ATP

00:00:00 ◼   ► We should start tonight by closing the loop. I can't believe I just said that out loud. I hate myself so hard.

00:00:06 ◼   ► Let me try that again.

00:00:07 ◼   ► Come out of the parking lot.

00:00:08 ◼   ► The sad thing is this is going to go in the show.

00:00:10 ◼   ► Oh yeah.

00:00:11 ◼   ► God, this is going to go in the show and I hate myself so hard.

00:00:14 ◼   ► [

00:00:14 ◼   ► [

00:00:23 ◼   ► What happened with your Energy Star sticker?

00:00:26 ◼   ► I was encouraged by lots of stories and pictures posted by people on the internet saying, "I

00:00:31 ◼   ► have removed my Energy Star sticker from my LG monitor and it went okay."

00:00:34 ◼   ► Didn't I tell you that during the episode?

00:00:36 ◼   ► Yeah, lots of people sent me images of them doing it.

00:00:41 ◼   ► It's not until the other people tell you that you believe them.

00:00:43 ◼   ► You don't believe me, your co-host, your good friend, but you believe the randos on the

00:00:47 ◼   ► internet.

00:00:48 ◼   ► Well, I need like a certain, you know, it helps to have more people say it.

00:00:52 ◼   ► Some people, one poor person was like, "Boy, I'm glad I don't have an Energy Star sticker

00:00:56 ◼   ► on my monitor."

00:00:57 ◼   ► And then he looked and he found it.

00:01:00 ◼   ► So is this, can you, now that we're on this topic, can you please explain the phrase "Trust

00:01:04 ◼   ► but verify" to me?

00:01:05 ◼   ► That's from the Cold War, the Reagan era thing of like trying to make it sound like

00:01:13 ◼   ► he is cooperating with the USSR in disarmament talks, but by the same token he is also still

00:01:19 ◼   ► a strong cowboy who will bang bang USA cheeseburger cheeseburger. So it's trust, but verify.

00:01:25 ◼   ► So how is that different from just not trusting people and just verifying everything anyway?

00:01:30 ◼   ► I told you how it's different. It's different because it sounds like you're being trusting

00:01:33 ◼   ► and cooperative, but at the same time you speak out of the other side of your mouth

00:01:36 ◼   ► and say, "But I'm still a manly man who can beat up people." So it's trust, but don't

00:01:41 ◼   ► trust. Okay, so it's not really trusting. It's like your dishes are virtually spotless.

00:01:45 ◼   ► because your dishes have spots on them.

00:01:47 ◼   ► - Right.

00:01:48 ◼   ► So, I've heard this phrase,

00:01:50 ◼   ► I didn't know that was the origin of it,

00:01:51 ◼   ► thank you for the history lesson,

00:01:52 ◼   ► I honestly did not know that.

00:01:54 ◼   ► So that makes sense,

00:01:55 ◼   ► that it would be like a political doublespeak thing,

00:01:57 ◼   ► but I hear people use the phrase

00:02:00 ◼   ► as a seemingly non-sarcastic directive.

00:02:03 ◼   ► So are they just using it wrong?

00:02:05 ◼   ► - What is the context of,

00:02:08 ◼   ► how does this connect to Energy Star stickers?

00:02:09 ◼   ► - It's almost like security,

00:02:10 ◼   ► well, because you didn't trust Casey telling you

00:02:13 ◼   ► that you had to get verification from everybody else.

00:02:15 ◼   ► - No, no, no, it's just like, I mean,

00:02:16 ◼   ► that's just one data point.

00:02:17 ◼   ► It just helps to have more data points.

00:02:19 ◼   ► It's not as if I needed to trust Casey, but verify,

00:02:22 ◼   ► like I needed more people,

00:02:23 ◼   ► because his monitor's not the same as mine,

00:02:25 ◼   ► his sticker is not the same as mine, you know,

00:02:27 ◼   ► there are many different possibilities here.

00:02:30 ◼   ► And maybe he's not as picky about sticky stuff.

00:02:32 ◼   ► - So trust, but verify really just means

00:02:35 ◼   ► don't trust anybody and verify everything.

00:02:37 ◼   ► - Either that or just don't trust me.

00:02:39 ◼   ► That's what it really boils down to.

00:02:40 ◼   ► - It means don't trust Casey.

00:02:42 ◼   ► - And I don't even know if the Reagan/USSR thing

00:02:44 ◼   ► the origin of it, but that's what I know it from. Anyway, emboldened by the internet.

00:02:51 ◼   ► And your good friend Casey-less. You're part of the internet. I removed the

00:02:56 ◼   ► sticker and everything went fine and there's no residue and thumbs up.

00:03:00 ◼   ► So don't trust your friend Casey, but trust Random Strangers on Twitter.

00:03:03 ◼   ► Right. That's what I'm hearing. If Casey had waited, if Casey had waited until

00:03:07 ◼   ► seven other people sent me pictures and then had said, he would have been, you know, not

00:03:13 ◼   ► straw that broke the camel's back, whatever the good version of that is.

00:03:16 ◼   ► This is not getting any better, Jon. This is just getting worse. Oh, God. All right,

00:03:21 ◼   ► so let's just move on while we still can. I went to the Apple Store today.

00:03:24 ◼   ► Move on while we're still friends. Right?

00:03:26 ◼   ► I went to the Apple Store today. First and most importantly, it infuriates me, the fact

00:03:33 ◼   ► that there is no obvious place to line up or queue in order to pay for something. I

00:03:39 ◼   ► I know we've spoken about this in the past.

00:03:41 ◼   ► Maybe it's an East Coast thing.

00:03:43 ◼   ► Maybe this is, maybe I'm the problem here,

00:03:45 ◼   ► but it drives me bananas.

00:03:47 ◼   ► - You're not the problem.

00:03:48 ◼   ► The store is the problem.

00:03:49 ◼   ► - It drives me bananas that I can't just go somewhere

00:03:54 ◼   ► in being an obvious line to pay for things.

00:03:59 ◼   ► Why is that not, it drives me nuts.

00:04:02 ◼   ► - And we've covered it before.

00:04:04 ◼   ► I was like, well, you know, that may bother you,

00:04:07 ◼   ► but for other people, it's more convenient.

00:04:08 ◼   ► But I think the key issue here is the one that all five-year-olds have, which is the

00:04:13 ◼   ► tiny child's version of a conception of fairness, which is like, if I come in the store before

00:04:19 ◼   ► somebody, or if I decide to, I'm ready to check out, if I make that decision before

00:04:23 ◼   ► somebody else, I should be served before somebody else.

00:04:26 ◼   ► And the way that's usually solved is by a line.

00:04:28 ◼   ► And yes, there can be multiple lines, and you feel like you picked the wrong line, and

00:04:31 ◼   ► there's all those little silly things that make you notice when you feel like you're

00:04:34 ◼   ► getting cheated.

00:04:35 ◼   ► Again, more five-year-old versions of fairness.

00:04:37 ◼   ► when it's just a big giant crowd and you come to a decision, I know what I want to get,

00:04:42 ◼   ► it's this, now I need to give someone money for it. And then you are just wandering aimlessly

00:04:48 ◼   ► with the feeling that people who made the decision after you are getting served before

00:04:52 ◼   ► you because they happen to be closer to someone who is ready to serve them. And then there's

00:04:56 ◼   ► the application that makes you feel like you're stealing where you can check yourself out

00:04:59 ◼   ► and just overall we want to go back to the system that we know and love which is a line.

00:05:04 ◼   ► Yep, because I know I'll get a thousand tweets and emails, I didn't use the Apple Store app

00:05:10 ◼   ► because I was buying a gift certificate or gift card or whatever it's called, where I

00:05:14 ◼   ► was doing an arbitrary sum of money on that gift card, which maybe there's a way to do

00:05:19 ◼   ► it through the Apple Store app, but I didn't want to leave any doubt that it would work,

00:05:23 ◼   ► so I wanted to wait for human being to help me.

00:05:26 ◼   ► And so anyway, so I just loitered.

00:05:29 ◼   ► And the worst part is, so there was an employee working with a customer who was getting, like,

00:05:37 ◼   ► from the looks of it, possibly a new phone, possibly a new watch, certainly a new watch

00:05:42 ◼   ► band.

00:05:43 ◼   ► And so this is like a fairly intense process.

00:05:46 ◼   ► And I'm in that, like, uncomfortable space where I want to make it clear that I'm kind

00:05:53 ◼   ► of forming my own line because I believe in order, because I'm from the East Coast.

00:05:59 ◼   ► And I want to make it obvious I'm waiting for this person, this employee's help.

00:06:04 ◼   ► Yet at the same time, there's that like ATM buffer zone where you don't want to get too

00:06:08 ◼   ► close to the customer's business because that's not really appropriate.

00:06:12 ◼   ► And so I'm just kind of standing around in the middle of the store looking lost because

00:06:17 ◼   ► basically that's what I am.

00:06:19 ◼   ► And so I get my wallet out.

00:06:21 ◼   ► You didn't want to be tied to that person too.

00:06:23 ◼   ► Because you're also on the lookout for anybody else who might be able to help you sooner.

00:06:25 ◼   ► And again, this is a problem that we've solved with the magic of lines.

00:06:28 ◼   ► It's called the express lane.

00:06:29 ◼   ► If you're behind someone who's doing all their Thanksgiving shopping and you don't want to

00:06:32 ◼   ► wait, you just want to buy two things, you can, in theory, go to the express lane.

00:06:37 ◼   ► You know, which is the app that makes you feel like you're stealing.

00:06:39 ◼   ► But anyway, lines, lines do have their drawbacks.

00:06:42 ◼   ► But you were in the situation where you're like, I'm going to claim my spot by this guy

00:06:46 ◼   ► just in case no one else is available.

00:06:47 ◼   ► But it's possible that someone else just finished checking someone out, giving them their iPod

00:06:51 ◼   ► socks or whatever, and they're ready to serve someone immediately.

00:06:55 ◼   ► And then someone will wander over to them and you'll be like, but I was ready five minutes

00:06:59 ◼   ► to go but I'm not over there but I was waiting by this guy it's like lines

00:07:01 ◼   ► lines people yep if this fixes everything and so so that's exactly what

00:07:06 ◼   ► happened so my eyes are darting so fast I must have looked like I was learning

00:07:10 ◼   ► something from you know getting a download from the matrix or something

00:07:12 ◼   ► like that cuz my eyes are darting all over the place maybe they're ready no

00:07:14 ◼   ► they're not ready that guy's right no that guy's ready that woman is ready no

00:07:17 ◼   ► that woman isn't ready it was insane and so anyway so I did the like social cue

00:07:22 ◼   ► of I got my wallet out and not only did I get my wallet in my hand so I have

00:07:26 ◼   ► merchandise in one hand, I have a wallet in the other hand.

00:07:28 ◼   ► I actually removed my credit card from my wallet,

00:07:31 ◼   ► in part because I will always slightly be a New Yorker

00:07:34 ◼   ► and I wanna take up as little time as possible,

00:07:36 ◼   ► in part because I just wanna give the social cue of,

00:07:39 ◼   ► I'm ready to pay for this, please.

00:07:42 ◼   ► Anyway, I bring all this up to say, I tried the Touch Bar.

00:07:46 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:07:47 ◼   ► - I tried it too, I was in, I was on an Apple store,

00:07:49 ◼   ► I was in there and I, when I was in there,

00:07:51 ◼   ► I forgot that the Touch Bar max would actually be there

00:07:54 ◼   ► until I noticed one, I'm like, oh yeah,

00:07:56 ◼   ► I should try that, so I did that as well.

00:07:58 ◼   ► - I also did it.

00:07:59 ◼   ► - Today or just recently?

00:08:01 ◼   ► - For the last few days since I bought one.

00:08:03 ◼   ► - Of course you did.

00:08:04 ◼   ► You are the, ugh.

00:08:05 ◼   ► - I'm the worst. - I can't.

00:08:06 ◼   ► - I'm just the worst.

00:08:07 ◼   ► - I let the record show I stopped myself

00:08:10 ◼   ► from finishing that sentence.

00:08:11 ◼   ► Anyway, so I tried the Touch Bar.

00:08:12 ◼   ► I only tried it for about two or three minutes.

00:08:15 ◼   ► Initial impressions, I liked it.

00:08:18 ◼   ► I don't like the presentation in the Apple Store.

00:08:22 ◼   ► And the reason I say that is I feel like,

00:08:25 ◼   ► And maybe it's my height, and I don't feel like I'm a remarkably tall person.

00:08:28 ◼   ► I'm roughly six feet, give or take an inch or two, maybe 5'11".

00:08:33 ◼   ► And I don't know what that is in meters because I'm American.

00:08:37 ◼   ► And I think that the Apple Store's tables are a bit too low.

00:08:44 ◼   ► And so the angle in which I'm looking at the touch bar is, I think, a bit too much.

00:08:50 ◼   ► In other words, I think generally speaking my head would be lower as compared to the

00:08:55 ◼   ► laptop if I was working at, say, a desk or something.

00:08:58 ◼   ► And so it looked like, I can't describe it, but it looked as though I was at the wrong

00:09:04 ◼   ► viewing angle for the touch bar.

00:09:06 ◼   ► That being said, I really liked it.

00:09:08 ◼   ► I think I can totally understand why someone would say, "Oh, it's a gimmick," because it

00:09:13 ◼   ► very well may be.

00:09:14 ◼   ► But I thought it was clever.

00:09:16 ◼   ► I thought it was well done.

00:09:17 ◼   ► There's things that I don't love about it.

00:09:19 ◼   ► For example, I want to say it was maybe Jason Snell, I might have that wrong, but somebody

00:09:23 ◼   ► was saying on one of the podcasts I was listening to lately that in Safari there are previews

00:09:29 ◼   ► of your different tabs that are open.

00:09:31 ◼   ► And that seems kind of silly to me.

00:09:32 ◼   ► I think titles would have perhaps been better.

00:09:36 ◼   ► Maybe not, I don't know.

00:09:37 ◼   ► I only used it for a couple minutes.

00:09:39 ◼   ► The escape key, I didn't have a problem mashing it by habit, but it was disconcerting that

00:09:46 ◼   ► I didn't feel a button press when I did it.

00:09:49 ◼   ► And a couple of times I caught the tilde key, which is an American keyboard, directly below

00:09:56 ◼   ► escape.

00:09:57 ◼   ► I caught that key instead of escape, which was frustrating.

00:10:00 ◼   ► And I also spent a little time typing on the keyboard.

00:10:05 ◼   ► And in case for some reason you weren't aware, because I don't know how much I've talked

00:10:09 ◼   ► about it on the show, but I've talked about it on like Twitter and my website incessantly.

00:10:12 ◼   ► I freaking love the Magic Keyboard, the external keyboard that Apple's currently selling for,

00:10:19 ◼   ► say, iMacs and whatnot.

00:10:21 ◼   ► I love that keyboard.

00:10:22 ◼   ► To me, it is my favorite keyboard ever, ever, ever, bar none.

00:10:27 ◼   ► And the keyboard on the MacBook Pro, to me, and I'm curious to hear both of your thoughts

00:10:31 ◼   ► here in a moment, to me the MacBook Pro keyboard was 80-ish percent of the way there, but I

00:10:37 ◼   ► felt like the key travel wasn't enough, and that was very frustrating.

00:10:40 ◼   ► I think I could get past it, but I really, really wanted just a little bit more key travel,

00:10:45 ◼   ► and I think it would have made a world of difference to me.

00:10:49 ◼   ► So let's start with Jon, since Marco you own one.

00:10:53 ◼   ► Jon, what did you think?

00:10:54 ◼   ► I presume you at least typed on it for a few minutes.

00:10:56 ◼   ► What did you think of the key travel and also the touch bar?

00:10:59 ◼   ► Didn't feel that different to me than the regular MacBook One.

00:11:02 ◼   ► And I did notice the, I did notice the noise, surprisingly.

