's higher resolution.

00:36:27 ◼   ► It's a little bit higher DPI.

00:36:29 ◼   ► It's 226 PPI now.

00:36:32 ◼   ► I forget what the other one was,

00:36:33 ◼   ► but it's like a slightly more dense screen,

00:36:35 ◼   ► but not to the point where,

00:36:36 ◼   ► like if you were using the scaling mode before

00:36:39 ◼   ► or the native, like whatever like step you had the sizing on,

00:36:43 ◼   ► you're probably gonna use that same step on this one.

00:36:45 ◼   ► Like you're mostly just getting the additional real estate,

00:36:48 ◼   ► not getting like a huge like density increase.

00:36:50 ◼   ► There's a small one, but not a big one.

00:36:52 ◼   ► For the most part, like I kind of stopped noticing the screen.

00:36:54 ◼   ► It's vast, especially 'cause I'm coming most recently

00:36:57 ◼   ► from a 13-inch, so it is significantly larger

00:36:59 ◼   ► than what I'm used to using, and there's tons of space,

00:37:02 ◼   ► but it is, you know, quality-wise,

00:37:05 ◼   ► I think it's very similar to what we had before,

00:37:07 ◼   ► and unfortunately, one of my nitpicks

00:37:10 ◼   ► with the previous generation was that they used

00:37:12 ◼   ► these scaling modes by default,

00:37:14 ◼   ► that the native 2x pixels of the panel

00:37:17 ◼   ► is one step down, or like I guess one step up,

00:37:21 ◼   ► in size from how they ship it.

00:37:24 ◼   ► So like they ship it in a mode that simulates

00:37:27 ◼   ► a higher resolution than the actual 2x of the panel is,

00:37:32 ◼   ► and you have to make everything one step larger

00:37:36 ◼   ► to be the actual 2x pixels.

00:37:38 ◼   ► Now, I actually usually run my Retina MacBook Pros

00:37:42 ◼   ► as the native setting, even though it makes everything

00:37:45 ◼   ► a little bit bigger, I get a little bit less

00:37:46 ◼   ► screen space for it.

00:37:47 ◼   ► I actually prefer how it looks at that size

00:37:49 ◼   ► most of the time, unless I'm doing something,

00:37:51 ◼   ► unless I'm doing like heavy coding,

00:37:52 ◼   ► then I'll step it down, but usually I run it

00:37:55 ◼   ► at the real native setting, but anyway,

00:37:57 ◼   ► this doesn't change what they have.

00:37:59 ◼   ► It still ships by default in a scaling mode,

00:38:02 ◼   ► so it's still very slightly blurry

00:38:05 ◼   ► at its default settings, and if you want it to be sharper,

00:38:07 ◼   ► you have to lose screen real estate.

00:38:09 ◼   ► And so again, that's a trade-off I make,

00:38:11 ◼   ► just 'cause I like how things look at that size,

00:38:13 ◼   ► but you know, it's unchanged.

00:38:15 ◼   ► This is one of those things, and I'll get to a lot

00:38:18 ◼   ► of these later, 'cause there's a lot of it

00:38:20 ◼   ► that's unchanged, it's one of those things

00:38:22 ◼   ► that it's a trade-off, I know it's a trade-off,

00:38:25 ◼   ► I know there's like battery life costs,

00:38:27 ◼   ► there's panel actual money costs of the panels,

00:38:31 ◼   ► the battery life of driving all the extra pixels

00:38:34 ◼   ► that would require to have the panel be

00:38:36 ◼   ► the higher resolution to actually be true 2x

00:38:38 ◼   ► of its default setting, so I get all that.

00:38:41 ◼   ► They made the decision to leave it this way,

00:38:44 ◼   ► and so I'm ambivalent towards that.

00:38:46 ◼   ► I wish they would up that, I think it's a waste

00:38:49 ◼   ► to have such great panels in all these other ways,

00:38:53 ◼   ► and then to have them scaled by default

00:38:56 ◼   ► and slightly blurry on even their highest end notebooks

00:38:59 ◼   ► that have all this other work put into the displays.

00:39:01 ◼   ► I think that's a shame, but it's a trade-off,

00:39:04 ◼   ► and they're continuing to make the same trade-off.

00:39:06 ◼   ► So I'll keep pushing for it, and hopefully

00:39:08 ◼   ► somebody will change their mind on that.

00:39:10 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's in Congress with 32 gigs of RAM

00:39:12 ◼   ► and an eight terabyte SSD, like that is

00:39:14 ◼   ► the most glaring thing, it's like obviously

00:39:16 ◼   ► maybe don't make it as a default, it's expensive,

00:39:18 ◼   ► it uses more battery, it costs more, right?

00:39:20 ◼   ► But the fact that you could spec this thing

00:39:22 ◼   ► up so high and still you can't get a higher-res screen,

00:39:26 ◼   ► like let people make that trade-off, because--

00:39:28 ◼   ► - Yeah, which they used to do, like before Retina,

00:39:30 ◼   ► that was an option, it was a very inexpensive option

00:39:32 ◼   ► to upgrade from the 1440 to the 1680 screen,

00:39:35 ◼   ► it was like 200 bucks, and it was great.

00:39:38 ◼   ► And I think, you know, 64 gigs of RAM,

00:39:41 ◼   ► that uses a lot of battery too, RAM uses battery,

00:39:43 ◼   ► I have a feeling, like I wonder, would it use

00:39:46 ◼   ► the same amount of battery as 64 gigs of RAM would?

00:39:49 ◼   ► - Yeah, I don't know the comparison, but like,

00:39:51 ◼   ► for those applications, as you said,

00:39:53 ◼   ► they were showing you where it's hooked up

00:39:55 ◼   ► to these two big displays and it's doing this fancy stuff

00:39:57 ◼   ► and the fans are spinning, those are plugged in anyway,

00:39:59 ◼   ► right, like that's the use case, for people who need this

00:40:02 ◼   ► and know they need it, make it an expensive option,

00:40:04 ◼   ► just like the eight terabyte SSD, it's not going to,

00:40:07 ◼   ► it's not going to detract from the reputation

00:40:09 ◼   ► of the laptop as having good battery life,

00:40:11 ◼   ► because only the people who really want that, you know,

00:40:14 ◼   ► option will choose it, right, so it's hanging right there

00:40:17 ◼   ► for them, like, we'll get to more of this later

00:40:19 ◼   ► when we start summing up, but this is part of the iMac Pro

00:40:23 ◼   ► or Mac Pro-ification of the laptop that Apple continues

00:40:26 ◼   ► to choose not to pick up, they have not, like,

00:40:29 ◼   ► they did it in the RAM, they did it in the SSD,

00:40:31 ◼   ► they're not doing it in the physical attributes

00:40:34 ◼   ► of the laptop, like the screen.

00:40:38 ◼   ► Oh, and they've also now done a, you can now set different

00:40:43 ◼   ► refresh rates on the LCD panel, the built-in one,

00:40:46 ◼   ► and they now, I don't know enough to tell you

00:40:48 ◼   ► why these matter, but they now have certain, like,

00:40:52 ◼   ► fractional refresh rates that are not exactly 60 hertz,

00:40:55 ◼   ► there's like, you know, 48 or whatever

00:40:58 ◼   ► for certain video production uses, like you want your

00:41:02 ◼   ► frame rate of your monitor to be an even multiple

00:41:04 ◼   ► of the frame rate of whatever video you're looking at

00:41:06 ◼   ► as you're editing it, or something like that,

00:41:08 ◼   ► again, this is not an area of my expertise,

00:41:10 ◼   ► but they now have different refresh rates

00:41:12 ◼   ► that you can set in display settings,

00:41:13 ◼   ► so that's pretty cool for people who need it.

00:41:16 ◼   ► - And all these refresh rates are lower than 60,

00:41:19 ◼   ► so it's not like there's 120 or anything like that,

00:41:21 ◼   ► it's all, like, fractions stepped down from 60.

00:41:23 ◼   ► Now this is interesting to me because, like,

00:41:26 ◼   ► Apple's not behind, but like, there are more places

00:41:30 ◼   ► Apple can go with this that would actually benefit them,

00:41:32 ◼   ► one of them obviously is 120 hertz,

00:41:34 ◼   ► like with the pro, what they call ProMotion display

00:41:36 ◼   ► on the iPad Pro and everything,

00:41:38 ◼   ► that might provide a nicer experience

00:41:41 ◼   ► and give you more options on a laptop,

00:41:45 ◼   ► but really what is waiting for them there

00:41:47 ◼   ► is variable refresh, and that's something

00:41:50 ◼   ► that has come in with, there's a bunch of gaming

00:41:53 ◼   ► applications for that, where the GPU is synced

00:41:55 ◼   ► with the refresh rate of the monitor to exactly,

00:41:57 ◼   ► to not have the monitor syncing at, you know,

00:42:01 ◼   ► at 60 frames per second regardless of what the GPU

00:42:03 ◼   ► is able to produce to try to get them more in sync,

00:42:05 ◼   ► and in things like the watch, to save power,

00:42:07 ◼   ► which is very relevant to laptops,

00:42:09 ◼   ► so this is like their first foray into maybe

00:42:12 ◼   ► having adjustable refresh rate, like manually adjustable,

00:42:15 ◼   ► right, for the purposes of video,

00:42:17 ◼   ► but I have to think that at some point

00:42:18 ◼   ► in the semi-near future, say, the next generation

00:42:21 ◼   ► of these laptops, which could mean three years or whatever,

00:42:23 ◼   ► variable refresh rate is right there,

00:42:25 ◼   ► both to save energy and for potential gaming AR applications

00:42:29 ◼   ► and then also the ability to adjust to various frame rates,

00:42:33 ◼   ► especially if like high frame rate video becomes a thing,

00:42:36 ◼   ► like if you're trying to edit 120 frame per second video

00:42:39 ◼   ► for some Hollywood movie on your laptop,

00:42:40 ◼   ► you can't really do that that well

00:42:42 ◼   ► on a 60 frame per second display,

00:42:43 ◼   ► so I'm looking forward to changes in that area.

