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Comment by titzer | Hacker News Reader

I switched back to a Linux workstation, after being "all mac laptop" since 2003 (!). My current Macbook Pro is from 2010 and my professional Macbook pro from 2015. The newest Macbooks with their stupid keyboards and USB-C only are total garbage, IMO. Sad.

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I ended up buying a new 2017 15 inch MacBook Pro and it's really been not that bad. Yes, you have to use a USB-A to USB-C dongle here and there but at least for my daily use, it's not been terribly inconvenient. The machine is light and thin and I enjoy it immensely, although I'm a little scared about the keyboard (so far no problems). Touchbar?... meh. Neither like not dislike.

I don't know. I understand the new MacBooks are not perfect for everybody but for me it has been more than OK, and I love the huge trackpad. I feel like a lot of the criticism seems excessive or are complaints that could very well be applied to the sad state of the PC industry as a whole.

Needing a dongle "here and there" means that now I need to carry it with me at all times. And that means both USB-A and HDMI dongles. More things I need to worry about to make my 3500EUR machine useful. This is a clear usability regression and the "USB-C" only future doesn't seem to be happening until end of lifetime of this machine.

The keyboard feels bad and my space has started failing. This is also a clear regression with no benefit over previous model.

Touchbar is still useless with pretty much no features over function keys (excluding TouchID on the power button). Pretty much no 3rd party apps use it well and the fact that it can't hold global app shortcuts make it significanly less useful than the previous keys. Another clear regression.

It's not that the new Macs are bad machines, it's that Apple made a few baffling decisions which make the user experience worse over previous models. With pretty much no benefits.

> With pretty much no benefits.

It sure is thin! And nice looking! Marchitecture, IMO.

Excessive complaints? A machine that costs >2000$ that very likely will have a broken keyboard, that is missing the function keys and all the useful ports have been removed. What is excessive in the complaiants made by people that spent a lot of money and would like to have a working machine without having to pray to win the keyboard lottery?

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