00:11:06 ◼   ► Maybe it's because I've read all the stories about it and I was primed for it, but I feel

00:11:09 ◼   ► I would have noticed anyway that it was noisier and it did feel like stiffer and clackier but not

00:11:15 ◼   ► so much. I do think I liked it better than the MacBook One keyboard. I hate laptop keyboards in

00:11:21 ◼   ► general so it's hard for me to say like you know I think I said this about the Mac one I just I just

00:11:25 ◼   ► don't like typing on them ever like in the best case just because the keys are you know it's all

00:11:30 ◼   ► wedged into a little shape it doesn't have the keys that I want and I just I don't like the

00:11:33 ◼   ► controls not in the corner yes I know I should wrap it to a caps lock whatever anyway I don't like them

00:11:38 ◼   ► As far as this one goes, I'm glad it's an improvement over the MacBook One.

00:11:43 ◼   ► I'm going to eventually have one of these for work, but I honestly doubt I will ever

00:11:46 ◼   ► type on it at work.

00:11:48 ◼   ► Like I guess maybe if I'm in a meeting or something briefly, but I don't use laptops.

00:11:53 ◼   ► I don't find myself using laptops.

00:11:55 ◼   ► Maybe that will change once I have this one for work and I'm bringing it home and maybe

00:11:58 ◼   ► I'll just find myself using it.

00:11:59 ◼   ► We'll see.

00:12:00 ◼   ► But for now, I don't know.

00:12:02 ◼   ► Same thing with the Touch Bar.

00:12:03 ◼   ► It seemed fine.

00:12:04 ◼   ► It was kind of interesting.

00:12:06 ◼   ► keyboard do you currently use at work or do you expect to be using at work?

00:12:10 ◼   ► Apple extended aluminum. That's what I've been using for many years now. And I

00:12:15 ◼   ► was Apple extended too for many many years. I had to give that up for RSI

00:12:20 ◼   ► reasons because the keys require more force to press and I find keys that

00:12:23 ◼   ► require less force to press are easier on my hands. That's why I like the Apple

00:12:27 ◼   ► aluminum extended because the keys seem very easy to hit. And that was one

00:12:33 ◼   ► of the things about the both the MacBook one and this one like the low travel maybe I'm

00:12:39 ◼   ► pressing harder than I need to but it feels almost like banging your hands against just

00:12:43 ◼   ► like the desk that doesn't move right like that it feels like there's more the for more

00:12:48 ◼   ► of the force I'm putting in is bouncing back at me or maybe it's bouncing back quicker

00:12:51 ◼   ► I don't know I would have to type on it for a long period of time to see if this is actually

00:12:53 ◼   ► a thing but yeah and then so the touch bar it's all right I mean it's basically what

00:13:00 ◼   ► thought it would be. It was cute. It looks nice. I think the Escape key activation is

00:13:07 ◼   ► reasonable. I would still prefer a regular key, but I think I would be excited to have

00:13:14 ◼   ► a laptop with this on it versus one without. Like, it is a net plus to me in my mind, again,

00:13:19 ◼   ► having using it for five minutes. Like, whatever the negatives are in there, I think the positives

00:13:24 ◼   ► overwhelm it, so I think this is a good addition to Apple's laptop line.

00:13:28 ◼   ► Marco.

00:13:29 ◼   ► - So regarding the keyboard, it doesn't feel that different

00:13:33 ◼   ► from the MacBook One keyboard, honestly.

00:13:35 ◼   ► If you get a chance, do either of you actually try them

00:13:38 ◼   ► side by side of the store, 'cause a lot of the stores

00:13:39 ◼   ► will have them, literally there will be an escape

00:13:42 ◼   ► next to the MacBook Ones?

00:13:43 ◼   ► - I did not.

00:13:43 ◼   ► - Yep, I did.

00:13:44 ◼   ► I went right from one to the other, and I could tell you

00:13:48 ◼   ► the difference, I could probably tell you the difference

00:13:50 ◼   ► with my ears plugged, but definitely with my ears open,

00:13:53 ◼   ► I could tell that they felt different, but they both felt

00:13:55 ◼   ► like that little keyboard that doesn't move too much

00:13:57 ◼   ► that has the little cupped keys.

00:13:58 ◼   ► They both felt like that.

00:13:59 ◼   ► - Exactly, I would say the MacBook One keyboard

00:14:02 ◼   ► kind of feels like what you'd expect

00:14:04 ◼   ► the new MacBook Pro keyboard to feel like

00:14:06 ◼   ► after five years of heavy use.

00:14:07 ◼   ► Like it almost feels like it's worn out.

00:14:09 ◼   ► You know, like it kind of lacks that kind of kickback

00:14:12 ◼   ► the way the new MacBook Pro does.

00:14:14 ◼   ► 'Cause like I think the way Apple described it

00:14:16 ◼   ► actually is a pretty good accurate description,

00:14:19 ◼   ► which is like, you know, it's the same key travel,

00:14:21 ◼   ► but it has more feedback.

00:14:23 ◼   ► Like it feels better,

00:14:25 ◼   ► but it's still a very, very shallow keyboard.

00:14:28 ◼   ► I still don't like it, but after a few days with it so far,

00:14:33 ◼   ► and I traveled with it, and I did a lot of coding

00:14:36 ◼   ► on the plane and everything, and I took a lot of notes

00:14:39 ◼   ► about the computer, on the computer, so lots of typing,

00:14:42 ◼   ► it's fine, I think this is one of many areas

00:14:45 ◼   ► where Jason Snell is right, it's fine, I can use it,

00:14:49 ◼   ► but I don't like it.

00:14:50 ◼   ► It's better enough than the MacBook One keyboard

00:14:54 ◼   ► that I would not not get this computer just for that,

00:14:58 ◼   ► if that makes sense.

00:14:59 ◼   ► - I think there's a big, one of the biggest improvements

00:15:01 ◼   ► over the MacBook One keyboard,

00:15:02 ◼   ► not so much in like how it feels and touchy-feely stuff,

00:15:05 ◼   ► but just practically speaking again

00:15:06 ◼   ► for the brief time I was typing,

00:15:08 ◼   ► my problem with the MacBook One keyboard was often

00:15:10 ◼   ► because there's so little travel

00:15:12 ◼   ► and because the keys are so sunken in,

00:15:14 ◼   ► it wasn't always easy to be sure

00:15:17 ◼   ► that I have successfully activated a key, right?

00:15:20 ◼   ► Because sometimes you go to hit it

00:15:22 ◼   ► and you can't tell you hit it

00:15:23 ◼   ► because your finger goes up and down,

00:15:24 ◼   ► but it goes up and down like too little.

00:15:26 ◼   ► And the new one has such a much more positive,

00:15:29 ◼   ► like you have pressed this key

00:15:30 ◼   ► and you'll know it because ka-clack, right?

00:15:34 ◼   ► Whereas if you go for it and don't quite hit it

00:15:35 ◼   ► because you didn't apply enough force,

00:15:37 ◼   ► you won't get the ka-clack.

00:15:38 ◼   ► And so I felt on the new one,

00:15:39 ◼   ► maybe it's just psychological,

00:15:41 ◼   ► that I could tell when I hit a key

00:15:42 ◼   ► and I could tell when I didn't successfully hit a key

00:15:44 ◼   ► in a way that was harder for me to tell

00:15:46 ◼   ► on the MacBook One keyboard.

00:15:47 ◼   ► - Yeah, I agree with that.

00:15:49 ◼   ► It is totally fine.

00:15:50 ◼   ► I will also point out though,

00:15:51 ◼   ► while we're on the subject of the noise,

00:15:53 ◼   ► the MacBook Pro keyboard is not only loud,

00:15:57 ◼   ► like noticeably loud, like TIFF noticed even

00:16:00 ◼   ► like in the same room, like wow, that is loud.

00:16:02 ◼   ► But I also think that the sound it makes

00:16:05 ◼   ► is particularly ungraceful.

00:16:07 ◼   ► It almost sounds like you're tapping your fingers

00:16:09 ◼   ► on a plastic tub.

00:16:11 ◼   ► It's like, it's really a, like I would do it now,

00:16:13 ◼   ► but I just, you know, I'm probably not gonna convey it,

00:16:15 ◼   ► but it's like--

00:16:16 ◼   ► - Steven Hackett already did it.

00:16:17 ◼   ► - It really does not sound good.

00:16:18 ◼   ► it sounds very cheap and doesn't sound like something

00:16:22 ◼   ► that's working the way it should be working.

00:16:24 ◼   ► - I don't think it sounds cheap, I think it sounds sharp.

00:16:27 ◼   ► Like I think it sounds like a precision piece of machinery

00:16:29 ◼   ► going (imitates machine clicking)

00:16:30 ◼   ► Like I don't think it's, it doesn't sound or feel cheap.

00:16:33 ◼   ► In fact, that's one of the things a lot of people said

00:16:35 ◼   ► about it and I agree that this keyboard feels solid.

00:16:37 ◼   ► Like it doesn't, the key caps don't wiggle around

00:16:39 ◼   ► like they do on the one in my Apple extended aluminum

00:16:41 ◼   ► or any of those other ones.

00:16:42 ◼   ► Like it feels very solid and when you type,

00:16:44 ◼   ► it's like a sharp little punch, right?

00:16:47 ◼   ► a little metal punch, which is not a pleasant sound if you're in the room, but I think it

00:16:51 ◼   ► doesn't feel cheap.

00:16:52 ◼   ► Yeah, it doesn't feel cheap, it sounds cheap.

00:16:55 ◼   ► It feels like a mediocre keyboard.

00:16:57 ◼   ► I mean, people will get used to it.

00:17:00 ◼   ► The problem with any of these things with volume is like, no matter what sound it makes,

00:17:03 ◼   ► if it's more sound than your other one was, that's a problem because people kind of develop

00:17:09 ◼   ► their habits around, like I remember when I was on the Apple Extended 2, like I would

00:17:13 ◼   ► would be typing two rooms away, and it would be like,

00:17:17 ◼   ► my wife would be trying to sleep,

00:17:18 ◼   ► but you're like, you can't do that, I can't sleep.

00:17:21 ◼   ► 'Cause we're in a 900 square foot apartment,

00:17:23 ◼   ► you can't be typing right now, 'cause it's just too much.

00:17:25 ◼   ► Like, it's super loud.

00:17:26 ◼   ► And so, in this situation, if you're used to sitting there

00:17:30 ◼   ► on the couch and typing while someone watches TV,

00:17:32 ◼   ► and this one cranks up the volume just a little bit,

00:17:34 ◼   ► it's like, all right, I can't watch TV

00:17:35 ◼   ► while you're doing that, just stop typing.

00:17:37 ◼   ► - Well, it's also, it's much louder

00:17:39 ◼   ► the way this kind of resonates on a desk.

00:17:41 ◼   ► If it's in your lap, it is still weirdly loud,

00:17:43 ◼   ► but it is less so.

00:17:44 ◼   ► On a desk, it becomes substantially louder.

00:17:47 ◼   ► I could definitely see, like,

00:17:49 ◼   ► if you share an office with people

00:17:51 ◼   ► and you have a laptop on a desk

00:17:52 ◼   ► and you're typing all day,

00:17:53 ◼   ► it's going to be very noticeable.

00:17:54 ◼   ► So you just better hope that you upgrade everyone

00:17:56 ◼   ► in the office at the same time to these things,

00:17:58 ◼   ► that way nobody can blame, you know, just you.

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00:19:42 ◼   ► (upbeat music)

00:19:45 ◼   ► - Now Marco, last I heard, if I recall correctly,

00:19:49 ◼   ► you had ordered and then canceled one,

00:19:50 ◼   ► but it appears you have now bought a new MacBook Pro.

00:19:54 ◼   ► So are you no longer a professional

00:19:57 ◼   ► or are you just slumming it?

00:19:58 ◼   ► - Well, I had ordered the MacBook Escape

00:20:01 ◼   ► and then canceled it because I wasn't that comfortable

00:20:03 ◼   ► with how much I was about to pay for it

00:20:04 ◼   ► for the benefit it was going to get,

00:20:06 ◼   ► and I kinda got like 15 inch regret,

00:20:08 ◼   ► like what if I end up wanting more power

00:20:10 ◼   ► or more screen space because--

00:20:13 ◼   ► - Sure, that makes sense.

00:20:14 ◼   ► - In summary, not to go over this too much again,

00:20:15 ◼   ► but in summary, basically, I use an iMac

00:20:19 ◼   ► for most of my stuff, I don't travel very often.

00:20:22 ◼   ► When I do travel, my needs are either almost nothing,

00:20:25 ◼   ► like if it's not like a working trip,

00:20:27 ◼   ► my needs are either almost nothing,

00:20:29 ◼   ► in which case I just need a Mac

00:20:31 ◼   ► just in case the server goes down

00:20:32 ◼   ► or I wanna SSH in and fix some stuff

00:20:34 ◼   ► or I might do light email and Twitter work,

00:20:37 ◼   ► or it's a trip where I intend to get work done

00:20:40 ◼   ► or edit photos, in which case I want

00:20:43 ◼   ► the biggest, most powerful screen I can get.

00:20:46 ◼   ► Even at 15 inch, it feels like I'm cramped,

00:20:48 ◼   ► I want the biggest, most powerful thing I can.

00:20:51 ◼   ► And so my idea was, well, I'll just leave those needs aside

00:20:55 ◼   ► and get the cheapo 13 inch one, which is not that cheap,

00:20:59 ◼   ► especially once you add any options to it.

00:21:01 ◼   ► And I decided to chicken out and instead

00:21:05 ◼   ► the local business rep gave me a good deal on the 15 inch,

00:21:09 ◼   ► so I got the 15 inch.

00:21:11 ◼   ► And I got the high end in store configuration,

00:21:15 ◼   ► so the 2.7 gigahertz and the 512

00:21:17 ◼   ► and the Radeon, whatever, 455.

00:21:20 ◼   ► The reason I went with this, first of all,

00:21:21 ◼   ► I was about to go on a kind of spur of the moment trip

00:21:24 ◼   ► and I wanted to test it out and I wanted to get

00:21:26 ◼   ► some work done so I figured this would be a good time

00:21:28 ◼   ► to test it and if I really hated it I could return it

00:21:31 ◼   ► but I figured this would be good to test and to talk about.

00:21:34 ◼   ► Because really the 15 inch MacBook Pro is the workhorse

00:21:38 ◼   ► of so many industries, especially software developers

00:21:42 ◼   ► and especially people who listen to this show.

00:21:44 ◼   ► - Hi.

00:21:45 ◼   ► - Exactly, it is such the workhorse.

00:21:48 ◼   ► If you look around at WWDC, almost every computer you see

00:21:54 ◼   ► is a 15 inch MacBook Pro.

00:21:57 ◼   ► It is so, they're so common.

00:21:59 ◼   ► But if you look around the office of any tech company,

00:22:01 ◼   ► look around what computers people are actually using,

00:22:04 ◼   ► a huge portion of them are 15 inch MacBook Pros.

00:22:07 ◼   ► It is just an incredibly popular laptop

00:22:10 ◼   ► among people who do the things I do

00:22:12 ◼   ► and people who listen to this show and read my site

00:22:15 ◼   ► that I figured it would be useful for my personal brand

00:22:18 ◼   ► to be able to talk about this computer intelligently.

00:22:21 ◼   ► And I kind of wanted one just to see for myself

00:22:23 ◼   ► to test out the touch bar and just get some idea

00:22:26 ◼   ► of where the Mac is going.

00:22:27 ◼   ► I also, it was very painful for me to continue

00:22:31 ◼   ► using my old one because I was constantly

00:22:34 ◼   ► running out of disk space.

00:22:35 ◼   ► 'Cause I had made the mistake of getting

00:22:36 ◼   ► the base model before.

00:22:37 ◼   ► And the base model 15 inch, in general,

00:22:40 ◼   ► the base model 15 inch is the best deal

00:22:43 ◼   ► in all of Apple computers, by far.

00:22:46 ◼   ► It is the best deal.

00:22:47 ◼   ► It is like for what you get for the price.

00:22:49 ◼   ► It is not cheap, but for what you get,

00:22:52 ◼   ► you get an amazing computer for that price.

00:22:56 ◼   ► and if you, the price of the 15 inch base model,

00:23:00 ◼   ► if you end up specking up a 13 inch to be comparable,

00:23:04 ◼   ► it actually is almost the same price.

00:23:06 ◼   ► Like if you spec it up to be comparable in RAM

00:23:08 ◼   ► and performance, it is really about the same price.