00:42:46 ◼   ► I didn't expect them, in fact, I didn't expect

00:42:47 ◼   ► this variable refresh rate, but I think it is very relevant

00:42:51 ◼   ► to laptops, and I hope Apple jumps on board soon.

00:42:53 ◼   ► - Yeah, and to clarify, this is not variable refresh rate,

00:42:55 ◼   ► it's just different settings that you can set globally.

00:42:57 ◼   ► - Yeah, you manually pick it from a pop-up menu,

00:42:59 ◼   ► like it's not a thing that's adjusting itself.

00:43:02 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's just like how it was in the CRT days,

00:43:04 ◼   ► like when you could pick up lots of different refresh rates

00:43:06 ◼   ► from most CRTs, like it's similar to that, but way newer.

00:43:10 ◼   ► - You could drive your neighbor crazy by setting it

00:43:12 ◼   ► to whatever the lowest refresh rate is,

00:43:14 ◼   ► where flicker will probably be visible,

00:43:16 ◼   ► like there's something wrong with my display.

00:43:18 ◼   ► It used to happen to people's CRTs,

00:43:19 ◼   ► only they wouldn't notice, I'd go over to their house

00:43:20 ◼   ► and they'd have their CRT refreshing at like 50 hertz,

00:43:23 ◼   ► and they'd be like, no, this cannot stand.

00:43:25 ◼   ► - And the funny thing is, usually that rate was 60 hertz,

00:43:28 ◼   ► which is our current fastest refresh rate,

00:43:31 ◼   ► but it's different for all CRTs.

00:43:33 ◼   ► - 60, well, it's a little bit different in CRTs,

00:43:35 ◼   ► but I feel like people who had their CRTs like below 60,

00:43:38 ◼   ► or some frame rate that was incredibly blinking,

00:43:40 ◼   ► it was like, you gotta get that over 100,

00:43:42 ◼   ► and it just, ah, it felt so good.

00:43:44 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah, so I believe that's it for the display,

00:43:48 ◼   ► and before I move on to the keyboard,

00:43:50 ◼   ► I wanted to talk about ports.

00:43:54 ◼   ► No changes.

00:43:56 ◼   ► - Oh, that's too bad.

00:43:57 ◼   ► - Yeah, no SD reader, no additional or different ports.

00:44:02 ◼   ► All the ports are exactly the same.

00:44:04 ◼   ► - I think we can have a positive spin on this by saying,

00:44:07 ◼   ► that means they didn't get rid of the headphone jack.

00:44:09 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:44:10 ◼   ► Right?

00:44:11 ◼   ► - Yes, it's still on the wrong side,

00:44:12 ◼   ► but yeah, this headphone jack is still there,

00:44:15 ◼   ► still on the wrong side,

00:44:16 ◼   ► you still have four USB-C ports on the 15 inch.

00:44:19 ◼   ► Again, it's just like the display refresh,

00:44:22 ◼   ► I get, or I mean the display density,

00:44:24 ◼   ► it's trade-offs, it's all sorts of trade-offs.

00:44:27 ◼   ► The way they've designed the enclosure,

00:44:29 ◼   ► it's just like before where there's a huge intake vent,

00:44:33 ◼   ► as soon as the ports end on each side,

00:44:36 ◼   ► on the lower edge, right after the ports end,

00:44:39 ◼   ► it becomes an intake air vent on both sides.

00:44:41 ◼   ► There is no space there to put an SD card

00:44:45 ◼   ► or more ports or anything,

00:44:46 ◼   ► unless they redesigned a lot of other stuff.

00:44:48 ◼   ► It's not like a small job to do that,

00:44:50 ◼   ► but again, it's trade-offs.

00:44:52 ◼   ► If it were me, I would put one USB-A port,

00:44:56 ◼   ► an HDMI port, and an SD card reader,

00:44:58 ◼   ► because those are the things that people need very frequently

00:45:00 ◼   ► and I still very firmly believe

00:45:02 ◼   ► that it is not a good customer experience

00:45:05 ◼   ► to ever need a dongle.

00:45:08 ◼   ► And dongles should be reserved for old, outgoing technologies

00:45:12 ◼   ► that most people don't need anymore.

00:45:14 ◼   ► So for instance, when the 2012 Retina MacBook Pro,

00:45:19 ◼   ► the very first Retina MacBook Pro came out,

00:45:21 ◼   ► you needed a dongle to use things like Ethernet or FireWire.

00:45:25 ◼   ► And at that time, most people were no longer

00:45:28 ◼   ► using Ethernet or FireWire on their laptops.

00:45:30 ◼   ► And so I feel like that was an okay transition to make then,

00:45:34 ◼   ► because most people who buy these

00:45:36 ◼   ► won't need to buy an adapter to do this older thing,

00:45:40 ◼   ► because most people aren't using these things.

00:45:42 ◼   ► Whereas on the USB-C generation of laptops,

00:45:45 ◼   ► I don't know anybody who has any of these laptops

00:45:48 ◼   ► who doesn't need at least one dongle on a regular basis.

00:45:51 ◼   ► Like something, either a USB-A adapter

00:45:53 ◼   ► or a power pass-through for Casey's terrible laptop

00:45:56 ◼   ► or whatever, and that's unfortunately still exactly the same.

00:45:59 ◼   ► You still need dongles.

00:46:01 ◼   ► I will say, time has slightly healed this wound

00:46:05 ◼   ► and it will continue to very slowly heal this wound.

00:46:10 ◼   ► So I think Apple's just kind of waiting it out at this point.

00:46:13 ◼   ► USB-C is becoming more common.

00:46:15 ◼   ► We are seeing more and more cables and peripherals

00:46:18 ◼   ► and more things are coming with USB-C cables.

00:46:20 ◼   ► So slowly this is solving itself.

00:46:23 ◼   ► The dongles are getting slowly less terrible.

00:46:27 ◼   ► People are able to find a few that seem to work okay for them.

00:46:30 ◼   ► So over time, this is slowly changing.

00:46:33 ◼   ► But I still think it's a terrible customer experience

00:46:36 ◼   ► to have a brand new laptop and almost immediately

00:46:40 ◼   ► need some kind of weird dongle for some port it doesn't have.

00:46:43 ◼   ► But they continue to make that trade-off.

00:46:46 ◼   ► Eventually this will solve itself, I think,

00:46:49 ◼   ► but it still hasn't after three years so far

00:46:52 ◼   ► of being all USB-C on these laptops.

00:46:54 ◼   ► We still need dongles and that's unfortunate.

00:46:57 ◼   ► - So are any of these ports or all of these ports have,

00:47:01 ◼   ► I wish we knew more about the display connection

00:47:04 ◼   ► because I'm wondering if, yeah, they're the same

00:47:06 ◼   ► and they're Thunderbolt 3 and they're USB-C,

00:47:08 ◼   ► but do they support a higher version of DisplayPort

00:47:10 ◼   ► that lets them drive the big monitors?

00:47:12 ◼   ► I'm not sure if there's any difference in capability

00:47:15 ◼   ► behind these strangely shaped ports.

00:47:17 ◼   ► You know, what was it?

00:47:18 ◼   ► My son of all people asked me the other day,

00:47:20 ◼   ► a friend of his was asking him a question

00:47:22 ◼   ► about whether we had any Macs with,

00:47:25 ◼   ► I don't know if it was like,

00:47:27 ◼   ► he was asking whether we had any Macs with USB-C ports

00:47:29 ◼   ► that aren't Thunderbolt ports.

00:47:31 ◼   ► He gave me some mishmash.

00:47:32 ◼   ► - Like Casey's.

00:47:33 ◼   ► - Didn't understand what he was asking.

00:47:34 ◼   ► And so I was faced with having to try to explain

00:47:37 ◼   ► to someone who knows absolutely nothing about this

00:47:39 ◼   ► what the deal is with USB-C and Thunderbolt.

00:47:42 ◼   ► It's really hard.

00:47:43 ◼   ► Like starting from first principles

00:47:45 ◼   ► because I have like, the only thing that I explained to him

00:47:48 ◼   ► was the rectangular USB-A because he's seen those

00:47:50 ◼   ► and he has them like in his room to charge his stuff

00:47:53 ◼   ► because he got USB-A to lighting ports to charge his devices.

00:47:55 ◼   ► He's familiar with those wires.

00:47:56 ◼   ► But everything else after that is gibberish.

00:47:58 ◼   ► Like look, the whole inside of the computer is the same shape

00:48:00 ◼   ► but by looking at the shape,

00:48:01 ◼   ► you can't tell what thing it does.

00:48:03 ◼   ► Some of them are Thunderbolt but some of them are not

00:48:05 ◼   ► and there's different versions of Thunderbolt

00:48:07 ◼   ► but the earlier version had a different shape

00:48:08 ◼   ► and it's like oh my god, doesn't make any sense.

00:48:10 ◼   ► So anyway, what I was asking is are the little shaped holes

00:48:13 ◼   ► that are the same in number and shape

00:48:15 ◼   ► and probably the same in capability,

00:48:17 ◼   ► do they support a higher version number of DisplayPort

00:48:20 ◼   ► when in the mode that they support in DisplayPort?

00:48:22 ◼   ► - I don't know but I don't think so.

00:48:25 ◼   ► I haven't followed the intricacies of DisplayPort

00:48:28 ◼   ► versus Thunderbolt and everything.

00:48:29 ◼   ► It's still Thunderbolt 3, I know that.

00:48:31 ◼   ► So I'm guessing a lot of that might depend on the GPU

00:48:35 ◼   ► but regardless, I think it's the same

00:48:37 ◼   ► as it was before in that area.

00:48:38 ◼   ► - I mean it does play, in that mode where it's like

00:48:40 ◼   ► I'm just a DisplayPort now, right?

00:48:42 ◼   ► That's like one of the modes that it can be.

00:48:44 ◼   ► It can be in USB-C mode and Thunderbolt mode

00:48:46 ◼   ► and DisplayPort tunneling, I don't know the details.

