```
defaults -currentHost write -globalDomain NSStatusItemSpacing -int 2
defaults -currentHost write -globalDomain NSStatusItemSelectionPadding -int 2
```
Honestly, I couldn't be happier. I get so much more out of my hardware and I enjoy the experience so much more.
This very article is about how Tailscale frequently gets reports of them being hidden.
And I personally have had the icons hidden. My work laptop has a lot of stuff running on it (much of it is mandatory: VPN, custom company processes, Google Drive, etc) and combined with my personal preferred programs (f.lux, etc) it occasionally hits the limit and goes under the notch.
Why on earth would people tell you that?
I should save this thread for every time someone tries to tell me that Windows is a horrible operating system that is a major reason to not buy a computer when I say things like "The MacBook Neo isn't that good of a deal and you can totally find a Windows laptop in the price range that's built well enough, has similar performance/battery life (or better)/trackpad, and leaves you with more RAM, storage, and I/O."
I've literally picked out laptops that are clearly better buys than the Neo/Air and people will tell me things like "well then you're stuck with Windows" or "but you'll have firmware problems" and then we have to remember that Apple has had plenty of that in their past.
How about those Nvidia GPUs that would fail inevitably in older MacBook Pros?
Or the butterfly keyboard?
Or how they can’t even make window corners that match with the Liquid Glass update?
Keep in mind it's not Magic Mac Memory because someone will jump in and tell us that 8GB of Mac memory is clearly superior to 16GB of PC memory because Macs are able to swap and wear down your SSD in the process.
Global user base
Mac: 100 million (2024)
PC gamers: 900 million
A lot of Mac enthusiasts seem to scoff at the idea that someone buying a laptop wants it to be able to play some kind of video games. Apple can make the greatest computer in the world but for many customers the fact that it can only run ~5% of games or whatever is a dealbreaker.
The Neo can play many games on some level but having 8GB of RAM plus needing to share it between the CPU and GPU is a major disadvantage.
The lack of a fan also hampers performance of the chip inside of it by something like 15-30%, rather than including one for a nominal cost to maximize performance.
It’s totally fine for the intended customer but it’s a computer for a very specific customer, more niche/specific than a customer who “just wants to play some CS:Go on the side.”
Apple could swallow their pride and partner with Steam but they’ll never willingly encourage their users to use a different App Store even if it makes the computer better.
This is a very comparable device considering it’s also an ARM-based computer essentially.
We need to stop making excuses for Apple’s unwillingness to include a basic form of cooling for their low end devices. It’s just price segmentation. Make the cheap stuff artificially slow, push you up to the MacBook Pro.
Do you not agree that having a fan in the system was a good design trade-off?
If that's not saying it's silent for you, you don't only need to get your hearing checked.
I still never said it’s silent. I merely implied that it’s quiet enough to satisfy the design parameters, where it is so quiet it’s forgettable. My ears might hear it but my brain doesn’t notice it. Maybe you need to dust out your Switch, it’s not a loud system.
I have no idea why you’re arguing this so hard, but I guess people just go crazy to defend trillion dollar corporation Apple. Enjoy your fanless computer that gives up 15-30% performance just to save a few millimeters and $3 on the BOM.
I bet Mac zealots would be surprised to find out that almost every PC with a fan comes with configurable modes so you can decide how loud or quiet you want your system and trade off performance. Crazy right? The user gets to choose for the situation rather than having to choose at time of purchase.
I would rather own a system that doesn’t slow down after 7 minutes of sustained activity. MacBook reviewers act like this is no big deal since they don’t play any games like the other 900 million PC gamers in the world. “Oh, your video exports will be done by the time throttling starts, so it’s not big deal.” These reviewers also only know about video editing since it’s their job to edit videos. But playing games is by definition dependent on sustained high performance. If I lose performance after 7 minutes I’m losing performance for most of my session.
Clearly it’s not a challenge to make a compact, performant device with a nearly silent fan. Clearly customers don’t mind that devices have fans even for devices meant to be held in hand for hours that weigh less than a pound.
I can buy a handheld from Nintendo for $450 that can play new AAA games with great performance while the Neo struggles with 5 year old titles like Cyberpunk despite likely having better overall hardware. A MacBook Neo with a fan would get 15-30% better overall performance and +50% framerate in games as has been demonstrated by multiple tinkerers on YouTube.
I don’t know why people parrot this talking point about a lack of fan being a positive feature. It’s like a shared propaganda talking point that Mac enthusiasts all agree upon universally. If Apple added fans to the Air and Neo you’d all change your tune since Dear Leader changed their mind, just like when Apple enthusiasts stopped blindly hating Intel suddenly during the architecture transition. You’d all say stuff like “Apple gave us boosted performance and you can’t even hear the fans! All those PC laptops that I’ve never cross shopped since 2001 sound like jet engines!”
A simple passive heatsink has been shown to boost performance significantly in the MacBook Neo.
The throttling of the chips in Apple’s lower end systems are an intentional form of price segmentation. The MacBook Pro won’t be any faster than the Air if the Air was just cooled properly.