00:23:12 ◼   ► So like if you have relatively moderate to high end needs

00:23:16 ◼   ► and you can afford the price of the 15 inch line,

00:23:20 ◼   ► I strongly suggest you go for the 15 inch line

00:23:23 ◼   ► because it is just that good.

00:23:25 ◼   ► Anyway, so I went for it, and yeah,

00:23:28 ◼   ► I've been trying it for a few days now,

00:23:30 ◼   ► a little under a week now, and I traveled with it,

00:23:34 ◼   ► I worked with it, and it's pretty good.

00:23:37 ◼   ► It's not perfect, but it's pretty good,

00:23:39 ◼   ► and I would say, I've actually considered

00:23:43 ◼   ► maybe doing a YouTube video about it, I don't know.

00:23:46 ◼   ► It's hard to make videos, so I might not,

00:23:48 ◼   ► but it's too long to go over all my impressions here,

00:23:51 ◼   ► but it's funny, it's too long to go over

00:23:55 ◼   ► my impressions in our two-hour podcast,

00:23:56 ◼   ► so I'm gonna try to make a five-minute YouTube video about.

00:23:59 ◼   ► - Naturally.

00:24:00 ◼   ► Okay, so a couple of quick hits,

00:24:01 ◼   ► maybe just the first one or two things that jump to mind.

00:24:04 ◼   ► What do you really like about it, or perhaps,

00:24:06 ◼   ► what do you like about it

00:24:07 ◼   ► that you didn't expect to like about it?

00:24:10 ◼   ► - They seem to have made substantial progress

00:24:12 ◼   ► in making it quieter under moderate load.

00:24:16 ◼   ► This is something that I haven't seen

00:24:17 ◼   ► any reviews talk about, but the fan noise,

00:24:20 ◼   ► that both the actual noise the fans make

00:24:23 ◼   ► and how loud the volume is, it is substantially quieter

00:24:27 ◼   ► and less noticeable of a noise.

00:24:30 ◼   ► Even if you're maxing out all the CPU cores

00:24:34 ◼   ► for a few minutes.

00:24:35 ◼   ► Now after a few minutes, if you're doing something

00:24:37 ◼   ► like a handbrake or a video in code,

00:24:39 ◼   ► where you're maxing them out for a long time,

00:24:42 ◼   ► then you will notice it.

00:24:44 ◼   ► They will spin up to an audible level then,

00:24:45 ◼   ► but it seems like whatever thresholds they've made

00:24:47 ◼   ► with the new thermal system, the new fans,

00:24:50 ◼   ► however they've designed this,

00:24:53 ◼   ► you don't hear the fan if it's just being stressed

00:24:56 ◼   ► for a minute or two.

00:24:59 ◼   ► And things like if one core is being maxed out

00:25:03 ◼   ► by some rogue process that's not working right,

00:25:06 ◼   ► Apple Photos library for instance, or Dropbox,

00:25:09 ◼   ► or iCloud, or iSecurity, iCloud Keychain,

00:25:12 ◼   ► all these different things where you'll find

00:25:14 ◼   ► one process hogging up one of your cores at 100%.

00:25:18 ◼   ► In the old model, that would usually cause the fan to spin up audibly. In this one, it

00:25:21 ◼   ► doesn't. If only one core is being saturated, you generally don't hear it. If all of them

00:25:27 ◼   ► are being saturated, you only hear it after a few minutes.

00:25:30 ◼   ► So overall, it's surprisingly quiet. Even quieter if you can keep it only using the

00:25:35 ◼   ► integrated GPU, which you can't force it to, like Cody Krieger's utility graphics

00:25:41 ◼   ► card status. It can't force this computer to only use integrated, at least not yet.

00:25:46 ◼   ► But it can tell you which one it's using

00:25:49 ◼   ► and which, like if it switches over to the discrete GPU,

00:25:51 ◼   ► it can tell you exactly which app or process

00:25:54 ◼   ► is demanding that and why it's doing that.

00:25:56 ◼   ► So if you can go quit that app, for instance,

00:25:58 ◼   ► then you can eliminate the need for that

00:26:01 ◼   ► and it can also notify you with standard system

00:26:03 ◼   ► notifications when the switches take place if you want to.

00:26:07 ◼   ► So anyway, it's nice to get an idea of what's going on

00:26:09 ◼   ► and why, but anyway, huge improvement

00:26:12 ◼   ► to the cooling system, I think.

00:26:13 ◼   ► It does still run very hot to the touch

00:26:16 ◼   ► when it's loaded heavily,

00:26:18 ◼   ► so it's not like it's running at lower temperatures,

00:26:20 ◼   ► but just whatever the cooling algorithms and designs are,

00:26:24 ◼   ► maybe because, and there is a whole new fan design,

00:26:26 ◼   ► so that could have something to do with it,

00:26:27 ◼   ► but they've really made substantial progress there,

00:26:30 ◼   ► and I'm very happy to say that,

00:26:31 ◼   ► 'cause I really hate when laptops get all loud and annoying

00:26:33 ◼   ► with the fan when you touch them,

00:26:35 ◼   ► when you do anything to the CPUs.

00:26:37 ◼   ► - Okay, but what sucks?

00:26:39 ◼   ► - Sucks is a strong word,

00:26:42 ◼   ► - But I would say what's really disappointing

00:26:43 ◼   ► is battery life, it's really disappointing.

00:26:46 ◼   ► - Yeah, I've heard that from a few people

00:26:48 ◼   ► and I haven't pestered anyone who I've seen say this

00:26:53 ◼   ► to ask, is this just day one,

00:26:56 ◼   ► just like you say on a new iOS device

00:26:58 ◼   ► or when you upgrade iOS on an iOS device,

00:27:02 ◼   ► the first couple of days are gonna be rough

00:27:03 ◼   ► as it's churning through all the things

00:27:04 ◼   ► it needs to churn through.

00:27:05 ◼   ► So you said you've had this machine

00:27:06 ◼   ► for nearly a week or about a week, right?

00:27:09 ◼   ► - So this is interesting.

00:27:09 ◼   ► I've had it for about a week, a little under a week.

00:27:13 ◼   ► There's a few system processes that will tend to

00:27:16 ◼   ► load a Mac that's fairly new.

00:27:18 ◼   ► Obviously, the old one that's as old as Time, itself,

00:27:21 ◼   ► at least Time Machine, is MDS and various

00:27:25 ◼   ► spotlight indexers.

00:27:27 ◼   ► That finishes pretty quickly in the first day,

00:27:29 ◼   ► and so that's pretty much done.

00:27:30 ◼   ► And I use the wonderful utility iStatMenus

00:27:34 ◼   ► to monitor this kind of stuff, so I can always see,

00:27:36 ◼   ► in my menu bar, I have a little CPU core graph,

00:27:39 ◼   ► I can notice, it's very apparent when a computer,

00:27:43 ◼   ► or when a process is using too much power, you see it.

00:27:46 ◼   ► And then you can go see what that process is,

00:27:48 ◼   ► and you can kill it if you want to.

00:27:50 ◼   ► Anyway, iStat menus.

00:27:51 ◼   ► - What kind of animal wouldn't use iStat menus?

00:27:54 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:27:55 ◼   ► - Yeah, anyway, most of the hosts on this show

00:27:59 ◼   ► use iStat menus.

00:28:00 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:28:01 ◼   ► So, what I've had problems with is the Photos app,

00:28:07 ◼   ► where in Sierra, I assume it added that the whole

00:28:12 ◼   ► search for objects in photos,

00:28:15 ◼   ► kind of like what Google Photos does, but slightly worse.

00:28:17 ◼   ► That process, there's no indicator on what it's doing,

00:28:22 ◼   ► when it's doing it, there's no way to tell it to pause

00:28:24 ◼   ► or to finish at a certain time or whatever else.

00:28:27 ◼   ► There's no control over when it does that.

00:28:29 ◼   ► You will just see things like photo library D

00:28:32 ◼   ► and photo analysis D in your activity list.

00:28:37 ◼   ► I cannot get this laptop to finish the,

00:28:41 ◼   ► so there's only one place you can even see

00:28:42 ◼   ► the progress of it, and that is if you go to the Photos tab

00:28:45 ◼   ► in the app, it'll show you like, you know,

00:28:47 ◼   ► we've scanned 9,000 of 25,000 photos.

00:28:50 ◼   ► I cannot get that to progress.

00:28:52 ◼   ► Like, it says that it'll do it, you know,

00:28:56 ◼   ► when you're plugged into power

00:28:57 ◼   ► and when you're not using the app.

00:28:59 ◼   ► So I don't know whether that means whether the app is quit

00:29:01 ◼   ► or whether it's just running and hidden,

00:29:03 ◼   ► whether the computer has to be idle or not.

00:29:05 ◼   ► I've experimented with all the different things,

00:29:06 ◼   ► and I cannot get it to advance very far,

00:29:08 ◼   ► but yet I still see photo library or photo analysis D

00:29:12 ◼   ► often popping up in the activity list,

00:29:13 ◼   ► but it tends to not do that on battery.

00:29:17 ◼   ► I watch for that, like when I was doing battery testing,

00:29:19 ◼   ► you know, taking these long flights,

00:29:21 ◼   ► I watch for that and I don't think that was the problem.

00:29:23 ◼   ► So basically, I don't think there was anything in my usage

00:29:27 ◼   ► when I was judging the battery,

00:29:30 ◼   ► there didn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary

00:29:32 ◼   ► that was unfairly draining the CPU

00:29:34 ◼   ► and keeping it in a higher powered state

00:29:36 ◼   ► that would otherwise not be there during regular use.

00:29:40 ◼   ► So if you notice the reviews for the battery,

00:29:44 ◼   ► some of them say, "Oh yeah, Apple's spot on, 10 hours.

00:29:47 ◼   ► "We did our light web browsing loop and it's 10 hours."

00:29:50 ◼   ► Okay, most of the ones that actually try real world use

00:29:55 ◼   ► seem to all agree that it's about five hours.

00:29:59 ◼   ► And if you drive it heavily,

00:30:01 ◼   ► it can be even shorter than that.

00:30:03 ◼   ► That matches up with my experience exactly,

00:30:06 ◼   ► that I'm consistently seeing that if I'm only doing

00:30:10 ◼   ► really casual web browsing, nothing else,

00:30:13 ◼   ► no Slack, no Twitter, no mail,

00:30:17 ◼   ► if I'm only doing web browsing,

00:30:19 ◼   ► and the wifi connection's great,

00:30:21 ◼   ► and I'm not browsing any pages

00:30:22 ◼   ► that turn on the discrete GPU,

00:30:23 ◼   ► 'cause some of them do for some reason,

00:30:24 ◼   ► maybe it's CSS animations, I don't know.

00:30:26 ◼   ► But if you can give it very, very light use

00:30:29 ◼   ► in a web browser, you can get about 10 hours.

00:30:32 ◼   ► But even if you're doing, bouncing between Twitter,

00:30:35 ◼   ► of Slack and web, like my typical light workload,

00:30:38 ◼   ► even that, it goes down to about six hours maybe,

00:30:41 ◼   ► maybe seven if I'm lucky.

00:30:43 ◼   ► If I'm using Xcode to build an iOS app

00:30:46 ◼   ► and do build and run cycles with the simulator

00:30:49 ◼   ► and change some stuff, and just typical iOS development

00:30:52 ◼   ► work in Xcode, nothing incredibly heavy,

00:30:54 ◼   ► not constantly cleaning and rebuilding the whole thing,

00:30:57 ◼   ► just typical work in iOS Xcode development, five hours.

00:31:02 ◼   ► and that's been pretty consistent for me so far.

00:31:06 ◼   ► So that is not great.

00:31:07 ◼   ► And that's with like, you know,

00:31:10 ◼   ► relatively modest brightness settings.

00:31:12 ◼   ► The good thing is the screen brightness level

00:31:14 ◼   ► doesn't appear to have as big of an effect as it used to.

00:31:16 ◼   ► It really does seem like whatever advances Apple's made

00:31:18 ◼   ► in getting the screen to be very low power,

00:31:21 ◼   ► those have paid off.

00:31:22 ◼   ► The screen really is seemingly pretty low power.

00:31:24 ◼   ► I don't know the exact numbers on it,

00:31:25 ◼   ► but it seems like the battery life I'm getting

00:31:28 ◼   ► is not that related to the screen brightness

00:31:31 ◼   ► the way it used to be.

00:31:33 ◼   ► But the problem is that you have these computers

00:31:36 ◼   ► where the big advances in Skylake processors

00:31:39 ◼   ► that let them make the battery smaller

00:31:42 ◼   ► almost all came at the bottom end, as we've discussed,

00:31:44 ◼   ► about like when the computer's doing almost nothing,

00:31:47 ◼   ► when you're being very gentle on it

00:31:49 ◼   ► and the processor can be mostly idle most of the time,

00:31:52 ◼   ► then now it is using less power than it did before.

00:31:55 ◼   ► But as soon as that processor's doing anything,

00:31:57 ◼   ► as soon as you're giving it even a moderate load,

00:31:59 ◼   ► the high end of the power envelope there

00:32:02 ◼   ► is the same as it's always been.

00:32:03 ◼   ► So as soon as you give it even a moderate load,

00:32:06 ◼   ► it's just going back to how much power it used to use

00:32:08 ◼   ► in the previous generation of processors.

00:32:11 ◼   ► But because the idle power dropped so much,

00:32:14 ◼   ► Apple considers that typical use,

00:32:16 ◼   ► and so they were able to drop the battery size by 25%.

00:32:20 ◼   ► So basically, we have computers that have

00:32:23 ◼   ► 25% smaller batteries, and processors that did get

00:32:26 ◼   ► efficient enough to compensate for that

00:32:29 ◼   ► when they're doing very little.

00:32:30 ◼   ► But as soon as you make them do anything really,

00:32:34 ◼   ► now we just have a 25% less battery life.

00:32:37 ◼   ► - That sucks, that definitely is a pain.

00:32:40 ◼   ► I have to ask, even though I'm already regretting doing so,

00:32:45 ◼   ► what was your dongle, I'm sorry, adapter situation

00:32:49 ◼   ► while you were traveling?

00:32:50 ◼   ► What did you buy, what did you need,

00:32:52 ◼   ► what did you miss, et cetera?

00:32:54 ◼   ► - First of all, on the plane,

00:32:56 ◼   ► This might have been my first long plane flight

00:33:00 ◼   ► with the iPhone 7.

00:33:02 ◼   ► And wow does it suck to not have a headphone jack

00:33:05 ◼   ► on the phone and to not be able to charge the phone

00:33:08 ◼   ► while using headphones.

00:33:09 ◼   ► That really does suck.

00:33:11 ◼   ► Like, I know it's been a while,

00:33:13 ◼   ► I know we're not talking about the headphone jack anymore,

00:33:15 ◼   ► but wow does that suck in practice.

00:33:17 ◼   ► In my regular day-to-day life,

00:33:18 ◼   ► I use Bluetooth headphones for walking around,

00:33:20 ◼   ► but my big plane headphones are wired

00:33:22 ◼   ► because there are very few big plane headphones

00:33:24 ◼   ► that are good that are Bluetooth.

00:33:26 ◼   ► Anyway, iPhone 7, big thumbs down

00:33:29 ◼   ► for listening to music on a plane.

00:33:31 ◼   ► Anyway, that aside, the computer itself,

00:33:35 ◼   ► for doing occasional deployments to the iPhone,

00:33:39 ◼   ► I used the Apple official USB-C to lightning cable.

00:33:43 ◼   ► That was fine.

00:33:45 ◼   ► I brought my other dongles, but it didn't really matter.

00:33:50 ◼   ► I didn't really need them.

00:33:51 ◼   ► I have the ones I discussed last week.

00:33:53 ◼   ► I have a couple of USB-C to A,

00:33:56 ◼   ► I have a Thunderbolt 3 to 2,

00:33:58 ◼   ► which I only use for this one audio interface,

00:34:01 ◼   ► which I didn't need the strips, I didn't bring it,

00:34:03 ◼   ► and I have a card reader,

00:34:03 ◼   ► which I didn't use because I didn't bring a camera.