00:48:48 ◼   ► Anyway, the point is it looks the same on the outside.

00:48:51 ◼   ► It has different capabilities than the earlier ones

00:48:54 ◼   ► that had the similar shaped holes in them though

00:48:56 ◼   ► because these can drive the XDR at native res

00:48:58 ◼   ► and earlier models could not.

00:49:00 ◼   ► (upbeat music)

00:49:01 ◼   ► - We are sponsored this week by Mac Weldon.

00:49:03 ◼   ► Better than whatever you're wearing right now

00:49:05 ◼   ► and not better than whatever I'm wearing right now

00:49:06 ◼   ► because I'm wearing a bunch of Mac Weldon stuff.

00:49:08 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:49:09 ◼   ► I gotta say, I love Mac Weldon.

00:49:11 ◼   ► This is a premium men's essentials clothing brand.

00:49:14 ◼   ► They believe in smart design,

00:49:15 ◼   ► premium fabrics and easy shopping.

00:49:18 ◼   ► I have been a Mac Weldon customer

00:49:20 ◼   ► since before they were a sponsor of ours.

00:49:21 ◼   ► I heard them on other podcasts.

00:49:22 ◼   ► I gave them a shot a few years ago

00:49:24 ◼   ► and I've been buying their stuff ever since

00:49:25 ◼   ► and I actually kind of sought them out as a sponsor

00:49:27 ◼   ► because I wanted to talk about it.

00:49:29 ◼   ► I just love Mac Weldon's clothes.

00:49:31 ◼   ► I have all sorts of stuff from them now.

00:49:33 ◼   ► So every day I'm wearing their underwear.

00:49:35 ◼   ► Most days I'm wearing their socks.

00:49:37 ◼   ► I'm usually wearing one of their t-shirts too,

00:49:39 ◼   ► especially in the summer.

00:49:40 ◼   ► I love their silver line stuff,

00:49:42 ◼   ► which is naturally antimicrobial.

00:49:43 ◼   ► I got that as the underwear material as well

00:49:46 ◼   ► and they actually, they want you to try their underwear.

00:49:48 ◼   ► They have this cool guarantee where

00:49:50 ◼   ► if you don't like your first pair of underwear,

00:49:52 ◼   ► they'll give you a refund but you can keep it

00:49:55 ◼   ► because they don't want your used underwear back.

00:49:56 ◼   ► It's pretty cool, no questions asked.

00:49:58 ◼   ► All this stuff, it looks good, it performs well.

00:50:01 ◼   ► They have a whole line of stuff specialized

00:50:03 ◼   ► for workout gear, which I use.

00:50:04 ◼   ► I have their sweatpants for workouts.

00:50:06 ◼   ► I have their workout socks, their Air Knit shirts.

00:50:08 ◼   ► In the winter now, it's getting colder.

00:50:10 ◼   ► I actually just restocked.

00:50:12 ◼   ► They have a whole bunch of great t-shirts.

00:50:14 ◼   ► The Pima cotton tees are great.

00:50:15 ◼   ► In the winter, I get the long sleeve ones

00:50:17 ◼   ► and the new warm knit sweaters.

00:50:19 ◼   ► I love the warm knit stuff.

00:50:21 ◼   ► It's kind of like a waffle knit pattern

00:50:22 ◼   ► on a long sleeve shirt.

00:50:23 ◼   ► Absolutely love those.

00:50:25 ◼   ► They're always coming out with new colors,

00:50:27 ◼   ► new materials, new designs, totally new items.

00:50:31 ◼   ► I love Mac Weldon.

00:50:32 ◼   ► I gotta say, I'm wearing them again almost every day.

00:50:34 ◼   ► All the different seasons,

00:50:35 ◼   ► I'm wearing something from Mac Weldon.

00:50:37 ◼   ► They have new tech cashmere fabric this year

00:50:39 ◼   ► that's really, really nice for sweaters

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00:50:55 ◼   ► Thank you so much to Mac Weldon for keeping me clothed,

00:50:58 ◼   ► frankly, most of the time, and for sponsoring our show.

00:51:01 ◼   ► (upbeat music)

00:51:04 ◼   ► - Have all your keyboard prayers been answered?

00:51:09 ◼   ► - I think so.

00:51:10 ◼   ► - (gasps) No.

00:51:12 ◼   ► - So there's one big one, and that is that the touch bar

00:51:16 ◼   ► is still required on the MacBook Pro.

00:51:19 ◼   ► You know, the touch bar came out in 2016.

00:51:21 ◼   ► I don't like it.

00:51:22 ◼   ► I know a lot of people who don't like it,

00:51:25 ◼   ► who if there was an option to buy the same computer

00:51:28 ◼   ► without a touch bar, even at the same price,

00:51:30 ◼   ► I know many people who would take it.

00:51:32 ◼   ► And touch bar is not required for touch ID

00:51:35 ◼   ► because the MacBook Air has no touch bar but touch ID.

00:51:38 ◼   ► So we know they can do it, you know,

00:51:40 ◼   ► but this computer requires a touch bar.

00:51:43 ◼   ► Now, I wish it didn't, but there are two critical changes

00:51:48 ◼   ► here that I think will make it less bad of a thing

00:51:50 ◼   ► for people who didn't like it before.

00:51:52 ◼   ► Number one, we have a hardware escape key again.

00:51:56 ◼   ► - Hooray!

00:51:57 ◼   ► - Thank God.

00:51:58 ◼   ► Now, I should actually say it.

00:51:59 ◼   ► I don't actually use it anymore,

00:52:00 ◼   ► because ever since the laptops got rid of it,

00:52:03 ◼   ► I converted myself to use caps lock for escape

00:52:05 ◼   ► 'cause Mac OS has a built-in thing

00:52:07 ◼   ► in the keyboard panel to do that.

00:52:08 ◼   ► If you go to modifier keys,

00:52:09 ◼   ► you can set caps lock to be escape,

00:52:11 ◼   ► and I never even need caps lock for anything,

00:52:13 ◼   ► so I remapped that, and now I just,

00:52:15 ◼   ► I kinda had the muscle memory where I hit it

00:52:16 ◼   ► with my little finger, and that's it.

00:52:18 ◼   ► I hit escape really easily.

00:52:19 ◼   ► It's closer now.

00:52:20 ◼   ► It's actually better.

00:52:21 ◼   ► So I actually don't need the escape key personally,

00:52:23 ◼   ► but I know a lot of people don't wanna do that remapping

00:52:26 ◼   ► and want that to be there,

00:52:28 ◼   ► so that's a huge improvement if you are a touch bar hater,

00:52:31 ◼   ► and also, one of the most important changes

00:52:35 ◼   ► they could have possibly made,

00:52:37 ◼   ► they made the space between the keys bigger.

00:52:41 ◼   ► Thank God.

00:52:43 ◼   ► So this, along with the inverted T arrow layout,

00:52:47 ◼   ► I think are actually more important

00:52:51 ◼   ► than the travel distance.

00:52:53 ◼   ► So the travel distance, I'll get all this at once.

00:52:55 ◼   ► Travel distance is doubled, what the butterfly is.

00:52:57 ◼   ► It is one millimeter travel depth for the keys.

00:53:00 ◼   ► So for comparison, funny, I actually went around,

00:53:04 ◼   ► I think I'm gonna write a blog post

00:53:05 ◼   ► and put a graph of this in it.

00:53:07 ◼   ► I went around yesterday with my calipers,

00:53:10 ◼   ► and which I actually brought into the briefing as well.

00:53:14 ◼   ► - Of course you did.

00:53:15 ◼   ► - No one else had calipers.

00:53:17 ◼   ► I went around and measured a whole bunch of keyboards

00:53:21 ◼   ► to see how big are the key caps,

00:53:23 ◼   ► how much spacing is there between the keys,

00:53:26 ◼   ► how much travel do they have, et cetera.

00:53:29 ◼   ► And I found, first of all, it was interesting

00:53:31 ◼   ► that the total height of the main area of the keyboard,

00:53:35 ◼   ► which I measured as from the top of the delete key

00:53:38 ◼   ► down to the bottom of the right arrow,

00:53:40 ◼   ► so not including a function row or a touch bar

00:53:42 ◼   ► if it has it, just that distance,

00:53:44 ◼   ► on almost every keyboard I measured across a huge range,

00:53:49 ◼   ► I should say I measured from a,

00:53:51 ◼   ► I measured a titanium PowerBook G4,

00:53:53 ◼   ► a white plastic MacBook, the 2015 generation MacBook Pro,

00:53:58 ◼   ► the butterfly keyboard MacBook Pro,

00:54:02 ◼   ► the iPad Pro 11 inch smart keyboard,

00:54:05 ◼   ► my Philco mechanical 10 keyless keyboard

00:54:07 ◼   ► with the big clicky key switches,

00:54:09 ◼   ► and my Microsoft Sculpt ergonomic keyboard.

00:54:11 ◼   ► I measured all of those, and it's funny,

00:54:13 ◼   ► the height of the main key region on all of them

00:54:17 ◼   ► is right around 90 millimeters.

00:54:20 ◼   ► And so what I found interesting was how little variation

00:54:22 ◼   ► there is in that, that the overall size of these keyboards

00:54:26 ◼   ► was very similar, actually.

00:54:28 ◼   ► I guess we figured out a long time ago

00:54:29 ◼   ► keyboards should be about 90 millimeters tall

00:54:31 ◼   ► from the bottom of the arrow to the top of the delete key,

00:54:33 ◼   ► so cool.

00:54:34 ◼   ► So what matters then of how big the keys are

00:54:37 ◼   ► and how much they're spaced, what shape the key caps take,

00:54:42 ◼   ► how much they travel down and everything,

00:54:45 ◼   ► and there was a huge range of these.

00:54:48 ◼   ► So my big Philco mechanical key switch

00:54:51 ◼   ► with one of the, I forget which cherry color switch it has,

00:54:54 ◼   ► but it has one of those cherry mechanical switches in it,

00:54:56 ◼   ► the travel on that was 4.3 millimeters.

