The New MacBook Pro Keyboard is a Throwback in the Best Way | Hacker News Reader

The New MacBook Pro Keyboard is a Throwback in the Best Way

ifixit.com

I stopped by my local Apple store today to try out one of the new keyboards, and I was _really_ surprised with how nice it felt. It's physically not a lot of key travel, but it _feels_ like it is sort of in the same way that the trackpad doesn't actually move when you click it. I think some of Apple's most underrated innovations are these tactile tricks that make your brain think something different is happening when you push a key or "click" the trackpad. I wish they would have started with this as a more incremental step instead of the weird butterfly mechanism.

The mic and speakers are also really impressive. Even if you're not interested in having a MBP as your daily carry device, it's really worth it to stop into a store and hear the speakers for yourself -- and then demand that quality from every other computer you ever use. IMHO, that's how laptops _should_ sound.

After several years away from the macOS ecosystem, I think this is the machine that's finally going to bring me back.

I tried the keyboard today at a Best Buy after using my Pixelbook at home, and after trying the new Surface Laptop keyboards in a different section of the store. While I think the new MBP keyboard is an improvement over the odd feel of the butterfly keyboards, I think the Surface and Pixelbook keyboards are better. Both the Surface and Pixelbook have snappier feedback while the MBP felt a bit mushier and "thunkier". In any case, the new MBP is good enough which is all that matters if you've been waiting for the light at the end of butterfly tunnel.

2nd best way, still has touch bar.

It also has a physical Escape key, which seemed to be by far the most common complaint about the Touch Bar. Physical F keys are quite a niche desire.

I don't think it's a desire for physical F keys. It's a desire to not accidentally increase/decrease volume (in my case), a thousand times a day. The function keys are located (I switched to a 2016 Macbook Air recently due to the keyboard issue) well above the number keys on the Macbook Air that I never accidentally press a F key.

System Preferences » Keyboard » Customize Control Strip

Change the buttons to a slider.

I personally never use F# keys so I set the Control Strip to show only on Fn.

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