00:34:05 ◼   ► But otherwise, the dongle situation is fine.

00:34:09 ◼   ► You know what really does drive me nuts, though,

00:34:10 ◼   ► is the lack of cable management on the power brick.

00:34:14 ◼   ► I brought it up last week,

00:34:15 ◼   ► I thought it would be a problem, and it is a problem.

00:34:17 ◼   ► It's really annoying to have this big, thick cable

00:34:20 ◼   ► with no flip-out arms, no more MagSafe.

00:34:24 ◼   ► The Apple Power Adapter, the previous one,

00:34:27 ◼   ► with MagSafe and with the cable management built in

00:34:29 ◼   ► and everything, that was really an awesome design.

00:34:31 ◼   ► And we had that for a very long time.

00:34:33 ◼   ► And before MagSafe, those flip-out arms we had

00:34:35 ◼   ► for even longer than that,

00:34:38 ◼   ► this has been around for quite some time.

00:34:39 ◼   ► Like my very first Mac, my 2006 PowerBook had,

00:34:43 ◼   ► no, my 2004 PowerBook, excuse me,

00:34:47 ◼   ► had those flip-out arms on the power brick.

00:34:49 ◼   ► and it's great, and the little clip to hold the excess,

00:34:52 ◼   ► at the very end of the cable,

00:34:53 ◼   ► the little clip that you can clip it on.

00:34:55 ◼   ► - Yep, yep, yep, yep.

00:34:56 ◼   ► - All the finest technology that's been around

00:34:57 ◼   ► in every vacuum cleaner cable forever.

00:34:59 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:35:00 ◼   ► Anyway, we don't have any of those anymore.

00:35:02 ◼   ► Now, it's just like an iPhone cable.

00:35:04 ◼   ► It's just bigger, and it's thick,

00:35:06 ◼   ► 'cause it's this big, I think it's like an 85 watt

00:35:09 ◼   ► or something cable, so it's like,

00:35:11 ◼   ► it looks like the thickest lightning cable you've ever seen.

00:35:13 ◼   ► And so it's kind of stiff.

00:35:15 ◼   ► It's long enough to be a laptop cable-ish,

00:35:18 ◼   ► So it's long, it's not very flexible,

00:35:22 ◼   ► there's no cable management whatsoever.

00:35:24 ◼   ► So basically you have to carry a cable tie

00:35:26 ◼   ► with you all the time and keep doing it and undoing it,

00:35:28 ◼   ► or do some kind of crazy wrapping scheme

00:35:30 ◼   ► which takes more time.

00:35:31 ◼   ► It's just a hassle.

00:35:33 ◼   ► And I have some hope here that if Apple

00:35:36 ◼   ► can start designing things to be useful again,

00:35:39 ◼   ► they can fix this just by making a new power adapter

00:35:42 ◼   ► or even a new power cable.

00:35:44 ◼   ► This is not the kind of thing,

00:35:45 ◼   ► is that USB-C design does not dictate

00:35:49 ◼   ► the power cable has to suck.

00:35:50 ◼   ► It can be any cable they want.

00:35:51 ◼   ► It can be any adapter they want.

00:35:52 ◼   ► It can still have MagSafe that's just like

00:35:55 ◼   ► a little bit away from the end of the computer

00:35:57 ◼   ► or possibly on the plug end or whatever.

00:35:58 ◼   ► They can still do all those things.

00:36:01 ◼   ► They didn't and that kind of annoys me

00:36:02 ◼   ► because it really does make the product

00:36:04 ◼   ► less convenient and less nice to use.

00:36:05 ◼   ► And Apple has been always all about things that are nice,

00:36:09 ◼   ► things that are delightful, premium products.

00:36:11 ◼   ► And the switch to the power cable here

00:36:13 ◼   ► is such a big step backwards.

00:36:14 ◼   ► it goes against all of that.

00:36:16 ◼   ► So it sounds minor, but if you're traveling around,

00:36:20 ◼   ► moving around with a laptop, you know you deal

00:36:21 ◼   ► with the power cable all the time.

00:36:23 ◼   ► And the battery life is not yet good enough

00:36:25 ◼   ► that you don't need to think about that.

00:36:27 ◼   ► So you still very much need to be concerned

00:36:29 ◼   ► about the power cable if you do anything

00:36:31 ◼   ► on your pro computer besides very light web browsing.

00:36:34 ◼   ► You still need to be plugged in often.

00:36:38 ◼   ► And so to have the power cable be so really crappy

00:36:41 ◼   ► is unfortunate.

00:36:42 ◼   ► So I really hope Apple fixes this at some point soon.

00:36:45 ◼   ► Just updates the frickin' power cable and the power adapter.

00:36:49 ◼   ► Just give us that.

00:36:50 ◼   ► Give us one with cable management and MagSafe.

00:36:52 ◼   ► That is very, very easy to do.

00:36:54 ◼   ► They could totally do it.

00:36:55 ◼   ► Third parties can do it.

00:36:57 ◼   ► That is an advantage here of the USB-C ecosystem.

00:37:01 ◼   ► Third parties can do it.

00:37:02 ◼   ► And Griffin has a MagSafe thing,

00:37:04 ◼   ► but the Max wattage on it is only in the 60s somewhere,

00:37:07 ◼   ► so you can't use it on the 15 inch.

00:37:09 ◼   ► and relying on third parties is not a great solution

00:37:13 ◼   ► to something like this.

00:37:15 ◼   ► Apple can make a power cable.

00:37:17 ◼   ► They can make a really nice one.

00:37:18 ◼   ► They have for a decade, and more than that, actually.

00:37:21 ◼   ► They've made them for over a decade,

00:37:24 ◼   ► and they just stopped for some reason,

00:37:25 ◼   ► and I wish they'd go back, and I hope they do.

00:37:28 ◼   ► - You can use the Griffin one.

00:37:29 ◼   ► I just won't charge as fast.

00:37:31 ◼   ► - Yeah, but honestly, I,

00:37:33 ◼   ► this episode was not sponsored by Griffin.

00:37:35 ◼   ► I have not had great luck with Griffin products in the past.

00:37:38 ◼   ► they make a lot of stuff that only they,

00:37:42 ◼   ► they fill a lot of gaps in the Apple product lineup,

00:37:44 ◼   ► and that's part of the reason why I've bought

00:37:47 ◼   ► so many things from them in the past,

00:37:49 ◼   ► where a lot of times they are the only maker

00:37:50 ◼   ► of something that solves problem X, Y, or Z.

00:37:53 ◼   ► And that's great, I'm glad they do,

00:37:54 ◼   ► but I've had very mixed luck with their products,

00:37:56 ◼   ► so I try to avoid needing them if I can.

00:37:58 ◼   ► And so the idea of relying on them for my power cable,

00:38:02 ◼   ► I don't feel great about that.

00:38:04 ◼   ► It's this kind of little thing,

00:38:06 ◼   ► Like, as I complained last week about the loss of humanity

00:38:09 ◼   ► and as John clarified maybe as being whimsy in the products,

00:38:14 ◼   ► a luxury product is kind of a collection of small delights.

00:38:17 ◼   ► And Apple has gotten rid of a lot of those small delights

00:38:21 ◼   ► in the laptop line in the last few generations.

00:38:24 ◼   ► Like, you know, you used to be able to push a little button

00:38:26 ◼   ► on either the battery or the side

00:38:28 ◼   ► after the battery was not removable,

00:38:30 ◼   ► and little green lights would light up

00:38:32 ◼   ► telling you how much the battery was charged.

00:38:33 ◼   ► That's really nice, you don't have to open up the laptop.

00:38:36 ◼   ► It's been in a bag for a while.

00:38:37 ◼   ► You can just see how much it's charged

00:38:40 ◼   ► without opening it up.

00:38:41 ◼   ► MagSafe connectors, of course, that's a huge one.

00:38:43 ◼   ► Having a little light on the plug

00:38:45 ◼   ► so you could see without opening it up or anything.

00:38:47 ◼   ► You can see, is it charging?

00:38:48 ◼   ► Is it fully charged?

00:38:50 ◼   ► It's just little useful things like that.

00:38:51 ◼   ► Of course, the light up Apple on the back,

00:38:54 ◼   ► the startup shine, a lot of these things

00:38:55 ◼   ► have been removed over time.

00:38:56 ◼   ► And some of them--

00:38:57 ◼   ► - Well, you're forgetting one of my favorites

00:38:59 ◼   ► that I miss all the time,

00:39:01 ◼   ► the little pulsating breathing light

00:39:03 ◼   ► to let you know that the machine was on.

00:39:05 ◼   ► - Exactly, I loved that. - Oh, God.

00:39:07 ◼   ► - That was so cool. - Me too, I agree.

00:39:10 ◼   ► - And a lot of that I think has died with Scott Forstall,

00:39:13 ◼   ► but I mean, he's alive, but basically.

00:39:16 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:39:17 ◼   ► - You can call that living.

00:39:18 ◼   ► - Yeah, exactly. (laughing)

00:39:21 ◼   ► - Wow.

00:39:22 ◼   ► - But when we bought Max, Casey and I at least,

00:39:26 ◼   ► John, you bought Max and that's donation,

00:39:28 ◼   ► but when Casey and I bought Max for the first time,

00:39:30 ◼   ► it was still this era of whimsy,

00:39:32 ◼   ► where we would be able to go into a computer store,

00:39:34 ◼   ► when those still existed.

00:39:36 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:39:38 ◼   ► We'd go into like a circuit city or something.

00:39:40 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:39:41 ◼   ► All these dead computer stores.

00:39:42 ◼   ► And you'd be able to go over to the Mac area.

00:39:45 ◼   ► And you'd be able to play with the dock

00:39:46 ◼   ► and see all the cheesy zoom animations

00:39:48 ◼   ► and the scaling and the minimizing.

00:39:50 ◼   ► You'd be able to see all the cheesy crap

00:39:51 ◼   ► and you'd be like, "Whoa, it's so cool."

00:39:53 ◼   ► And when you actually bought your first Mac back then,

00:39:56 ◼   ► all those cool little things just seemed amazing.

00:39:59 ◼   ► The pulsing sleep light,

00:40:01 ◼   ► all the cool little lights and battery things and everything.

00:40:05 ◼   ► It was just cool.

00:40:06 ◼   ► It made you feel nice about your luxury product purchase.

00:40:10 ◼   ► And it made you love this platform.

00:40:12 ◼   ► And so when things like the niceties of the power cable

00:40:16 ◼   ► just get removed for seemingly very little reason,

00:40:20 ◼   ► it really does kind of erode that nice feeling

00:40:23 ◼   ► and the feeling of this being a premium product

00:40:26 ◼   ► that you love.

00:40:27 ◼   ► - Yeah, you know, I think it's been relatively obvious

00:40:31 ◼   ► I haven't always agreed with you on some of the things that you've been grumbly about over the last,

00:40:37 ◼   ► I don't know, couple of months about, you know, dongles and this and that and the other thing.

00:40:40 ◼   ► I could not possibly agree with everything you just said more. I think, and I think you nailed

00:40:45 ◼   ► it on the head with, and I forget how you phrased it, so I apologize, but a luxury product being a

00:40:51 ◼   ► series of small delights. I think that's absolutely true, and I think that that used to, and to a large

00:40:57 ◼   ► degree still is, but even more so used to be the case with Apple products. And obviously

00:41:01 ◼   ► I don't have a new MacBook Pro yet, but eventually I will get one for work if not for myself.

00:41:06 ◼   ► And not having those little flip-out hooks or arms, whatever you call them, on the brick

00:41:12 ◼   ► in order to wrap up the cord, that's going to drive me batty. Not having the pulsating

00:41:17 ◼   ► light, I still miss that to this day. Not having MagSafe, that has saved my computer

00:41:22 ◼   ► on numerous occasions. I mean, how many in aggregate?

00:41:26 ◼   ► And by the way, about MagSafe, USB-C holds on tight.

00:41:30 ◼   ► Like it's a really secure connector.

00:41:33 ◼   ► - Which generally is good.

00:41:34 ◼   ► - Yeah, except that you could,

00:41:35 ◼   ► especially now with these laptops being lighter,

00:41:37 ◼   ► you can very easily kick it off a table with that.

00:41:40 ◼   ► - You saw on the iFixit tear down though

00:41:42 ◼   ► that they were smart enough to make the board

00:41:44 ◼   ► that connects on the inside of the computer

00:41:46 ◼   ► a separate replaceable part.

00:41:47 ◼   ► So when you inevitably knock the thing over,

00:41:49 ◼   ► assuming it survives,

00:41:51 ◼   ► they can just replace the part that it plugs into.

00:41:53 ◼   ► It won't like, it won't kill your whole motherboard,

00:41:55 ◼   ► at least on one of them, sorry, Logic Board and Apple Parlance, at least on one of the

00:41:59 ◼   ► models that did that.

00:42:00 ◼   ► Yeah, but that's not a great solution. That is both incomplete and inferior to MagSafe.

00:42:06 ◼   ► No, but anyway, I just wanted to say that I completely agree with you, and I think this

00:42:12 ◼   ► isn't absolutely whimsy or humanity, but it's tangentially related, I think, or it's in

00:42:19 ◼   ► this kind of same universe, in that it's these little things, in the same way that, in my

00:42:24 ◼   ► personal estimation, Windows's death by a thousand paper cuts. Apple products, again,

00:42:32 ◼   ► for the most part still are, but especially just a few years ago, tended to be whatever

00:42:37 ◼   ► the opposite of that is. I don't know what the opposite of death by a thousand paper

00:42:40 ◼   ► cuts is, but the opposite of that is what Apple products were, and to some degree still

00:42:44 ◼   ► are.

00:42:45 ◼   ► Life by a thousand hugs.

00:42:46 ◼   ► Yeah, there you go. But no, I couldn't agree with you more, Marco. Little stuff like that

00:42:52 ◼   ► just it's frustrating. And I do think, you know, as we've talked about in the past,

00:42:56 ◼   ► like this dongle situation, it sounds like for you it wasn't that bad for this particular trip.

00:43:00 ◼   ► And I do think in the future it'll get a lot better. But there's nothing, there's no obvious

00:43:06 ◼   ► answer for not having the little the cable management arms on the power supply. I guess

00:43:11 ◼   ► you could get a third-party power supply. I guess those might exist at some point. But there's no

00:43:16 ◼   ► obvious answer for that. There's no way you're going to get the little pulsing sleep light on a

00:43:20 ◼   ► on a MacBook Pro, which is not gonna happen.

00:43:23 ◼   ► And all of this little stuff, it just adds up

00:43:25 ◼   ► and is kind of frustrating over time.

00:43:28 ◼   ► - Yeah, and like some of it, things like the glowing LED,

00:43:31 ◼   ► like the glowing Apple logo on the back,

00:43:33 ◼   ► apparently that was due to thinness reasons

00:43:35 ◼   ► on the new displays or something like that.

00:43:36 ◼   ► Things like the sleep LED, you could blame that on power

00:43:40 ◼   ► or it being too bright in some people's rooms or whatever.

00:43:43 ◼   ► But things like the power brick getting worse,

00:43:47 ◼   ► like there's kind of no reason for that.

00:43:49 ◼   ► And that's kind of what drives me nuts,

00:43:50 ◼   ► is like the unnecessary shaving off

00:43:53 ◼   ► of all the personality and delight.

00:43:55 ◼   ► - And losing the extendo cable, I forget the term for it,

00:43:58 ◼   ► but you know what I'm talking about?

00:43:59 ◼   ► - That's now $19. (laughs)

00:44:01 ◼   ► - You can't throw that in, come on.

00:44:03 ◼   ► - You're getting at the reasons.

00:44:05 ◼   ► Like in the car industry, they called it decontenting.

00:44:07 ◼   ► And when it struck Hondas, I was very upset.

00:44:10 ◼   ► That was many, many years ago.

00:44:11 ◼   ► I think we talked about it in "Unneutral" at one point.

00:44:13 ◼   ► But when I bought my first Honda Civic, which was in 1992,

00:44:18 ◼   ► The Honda Civic is the low-end model, and I got the lowest of the low-end model.

00:44:22 ◼   ► Didn't even have a side mirror on the passenger side, like the cheapest model you could get.