00:55:00 ◼   ► And so for reference, this laptop, the new one,

00:55:03 ◼   ► is one millimeter.

00:55:05 ◼   ► The butterfly was half a millimeter,

00:55:08 ◼   ► so it's twice as much travel.

00:55:09 ◼   ► The Magic Keyboard was 1.2.

00:55:12 ◼   ► So this is very close to the Magic Keyboard,

00:55:14 ◼   ► but kind of like a third of the way

00:55:17 ◼   ► between the Magic Keyboard and the butterfly

00:55:20 ◼   ► in travel distance.

00:55:22 ◼   ► And I could actually say about the same thing

00:55:25 ◼   ► for the key margins as well.

00:55:28 ◼   ► So Magic Keyboard, 2.8 millimeters spacing

00:55:31 ◼   ► between the keys.

00:55:33 ◼   ► New MacBook Pro, 2.5.

00:55:36 ◼   ► Old MacBook Pro with the crappy keyboard, 1.8.

00:55:39 ◼   ► So huge variation, like huge drop there.

00:55:42 ◼   ► And the 2.5 millimeter key spacing

00:55:45 ◼   ► actually compares pretty well,

00:55:47 ◼   ► like the iPad Smart Keyboard,

00:55:50 ◼   ► which I think has very wide key spacing, is 3.1.

00:55:53 ◼   ► So compared to 2.5, you can see like the 2015 MacBook Pro

00:55:56 ◼   ► with the previous generation's keyboard,

00:55:59 ◼   ► 3.5 millimeter spacing.

00:56:01 ◼   ► And about 1.5 millimeters of travel.

00:56:04 ◼   ► So again, we're going,

00:56:06 ◼   ► we're like hitting like roughly Magic Keyboard levels,

00:56:10 ◼   ► but slightly less.

00:56:12 ◼   ► So like a little bit less key spacing than the Magic Keyboard.

00:56:15 ◼   ► A little bit less travel than Magic Keyboard,

00:56:17 ◼   ► but way closer to that

00:56:19 ◼   ► than to the butterfly keyboard, which sucked.

00:56:21 ◼   ► So overall,

00:56:23 ◼   ► I would say that they really have,

00:56:26 ◼   ► and I should say too, like they are calling this

00:56:29 ◼   ► a Magic Keyboard.

00:56:30 ◼   ► Like they said in the presentation,

00:56:32 ◼   ► they said that the,

00:56:34 ◼   ► you know, they defended the butterfly a little bit,

00:56:37 ◼   ► but I don't care.

00:56:39 ◼   ► And I will say to be honest though,

00:56:41 ◼   ► like it does seem like the 2018,

00:56:43 ◼   ► or the 2019 new materials revision,

00:56:46 ◼   ► the third gen revision they did this past May,

00:56:49 ◼   ► I haven't heard of many problems with it,

00:56:51 ◼   ► so I think they actually might have mostly fixed it,

00:56:53 ◼   ► but I don't care.

00:56:54 ◼   ► It still sucks.

00:56:55 ◼   ► So even if they fixed it, I still hate it.

00:56:57 ◼   ► But it's good for people who haven't, I guess.

00:56:59 ◼   ► But anyway,

00:57:01 ◼   ► they so heavily focused on the keyboard

00:57:04 ◼   ► during the presentation.

00:57:06 ◼   ► They knew we all were too.

00:57:07 ◼   ► And they said they went back,

00:57:09 ◼   ► they had like people studying physiology,

00:57:11 ◼   ► and they wanted to focus on all these different areas,

00:57:15 ◼   ► key shapes, the feel, acoustics,

00:57:18 ◼   ► what makes people accurate and what doesn't.

00:57:20 ◼   ► And they said something that's funny,

00:57:22 ◼   ► I actually wrote this like two years ago in a blog post.

00:57:24 ◼   ► They said that they already make a fantastic keyboard

00:57:27 ◼   ► that meets all those criteria.

00:57:28 ◼   ► It's the Magic Keyboard that ships with the iMac.

00:57:31 ◼   ► It's like yes, we know, thank you.

00:57:34 ◼   ► And they really are saying that they're bringing

00:57:36 ◼   ► the Magic Keyboard to the MacBook Pro.

00:57:38 ◼   ► Like that's how they're framing it.

00:57:40 ◼   ► And based on all my measurements and based on the feel,

00:57:43 ◼   ► I can say that's pretty damn accurate.

00:57:46 ◼   ► Like it isn't exactly the same.

00:57:48 ◼   ► It's actually, like in some ways,

00:57:49 ◼   ► it's better than the Magic Keyboard.

00:57:51 ◼   ► If you were a fan of the increased key stability

00:57:55 ◼   ► with the butterfly keyboard,

00:57:57 ◼   ► which is one of the only advantages

00:57:59 ◼   ► that they ever touted for it,

00:58:01 ◼   ► which was like if you hit the edge or the corner of a key,

00:58:04 ◼   ► the whole thing depresses more evenly

00:58:06 ◼   ► than on the previous types of similar keyboards.

00:58:08 ◼   ► It would kind of like slant.

00:58:09 ◼   ► And that's better with the 16 inch keyboard

00:58:13 ◼   ► than even with the Magic Keyboard,

00:58:14 ◼   ► which itself was better than previous scissors.

00:58:16 ◼   ► There's a rubber dome that they tweaked

00:58:19 ◼   ► to make a better like feedback mechanism or something.

00:58:22 ◼   ► I'm sorry, I'm not really sure on many of the details here.

00:58:25 ◼   ► And I'm sure we'll find out a lot of this

00:58:26 ◼   ► through tear downs down the road.

00:58:28 ◼   ► But short version is they really focused a lot on these.

00:58:34 ◼   ► And they said right in the presentation,

00:58:37 ◼   ► this is the best typing experience ever on a Mac notebook.

00:58:40 ◼   ► And I might agree with that.

00:58:43 ◼   ► It's been a while since I've used the old mush keyboards

00:58:45 ◼   ► on like my PowerBook G4 that I love so much.

00:58:47 ◼   ► But it's really good.

00:58:50 ◼   ► It is not like super high travel,

00:58:53 ◼   ► but it is not so low that you really care.

00:58:57 ◼   ► You know, laptops have always had lower travel

00:59:00 ◼   ► than desktop keyboards, but it's been like close,

00:59:03 ◼   ► kind of in the ballpark that you would kind of forgive it

00:59:06 ◼   ► for being a laptop.

00:59:08 ◼   ► This is finally back in that area.

00:59:10 ◼   ► Like when I was typing on this,

00:59:12 ◼   ► even just the initial things of just like the setup wizard,

00:59:15 ◼   ► like migration assistant, typing in my wifi password,

00:59:18 ◼   ► every key press, I was like, yes, finally, thank you.

00:59:23 ◼   ► Thank you, God.

00:59:25 ◼   ► I'm an atheist, but thank you, God.

00:59:27 ◼   ► Like I was so happy to just type in regular things

00:59:33 ◼   ► because you know what, it didn't feel noteworthy.

00:59:37 ◼   ► It felt like a keyboard.

00:59:39 ◼   ► And this is after three years of their laptops

00:59:43 ◼   ► feeling like they hated me.

00:59:45 ◼   ► Like I had to type in something on my 13 inch afterwards,

00:59:49 ◼   ► like deactivated something,

00:59:50 ◼   ► and I just immediately wanted to throw it in the garbage.

00:59:53 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:59:54 ◼   ► Like I should warn everybody out there,

00:59:56 ◼   ► if you've been using a butterfly keyboard

00:59:59 ◼   ► and not a fan of it like me,

01:00:01 ◼   ► the second you use one of these things,

01:00:03 ◼   ► your old laptop is trash.

01:00:05 ◼   ► You will immediately want to get rid of it.

01:00:07 ◼   ► So if you don't want to buy a new one, don't touch one.

01:00:10 ◼   ► Just don't, it's like don't test for a Tesla,

01:00:13 ◼   ► like don't ever touch one of these keyboards.

01:00:15 ◼   ► - That's true, that's true.

01:00:16 ◼   ► - Because it's just so nice.

01:00:18 ◼   ► What's nice about it, like it dramatically changes

01:00:22 ◼   ► the way the laptop feels to me

01:00:24 ◼   ► because it changes from something

01:00:26 ◼   ► that has literally felt hostile towards me for three years.

01:00:30 ◼   ► And frankly, it felt like they were never gonna fix it.

01:00:34 ◼   ► It felt like they thought it was fine.

01:00:36 ◼   ► So for three years, it felt like this hostile thing

01:00:39 ◼   ► where all of their laptops were telling me,

01:00:42 ◼   ► we don't want you using us, we hate you.

01:00:45 ◼   ► We hate ourselves and we hate you.

01:00:47 ◼   ► Like that's how it felt to me.

01:00:49 ◼   ► It's just so hostile.

01:00:50 ◼   ► And to have this new keyboard that,

01:00:53 ◼   ► not only did they put a lot of effort into it,

01:00:57 ◼   ► and not only did they really try to make a keyboard

01:01:01 ◼   ► that people liked a lot, which I don't think

01:01:04 ◼   ► that was ever a goal of the butterfly,

01:01:06 ◼   ► but they succeeded.

01:01:08 ◼   ► And they made a really frickin' good laptop keyboard

01:01:11 ◼   ► that is still thin, still has the stability

01:01:15 ◼   ► that some people like, still has the kind of snappy feedback

01:01:19 ◼   ► a little bit, but has significantly more travel,

01:01:23 ◼   ► has easier to find keys, has the inverted T arrows,

01:01:26 ◼   ► the real escape key.

01:01:28 ◼   ► And it just seems like, oh my god,

01:01:31 ◼   ► why didn't they have this three years ago?

01:01:33 ◼   ► But I'm really glad they have it now.

01:01:35 ◼   ► And finally, I can go back to using a laptop

01:01:39 ◼   ► and not be constantly irritated

01:01:42 ◼   ► by this unchangeable fundamental quality of it.

01:01:46 ◼   ► It is such a nice feeling.