I would unironically take a fan in my phone if it stopped it from throttling, dimming the screen, and halting charging when it’s a hot day in direct sunlight. It would just have to make sense in the context of a phone design, of course, which is a challenge.
https://support.apple.com/en-us/118431
There are phones on the market with detachable active cooling solutions to help with sustained intense gameplay:
If the MacBook Air had a fan, it would be thicker and would need a bigger battery. It would then be the same, aside from the screen, from the base MacBook Pro. You are 100% correct. The fact it has no fan allows Apple to reduce its weight and thickness. Thus reducing its price. You’re absolutely right.
Fans in laptops are more and more a gamer pilled flight of fancy. Phones and iPads have shown they’re not a necessity.
Is the Nintendo Switch/Switch 2 a thick device? They are thinner than the MacBook Pro, and they have more space constraints than a MacBook Neo.
If fans in laptops are just for “gamer pilled” why does the MacBook Pro have one?
Do you think Apple can continue to grow their marketshare indefinitely if they continually ignore the 900 million PC gamers who currently own Windows PCs? The PC gaming market is the only one that has been growing since 2021.
https://www.techspot.com/news/106371-gaming-industry-hits-wa...
The iPad doesn’t prove anything, it’s routinely criticized for wasting its performance potential with inflexible and limited software. Its performance limits are never tested because you can’t actually do things on it in comparison to a full desktop OS.
My phone will regularly dim the screen, halt charging, and throttle performance when I’m out in a sunny day during the summer. You ever been to Miami? I would actually be interested in an actively cooled phone if it existed and would accept a device that was thicker.
I don't bet against simplicity. Those who really require complexity pay for it. On the Apple side, that now includes those who need sustained throughput achieved by a fan.
I’ll shill a website for a YouTuber called bestlaptop.deals. It tracks sale prices and has reviews attached for the laptops, along with categories for use cases. Shopping for Macs less frequently involves big sales but with Windows laptops being patient can pay off.
I’ve seen on recent reviews indicating Windows on ARM has made really great strides, from including support for anti-cheat for many online games. Not every game works but many do without any effort.
I bring these up because the battery life is excellent and many of them are in the $500-600 range.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=f8EbtQ7jQnQ
Yes, that’s a sponsored video, but I’m linking it to show you his commentary on the software situation.
For x86-based computers there are a couple of ways you can go:
Since you mentioned gaming, you can sacrifice some portability and go with something like a Lenovo LOQ. A previous generation unit will cost about $700 and have an RTX 4050, which is enough to beat anything Apple will sell you before you get up to Pro chips. I believe there are other OEMs that may hit that price point with an RTX 5050 which of course will be an improvement.
These systems do get good battery life when you’re in integrated graphics mode. When you’re gaming you’re going to be plugged in regardless of laptop.
Another one I’ve seen on sale lately has been the Yoga 7 14” with either the Ryzen AI 340/512GB storage or the Ryzen AI 350/1TB of storage. I think the sales aren’t as good as were a couple weeks ago. These have a 2K OLED screen, 2-in-1 and pen support, generally good overall systems. The 350 model has significantly better integrated graphics performance so I’d try to stretch for that one.
Finally, in-person I was really impressed with the Acer Aspire 14 AI for being only $530. I did wish the screen was a bit better but the rest of the system was really impressive to be hitting that price.
There was an HP OmniBook I played with in store that had a great aluminum build, though the value wasn’t quite as good. It seemed like it was designed to compete with the Air and felt to me like an Air clone in a way.
I haven’t touched on used, which is obviously an option. There are a lot of options there and I think it’s worth looking into.
I would still say, if you can, spend more than what the MacBook Neo costs. The MacBook Neo isn’t a revolutionary device that changes the game in my mind. Instead, it’s a machine that makes a lot of similar sacrifices that other cheap laptops make. It’s better if you save up and spend more if you can.
For example, you’re interested in gaming, you just missed an amazing sale on the RTX 5070Ti/32GB RAM version of the Zephyrus G14 at Best Buy. It was $500 off, so about $1800 for a really amazing machine that is basically the best thing and light gaming system on the market.
Also keep in mind as I talk about this, I’m biased against 15-16” models. I like 14”.
I don’t love Windows, but I don’t hate it either. Amazing backward compatibility, and that is not to be ignored.
It’s actually better in many ways: 2K OLED touch screen, convertible with pen support, double the RAM, backlit keyboard, ranks better on battery life for office tasks, a far wider array of ports.
If you stretch to the 1TB model you get the Ryzen 7 AI 350 which beats the Neo on integrated graphics and multi-core processor speeds. You’ll pay a little more but if you need the storage the Neo is out of contention already, and at that price your MacBook Air will come with 256GB.
I was a huge Windows fanboy, now completely Apple but this was single most annoying regression of functionality when switching and one of the only things I miss.
macOS is still better than windows, but my feeling is it’s more of a glass of cheap warm whiskey in hell than a cool glass of ice water.