00:44:27 ◼   ► And yet when you open the very, very tiny trunk on the back of that car, there were

00:44:32 ◼   ► no struts that intruded into the trunk area.

00:44:35 ◼   ► It had a series of struts so that when you closed it, there wasn't anything poking

00:44:38 ◼   ► in.

00:44:39 ◼   ► You could put a suitcase in there so it would just like fill the entire opening and then

00:44:42 ◼   ► close the lid, and you wouldn't have to worry, "Oh, but now when I try to close it,

00:44:45 ◼   ► hinge will bang into, you know, the gooseneck type hinge will bang into the thing. Those

00:44:48 ◼   ► are more expensive to make, the little struts. They're more complicated, they're more prone

00:44:53 ◼   ► to break, they cost a lot more than taking a bent piece of metal and bending it into

00:44:57 ◼   ► a gooseneck shape and welding it on. And then when decontending struck, the Japanese car

00:45:03 ◼   ► industry, I think because of exchange rates or some other thing or whatever, I don't remember

00:45:07 ◼   ► what it was, but anyway, it came to Honda and all of a sudden the Civic got gooseneck

00:45:11 ◼   ► And in fact the Accord got gooseneck struts and you know what to this day if you go buy an Accord no matter how much money

00:45:17 ◼   ► You pay for an Accord gooseneck on the trunk. They never came back like they never said, okay

00:45:22 ◼   ► Well when things when things change we will you know, well, well whatever the reverse of decontending is

00:45:28 ◼   ► They made the parts cheaper and probably like, you know simpler to build and more reliable

00:45:32 ◼   ► And so they don't have to worry about it

00:45:34 ◼   ► But it's worse in terms of packing things into the back of your car because now you have to worry about where the hinges land

00:45:39 ◼   ► - Yeah, I would say in general, I have thought about

00:45:42 ◼   ► the concept of de-contenting for a while

00:45:44 ◼   ► with Apple products, and it really does seem that way

00:45:47 ◼   ► with some of the more recent releases, and it's sad

00:45:50 ◼   ► because so many of those little things are delightful,

00:45:53 ◼   ► and they add up to this perception of this being

00:45:57 ◼   ► a premium nice product that makes you happy,

00:45:59 ◼   ► and every one of these removals,

00:46:01 ◼   ► it's just eroding that feeling,

00:46:04 ◼   ► and these are still nice computers,

00:46:07 ◼   ► but they were nicer in many ways in the past.

00:46:10 ◼   ► And it's, you know, in general,

00:46:12 ◼   ► like, you know, it's hard to really complain too much,

00:46:15 ◼   ► although we always find a way,

00:46:16 ◼   ► but it's hard to complain too much

00:46:19 ◼   ► because overall, I would say this is a better computer

00:46:23 ◼   ► in many ways than the one it replaced,

00:46:26 ◼   ► but like, it is not as good as it could be.

00:46:29 ◼   ► And in areas that there is no excuse for,

00:46:32 ◼   ► that, you know, certain areas you can say,

00:46:34 ◼   ► "All right, well, if Mac is at 16 gigs of RAM

00:46:37 ◼   ► for these reasons with low power RAM

00:46:38 ◼   ► and Intel limitations, et cetera.

00:46:40 ◼   ► You know, you can say like,

00:46:41 ◼   ► "Oh well, it couldn't have a better keyboard

00:46:44 ◼   ► "because then it would have to be thicker."

00:46:47 ◼   ► By the way, as for the way this computer feels

00:46:49 ◼   ► with it being so much thinner and lighter,

00:46:51 ◼   ► I feel like a small improvement,

00:46:53 ◼   ► not a substantial improvement.

00:46:54 ◼   ► Like, I'll take it, you know,

00:46:56 ◼   ► I'll take it being lighter, I guess.

00:46:58 ◼   ► I mean, I would prefer great battery life,

00:46:59 ◼   ► but you know, if this is what is available now,

00:47:03 ◼   ► okay, you know, I'll accept the weight reduction,

00:47:07 ◼   ► but going from the Retina MacBook Pro,

00:47:09 ◼   ► the 2012 design, to the 2016 design,

00:47:13 ◼   ► does not feel that different.

00:47:16 ◼   ► We're severely diminishing returns here.

00:47:19 ◼   ► It really does not feel like a massive savings

00:47:22 ◼   ► in weight or size or thickness.

00:47:24 ◼   ► At no point, you know, having used the 2012

00:47:26 ◼   ► 15-inch design since 2012,

00:47:29 ◼   ► at no point during these four years

00:47:31 ◼   ► that I ever think, you know, this is too thick.

00:47:33 ◼   ► You know, like everybody could use their laptop

00:47:35 ◼   ► being lighter, 'cause when you carry it,

00:47:36 ◼   ► it's nice when it's lighter.

00:47:38 ◼   ► Everyone can use a smaller footprint

00:47:40 ◼   ► for the same screen size to have less overhead,

00:47:42 ◼   ► because, oh, that makes it easier to use on planes

00:47:44 ◼   ► and tight areas and stuff, that's great.

00:47:46 ◼   ► But the thickness of these laptops,

00:47:48 ◼   ► especially in the 15-inch line, is so irrelevant,

00:47:52 ◼   ► and they were already so thin in 2012.

00:47:55 ◼   ► To make them lighter is very welcome,

00:47:57 ◼   ► but they really didn't need to get thinner,

00:48:00 ◼   ► And they really didn't get thinner enough

00:48:03 ◼   ► in ways that are actually noticeable in real world use.

00:48:06 ◼   ► So to do things like make a really controversial,

00:48:10 ◼   ► weird new keyboard in the name of only thinness

00:48:14 ◼   ► and not lightness, 'cause keyboards are mostly empty space,

00:48:17 ◼   ► to be able to force yourself into that kind of

00:48:20 ◼   ► design trade-off seems unnecessary

00:48:23 ◼   ► when it was already so thin to begin with.

00:48:25 ◼   ► So lightness, great.

00:48:27 ◼   ► It is noticeably lighter.

00:48:28 ◼   ► It's not massive lighter.

00:48:29 ◼   ► It isn't like when you first,

00:48:31 ◼   ► like the first time you picked a MacBook Air

00:48:33 ◼   ► and you were used to everything

00:48:34 ◼   ► that wasn't a MacBook Air before that.

00:48:36 ◼   ► That was an amazing difference,

00:48:37 ◼   ► 'cause that was like, I think it was something like

00:48:41 ◼   ► going from like 4.5 or 5.0 pounds to 3.0.

00:48:44 ◼   ► It was a huge difference.

00:48:46 ◼   ► - And also the taper was totally,

00:48:47 ◼   ► totally made a difference.

00:48:48 ◼   ► - Sure, but like, you know, going from 4.5 to 4.0 pounds

00:48:53 ◼   ► is a much smaller difference.

00:48:55 ◼   ► - You forgot about the biggest difference though

00:48:57 ◼   ► with this model that I can't believe you didn't notice.

00:48:59 ◼   ► maybe you don't notice because you didn't get it.

00:49:01 ◼   ► We never asked you.

00:49:02 ◼   ► What color?

00:49:03 ◼   ► - I did get space gray.

00:49:05 ◼   ► - Oh, nice.

00:49:05 ◼   ► - And isn't that a big difference?

00:49:07 ◼   ► To me, that was the biggest difference.

00:49:09 ◼   ► Other than the touch bar, I guess.

00:49:10 ◼   ► Maybe actually tied with the touch bar.

00:49:12 ◼   ► What's the biggest difference

00:49:13 ◼   ► between this model and the old one?

00:49:14 ◼   ► This one comes in gray,

00:49:15 ◼   ► and it's a little bit of a weird gray,

00:49:17 ◼   ► but it totally looks different than the old one.

00:49:19 ◼   ► Do you like it?

00:49:20 ◼   ► - Yeah, and honestly,

00:49:21 ◼   ► I was not a huge fan of space gray on the MacBook One.

00:49:24 ◼   ► It just didn't seem quite right to me when I've seen it.

00:49:27 ◼   ► You know, it doesn't look bad,

00:49:29 ◼   ► But I just think like Space Gray and the MacBook One,

00:49:30 ◼   ► it just seems like, you know,

00:49:31 ◼   ► that's not really the best color.

00:49:32 ◼   ► Like I would say the MacBook One is best

00:49:35 ◼   ► in probably gold and pink.

00:49:37 ◼   ► And I don't love those colors myself,

00:49:39 ◼   ► but it just looks kind of odd in Space Gray.

00:49:42 ◼   ► On the 15 inch, I'd say Space Gray looks awesome.

00:49:44 ◼   ► I don't know why, I think it's the same.

00:49:47 ◼   ► But it, for whatever reason, looks really good to me.

00:49:51 ◼   ► I'm very happy with it.

00:49:53 ◼   ► So, you know, cool, that's good news.

00:49:57 ◼   ► I do like it.

00:49:58 ◼   ► I do worry a little bit, I know our friend Steven Hackett,

00:50:01 ◼   ► by the way, did you see his amazing video

00:50:03 ◼   ► with the Apple Book and the real products?

00:50:04 ◼   ► Oh my God, we'll put that in the show notes.

00:50:06 ◼   ► It's so good. (laughs)

00:50:08 ◼   ► - I was upset about the part

00:50:09 ◼   ► where he shoves his $300 book.

00:50:11 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:50:12 ◼   ► He's like, all right, fine, I see what you're going for,

00:50:14 ◼   ► but really, come on, it's a $300 book,

00:50:15 ◼   ► let's not just chuck it against the wall.

00:50:17 ◼   ► - You would. - Anyway.

00:50:19 ◼   ► - You would. (laughing)

00:50:21 ◼   ► - Yeah, that video's amazing.

00:50:23 ◼   ► Anyway, Space Gray is good,

00:50:25 ◼   ► but if it gets scratched or dented at all,

00:50:28 ◼   ► it shows the silver color through,

00:50:31 ◼   ► as he learned on his MacBook Escape.

00:50:33 ◼   ► - Oh no, really?

00:50:34 ◼   ► - Yeah, so I don't know how deep of a scratch

00:50:37 ◼   ► is necessary to make that happen,

00:50:38 ◼   ► but it happened to Steven already with his MacBook Escape.

00:50:41 ◼   ► - Oh, that's bad.

00:50:42 ◼   ► - So that could be bad.

00:50:43 ◼   ► - I was gonna change my work order to be gray,

00:50:45 ◼   ► but now that I heard that, no, I can't have that.

00:50:47 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:50:48 ◼   ► - Oh my God, Jon.

00:50:50 ◼   ► - Yeah, so anyway though, overall I would say

00:50:53 ◼   ► It's a good computer.

00:50:56 ◼   ► As for the touch bar, which I didn't even talk about,

00:50:58 ◼   ► the touch bar, I guess I'll go into it more in the future

00:51:01 ◼   ► once I've had more experience with it.

00:51:03 ◼   ► So far it seems fine, it seems kind of like a sideways step.

00:51:08 ◼   ► Again, there's some pluses, there's some minuses.

00:51:12 ◼   ► We'll see over time how it develops.

00:51:14 ◼   ► The escape key is really annoying to be up there,

00:51:16 ◼   ► so I've started developing a habit of,

00:51:19 ◼   ► I switched, I remapped escape to caps lock.

00:51:22 ◼   ► I've just been hitting, and I did that on both my iMac

00:51:24 ◼   ► and my laptop, so I've just been training myself

00:51:25 ◼   ► to hit caps lock instead of escape,

00:51:27 ◼   ► and the best way to deal with the escape key

00:51:28 ◼   ► is to stop using it, because the new escape zone

00:51:31 ◼   ► is fine, but not great.

00:51:35 ◼   ► The main problem is, when you're talking about a key,

00:51:39 ◼   ► not an area on a touchscreen, but a key,

00:51:41 ◼   ► you know exactly when you've hit it.

00:51:43 ◼   ► You can rest your hand on it before you're ready to hit it,

00:51:45 ◼   ► and then you can push down, and you know you hit it.

00:51:48 ◼   ► And you can't do that on the escape zone.

00:51:50 ◼   ► You can't rest your finger on it beforehand

00:51:53 ◼   ► and you just trigger it.

00:51:53 ◼   ► I did that a lot the first couple,

00:51:55 ◼   ► the first day or two I had it.

00:51:57 ◼   ► And you can't know when you've hit it or not

00:52:00 ◼   ► or how many times you've hit it very reliably.

00:52:02 ◼   ► So I don't love that.

00:52:03 ◼   ► So my solution there was to simply remap to Caps Lock,

00:52:07 ◼   ► which is easily done with system preferences.

00:52:09 ◼   ► The trackpad is, being that huge,

00:52:12 ◼   ► I do love having the big trackpad area.

00:52:15 ◼   ► And when I went back to test to use my old MacBook Pro,

00:52:18 ◼   ► One of the things that made it feel impossibly old

00:52:21 ◼   ► was having this tiny little track pad,

00:52:23 ◼   ► which of course, when it came out it was huge,

00:52:25 ◼   ► but it's like having this tiny track pad now.

00:52:28 ◼   ► I still hate the Force Touch track pad.

00:52:31 ◼   ► I hate the way it clicks.

00:52:33 ◼   ► I hate how weirdly the pressure is not quite right.

00:52:35 ◼   ► I hate how it's not 100% reliable.

00:52:38 ◼   ► So instead I've been slow transitioning

00:52:40 ◼   ► to a tap to click wizard.

00:52:42 ◼   ► If I'm gonna have my taps be only mostly reliable

00:52:46 ◼   ► and not 100% reliable, I'd rather do it that way

00:52:49 ◼   ► instead of having to feel their stupid weird click

00:52:51 ◼   ► and push harder to get it.

00:52:53 ◼   ► So basically my solution to the downsides

00:52:56 ◼   ► of the touch bar and the Force Touch trackpad

00:52:58 ◼   ► are to avoid using them. (laughs)

00:53:02 ◼   ► And the upsides of the trackpad being so big

00:53:05 ◼   ► are very welcome, and the upside of the touch bar

00:53:08 ◼   ► being this new functional surface of weird things

00:53:11 ◼   ► is basically a big we will see about that later

00:53:14 ◼   ► from me so far.

00:53:15 ◼   ► but so far it seems it might be really cool.

00:53:19 ◼   ► One more closing thought about this.

00:53:21 ◼   ► I think looking at the specs and the pricing,

00:53:25 ◼   ► to me there's two laptops worth getting in this lineup,

00:53:28 ◼   ► the MacBook Escape and the 15 inch.

00:53:31 ◼   ► The 13 inch with touch bar is so expensive

00:53:35 ◼   ► for what you get.

00:53:36 ◼   ► It also has I think the worst battery life of the three.

00:53:39 ◼   ► I think if you have the need for a lower end

00:53:42 ◼   ► or smaller or lower performing computer,

00:53:45 ◼   ► get the MacBook Escape.

00:53:46 ◼   ► It's so much cheaper and it has better battery life

00:53:49 ◼   ► and everything else.

00:53:50 ◼   ► If you want a strong workhorse computer

00:53:53 ◼   ► that has a little more power or that has the touch bar,

00:53:56 ◼   ► get the 15 inch because it is so much better spec'd

00:53:58 ◼   ► per dollar than the 13.

00:54:00 ◼   ► So to me, those are the two worth getting.

00:54:03 ◼   ► I don't love the 13 inch.

00:54:05 ◼   ► I tried it in the store and I ran a bunch of numbers online,

00:54:07 ◼   ► of course, I don't love the 13 inch with touch bar.

00:54:09 ◼   ► I don't think that product makes a ton of sense

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00:55:52 ◼   ► (upbeat music)

00:55:55 ◼   ► - John, do you have a new phone?

00:55:57 ◼   ► - I do, I got a new iPhone 7.

00:55:59 ◼   ► It was the one that I said I was gonna get,

00:56:02 ◼   ► which was Jet Black, and I wanted to try

00:56:05 ◼   ► using it without a case, and I did.

00:56:07 ◼   ► I just didn't try it for very long.

00:56:12 ◼   ► - Define not very long.

00:56:14 ◼   ► - Less than 24 hours?