01:01:49 ◼   ► It's like this weight has been lifted off my shoulders.

01:01:52 ◼   ► The world made a couple of big mistakes in 2016.

01:01:55 ◼   ► One of them has now been fixed.

01:01:57 ◼   ► - Wow.

01:01:58 ◼   ► - And it really, it's like the dawning of a new day, finally.

01:02:01 ◼   ► The long night is over.

01:02:03 ◼   ► It's like, finally.

01:02:05 ◼   ► It is, I can't describe, although I'm trying poorly,

01:02:09 ◼   ► I can't describe how nice it is to just start using this

01:02:14 ◼   ► and be like, ah, okay, things are getting right

01:02:18 ◼   ► in the world again.

01:02:19 ◼   ► Finally, I can use a laptop

01:02:21 ◼   ► and not hate every minute of typing on it.

01:02:24 ◼   ► - So speaking of success and this being a successful keyboard,

01:02:27 ◼   ► did they mention anything or tout anything

01:02:30 ◼   ► about the reliability of this keyboard?

01:02:32 ◼   ► - Honestly, I'd be surprised if they ever mentioned that,

01:02:35 ◼   ► but it's a scissor mechanism,

01:02:37 ◼   ► which inherently means that it is, first of all,

01:02:40 ◼   ► a lot less likely to break.

01:02:42 ◼   ► We've had scissor mechanisms for a long time.

01:02:44 ◼   ► The butterfly mechanism was a whole completely new design.

01:02:47 ◼   ► Lots of very precise, tiny, fragile things

01:02:51 ◼   ► had to go perfectly with it for it to work.

01:02:53 ◼   ► Scissor, just the design of scissor keycaps

01:02:56 ◼   ► are much more resilient to problems,

01:02:59 ◼   ► and having increased travel means that you can

01:03:02 ◼   ► probably pop off the keycap,

01:03:04 ◼   ► and just the whole way they attach is different,

01:03:06 ◼   ► so it's probably gonna be way easier to service these.

01:03:09 ◼   ► Time will tell.

01:03:10 ◼   ► I don't know, and they didn't really hit it too hard,

01:03:13 ◼   ► but I'm guessing these are gonna be way easier to service

01:03:16 ◼   ► than the butterflies, probably similar to previous laptops.

01:03:20 ◼   ► We've had scissor key laptops for a long time.

01:03:23 ◼   ► Many people have had keys replaced

01:03:25 ◼   ► or had to get service on them, and it's been fine.

01:03:28 ◼   ► Occasionally, it requires a huge, expensive replacement,

01:03:30 ◼   ► but for minor stuff, it usually doesn't,

01:03:32 ◼   ► and most people, in the lifetime of their laptops,

01:03:35 ◼   ► most people don't need expensive keyboard repairs.

01:03:38 ◼   ► - I've repaired scissor key switches myself

01:03:40 ◼   ► on older laptops when they get old or wear out

01:03:43 ◼   ► or start flopping off, or some kid would break one off

01:03:46 ◼   ► and you'd put it back on.

01:03:47 ◼   ► There are tiny, delicate parts in there, for sure,

01:03:49 ◼   ► but they're not so delicate that I destroyed my keyboard

01:03:52 ◼   ► by trying to fix it, which was nice.

01:03:55 ◼   ► And yeah, the scissor mechanisms are tried and true.

01:03:57 ◼   ► It's interesting, though, that the main,

01:03:59 ◼   ► so you hated the keyboard even when it was working perfectly,

01:04:01 ◼   ► but Apple's big problem with the keyboards

01:04:03 ◼   ► is that they weren't working.

01:04:04 ◼   ► Yes, some people like them, some people don't,

01:04:06 ◼   ► but not working is just a universal, right?

01:04:09 ◼   ► And it's kind of weird to pitch a new keyboard without,

01:04:14 ◼   ► I mean, I don't know how you do it.

01:04:17 ◼   ► They don't wanna say anything as an ongoing lawsuit,

01:04:18 ◼   ► so they can't really say anything about, you know,

01:04:20 ◼   ► they could've at least said,

01:04:21 ◼   ► this is our most reliable keyboard ever,

01:04:22 ◼   ► or they could've said, look, we'll pour a bucket of sand

01:04:24 ◼   ► on top of it and type and it'll keep going,

01:04:26 ◼   ► which is probably not true.

01:04:27 ◼   ► You probably shouldn't do that 'cause there are other reasons

01:04:29 ◼   ► other than your keyboard working that you don't want sand

01:04:31 ◼   ► leaking into your laptop, right?

01:04:33 ◼   ► But it's kind of weird that like,

01:04:35 ◼   ► I would've expected them to somehow address

01:04:39 ◼   ► what is the main problem with their keyboard.

01:04:42 ◼   ► The main problem with their keyboard was not

01:04:44 ◼   ► that Marco didn't like how it felt.

01:04:45 ◼   ► The main problem was that it would stop working

01:04:47 ◼   ► sometimes, like my space bar, which still doesn't work.

01:04:50 ◼   ► And by the way, I've been holding out for these laptops,

01:04:52 ◼   ► I'm hoping, when I bring this thing to work and say,

01:04:54 ◼   ► hey, by the way, the space bar doesn't work,

01:04:56 ◼   ► I'm gonna do that at a time that when they order me

01:04:58 ◼   ► a replacement, they could potentially get a 16 inch.

01:05:00 ◼   ► Instead, they're just gonna get it repaired for 900 bucks,

01:05:02 ◼   ► so it's gonna suck for me.

01:05:03 ◼   ► At least I won't have the highest chance of, you know,

01:05:06 ◼   ► getting me a new one of these.

01:05:07 ◼   ► But anyway, reliability is still a question.

01:05:09 ◼   ► And unfortunately, although we suspect that these

01:05:12 ◼   ► will be better because the travel's bigger,

01:05:14 ◼   ► because this is a mechanism, at this time,

01:05:16 ◼   ► we can't say.

01:05:17 ◼   ► Because Marco's had this for half a day.

01:05:20 ◼   ► My 2017 laptop, which admittedly I mostly used docked

01:05:24 ◼   ► at work, so I didn't use the keyboard a lot,

01:05:26 ◼   ► it took pretty much two full years for the space bar to die.

01:05:30 ◼   ► I still find that infuriating, but it didn't die immediately.

01:05:34 ◼   ► And the same thing with the 2019s that you were

01:05:36 ◼   ► mentioning before, they seemed like the problems were okay.

01:05:38 ◼   ► If the problems only come up after, you know,

01:05:40 ◼   ► a year and a half, two years, we're not gonna be able

01:05:43 ◼   ► to tell that now.

01:05:44 ◼   ► So, you know, we talked about this before,

01:05:48 ◼   ► like, if and when they come out with a new keyboard,

01:05:50 ◼   ► we just have to take their word for it.

01:05:51 ◼   ► So I would have loved some reassurance to say,

01:05:53 ◼   ► and we reliability tested these, and we poured potato chips

01:05:55 ◼   ► into them, and we had our robots poking them

01:05:57 ◼   ► at 20 different angles.

01:05:58 ◼   ► And like, whatever it is that they didn't do

01:06:00 ◼   ► with the butterflies, they should have done with this one,

01:06:03 ◼   ► and they could have touted that.

01:06:05 ◼   ► I mean, we love seeing robot fingers poking keyboards

01:06:07 ◼   ► or whatever.

01:06:08 ◼   ► And speaking of the travel stuff and older keyboards,

01:06:11 ◼   ► I'm sure you have all these numbers from your caliper travels.

01:06:15 ◼   ► What was the travel on the 2015 MacBook Pro keys?

01:06:19 ◼   ► You're gonna consult your wall poster that shows you

01:06:21 ◼   ► key travel in millimeters for all Apple laptops?

01:06:24 ◼   ► Yeah, so here, I breezed by it earlier, let me see.

01:06:27 ◼   ► The 2015 key travel was about one and a half millimeters.

01:06:31 ◼   ► So about 1.5, Magic Keyboard is 1.2, and this new laptop

01:06:35 ◼   ► is 1.0.

01:06:36 ◼   ► Butterfly was 0.5.

01:06:38 ◼   ► So we are in the ballpark of the old one.

01:06:42 ◼   ► What you get with this, like, when the butterfly came out

01:06:45 ◼   ► and it was very controversial, still is,

01:06:47 ◼   ► there were the people like me who hated it,

01:06:49 ◼   ► and there were a lot of people who said,

01:06:52 ◼   ► "We actually prefer this to the old one."

01:06:54 ◼   ► And a lot of people would go back to one of the old ones

01:06:56 ◼   ► and say, "This is too mushy."

01:06:57 ◼   ► They didn't like going back to the old ones

01:06:59 ◼   ► once they were used to the more, like, crisp feel

01:07:01 ◼   ► of the new one.

01:07:03 ◼   ► I think this new one is going to really satisfy

01:07:06 ◼   ► both groups well.

01:07:07 ◼   ► And like, again, one of the biggest problems

01:07:09 ◼   ► with the butterfly was that they took this incredibly

01:07:11 ◼   ► controversial keyboard, again, even if it worked perfectly,

01:07:14 ◼   ► even if it never had any reliability problems,

01:07:16 ◼   ► it was a very controversial design.

01:07:18 ◼   ► Lots of people really hated it.

01:07:20 ◼   ► And it was so that, therefore, it was never

01:07:23 ◼   ► a suitable keyboard to be the only keyboard.

01:07:26 ◼   ► Like, you can't have something that a whole bunch

01:07:28 ◼   ► of your customers hate if that's the only option

01:07:30 ◼   ► you're going to give them for an entire category

01:07:32 ◼   ► of products.

01:07:33 ◼   ► And that's what they did with the butterfly.

01:07:35 ◼   ► I think with this, this is presumably going to trickle down

01:07:39 ◼   ► to the rest of the product line.

01:07:40 ◼   ► Presumably this will soon be the only keyboard

01:07:43 ◼   ► you can buy in an Apple laptop.

01:07:45 ◼   ► And I think that's fine.