Frankly, I prefer the mac because there's so little arsing around with drivers. Not out of any blinkered misconceptions about quality, usability, or an otiose love for Apple or their products otherwise.
All Windows laptops come preinstalled, there's no arsing about with drivers there either.
Unless you install the bare OS from scratch. Apple bundles the drivers for their hardware with their OS.
Good luck with plugging in anything non-Apple branded or not using standard USB audio or Ethernet CDC and you're 100% having to muck about with sketchy kexts that almost certainly will break in the next OS release.
You can do this for Windows too, that's how most corporate images are built.
One image and 30 different laptop models, that's how it's done in every competently run megacorp IT department. Do you think some poor technician is manually loading drivers onto every Windows laptop?
Apple has replaced kexts (kernel extensions) with a user-space alternative for many years now
> that almost certainly will break in the next OS release
My scanner has drivers available for download that date from 2015 with no updates since then.
Though I'm certain you've raised this issue before, and it was met with "I've never heard of anyone needing a scanner, you must be doing something weird, have you tried taking a picture of it with your iPhone(R) instead?"
If you’re lucky. One laptop I had in the past (and ultimately returned) had an issue where the vendor-provided NVIDIA drivers were the only ones that allowed its GPU to perform correctly, but were very outdated, which resulted in Windows Update continuously updating them and dragging performance back down. I even tried using the policy editor to lock the drivers in but that failed too because the drivers are split into several pieces and I’d inevitably miss some component, resulting in broken half-updated drivers.
This caveat is doing enough heavy lifting for an Olympic podium.
My goal is genially not to have anything running in the menubar that isn't out of the box from the OS. I had a similar desire with the system tray on Windows (though it was more difficult on Windows due to some hardware requiring it).
Work is the only place I have an issue, because they install a bunch of security agents that all want a spot in the menubar, even though they never need me to interact with them or know what they're doing. Those agents sitting up in the menubar tend to be the reason my system has slow downs or issues. Though the slowdowns have gone away since moving to M1. On Intel my fan used to run all the time. Now I'm just left with the weird issues they cause.
> My goal is genially not to have anything running in the menubar that isn't out of the box from the OS.
My goal is to use the apps I want to use, and if they are exclusively menu bar apps, what can I do about that?
> The people with the most stuff up there tend to be the same ones who are always complaining about system slowness
The cause for system slowness on my mac are too many browser tabs eating 500 MB memory each, not a few 10 MB native Swift apps.
I agree. My menu widgets aren't the primary cause if my computer feels slow. It's almost always a ton of browser tabs because I collect stuff to investigate later and I procrastinate removing them.
However, I also see the point of the commenter that a lot of people who have a bunch of shit in the menu bar might not be computer people who understand what they are or how they got there. In those cases, people exploring things they don't know how to remove might accumulate a lot of other crap that causes a slow system.
I'm talking about the file manager missing features.
Wifi issues going back years and years.
Default mice settings that make me want to throw the thing out a window. Seriously, who moves their cursor that slow?
The worst window manager I've ever used.
I could go on, but it's genuinely pointless. People love their macs like people love their sports teams. No matter what, some people will always love the maple leafs.
Then couple ordinary services that add menu bar icons that you don't even ask for (DropBox, Docker, Adobe, etc.) and you can overflow onto the notch quite quickly.
Now I just click on the chevron whenever I need to access Tailscale or Postgres or CloudFlare or Creative Cloud Dropbox or Google Dropbox or ……
Really solved the problem for me.
so now what
Examples:
Look, I don't even want half that stuff, but the reality is that a bunch of tools mandate by my employers, and a bunch of utilities that are needed to make modern MacOS work reliably, all live up there.
A couple of VPNs, DropBox, OrbStack/Docker, eqMac to unfuck volume control on external displays, BetterDisplays and BetterSnapTool to unfuck everything else about external displays... I'm already most of the way to the notch on a 14" macbook
Windows isn't the alternative if you're on hacker news, OpenBSD and linux are the alternatives.
If you care about productivity and want your computer to "just work", install stock Mac OS (with maybe a utility or two), and you don't have to worry about anything for the next 3 or so years.
If you want to constantly fiddle with configs and spend hours just so things work exactly the way you want them to, sure, go with a BSD or whatever.
No judgment either way, this is a hobby like any other. Some people like to paint, some people like assembling model airplanes, others like building their oS from source and making sure the window is exactly the shade of blue they want it to be. Nothing wrong with any of the three.
I think it's a fair balance. If you're running a bajillion things that add menu icons and you don't also care about computers enough to want to learn more, that's probably pretty frustrating. Most of the people I've met who care a lot about custom software have been curious about going further. Small sample size, just my two cents.
system.defaults.NSGlobalDomain = {
NSStatusItemSpacing = 2;
NSStatusItemSelectionPadding = 2;
};Previously killing SystemUI server was enough to restart the menu bar, but that doesn't seem to do the trick anymore.
Do you have anything else as useful as this? THis is perfect
defaults -currentHost delete -globalDomain NSStatusItemSpacing