00:56:16 ◼   ► - The little birdie told me it was less than six,

00:56:18 ◼   ► but I'll let you decide.

00:56:20 ◼   ► - Yeah, I mean, I wanted to try it.

00:56:24 ◼   ► It is grippy and I never had a iOS device without a case,

00:56:29 ◼   ► a small iOS device without a case,

00:56:30 ◼   ► so I always thought I was gonna just give it a go.

00:56:33 ◼   ► And I was willing to take the scratches and whatever.

00:56:37 ◼   ► And there's two reasons I had to stop.

00:56:40 ◼   ► The first, which I kind of knew about

00:56:42 ◼   ► from using it in the store,

00:56:43 ◼   ► is like when I was playing with it in the store,

00:56:44 ◼   ► I noticed that I could feel the seams on the SIM tray

00:56:47 ◼   ► and I didn't like that, you know, on the outside of it.

00:56:51 ◼   ► And using it more in real life,

00:56:53 ◼   ► I could also feel the seams around the Apple logo

00:56:57 ◼   ► on the back and I didn't like that either.

00:57:00 ◼   ► Like it's not, it wasn't, you know,

00:57:01 ◼   ► it's one of those things where you,

00:57:02 ◼   ► my fingers feel compelled to like seek out that seam

00:57:05 ◼   ► or whatever, and it was bothering me.

00:57:07 ◼   ► That alone wouldn't have done it.

00:57:08 ◼   ► The real problem I eventually realized was,

00:57:12 ◼   ► even though I said, "Oh, I'm just gonna let it get scratched.

00:57:14 ◼   ► Like, I'm gonna accept the grippiness

00:57:16 ◼   ► and I'll have a smaller shape, and I'll just,

00:57:17 ◼   ► I accept that it's gonna get scratched."

00:57:19 ◼   ► I found myself, when I was placing it down,

00:57:24 ◼   ► like, placing it down gently.

00:57:28 ◼   ► Like, I was trying to stop myself

00:57:30 ◼   ► from placing it down gently, but I realized,

00:57:32 ◼   ► no matter how, like, it was a battle within myself

00:57:34 ◼   ► to treat it as cavalierly as I treated my thing with a case on it.

00:57:40 ◼   ► And then the final little bit of the, you know, these three things combined, but I really

00:57:44 ◼   ► think putting it down gently was a thing I just could not get over.

00:57:46 ◼   ► The final little bit was, it doesn't lay flat because it's got a stupid bump on the back

00:57:49 ◼   ► of it.

00:57:50 ◼   ► When you have a case, you don't have that problem.

00:57:51 ◼   ► And I find that I very often have my phone laying down and I very often press the button

00:57:56 ◼   ► and do other things with it, and I don't like the fact that it's on an angle and could potentially

00:58:00 ◼   ► wobble and stuff like that.

00:58:03 ◼   ► Although I got a leather case for it, it's in the leather case, it's much happier now.

00:58:07 ◼   ► I think I got it into the leather case before any major scratching set in, but who knows,

00:58:10 ◼   ► I'm just happy to have leather case on it.

00:58:12 ◼   ► And the new leather case is way better, the buttons that poke out through the case are

00:58:15 ◼   ► better than they were.

00:58:17 ◼   ► The leather case is slip- feels slipperier to me than the phone by itself, so it's not

00:58:20 ◼   ► like I'm putting in the case to be grippier, but as soon as I got that case on it, like

00:58:26 ◼   ► just like a weight lifted off my shoulders, and I can just go back there just having my

00:58:29 ◼   ► regular phone.

00:58:30 ◼   ► The only other thing to speak of about this, oh two more things.

00:58:34 ◼   ► One, the home button that doesn't move.

00:58:36 ◼   ► I was on board pretty quickly with that.

00:58:39 ◼   ► It is different, but I kind of like the little kick as opposed to the button press.

00:58:46 ◼   ► I'm pretty much on board with that.

00:58:47 ◼   ► I even don't mind it when it's laying flat on a table, but like, "Oh, it feels so wrong."

00:58:51 ◼   ► It does feel weird and different, but I'm pretty much on board with it.

00:58:54 ◼   ► Like it doesn't bother me that much.

00:58:56 ◼   ► I did eventually go down to a setting of one on that button because I can feel it.

00:59:01 ◼   ► I don't need it to be in my face that much.

00:59:04 ◼   ► I think one is fine.

00:59:06 ◼   ► I'm definitely a one person for the home button.

00:59:09 ◼   ► And then the final thing, the headphone port, which Marco had talked about, like, coming

00:59:13 ◼   ► back to reassert its absence when he was on the plane.

00:59:18 ◼   ► I haven't had that experience yet, although maybe I will, but for now, the one thing that

00:59:23 ◼   ► that I, that no review prepared me for or that, you know, I didn't think about beforehand

00:59:27 ◼   ► and one of the things I didn't know is that, well two things.

00:59:32 ◼   ► One, I knew this but didn't realize how, how I would feel about it.

00:59:37 ◼   ► The Lightning plug is bigger than the headphone jack.

00:59:42 ◼   ► Maybe not in volume if you do the math on it because the headphone jack is longer, but

00:59:46 ◼   ► it's just bigger around.

00:59:48 ◼   ► The headphone port is thinner circumference wise.

00:59:51 ◼   ► is closer to the diameter of the wire than the thing, right?

00:59:56 ◼   ► And it goes in and out a little bit easier, especially on this new thing.

00:59:59 ◼   ► So this feels like plugging in a bigger plug than plugging in the headphone.

01:00:04 ◼   ► And the second thing is the headphone, just the little thing that comes with the EarPods,

01:00:08 ◼   ► which is what I use, I use the EarPods.

01:00:11 ◼   ► And on all of their peripherals that have this little DAC chip in them, the Lightning

01:00:16 ◼   ► Port on those, including the adapter by the way, including the headphone jack adapter,

01:00:19 ◼   ► The lightning port on that is fatter.

01:00:21 ◼   ► The little plastic white plastic part

01:00:23 ◼   ► that the lightning metal thing pokes out of

01:00:25 ◼   ► is fatter than the plain old lightning cable one.

01:00:28 ◼   ► Fatter enough that you'll notice,

01:00:30 ◼   ► fatter enough that if you hold them up,

01:00:32 ◼   ► it's not just slightly fatter, it is fatter.

01:00:34 ◼   ► So I feel like I'm plugging a big fat clunky thing

01:00:39 ◼   ► into my phone when I connect my headphones.

01:00:41 ◼   ► And that is weird to me

01:00:43 ◼   ► because this is supposed to be the modern new,

01:00:45 ◼   ► getting rid of the old clunky TTR

01:00:48 ◼   ► or whatever the hell that thing is called,

01:00:49 ◼   ► like the headphone jack.

01:00:50 ◼   ► That's supposed to be the archaic thing.

01:00:53 ◼   ► We should be going to the sleek new,

01:00:54 ◼   ► and I feel like I went the opposite direction.

01:00:56 ◼   ► I feel like I just gave up USB-C for SCSI.

01:00:59 ◼   ► That's what it feels like.

01:01:00 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:01:02 ◼   ► - Oh my God. - And it is not

01:01:03 ◼   ► a good feeling.

01:01:04 ◼   ► I mean, I'll get over it, like whatever, it's fine,

01:01:06 ◼   ► but I didn't expect that at all.

01:01:08 ◼   ► And I had to actually say, is it just me?

01:01:11 ◼   ► But you just hold it up, just grab an old lightning cable

01:01:13 ◼   ► hold it up to your headphones for your iPhone 7 or for the headphone adapter, it's bigger.

01:01:21 ◼   ► It's bigger around.

01:01:22 ◼   ► I really hope they can shrink that.

01:01:23 ◼   ► I think that would make a big difference.

01:01:25 ◼   ► I'll get over it.

01:01:26 ◼   ► I really like my new phone.

01:01:27 ◼   ► It's super fast.

01:01:28 ◼   ► The screen is really awesome looking.

01:01:29 ◼   ► I kind of like the new home button.

01:01:31 ◼   ► Now I have force touch.

01:01:33 ◼   ► Overall, I really like the new phone, especially now that I have a case on it.

01:01:39 ◼   ► It's not the absence of the headphone port that bothers me so much.

01:01:41 ◼   ► the presence of the big fat lightning thing.

01:01:44 ◼   ► - Yeah, you know, I noticed the big fat lightning thing,

01:01:46 ◼   ► but I couldn't put my finger on until you said something,

01:01:49 ◼   ► what it was about it that kinda bothered me,

01:01:51 ◼   ► and I think it's exactly like you said,

01:01:53 ◼   ► it's that it feels bigger and clunkier

01:01:57 ◼   ► than just a headphone jack, which is definitely peculiar.

01:02:01 ◼   ► - Yeah, and I gotta say, I have also come around

01:02:03 ◼   ► to the Force Touch Home button,

01:02:05 ◼   ► although I am a three person,

01:02:07 ◼   ► I don't know how you could do anything less than three,

01:02:09 ◼   ► But the first day I hated it,

01:02:13 ◼   ► but after about that first day, now it feels normal.

01:02:17 ◼   ► The illusion has totally worked on me.

01:02:20 ◼   ► I like it way, way better

01:02:22 ◼   ► than any Force Touch track pad I've ever used.

01:02:25 ◼   ► It is substantially better.

01:02:27 ◼   ► So yeah, it's good.

01:02:29 ◼   ► I'm with you on that.

01:02:31 ◼   ► The jet black though, I'm curious, I must know,

01:02:35 ◼   ► in your six hours of having it caseless,

01:02:38 ◼   ► Did you get any scratches on it?

01:02:40 ◼   ► - As I was saying, I think it's mostly scratch-free.

01:02:43 ◼   ► I didn't go hunting.

01:02:44 ◼   ► I'm sure there are some, because again,

01:02:46 ◼   ► I was trying to be like,

01:02:47 ◼   ► "All right, well, just don't put it down gently.

01:02:49 ◼   ► "You know, the whole thing,

01:02:50 ◼   ► "you're on board with getting a scratch,

01:02:51 ◼   ► "stop putting it down gently."

01:02:53 ◼   ► So I was trying to force myself to just be like,

01:02:55 ◼   ► "Stop thinking about it.

01:02:56 ◼   ► "Just treat it like your old phone."

01:02:57 ◼   ► So I'm sure I half-intentionally put it down

01:03:00 ◼   ► with more force than I would normally,

01:03:02 ◼   ► and so I'm sure there are little scratches

01:03:04 ◼   ► on the corners here and there,

01:03:05 ◼   ► but I didn't go hunting for them.

01:03:06 ◼   ► I just wanted to put it into the leather case.

01:03:08 ◼   ► It still looks pretty good.

01:03:09 ◼   ► Like when I polished it up before I put it in the leather case, it still basically looks

01:03:13 ◼   ► new.

01:03:14 ◼   ► But I'm sure if I got out there and looked at the edges exactly, you'd see these little

01:03:17 ◼   ► hairline things.

01:03:18 ◼   ► Whatever, it's fine.

01:03:19 ◼   ► It'll be fine for the museum slash.

01:03:22 ◼   ► Although now that my iPhone 6, I took it out of its case, which its case that is destroyed

01:03:27 ◼   ► again.

01:03:28 ◼   ► And it looks so nice and new in there.

01:03:30 ◼   ► And I'm like, "Boy, this is a nice, pristine phone."

01:03:32 ◼   ► And then I realized, "Wait, I'm handing this down to my son, aren't I?"

01:03:35 ◼   ► That's the problem with phones.

01:03:40 ◼   ► Maybe I won't hand him down my 7.

01:03:42 ◼   ► Maybe I'll preserve that one and he'll have to get his own phone of some kind.

01:03:45 ◼   ► But yeah, I'm handing my 6 down to my son.

01:03:48 ◼   ► And so that's kind of a bummer for the…

01:03:51 ◼   ► I did buy an OtterBox case for it and hopefully that will help it survive.

01:03:54 ◼   ► And he hasn't destroyed the 5S that he's using now, which is also in an OtterBox case.

01:03:58 ◼   ► So I have some hope that the 6 will make it out alive, but we'll see.

01:04:02 ◼   ► That's amazing.

01:04:03 ◼   ► For the record, I am also a one person, just like Jon on the home button.

01:04:08 ◼   ► I started, I think I started at two if memory serves, and then eventually moved my way down

01:04:14 ◼   ► to one.

01:04:15 ◼   ► It works, or at least for me anyway.

01:04:18 ◼   ► We got a tweet from Chris Millar, who did a short video comparing different color gamuts.

01:04:27 ◼   ► And this is just a couple of minutes long, and it is definitely worth watching, and it

01:04:31 ◼   ► help me understand a little better what the differences are. So we'll put a link

01:04:36 ◼   ► to this in the show notes. It's pretty good stuff. Yeah it gives you a 3D

01:04:40 ◼   ► representation of the color space and so you can just compare the size of like 3D

01:04:43 ◼   ► shapes. Like here's how big this color gamut is and now look the shape is

01:04:46 ◼   ► bigger and it's bigger in these dimensions and so it's it's nice to

01:04:49 ◼   ► visualize. And the app that he's using to do that I think that's like a built-in

01:04:52 ◼   ► OS X app isn't it? Yeah. So you can you can watch the video and then if you

01:04:56 ◼   ► have a Mac you can open the same app and do the same thing he's doing and you

01:04:59 ◼   ► know, explore at your leisure. Yep, exactly right.

01:05:03 ◼   ► Johnny Ive, speaking of beat-up iPhones, commented on beat-up iPhones in the, or I

01:05:09 ◼   ► guess he didn't comment in the book because the book has no words, but

01:05:12 ◼   ► somehow commented in the in the in context of the book. In the link that's

01:05:17 ◼   ► in the show notes. Oh there you go, sorry I didn't read far enough. So yeah, so

01:05:21 ◼   ► Johnny said, "That's Evans Hanke's phone who manages the design studio. Isn't it

01:05:27 ◼   ► cool, she destroys her objects, but I thought there was something so charming about that.

01:05:31 ◼   ► I thought it was lovely to put that in. We designed tools to be used, and she definitely

01:05:35 ◼   ► uses them.

01:05:36 ◼   ► I put that quote in there because it sounds so much like he does not like that phone being

01:05:40 ◼   ► in the book. Now, obviously that's silly because he controls everything that's in that book.

01:05:43 ◼   ► Like why would he ever put anything in there that he didn't want? But I read that, and

01:05:48 ◼   ► you know, I've said this in the past talking about Apple products, like Apple, with very

01:05:54 ◼   ► very few exceptions does not show its products used. Like, worn, scratched, dented, almost

01:06:02 ◼   ► all of their product shots show them in the pristine, idealized, very often 3D rendered,

01:06:07 ◼   ► or at the very least, you know, photoshopped. Like, that's how their products are. And we

01:06:11 ◼   ► know in the real world, like, what Apple's been doing design-wise has been trying to

01:06:16 ◼   ► design products that stay as close as possible to that pristine look, which is an amazing

01:06:21 ◼   ► feet and you know sometimes they get closer than other times like it sounds

01:06:25 ◼   ► like the Darth Vader Apple watch with the TLC coating is very close to that

01:06:29 ◼   ► whereas the you know the iPod nano with a scratchy thing was very far from that

01:06:33 ◼   ► and all products in between and we'll see how the space gray 15 inch MacBook

01:06:38 ◼   ► Pro turns out but that has been the trend for many many years now and this

01:06:44 ◼   ► this whole let's see what it looks like when it's been used flies in the face of

01:06:49 ◼   ► and is not common. And the fact that they put that in there, and as far as I'm aware,

01:06:53 ◼   ► that's the only beat up thing. Like they didn't show, here's what a Tangerine iMac looks like.

01:06:57 ◼   ► It's been used by a bunch of kindergarten students for five years. Like they didn't show that,

01:07:01 ◼   ► because that is a thing. And there is a look to that, and it's not a great look.

01:07:05 ◼   ► But they did show the original iPhone. And so this little passage almost sounds like he is

01:07:09 ◼   ► trying to convince himself that it's such a great thing. I'm sure lots of other people

01:07:13 ◼   ► tried to convince him that it was awesome. And I'm sure he appreciates it. But I still feel like

01:07:18 ◼   ► if he was a magical wizard, a magical industrial design wizard, and we said that you can create

01:07:24 ◼   ► products that look like your product shots and that no matter what users do to them,

01:07:28 ◼   ► they stay looking that way, he would say yes, do that, because that's exactly what I want.