01:07:47 ◼   ► Because this new one is, I think, going to be

01:07:49 ◼   ► a big crowd pleaser.

01:07:50 ◼   ► It is not as extreme in either direction.

01:07:54 ◼   ► You know, it's not a super high travel, mechanical,

01:07:57 ◼   ► clicky thing, you know, like you get from an external

01:07:59 ◼   ► gamer keyboard.

01:08:00 ◼   ► It's not a super flat butterfly thing

01:08:04 ◼   ► or like a virtual keyboard on a touch glass

01:08:06 ◼   ► or anything like that.

01:08:07 ◼   ► It's just a regular laptop keyboard.

01:08:09 ◼   ► It's the kind of laptop keyboard that used to be

01:08:11 ◼   ► the only kind of laptop keyboard.

01:08:12 ◼   ► The kind that you would barely even mention

01:08:14 ◼   ► because it was fine.

01:08:15 ◼   ► That's what this is.

01:08:16 ◼   ► That is, if you're only going to offer one type

01:08:19 ◼   ► of keyboard for all your laptops, it has to be that.

01:08:22 ◼   ► It has to be something that everyone says, that's fine.

01:08:24 ◼   ► And this has a way better chance of achieving that

01:08:27 ◼   ► than the butterfly ever would.

01:08:29 ◼   ► - So as someone who loved the Magic Keyboard

01:08:33 ◼   ► when it first came out, it was my favorite keyboard

01:08:35 ◼   ► by a mile when it first came out.

01:08:38 ◼   ► And then I got my MacBook Adorable, and over time

01:08:41 ◼   ► I came to really, really like this keyboard.

01:08:44 ◼   ► It has its faults.

01:08:45 ◼   ► I've had to take air to it more than zero times,

01:08:47 ◼   ► which is, I've never taken air to a Magic Keyboard before.

01:08:51 ◼   ► Certainly not, you know, I've never been forced to anyway.

01:08:54 ◼   ► So I do actually quite like the MacBook Keyboard.

01:08:57 ◼   ► I do like how sturdy it feels.

01:08:59 ◼   ► Is it a deal breaker?

01:09:00 ◼   ► No.

01:09:01 ◼   ► I don't know, it does make the Magic Keyboard feel

01:09:04 ◼   ► not mushy, but comparatively slightly more mushy

01:09:08 ◼   ► than the MacBook Keyboard.

01:09:10 ◼   ► And it sounds to me like what you're describing is

01:09:12 ◼   ► basically the Magic Keyboard with a little bit less travel,

01:09:15 ◼   ► which I'd be fine with, and a little bit more,

01:09:19 ◼   ► if not a lot more, sturdiness or stability,

01:09:22 ◼   ► which to me sounds like you're taking the best

01:09:24 ◼   ► of both worlds and mashing them together.

01:09:26 ◼   ► So I am all in on this.

01:09:28 ◼   ► This sounds excellent.

01:09:30 ◼   ► I'm telling you, I think people are gonna love this thing.

01:09:33 ◼   ► I don't think there is gonna be anybody

01:09:36 ◼   ► who is really truly upset by this move.

01:09:39 ◼   ► Only the most die-hard butterfly lovers

01:09:42 ◼   ► are really gonna care.

01:09:44 ◼   ► And honestly, they had their time in the sun.

01:09:47 ◼   ► (laughs)

01:09:48 ◼   ► It's whatever butterfly metaphor they're gonna make.

01:09:50 ◼   ► It's time for them to fly south for the winter, whatever,

01:09:53 ◼   ► to make room for us.

01:09:54 ◼   ► No, I don't know.

01:09:55 ◼   ► But all I want was to go back to a world

01:09:57 ◼   ► where we could stop talking about the freaking keyboards.

01:09:59 ◼   ► And after this episode, I think we've achieved that.

01:10:01 ◼   ► I think finally we can go back to talking about anything else

01:10:04 ◼   ► because this won't be a constant source of friction

01:10:07 ◼   ► in our computing lives anymore.

01:10:08 ◼   ► Once this takes over the product line

01:10:10 ◼   ► and once the butterflies are all out of mainstream usage

01:10:13 ◼   ► in maybe four or five years,

01:10:15 ◼   ► we're gonna look back on this time,

01:10:17 ◼   ► the way people look back on that Chicklet keyboard

01:10:20 ◼   ► on whatever computer that was.

01:10:21 ◼   ► John, you probably know.

01:10:22 ◼   ► - I don't.

01:10:23 ◼   ► I know what you're talking about, but I don't remember.

01:10:24 ◼   ► I think it was a Compaq, but I don't remember.

01:10:26 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's some terrible computer that,

01:10:28 ◼   ► or maybe was it PCjr?

01:10:30 ◼   ► Was that the IBM PCjr?

01:10:31 ◼   ► - Maybe.

01:10:32 ◼   ► It was like, there was a membrane over, yeah.

01:10:35 ◼   ► Although there were membrane keyboards as well.

01:10:37 ◼   ► I don't know if that was the Chicklet one.

01:10:38 ◼   ► I used a PCjr though.

01:10:39 ◼   ► My friend had one.

01:10:40 ◼   ► It was not a good computer.

01:10:41 ◼   ► - Yeah, probably for other reasons as well.

01:10:43 ◼   ► But yeah, so I really do think we're gonna look back

01:10:45 ◼   ► on the butterfly era as this tragic mistake

01:10:48 ◼   ► that was made for a few years.

01:10:50 ◼   ► Like back when Apple had bad CEOs,

01:10:52 ◼   ► like the weird business people CEOs.

01:10:54 ◼   ► I think it's gonna be like that kind of era.

01:10:56 ◼   ► And thank goodness it's ending.

01:10:59 ◼   ► Like I truly think this keyboard I think is so good

01:11:02 ◼   ► and it will have probably a significant effect

01:11:06 ◼   ► on Apple's bottom line for saved warranty repairs

01:11:09 ◼   ► compared to the butterflies.

01:11:10 ◼   ► I have a feeling this is gonna take over

01:11:12 ◼   ► the product line quickly.

01:11:13 ◼   ► I would be shocked if any butterfly keyboards

01:11:16 ◼   ► are still sold one year from now.

01:11:18 ◼   ► I bet one year from now they're all out of the lineup.

01:11:21 ◼   ► - And I don't think it'll be good for their sales

01:11:23 ◼   ► because like you said, if someone has one

01:11:24 ◼   ► of these existing ones and especially if they've

01:11:26 ◼   ► had any problems, even if it's just like a sticking key

01:11:28 ◼   ► or they had to blow it out with air.

01:11:29 ◼   ► Once they try one of these, they're going to be looking

01:11:31 ◼   ► to offload these as fast as possible and replace it

01:11:34 ◼   ► with basically an equivalent machine.

01:11:36 ◼   ► Oh, I didn't really need a new one,

01:11:37 ◼   ► but I need my keyboard to be reliable

01:11:39 ◼   ► and this one is nicer.

01:11:40 ◼   ► So they're just, you know,

01:11:41 ◼   ► I think this will be good for Apple's bottom line.

01:11:43 ◼   ► Imagine making products that people like

01:11:44 ◼   ► being good for your bottom line.

01:11:46 ◼   ► But there is surely pent up demand for the keyboard.

01:11:50 ◼   ► So hopefully that will be reflected.

01:11:52 ◼   ► And that's why they need to get it out

01:11:53 ◼   ► in the rest of the line as fast as possible.

01:11:56 ◼   ► I hope they do.

01:11:57 ◼   ► I hope it doesn't lag behind in kind of Tim Cook fashion

01:11:59 ◼   ► where like the MacBook Air has the butterfly keyboard

01:12:01 ◼   ► for the next three years and we're like, come on.

01:12:03 ◼   ► Like I really hope it does go through all the other computers

01:12:06 ◼   ► as fast as possible.

01:12:08 ◼   ► We'll see.

01:12:09 ◼   ► Although I, you know, so sticking to the keyboard here,

01:12:12 ◼   ► I still have my same raft of keyboard complaints

01:12:15 ◼   ► that I've had for a while.

01:12:16 ◼   ► Some of them are actually still new from the butterfly.

01:12:18 ◼   ► Obviously all we really care about is that this

01:12:20 ◼   ► is a reliable keyboard and it sounds, you know,

01:12:22 ◼   ► as far as we can tell they've done everything

01:12:23 ◼   ► that they could to--

01:12:24 ◼   ► - That isn't all we care about.

01:12:25 ◼   ► - To set the, I know, but like--

01:12:26 ◼   ► - Hey, I hated the butterfly keyboard

01:12:28 ◼   ► before it broke for everybody.

01:12:29 ◼   ► - I know, I know, I'm just saying like it is,

01:12:31 ◼   ► in the big picture wise, Apple can't have keyboards

01:12:34 ◼   ► that don't work on their laptops.

01:12:35 ◼   ► Like that is the major problem that we're addressing here

01:12:38 ◼   ► and of course we can't tell.

01:12:39 ◼   ► But there are other things about this keyboard

01:12:42 ◼   ► that still bother me and this has been a problem

01:12:45 ◼   ► on Apple's line for a long time.

01:12:46 ◼   ► So since, right after the tie book,

01:12:50 ◼   ► I guess the first Macbooks, the very first aluminum Macbooks,

01:12:54 ◼   ► that I believe began the era where, well,

01:12:58 ◼   ► and actually maybe it was before that, but anyway,

01:12:59 ◼   ► whenever the era began where Apple decided

01:13:02 ◼   ► that they're going to offer you multiple sizes of laptops

01:13:05 ◼   ► but every single one of them will have a keyboard

01:13:06 ◼   ► that's exactly the same size.

01:13:08 ◼   ► There are advantages to that.

01:13:09 ◼   ► The user experience is the same.

01:13:10 ◼   ► You get used to the key layout on one.

01:13:11 ◼   ► You can use all of them.

01:13:12 ◼   ► Like I understand all the advantages,

01:13:14 ◼   ► but like just what we were saying before about ports

01:13:17 ◼   ► and eight terabyte SSDs and 64 gigs of RAM,

01:13:20 ◼   ► at a certain point it becomes ridiculous.

01:13:22 ◼   ► The most ridiculous it's ever been

01:13:23 ◼   ► is the 17 inch MacBook Pro

01:13:26 ◼   ► or the 17 inch PowerBook before that.

01:13:28 ◼   ► It was a 17 inch laptop with the same exact keyboard

01:13:32 ◼   ► as their 12 inch laptop.

01:13:33 ◼   ► It looked dumb.

01:13:35 ◼   ► It was dumb.

01:13:36 ◼   ► Now they have a 16 inch with basically

01:13:39 ◼   ► the same size keyboard as their 12 inch,

01:13:42 ◼   ► give or take a millimeter or two

01:13:43 ◼   ► according to Marco's calipers.

01:13:44 ◼   ► It doesn't look as dumb, but it is dumb.

01:13:47 ◼   ► We're celebrating the inverted T arrow keys,

01:13:50 ◼   ► which obviously is better.

01:13:51 ◼   ► You can feel for them.

01:13:52 ◼   ► You could have a full size inverted T.

01:13:54 ◼   ► There's plenty of room.

01:13:55 ◼   ► You could have a page up, page down and home.

01:13:57 ◼   ► You could have all sorts of things.

01:13:58 ◼   ► You could get the stupid FN key out of the lower left corner

01:14:01 ◼   ► so control could be back there

01:14:02 ◼   ► if you don't already have a remap to caps lock.

01:14:04 ◼   ► With more room and they have more room,

01:14:07 ◼   ► you can do more things and include more keys

01:14:10 ◼   ► and Apple continues to resist that.

01:14:12 ◼   ► Can I understand the reasons?

01:14:13 ◼   ► Everyone's got their reasons, their excuses.

01:14:15 ◼   ► Oh, we need room for the speakers.

01:14:16 ◼   ► Oh, we need this.

01:14:17 ◼   ► Oh, we need that.

01:14:18 ◼   ► Bottom line is there's more room there.

01:14:20 ◼   ► Look at the world of laptops.

01:14:21 ◼   ► When they have large laptops with 16 inch screens,

01:14:24 ◼   ► there's room for more keys and people use it

01:14:26 ◼   ► and users like it.

01:14:28 ◼   ► Johnny Ive doesn't like it because it's not symmetrical.

01:14:31 ◼   ► So we can't have the inverted T poking down

01:14:33 ◼   ► out of the rectangle of the keyboard,

01:14:34 ◼   ► but he's gone now,

01:14:35 ◼   ► but his replacements apparently still like symmetry.

01:14:37 ◼   ► Another symmetry thing that drives me nuts,

01:14:39 ◼   ► the previous generation of keyboards

01:14:42 ◼   ► as we noted many, many episodes ago,

01:14:45 ◼   ► the bottom row of keys with the space bar

01:14:47 ◼   ► and the modifiers was taller than all the other rows of keys.

01:14:51 ◼   ► I thought that was a great idea

01:14:53 ◼   ► because that bottom row serves a special purpose.

01:14:56 ◼   ► The space bar, the biggest key on the keyboard,

01:14:58 ◼   ► maybe it doesn't need to be any taller, but it's nice.

01:15:00 ◼   ► The modifiers, you smush them with one of your less

01:15:03 ◼   ► dexterous fingers while you hit another key

01:15:05 ◼   ► because you cord with them.

01:15:06 ◼   ► Having the modifiers be slightly taller

01:15:08 ◼   ► than the rest of the keys was nice.

01:15:10 ◼   ► More space for the half height arrows.

01:15:12 ◼   ► Yeah, they did away with that in the 2016 models

01:15:16 ◼   ► because symmetrical, exactly symmetrical,

01:15:18 ◼   ► down to the millimeter keys look nicer.

01:15:21 ◼   ► There's no reason to make it slightly bigger.

01:15:24 ◼   ► Someone did that intentionally and it was smart

01:15:26 ◼   ► and they got rid of it because it's not as symmetrical.

01:15:29 ◼   ► Talk about the level of symmetry.

01:15:30 ◼   ► Not only can we not break the rectangle outline

01:15:32 ◼   ► of the keyboard, but we also can't have that bottom row

01:15:34 ◼   ► be a little bit bigger.

01:15:35 ◼   ► We have to make it smaller.

01:15:36 ◼   ► It's ridiculous.

01:15:38 ◼   ► The touch bar, which Marco mentioned,

01:15:40 ◼   ► which is not optional in his Pro models,

01:15:43 ◼   ► one of the problems with the touch bar is accidental input.

01:15:45 ◼   ► I myself have removed the Siri button

01:15:48 ◼   ► because occasionally I'd hit the Siri thing and it would

01:15:50 ◼   ► bloop, you know, like I go for the delete key and I hit

01:15:52 ◼   ► where the Siri button was, so I removed it from my touch bar.

01:15:54 ◼   ► Occasionally, while I'm thinking about something,

01:15:57 ◼   ► my screen will go black and I'll realize one of my fat

01:15:59 ◼   ► fingers leaned on the little brightness down button

01:16:01 ◼   ► on the touch bar.

01:16:03 ◼   ► And by the way, if that happens to people who are less

01:16:05 ◼   ► technically savvy, they may not realize what happened

01:16:07 ◼   ► and think their computer is broken because it's a very

01:16:09 ◼   ► strange experience and you don't notice it happening.

01:16:11 ◼   ► How can you prevent accidental input on a touch bar?

01:16:13 ◼   ► You can move it farther away from the keyboard.

01:16:15 ◼   ► More than, you know, 0.02 millimeters farther away

01:16:19 ◼   ► as they've done with the extra spacing or whatever.

01:16:21 ◼   ► But how can we move it farther away from the keyboard?

01:16:23 ◼   ► There's no room.

01:16:24 ◼   ► There's totally more room.

01:16:25 ◼   ► To give an example, in the olden days,

01:16:27 ◼   ► the Apple Extended Keyboard 2 had a huge space

01:16:30 ◼   ► between the number keys and the function keys.

01:16:32 ◼   ► It was great because you'd never accidentally go for

01:16:34 ◼   ► a number key and hit a function key.

01:16:36 ◼   ► It was a gigantic amount of space.

01:16:37 ◼   ► Now, there's less room on a laptop,

01:16:39 ◼   ► but there's more room than one or two millimeters.

01:16:41 ◼   ► That would be less aesthetically pleasing.

01:16:43 ◼   ► It is certainly nice when the space between the touch bar

01:16:45 ◼   ► and all the keys is exactly symmetrical,

01:16:47 ◼   ► but it's not as good ergonomically.

01:16:49 ◼   ► These concerns about the laptops and sort of the battle

01:16:52 ◼   ► of form versus function make me think that there is still

01:16:56 ◼   ► plenty of room for improvement and design innovation

01:16:59 ◼   ► in especially the large pro laptop space that I really

01:17:04 ◼   ► hope Apple latches onto.

01:17:05 ◼   ► And I don't want this to sound negative because I'm really

01:17:07 ◼   ► excited that they've fixed the worst problems of their laptops

01:17:11 ◼   ► and have made a keyboard that Marco likes.

01:17:13 ◼   ► But I mentioned the iMac proifications of the laptops before.

01:17:16 ◼   ► This is half of iMac proification because if they had gone

01:17:20 ◼   ► all the way, it would be more versatile and have more ports

01:17:25 ◼   ► and more capabilities and would have broken out of the mold

01:17:27 ◼   ► than the previous laptops.

01:17:28 ◼   ► This is exactly in the mold of the previous laptops,

01:17:30 ◼   ► but it's an alternate universe one where they made them good,

01:17:33 ◼   ► which isn't great.

01:17:34 ◼   ► We want to live in that universe.

01:17:35 ◼   ► We want the universe where they make the laptops good,

01:17:37 ◼   ► but it's the same design.

01:17:39 ◼   ► It's four USB-C shaped holes on the outside, headphone jack,

01:17:42 ◼   ► same size keyboard as everybody else, screen, laptop,

01:17:46 ◼   ► giant trackpad.

01:17:47 ◼   ► It's the same exact design.

01:17:48 ◼   ► And I think that's a really good design.

01:17:50 ◼   ► I just continue to hope that there's room at the top of their

01:17:53 ◼   ► lineup and the largest, most powerful laptops for them to,

01:17:57 ◼   ► you know, break out of that design mold and give us something

01:18:02 ◼   ► more capable and, you know, frankly better in terms of the

01:18:07 ◼   ► ergonomics of the keyboard and the key layout and everything.

01:18:09 ◼   ► There is room for improvement there.

01:18:10 ◼   ► And I really, really hope that somehow, some way,

01:18:13 ◼   ► Apple can find the courage to break out of the rectangle of

01:18:15 ◼   ► the keyboard and to put a different keyboard on their

01:18:17 ◼   ► largest laptop than on their smallest.

01:18:19 ◼   ► See, I actually don't know if I agree with you on that.

01:18:23 ◼   ► I would love things like full height arrows,

01:18:25 ◼   ► which you would need, I guess, like another row on the right

01:18:27 ◼   ► probably to do that, like a home and page up kind of row at least.

01:18:30 ◼   ► No, you just move them down one, you know what I mean?

01:18:33 ◼   ► Oh, that's interesting.

01:18:34 ◼   ► The left and right would be, it would break out of the

01:18:36 ◼   ► rectangle of the keyboard.

01:18:37 ◼   ► The left and right would be like lower.

01:18:38 ◼   ► Oh boy, yeah, that's not going to happen.

01:18:40 ◼   ► But, like, I'm not saying because it's ugly,

01:18:42 ◼   ► but not because it's ergonomically bad.

01:18:43 ◼   ► It's great.

01:18:44 ◼   ► Yeah, well, and I really do think, like,

01:18:46 ◼   ► Johnny Ive has been gone for officially something like six

01:18:49 ◼   ► months, but I think his exit was much longer than that in practice.