01:07:32 ◼   ► Like if you can make everything out of adamantium or vibranium or whatever your

01:07:35 ◼   ► Marvel universe, magic metal, or unobtainium if you want to go with the very stupid avatar,

01:07:42 ◼   ► and they never actually changed, he would take that because that's what he wants.

01:07:47 ◼   ► as expressed by every product that he's ever made

01:07:49 ◼   ► and every ad that they've ever been in

01:07:51 ◼   ► with the exception of like that one ad

01:07:52 ◼   ► that shows a MacBook with a bunch of stickers on it

01:07:54 ◼   ► and stuff, and maybe one or two other exceptions

01:07:57 ◼   ► and this one thing.

01:07:58 ◼   ► It's so weird to me.

01:07:59 ◼   ► So hearing that quote, I was just like,

01:08:02 ◼   ► who is it that convinced you to put that in the book?

01:08:04 ◼   ► Obviously you agreed to it eventually,

01:08:06 ◼   ► but your heart doesn't seem in it.

01:08:08 ◼   ► - Fair enough.

01:08:09 ◼   ► All right, tell me about the Penny Arcade

01:08:12 ◼   ► and the Microsoft Surface Studio.

01:08:13 ◼   ► This link was in the show notes for the last episode,

01:08:16 ◼   ► but we never got a chance to talk about it.

01:08:18 ◼   ► - Yeah, this is just one example of,

01:08:20 ◼   ► we're talking about who would want this computer.

01:08:22 ◼   ► It's obviously not just for everybody

01:08:24 ◼   ► because most people aren't doing digital art

01:08:25 ◼   ► on their computer, but if you're a digital artist,

01:08:28 ◼   ► maybe it's for you.

01:08:28 ◼   ► And then we talked about, well,

01:08:29 ◼   ► digital artists may be set in their ways,

01:08:31 ◼   ► but for other people who are more flexible

01:08:33 ◼   ► or have been looking for a new approach, this is great.

01:08:37 ◼   ► And so Mike from Penny Arcade has been drawing comics

01:08:42 ◼   ► for many years now digitally,

01:08:45 ◼   ► and he's used a tablet, and then he switched from a tablet

01:08:48 ◼   ► to a tablet that's basically a screen, the Cintiq,

01:08:51 ◼   ► where instead of just looking at your screen

01:08:53 ◼   ► and drawing where you're not looking,

01:08:55 ◼   ► now you're looking down at where you're drawing

01:08:56 ◼   ► because there's an image there.

01:08:59 ◼   ► And he wrote this big blog post about it.

01:09:00 ◼   ► He's also been connected with Microsoft.

01:09:02 ◼   ► Like, they've been giving him preview hardware for a while

01:09:04 ◼   ► with the old Surface books and the, you know,

01:09:07 ◼   ► he's embedded with Microsoft on this,

01:09:10 ◼   ► but he is pretty honest about what he likes

01:09:12 ◼   ► and what he doesn't like.

01:09:14 ◼   ► And here's a couple of quotes from his post about it that we'll put a link to in the show notes.

01:09:19 ◼   ► His business partner, Jerry, asked him to compare it to his Cintiq.

01:09:23 ◼   ► He says, "And I told him that drawing on a Cintiq now felt like drawing on a piece of dirty plexiglass hovering over a CRT monitor from 1997."

01:09:31 ◼   ► So that's a pretty, you know, Cintiq is supposed to be like the gold standard of, you know,

01:09:37 ◼   ► or at least the sort of mainstream "I want to draw on a screen, but I can't draw on my computer screen because my computer screen is just a monitor."

01:09:44 ◼   ► then I'll get a Cintiq, which by the way are very expensive.

01:09:47 ◼   ► And I'm assuming what he's reacting to

01:09:48 ◼   ► is basically the retina resolution of the Surface Studio.

01:09:51 ◼   ► And to him, that's more important

01:09:53 ◼   ► than perhaps what a Cintiq fan might say is,

01:09:54 ◼   ► "Yeah, but the Cintiq is more responsive or whatever."

01:09:58 ◼   ► The Cintiq now feels like a CRT, which is bad.

01:10:01 ◼   ► On this little passage where he tries to wrap things up,

01:10:04 ◼   ► he says, "When I first saw the device months ago

01:10:05 ◼   ► in that secret room in Microsoft,"

01:10:07 ◼   ► he did get a preview of this, by the way,

01:10:08 ◼   ► "they asked me what I thought.

01:10:09 ◼   ► I said, 'Well, I have no idea if anyone else will want it,

01:10:11 ◼   ► but you have made my dream computer.

01:10:13 ◼   ► I recognize that not everybody wants or needs a computer that they can draw on.

01:10:17 ◼   ► Some people do though, and I will tell you that the Surface Studio is without a doubt

01:10:19 ◼   ► the best digital drawing experience I've ever tried.

01:10:22 ◼   ► I spend 6-10 hours a day drawing digitally and I have for more than a decade.

01:10:26 ◼   ► The Cintiq and the Surface, these are like my tools or my instruments.

01:10:29 ◼   ► I am intimately familiar in how it feels to create things on these sorts of devices, and

01:10:33 ◼   ► the Studio honestly feels like a generational leap forward.

01:10:35 ◼   ► That sounds like ad copy from Microsoft, right?

01:10:37 ◼   ► But I can tell you that Mike from Penny Arcade is not one to sugarcoat things.

01:10:42 ◼   ► whatever, you know, so he really likes this.

01:10:45 ◼   ► He's an example of who might like this weird thing?

01:10:48 ◼   ► This is the type of person that would like this.

01:10:49 ◼   ► And the people who like it,

01:10:50 ◼   ► it feels like I've been waiting all my life

01:10:53 ◼   ► for this computer.

01:10:54 ◼   ► I think, again, I still think he's in the minority

01:10:56 ◼   ► because I think most people who've been drawing digitally

01:10:57 ◼   ► for as long as he have are kind of set in their ways

01:11:00 ◼   ► and are happy with the situation they have

01:11:01 ◼   ► and they just wish they could have

01:11:02 ◼   ► an incrementally better Cintiq.

01:11:04 ◼   ► But if you've been dreaming of this,

01:11:06 ◼   ► this fulfills your dreams.

01:11:08 ◼   ► And you know, I really feel his enthusiasm for this device.

01:11:10 ◼   ► And that's what makes me think that given enough turnover in the staff of professional

01:11:17 ◼   ► artists, eventually some company is going to win out by letting these people draw on

01:11:20 ◼   ► a big, giant, beautiful screen, whether it's Microsoft or not.

01:11:24 ◼   ► So there was some talk on our show last week about ARM Max, and there's a great article

01:11:32 ◼   ► by Jason Snell on ARM Max.

01:11:35 ◼   ► But the thing we were going to talk about really quickly is that apparently Microsoft

01:11:39 ◼   ► listens to ATP because they've announced that they're going to enable x86 emulation on top

01:11:44 ◼   ► of ARM64.

01:11:47 ◼   ► That's part of their whole on-again-off-again dalliance with trying to sell Windows on ARM

01:11:53 ◼   ► and the ARM, you know, Surface computers and everything that haven't been selling as well

01:11:57 ◼   ► as the Intel versions and Microsoft's analysis seems to be.

01:12:02 ◼   ► It's because people have a lot of x86 software and if you buy the ARM one you can't run the

01:12:05 ◼   ► x86 software and it's hard for us to get everyone to recompile it.

01:12:08 ◼   ► same old problem that you always have when you change architectures.

01:12:11 ◼   ► Only Microsoft wasn't changing architectures.

01:12:12 ◼   ► They wanted to have their cake and eat it too and say, "Everybody, could you like make

01:12:17 ◼   ► your apps, build them for, make your, you know, Surface apps also for ARM and exit?"

01:12:22 ◼   ► No, you're not into that?

01:12:23 ◼   ► Okay, well, maybe if you think about it, you know, you have to do what Apple does, but

01:12:27 ◼   ► just say, "You have to stop making 68K applications.

01:12:31 ◼   ► Eventually just make, you know, fat binaries, but eventually we're just going to sell Power

01:12:35 ◼   ► Pc computers.

01:12:36 ◼   ► We don't sell 68K Macs anymore.

01:12:37 ◼   ► So if you keep building for 68K, you're gonna have to keep doing that for any number of

01:12:41 ◼   ► years to support your old customers, but you know that the future is PowerPC only, right?

01:12:46 ◼   ► And Microsoft didn't do that, and I don't see them doing that with ARM, so it's been

01:12:49 ◼   ► difficult to get them on board.

01:12:50 ◼   ► So there's stopgap, just like Apple during transitions as well, let's try to emulate

01:12:53 ◼   ► it.

01:12:54 ◼   ► And we've talked about that many times in the past, that ARM CPUs are not so much faster

01:12:59 ◼   ► than x86 or faster at all, perhaps that you get emulation, you know, not for free, but

01:13:05 ◼   ► like that you can emulate it at an acceptable speed.

01:13:07 ◼   ► But Microsoft's a company filled with a lot of smart people,

01:13:10 ◼   ► and if anybody can work out an x86 on Arm emulator

01:13:14 ◼   ► that has acceptable performance, maybe it's them.

01:13:17 ◼   ► Now, how does this factor into Apple?

01:13:20 ◼   ► Is Microsoft gonna open source this?

01:13:21 ◼   ► Does the work that Microsoft does,

01:13:23 ◼   ► making their emulator work, help Apple at all?

01:13:25 ◼   ► Maybe not, but maybe they can prove that it can be done.

01:13:28 ◼   ► Maybe they can give a data point to say,

01:13:29 ◼   ► if you were to emulate x86 on Arm, how would it work?

01:13:32 ◼   ► Would it be okay, or would it be dog slow,

01:13:34 ◼   ► or it's nice to see somebody go first.

01:13:37 ◼   ► And so we will have something more than speculation

01:13:40 ◼   ► eventually to see how feasible it is to do this emulation.

01:13:45 ◼   ► Because it's important for compatibility

01:13:47 ◼   ► for all Microsoft's x86 apps,

01:13:48 ◼   ► and if Apple ever wants to transition,

01:13:51 ◼   ► surely as it has done in the other two transitions,

01:13:54 ◼   ► it will need emulation.

01:13:55 ◼   ► So it's something to watch.

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01:16:02 ◼   ► Thanks a lot to Torrey Parker for sponsoring our show.

01:16:04 ◼   ► (upbeat music)

01:16:07 ◼   ► So speaking of people who listen to the show,

01:16:10 ◼   ► apparently we've reminded Apple that they make,

01:16:13 ◼   ► that they make Wi-Fi routers, or they did anyway,

01:16:16 ◼   ► because now they don't.

01:16:18 ◼   ► - That was Marco, they did that, right?

01:16:19 ◼   ► Wasn't Marco who said,

01:16:20 ◼   ► "They should just discontinue the routers."

01:16:22 ◼   ► And I said, "Shh, they'll hear you."

01:16:23 ◼   ► - No, I wasn't even arguing they should discontinue,

01:16:25 ◼   ► but we were talking, it was literally like last week

01:16:28 ◼   ► like the one before that, saying how they exit

01:16:30 ◼   ► the monitor business and one of the arguments was that,

01:16:33 ◼   ► well, they don't need to focus on monitors.

01:16:34 ◼   ► And I said, well look, they still make WiFi routers

01:16:37 ◼   ► and some of them even have hard drives in them.

01:16:39 ◼   ► Like obviously they don't need, they're in businesses

01:16:41 ◼   ► that are less glorious but they stay in them

01:16:43 ◼   ► in these supporting roles for the rest of their product line

01:16:46 ◼   ► and the airport routers really support the Mac

01:16:50 ◼   ► and the various iDevices in this supporting role.

01:16:54 ◼   ► The time capsule ones in particular are very useful

01:16:58 ◼   ► appliances to get people who otherwise probably wouldn't

01:17:01 ◼   ► back up to a drive, to a time machine drive,

01:17:04 ◼   ► or to have any backup whatsoever,

01:17:06 ◼   ► who don't listen to our back play sponsorships,

01:17:08 ◼   ► or who can't use it for whatever reason,

01:17:09 ◼   ► maybe they have a really crappy internet connection.

01:17:11 ◼   ► So like, those are now major roles

01:17:14 ◼   ► that are going now unserved.

01:17:16 ◼   ► That being said, Apple routers were never,

01:17:21 ◼   ► as far as I could tell, they were never that popular

01:17:23 ◼   ► because, you know, the idea of every other router

01:17:28 ◼   ► being not only good enough, but like 10 times cheaper,

01:17:32 ◼   ► that has been the case for a long time now.

01:17:35 ◼   ► - Like cheaper and better usually,

01:17:37 ◼   ► like better in terms of WiFi signal.

01:17:39 ◼   ► Like I don't think Apple has ever had,

01:17:42 ◼   ► maybe the very first one,

01:17:43 ◼   ► but I don't think Apple has ever had a WiFi router

01:17:46 ◼   ► whose WiFi performance in terms of range and throughput

01:17:50 ◼   ► has been the tops.

01:17:53 ◼   ► They just have never done that.

01:17:55 ◼   ► But I will say, you know, as a fan of Apple's Wi-Fi routers, one thing in my experience

01:17:59 ◼   ► that Apple has done with its Wi-Fi products is that they have been, in my experience,

01:18:04 ◼   ► at the top of the consumer brands in terms of reliability.

01:18:08 ◼   ► Like they don't reboot, they don't flake out.

01:18:10 ◼   ► My experience with them has been very, very solid.

01:18:12 ◼   ► So I always felt comfortable spending the ridiculous amount of money for these things,

01:18:18 ◼   ► both for the integration reasons, because there is actually a surprising amount of crap

01:18:21 ◼   ► integrated with them.

01:18:22 ◼   ► time machine, but there's also the Bonjour sleep/wake thing and the little app that comes

01:18:27 ◼   ► with your Mac and iOS devices to control them.

01:18:31 ◼   ► There are Apple-specific technologies and nice integration with the Apple ecosystem

01:18:36 ◼   ► that goes along with them, and they were just always dead reliable for me.

01:18:39 ◼   ► I was willing to accept the crappy Wi-Fi performance for those two things, because there's nothing

01:18:44 ◼   ► worse than being in a house with flaky Wi-Fi, right?

01:18:46 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:18:47 ◼   ► First world problems.

01:18:48 ◼   ► But I think they fit into the old Apple model

01:18:53 ◼   ► of giving you a product that may not be the best,

01:18:57 ◼   ► but integrates with the Apple ecosystem,

01:18:59 ◼   ► and we charge you through the nose for it,

01:19:00 ◼   ► and it's actually pretty good.

01:19:02 ◼   ► - Yeah, but unfortunately,

01:19:05 ◼   ► I don't think that's ever been a large business.

01:19:07 ◼   ► And the thing is, as you get further away from the devices,

01:19:13 ◼   ► or you get in these supporting roles,

01:19:15 ◼   ► whether you're using an Apple product or not

01:19:17 ◼   ► it matters a lot less.

01:19:19 ◼   ► So like a monitor, you know, that matters somewhat,

01:19:22 ◼   ► not as much as you might think, but it matters--

01:19:26 ◼   ► - Unless you're John.

01:19:27 ◼   ► - Unless you're John.

01:19:28 ◼   ► But if you're anybody else, you know,

01:19:29 ◼   ► the monitor you're using, the brand of the monitor,

01:19:31 ◼   ► whether it matches your computer or not,

01:19:33 ◼   ► or whether it's an official app monitor or not,

01:19:35 ◼   ► for the most part, it doesn't affect your experience

01:19:37 ◼   ► that badly if it's not.

01:19:39 ◼   ► There's a few things that don't work quite right,

01:19:41 ◼   ► or don't have as nice of an experience as they could,

01:19:43 ◼   ► you know, integrations that might not work for you,

01:19:45 ◼   ► like brightness control on the keyboard.