01:18:54 ◼   ► I think it was a slow, gradual exit over probably a couple of years, right?

01:18:58 ◼   ► Yeah, I'm using him as the stand in for that ethos of, like,

01:19:01 ◼   ► well, the bottom row of keys can't be half a millimeter taller.

01:19:04 ◼   ► They have to be exactly the same size or I'll notice that

01:19:07 ◼   ► that ethos does not serve anybody.

01:19:10 ◼   ► Whether it was Johnny or not, the fact is they've had

01:19:13 ◼   ► significant change in design leadership since the 2016s came out,

01:19:17 ◼   ► and now they have made some changes that do break symmetry,

01:19:23 ◼   ► that are less attractive, like making the, first of all,

01:19:26 ◼   ► giving us the inverted T arrows back.

01:19:28 ◼   ► That's a huge breaking of symmetry on the keyboard.

01:19:30 ◼   ► Giving us the escape key.

01:19:32 ◼   ► Yeah, but it's a preexisting one.

01:19:33 ◼   ► They did that in the 2015s as well.

01:19:35 ◼   ► I wouldn't say the escape key is breaking symmetry

01:19:37 ◼   ► because it's mostly symmetrical with a touch ID,

01:19:40 ◼   ► although it's kind of surprising it's not exactly the same size.

01:19:42 ◼   ► I know they're not the same size, but they're still--

01:19:44 ◼   ► The escape key is wider than touch ID.

01:19:45 ◼   ► I understand.

01:19:46 ◼   ► Like, it wasn't a MacBook escape as well.

01:19:48 ◼   ► And even just even the key margins.

01:19:49 ◼   ► Like, I'm really convinced that the whole reason the keys

01:19:52 ◼   ► were so damn close together on the butterfly

01:19:55 ◼   ► was simply that the thinner margins looked better,

01:19:58 ◼   ► even though it was awful for ergonomics and accuracy.

01:20:01 ◼   ► But like, I really do think that's why they did it.

01:20:04 ◼   ► I can't think of any other reason why they would've.

01:20:06 ◼   ► And so they have made a number of changes in this area

01:20:10 ◼   ► that are aesthetically regressions,

01:20:12 ◼   ► but that dramatically improve usability, accuracy, et cetera.

01:20:16 ◼   ► And so that's why I think, like, I'm actually hopeful.

01:20:19 ◼   ► And again, they made it thicker and heavier

01:20:21 ◼   ► and a little bit bigger, because that was required

01:20:24 ◼   ► to achieve things people really wanted.

01:20:26 ◼   ► Same thing on the iPhones, right?

01:20:28 ◼   ► The iPhones were made thicker and heavier,

01:20:30 ◼   ► because it achieved significant gains that people wanted.

01:20:33 ◼   ► So I think we actually are seeing the early days of Apple,

01:20:37 ◼   ► like, stepping back from the worst of form over function,

01:20:42 ◼   ► that I think is gonna be like, the one negative asterisk

01:20:47 ◼   ► on the Johnny Ive era that we're gonna look back on

01:20:49 ◼   ► is like, way too much form over function.

01:20:51 ◼   ► I really do think we're seeing it.

01:20:53 ◼   ► The Mac Pro, the new Mac Pro, is way uglier

01:20:56 ◼   ► than the trash can Mac Pro, but it's what people wanted.

01:20:59 ◼   ► - The Mac Pro is the example of going all the way.

01:21:02 ◼   ► There is nothing in the Mac Pro that is functionally

01:21:05 ◼   ► compromised for the sake of aesthetics.

01:21:07 ◼   ► Nothing.

01:21:08 ◼   ► And the iMac Pro is close to that,

01:21:10 ◼   ► because they use the same case, but in general.

01:21:13 ◼   ► They went halfway with this thing.

01:21:15 ◼   ► They did the guts.

01:21:16 ◼   ► They said, better cooling, bigger capabilities,

01:21:18 ◼   ► everything we can possibly do on the inside

01:21:20 ◼   ► other than the screen, we're gonna do.

01:21:22 ◼   ► It's still basically the same design as it was before.

01:21:24 ◼   ► And I applaud all the things they did with the keyboard

01:21:26 ◼   ► to improve on it, but they haven't broken

01:21:29 ◼   ► with their existing orthodoxy for the past decade.

01:21:32 ◼   ► The half an hour keys existed before, right?

01:21:34 ◼   ► So they're just going back to a design they had.

01:21:36 ◼   ► And by the way, the spacing between the keys,

01:21:37 ◼   ► my guess is that someone thought bigger keys

01:21:39 ◼   ► would be better, because by reducing the spacing,

01:21:41 ◼   ► you do make larger keys, and you can see someone

01:21:43 ◼   ► thinking that and saying, oh, larger keys would be better.

01:21:45 ◼   ► They'd be easier to hit.

01:21:47 ◼   ► And maybe some people even agree with that,

01:21:48 ◼   ► but obviously, you don't, and I don't think I do either.

01:21:51 ◼   ► But it might have been aesthetics,

01:21:53 ◼   ► but it might have also just been bigger key caps.

01:21:55 ◼   ► All I'm saying is that this feels like a successful

01:21:59 ◼   ► incarnation of the design of the 2015 MacBook Pro

01:22:05 ◼   ► updated for modern internals and technology

01:22:07 ◼   ► with a dose of the iMac Pro internals saying,

01:22:10 ◼   ► let's just blow out the doors on the capabilities

01:22:13 ◼   ► of the inside of this thing.

01:22:14 ◼   ► But it's not a fundamentally different design

01:22:16 ◼   ► in the way that the Mac Pro is a fundamentally

01:22:19 ◼   ► different design than the trash can,

01:22:21 ◼   ► is a fundamentally different design than the iMac Pro.

01:22:23 ◼   ► Like, again, no one is looking at the Mac Pro

01:22:25 ◼   ► and wondering how it is differentiated from the trash can

01:22:28 ◼   ► or from the iMac Pro, whereas if you look at this laptop,

01:22:31 ◼   ► you might wonder how it's differentiated from the 13-inch.

01:22:34 ◼   ► And there are explanations for that,

01:22:36 ◼   ► but they are more subtle than, I can just look at this

01:22:38 ◼   ► and know this is a more capable thing,

01:22:41 ◼   ► or this is a different design.

01:22:42 ◼   ► It's not a different design.

01:22:43 ◼   ► It is a better iteration of the previous design.

01:22:46 ◼   ► - Yeah, but I think ultimately, like, this is hard

01:22:51 ◼   ► to distinguish from a 2015 if there isn't a 2015 next to it,

01:22:56 ◼   ► because you have the inverted T arrows

01:22:58 ◼   ► and it's the same kind of size class and everything.

01:23:00 ◼   ► At a very casual, quick glance,

01:23:03 ◼   ► it just looks like a MacBook Pro, simple as that.

01:23:06 ◼   ► It just looks like the way they've always looked,

01:23:08 ◼   ► quote always, right?

01:23:09 ◼   ► And I think the new Mac Pro,

01:23:10 ◼   ► it doesn't look like anything like the trash can,

01:23:13 ◼   ► but it is very similar in lots of ways to the old tower.

01:23:15 ◼   ► That only ancient dinosaurs, I guess,

01:23:18 ◼   ► are still using these days, but it does,

01:23:21 ◼   ► in a way, they had their form over function peak,

01:23:26 ◼   ► which was the trash can, and customers said no,

01:23:31 ◼   ► and there were problems with it,

01:23:32 ◼   ► and so they went back to what they had before that misstep.

01:23:36 ◼   ► And they've done a lot of that same thing here.

01:23:39 ◼   ► They have gone much of the way back to before the,

01:23:44 ◼   ► before the 2016 Touch Bar generation misstep.

01:23:48 ◼   ► Not as far back as they did with the Mac Pro.

01:23:50 ◼   ► And to some degree, I don't know how much further back

01:23:54 ◼   ► they could have gone with some of these things.

01:23:56 ◼   ► - Well, they need to go forward,

01:23:57 ◼   ► because they've never made a laptop like I described.

01:24:00 ◼   ► I'm obviously asking them for it to go way farther.

01:24:02 ◼   ► I'm not saying you should go back to the Mac portable,

01:24:04 ◼   ► which I guess you could go by that far,

01:24:06 ◼   ► you can get some weird keyboard layouts,

01:24:07 ◼   ► but they've never made anything

01:24:09 ◼   ► as ugly as what I was describing.

01:24:11 ◼   ► And it makes sense,

01:24:12 ◼   ► 'cause they're the nice looking computer company.

01:24:13 ◼   ► I'm just saying, I think there's room for that.

01:24:16 ◼   ► Arguably they never made a tower computer

01:24:18 ◼   ► as ugly as the Mac Pro,

01:24:19 ◼   ► but obviously there was room for that too.

01:24:20 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:24:21 ◼   ► - Wow.

01:24:22 ◼   ► - I'm excited, I really am.

01:24:23 ◼   ► This--

01:24:24 ◼   ► - You should be, it's really good.

01:24:26 ◼   ► - The big problem I have with this announcement is,

01:24:29 ◼   ► well, two problems.

01:24:30 ◼   ► Number one, I'm not planning on spending money

01:24:32 ◼   ► on a laptop soon, but it sounds like I'm gonna have to.

01:24:34 ◼   ► But I guess the good--

01:24:35 ◼   ► - Don't touch one.

01:24:36 ◼   ► - The silver lining here--

01:24:37 ◼   ► - Actually, I have a,

01:24:38 ◼   ► if you love the butterfly keyboard so much,

01:24:40 ◼   ► I have a 13 inch MacBook Pro that you can--

01:24:41 ◼   ► - Ah, here we go.

01:24:42 ◼   ► - I can give it to you for a good price.

01:24:43 ◼   ► - Here we go.

01:24:44 ◼   ► - That's what I was saying about people

01:24:45 ◼   ► wanting to offload their old things.

01:24:47 ◼   ► I wonder if the price on these things

01:24:48 ◼   ► is really gonna drop through the floor,

01:24:50 ◼   ► because I think people will want to get rid of