01:19:47 ◼   ► like that, but for the most part, you know, you're, it's mostly fine. With your Wi-Fi

01:19:52 ◼   ► router, if that's not being made by Apple, for the most part, you won't even notice,

01:19:56 ◼   ► you know, unless, until you're going to change something.

01:19:58 ◼   ► So, same people who are cranky about monitors like me, like, I had this experience recently

01:20:02 ◼   ► because a lot of people after this announcement have been like, "Oh, great, well, I got a

01:20:05 ◼   ► shop for a bunch of Wi-Fi things, what should I get?" And people have been throwing around

01:20:09 ◼   ► links to lots of different things. One of the ones that was shown to be like, "Oh, this

01:20:12 ◼   ► has the best performance by like 5%, you should get this one." I forget what it was, it was

01:20:16 ◼   ► like Netgear, Orbi or something like that. Anyway, I'm like, "Okay, well look at these benchmarks."

01:20:22 ◼   ► Then I go look at the product. And I'm like, "Nope, sorry. I can't have three of those sitting

01:20:28 ◼   ► around in open spaces at my house." Because for Wi-Fi that is in multiple places, like to get

01:20:32 ◼   ► whole house coverage, you know, then it's not just one like in the computer room or whatever.

01:20:36 ◼   ► There's one in my hall, there's one in my bedroom, and there's one in the computer room. And I want

01:20:43 ◼   ► want them to be small, unobtrusive, and reasonable looking. And these knit gear,

01:20:49 ◼   ► whatever they think, they were tall, ugly, looked computery, and I

01:20:53 ◼   ► didn't want them in my house. And so it's not to say the Apple ones are great

01:20:58 ◼   ► because the stupid Apple Tower thingy is also big and ugly, but I'm still shopping

01:21:03 ◼   ► based on how these things will look. Like this is one of the reasons that the

01:21:06 ◼   ► Eros have stayed in my house is that they are small and generally unobtrusive.

01:21:11 ◼   ► If they were bigger and uglier, I would have a harder time,

01:21:16 ◼   ► you know, like this is a shopping criteria.

01:21:18 ◼   ► So it is, I mean, the Apple Airport Express

01:21:22 ◼   ► was also small and unobtrusive,

01:21:24 ◼   ► but it was so crappy that you wouldn't want it.

01:21:25 ◼   ► So yeah, Apple has gotten itself out of this business

01:21:28 ◼   ► by just, you know, in Mac Pro style,

01:21:30 ◼   ► by not updating their products for three years

01:21:32 ◼   ► and never having them be particularly good.

01:21:34 ◼   ► And now it's like, we're getting out of the wifi business.

01:21:35 ◼   ► So many people replied,

01:21:37 ◼   ► you've been out of the wifi business for so,

01:21:39 ◼   ► like in case you haven't noticed,

01:21:41 ◼   ► everyone else has been doing these mesh networks and you have been selling this crappy overpriced

01:21:45 ◼   ► thing for three years.

01:21:47 ◼   ► Some people might say good riddance, but my reaction to it was to tweet "Apple out of

01:21:51 ◼   ► everywhere," which is a reference to "USA out of everywhere," which is not that I'm

01:21:56 ◼   ► endorsing this, it was a snark, because that kind of seems, on the decontending front,

01:22:02 ◼   ► the idea that Apple should get out of every single business that is not the iPhone and

01:22:06 ◼   ► is not a potentially multi-billion dollar thing.

01:22:08 ◼   ► Like stop selling everything.

01:22:10 ◼   ► Stop selling USB cable, stop selling lightning cable,

01:22:15 ◼   ► stop selling power adapters,

01:22:17 ◼   ► just stop selling everything.

01:22:19 ◼   ► The bean counter kind of philosophy of just isolation

01:22:22 ◼   ► is concentrate everything on the iPhone,

01:22:24 ◼   ► get out of all these other businesses.

01:22:25 ◼   ► And we kind of feel like we're in this contraction

01:22:30 ◼   ► period right now where they are getting out

01:22:32 ◼   ► of other businesses.

01:22:32 ◼   ► I keep bringing this up from past shows.

01:22:34 ◼   ► They got out of the printer business

01:22:36 ◼   ► And at the time that was a pretty big deal because Apple's printers were similar to Apple's

01:22:40 ◼   ► Wi-Fi routers.

01:22:42 ◼   ► There were some really good ones in the beginning.

01:22:44 ◼   ► The Apple Laser writers were actually pretty cool, like the very early ones.

01:22:47 ◼   ► There weren't really any competitive products that were as cool.

01:22:51 ◼   ► They had a good integration with Apple's products, better than third-party things.

01:22:56 ◼   ► Eventually, in the bad days, when they were just taking Canon inkjet things and wrapping

01:23:01 ◼   ► them up with Apple outsides, they at least looked nicer than traditional printers, but

01:23:05 ◼   ► were all pretty crappy and when Apple stopped making them people were kind of like, "All

01:23:09 ◼   ► right, well, your printers were expensive anyway and they were barely yours and you

01:23:12 ◼   ► should get out of it." But the thing you were talking about, like, now that Apple's

01:23:17 ◼   ► out of it you can look at the better alternatives. How's that turned out for printers? Not too

01:23:20 ◼   ► well. If you look at printers right now, they're all pretty crappy. They're all pretty ugly.

01:23:25 ◼   ► And if there was an Apple one, the same stupid rich people who'd be tempted to buy overpriced

01:23:30 ◼   ► crappy Apple routers because they look nice and are reliable would also be tempted to

01:23:34 ◼   ► to buy stupid overpriced crappy Apple printers in the more of the laser rider vein than the

01:23:38 ◼   ► style rider vein, right? That problem, like the ecosystem problem, has been what a lot

01:23:43 ◼   ► of people are reacting to. We have a couple of random quotes from listeners here. Maxim

01:23:48 ◼   ► says, "All these products working together seamlessly created value. Apple is killing

01:23:51 ◼   ► its own ecosystem." This is Alex says, "There goes the only official way of having a wireless

01:23:56 ◼   ► time machine backup." Which is not strictly true because Apple has recently published

01:24:00 ◼   ► the Apple's time machine over SMB spec, and we'll put a link to it in the show notes.

01:24:04 ◼   ► as we all know from using Synologies, it is possible to have a third-party product that

01:24:07 ◼   ► reliably backs up over time machine, but a lot of people want to just have the ease of saying,

01:24:14 ◼   ► "I don't want to have to shop around to figure out what things are going to work or whatever.

01:24:16 ◼   ► If I just buy all Apple stuff, everything will work together and be nice-looking and pleasant

01:24:20 ◼   ► if I just give them a lot of money." And as they remove pieces of that and say, "Well,

01:24:26 ◼   ► actually that adapter you got to buy from Belkin and printer you got to buy from somebody else,

01:24:29 ◼   ► and they still all suck. And wireless adapter, you got a Wi-Fi thing, you're probably going to

01:24:33 ◼   ► gonna get it from your ISP so you're not gonna buy one anyway but if you do buy

01:24:36 ◼   ► one just you know go to Wirecutter and find out what the good one is and yeah

01:24:39 ◼   ► it'll be ugly and it might be weird and it won't work with all our stuff but

01:24:41 ◼   ► you'll be fine and it is a contracting of the ecosystem to the most essential

01:24:48 ◼   ► elements which is good in that it focuses Apple but as Dan Morin at Six

01:24:53 ◼   ► Colors said, this is quoting him, "It's not as if the iPad or most of the Mac

01:24:57 ◼   ► line has seen an update recently either." So what exactly is the company working

01:25:00 ◼   ► on. Like, if you're gonna, like, the idea of focus is, stop doing that all extraneous

01:25:05 ◼   ► stuff so you can concentrate all your awesome effort on the things that you care about.

01:25:09 ◼   ► And it could be with just a time lag. They are doing that, we just don't see the fruits

01:25:12 ◼   ► of that focus yet. So I hope there are fruits of this focus that come out of it, but in

01:25:17 ◼   ► the meantime, we just get the pain of this focus, which is, now I gotta shop in the nasty,

01:25:23 ◼   ► shiny black plastic world of non-apple peripherals for yet more things that I used to be able

01:25:29 ◼   ► to just throw money at Apple to give me.

01:25:32 ◼   ► Ah, Jon, struggle is real.

01:25:36 ◼   ► All right, is there any way we can avoid talking about the Nintendo Switch?

01:25:42 ◼   ► We could because we're an hour and a half into this, but I don't know if we can squeeze

01:25:45 ◼   ► it in.

01:25:46 ◼   ► No one wants to talk about Brent Simmons' reverse halo effect?

01:25:47 ◼   ► Because I think there's more to say about this Wi-Fi thing and the decontainting.

01:25:50 ◼   ► Oh, yeah.

01:25:51 ◼   ► Margot, do you think you can summarize the reverse halo effect?

01:25:55 ◼   ► Basically the halo effect is when you make the whole ecosystem, as people get into parts

01:26:00 ◼   ► of it, it's kind of easier to get into the rest of it.

01:26:03 ◼   ► Like back in the day when you buy an iPod, then maybe your next computer you might buy

01:26:07 ◼   ► a Mac because you were so impressed by the iPod, you're like well, maybe Apple's computers

01:26:12 ◼   ► are pretty good too.

01:26:14 ◼   ► And same thing with the iPhone.

01:26:15 ◼   ► Anyway, Brent Simmons wrote this post called the reverse halo effect, basically saying

01:26:19 ◼   ► as Apple gets out of various businesses like monitors

01:26:23 ◼   ► and wifi routers and everything,

01:26:25 ◼   ► people who are in the Apple ecosystem,

01:26:27 ◼   ► who used to just throw money at Apple to just solve problems

01:26:30 ◼   ► because things were pretty good for the most part

01:26:32 ◼   ► when you did that, once you start looking outside of Apple

01:26:35 ◼   ► for some of these key things,

01:26:37 ◼   ► maybe you'll start looking outside of Apple more

01:26:40 ◼   ► for more needs and realize, wait a minute,

01:26:43 ◼   ► if I can stop paying $300 for Apple's fancy routers

01:26:47 ◼   ► and I can start getting a really nice router

01:26:49 ◼   ► for like 70 bucks, maybe I could also get really nice

01:26:53 ◼   ► cables from Monoprice and hey, what about that PC monitor

01:26:57 ◼   ► that costs basically nothing?

01:26:59 ◼   ► And then eventually you're buying Android phones and PCs.

01:27:02 ◼   ► - Wait, are you saying they're books

01:27:03 ◼   ► that cost less than $300?

01:27:05 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:27:06 ◼   ► - Only the small ones, not a big one like that.

01:27:08 ◼   ► - Yeah, the cut down model, literally.

01:27:11 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:27:13 ◼   ► Yeah, so I think there's something to this,

01:27:18 ◼   ► to Brent's reverse halo effect.

01:27:20 ◼   ► I don't know how strong it will be.

01:27:23 ◼   ► I'm more concerned about,

01:27:25 ◼   ► if I can summarize, again, this is kind of like

01:27:29 ◼   ► a big feeling like last time where I'm gonna try

01:27:31 ◼   ► to put this into words.

01:27:32 ◼   ► We've had to try to figure out context and meaning

01:27:36 ◼   ► for a lot of Apple decisions recently

01:27:38 ◼   ► that one of the interpretations of them is

01:27:42 ◼   ► Apple might be getting a little too nickel and dimey

01:27:44 ◼   ► or a little too, maybe not greedy,

01:27:47 ◼   ► but just like making decisions that are better for money

01:27:50 ◼   ► than for their products and for their customers.

01:27:52 ◼   ► There have been so many decisions recently

01:27:53 ◼   ► where that is one of the explanations.

01:27:56 ◼   ► And the other explanation is, well,

01:27:58 ◼   ► we can try to figure out why things like the headphone jack

01:28:01 ◼   ► got removed from the 7 and stuff like that.

01:28:03 ◼   ► In the last few years, I feel like the rate at which

01:28:06 ◼   ► we have to make that interpretation,

01:28:07 ◼   ► 'cause Apple doesn't really provide it

01:28:09 ◼   ► or provides a weak explanation,

01:28:10 ◼   ► it seems like we keep having to make those excuses

01:28:13 ◼   ► more and more with each new product change

01:28:16 ◼   ► or product end, or product neglect,

01:28:19 ◼   ► we are making a lot of excuses for Apple recently.

01:28:23 ◼   ► We are having to interpret lots of things charitably.

01:28:27 ◼   ► In the same vein of where there's smoke, there's fire,

01:28:31 ◼   ► we are having to explain away decisions Apple's making

01:28:34 ◼   ► as just being by bean counter management,

01:28:36 ◼   ► or just being for nickel and diming,

01:28:38 ◼   ► a little too often recently, and that has me worried

01:28:42 ◼   ► there's a lot of cracks showing in the foundation.

01:28:44 ◼   ► maybe there's a bigger picture thing here that we're all afraid to not only say but to even consider

01:28:50 ◼   ► Until maybe it maybe it's too late

01:28:54 ◼   ► You know the weird thing about the nickel and diming thing is like it's such an obvious explanation for things like

01:28:59 ◼   ► Removing the little wings and you know the other obvious explanations are our research shows that nobody used those wings and they often break off

01:29:05 ◼   ► And it's simpler to not have them and simplicity is the ultimate sophistication and yada yada yada, but

01:29:10 ◼   ► What the other aspect of this that that is weird to me that makes me?

01:29:14 ◼   ► Pull away from the nickel and diming angle although that totally is there

01:29:19 ◼   ► I know there I know for a fact that there are factions inside Apple

01:29:22 ◼   ► Related to hardware and product design that will always argue for saving money if possible because they're gonna make a lot of these widgets as well

01:29:28 ◼   ► There has to be right, but if you look at Apple spending on R&D in recent years

01:29:33 ◼   ► It is gone up hugely and so I when I look at these things

01:29:37 ◼   ► I think they're willing to spend

01:29:39 ◼   ► Vast amounts of money to realize the design vision of their products in terms of like even just the new MacBook Pros

01:29:46 ◼   ► But yeah, they're just unibody aluminum just like everything else surely they've already mastered that process, and there's nothing new about this one

01:29:51 ◼   ► Nope, nope

01:29:52 ◼   ► I'm sure these machines have you know they they probably have new processes and new machines and even if it's just like the part spinning to

01:29:59 ◼   ► Exactly match up the little inside Apple logo

01:30:01 ◼   ► Which they've done on the phones and everything like just doing that at scale and larger things like every product

01:30:06 ◼   ► they make, they seem to be willing to put such huge amounts of money into like, I don't

01:30:11 ◼   ► care what it takes. I don't care if we have to invent a new machine or buy a company that

01:30:14 ◼   ► sells this thing or do just huge, you put huge amounts of initial investment in to make

01:30:20 ◼   ► this perfectly designed product. And yet on the other side of it, we're like, if you're

01:30:25 ◼   ► willing to ramp up your R and D spending, it really has gone up. If you look at like

01:30:28 ◼   ► ASEMCO's charts recently, it's, it is, it is not just like a 5% increase over the past

01:30:32 ◼   ► years it is just like a 45 degree angle slope like it is they're spending so much more money

01:30:38 ◼   ► a lot of that's like oh that's all project titan in the car or whatever i'm not sure what they're

01:30:41 ◼   ► spending on maybe some of it is that but i think they really are investing a lot of money even in

01:30:48 ◼   ► things like just the mac like the little old mac and what it takes to manufacture the mac to you

01:30:53 ◼   ► know to satisfy the vision and then they're also removing the little wings and the little rubbery

01:30:58 ◼   ► thing from the adapter it makes me think that those removals are more explained

01:31:05 ◼   ► by someone's wrongheaded in my opinion idea of you know simplicity we need to

01:31:09 ◼   ► just reduce stuff everything needs to be simpler you shouldn't have little lights

01:31:14 ◼   ► on the adapter that it's orange when it's charging in green when it's done

01:31:17 ◼   ► because that's just one more thing and you should find out that information

01:31:20 ◼   ► another way I don't want to have a little light up button buttons on the

01:31:23 ◼   ► bottom tell your battery charge because that would take up room in the case and

01:31:27 ◼   ► It's just, you know, like it's the computer equivalent

01:31:30 ◼   ► of omit needless words.