“I don’t use this computer for serious work.” Dropped $3K on MBP to play around with. Definitely should have gotten MBA
I actually find M1 Air class performance still more acceptable for all my usual dev tasks. I might only need a beefier machine for the extra RAM if I'm spinning up a lot of VMs. Otherwise though, the raw CPU performance is still quite fine.
As for camera lenses, I expect my collection of manual focus F-mount Zeiss primes to have a longer useful life than their owner.
[0] EDIT: for reference, my previous ThinkPad lasted me 14 years.
Their recent hardware is proving much more capable as tools than the budget i5 I had before, so I upgraded. In terms of machinery expenses, it's more than I'd like to spend on RAM and ssd than I'd prefer (their pricing ladder is comical) but the product is amazing. I'm going to wait as long as possible before I upgrade to Tahoe though, seems almost DoA
Since we are talking about OS support. 4th gen Intel isn’t supported by Windows 11, so you’d have to upgrade to Linux.
If they're working perfectly, why does it matter if they have current operating support? It doesn't seem like you're dependent on Apple.
The first iPad Pro can’t run adobe products for example.
The Mac is a bit more resilient to this, but it’s still worrying as yearly improvements become subtler.
So, Apple leaves old hardware high and dry by not supporting them with operating systems, and 3P software leaves users high and dry by dropping support for operating systems. It's like they are working together to create e-waste.
It depends on the person and the use case. Different personalities etc
For example if I spec out a 13" M4 MBA to match my current 14" M1 Pro MBP, which with tax came to ~$3k in 2021 (32GB RAM, 1TB storage), that $1k MBA ends up being ~$1900. Now that more frequent upgrade cadence doesn't make as much sense financially. After one purchase and one upgrade, you've exceeded the cost of the M1 Pro MBP purchase.
Overall I don't disagree with your sentiment, especially for more casual use cases, but progress will never stop. There will always be a newer laptop with better specs coming out. I personally would rather beef up a machine and then drive it until it dies or can no longer perform the tasks I need it to.
i think i'll be upgrading in the next 2 or maybe 3 years if apple puts OLED screens on their new machines as it is rumored.
It’s also not true if you care about certain workloads like LLM performance. My biggest concern for example is memory size and bandwidth, and older chips compare quite favorably to new chips where “GPU VRAM size” now differentiates the premium market and becomes a further upsell, making it less cost-effective. :( I can justify $3k for “run a small LLM on my laptop for my job as ML researcher,” but I still can’t justify $10k for “run a larger model on my Mac Studio”
See https://github.com/ggml-org/llama.cpp/discussions/4167#discu...
Of course, not near the top in terms of money because there are a few hobbies that cost vastly more.
Sure, but I did specify expensive hobbies.
Yacht owner says ‘hold my beer’.
I want to find a way to revive the hobby by showing younger people short on money that they can get into sailing for less than they already spend on much less rewarding stuff like app subscriptions and smartphones.
In many areas there’s a tendency to overdo it with tools, gadgets and also to compensate for lack of skill with more gadgets. I do woodworking for example and my total spend for industrial vacuum, different types of power and hand tools, work bench, clamps, etc probably comes to around a few thousand EUR. Mine is a really good set-up for a hobby, but I still don’t have any stationary machines or fancy separate work area or room. I bought everything over the years and I only buy brand-name. My point is, this is actually a lot of money especially if spent as lump sum and not at all a “nothing-burger”.
It’s once you get “serious” and need to have your own equipment that all these things get real. Or in the case of things like social dance, you want to take time off with and travel further and further away to attend pricey exchanges and camps.
I’ve taken my 10 euro dance classes for years without feeling the necessity of pricey exchanges and camps.
My neighbour goes to the park many evenings to play petanque, doesn’t cost him anything.
A couple I’m friends with goes on day hikes where they do bird watching—maybe they bought a nice pair of binoculars once? Another couple likes to lay jigsaw puzzles together, not exactly breaking the bank!
My sister is learning Finnish because she never learned a non indo-european language. She bought a book.
I would wager most people’s hobbies are low key like this because either they don’t have disposable income to spend on them, or they don’t want too!
I get very frustrated with the kind of people who see one tiktok about a thing and suddenly feel like they need to spend $3k to pursue whatever their new passion is.
Take the music hobby as an example. I have several expensive guitars now, but in the first 20 years of that hobby I probably spent under $1000 on guitars and related gear the entire time.
The distribution is highly skewed. Like wealth. The 99th percentile are near the top in rank (by definition) but nowhere near the top in absolute terms.
And in contradiction to computers, a bicycle from 40 years ago still does the same job as it did at the time, there is no software making it incompatible and it doesn't feel slower than the more modern stuff. All you need is a set of brake pads, cables, tires, chain and cassette every once in a while. All these consumables are fairly cheap if you aren't chasing the newest/highest end tech and stick to 2x9 / 2x10 speed transmissions.
Obviously you can spend pretty much any amount of money on those if you want (if you are "serious" about it) but you don't have to and most people don't. Also he said this $3k expenditure wasn't for serious work.
Judging by the authors preference for Linux, I’m guessing this hobby has some professional applications as well.
$3k is the price of a very nice guitar, but I am not about to casually shell out that money every few years.
However, I earn my wage using a computer, so it’s a lot easier to justify staying relatively current on specs.
A computer is many, many orders of magnitude more complex and expensive than that.
This isn't said with the intention to demonize expensive hobbies if no one is harmed because of it.
But I do sometimes wonder if my hobbies are too dependent of a power plug. Even reading, which I do with a e-reader.
Most people save $400 per month tops, that they spend on holidays.
Many universities in rural areas have student clubs that offer lessons and rent club owned planes for cheap.
Not sure what you call a "reliable used car". My low mileage for its age 2006 Mercedes B200 costed me 5.5k€ for instance. A car doesn't have to cost a lot to be reliable.
Around me $20k is an expensive price for a car and most people buy second hand +20y old cars they buy for less than 5k€.
I am also into older cars and can get a reliable car for a few hundred dollars, but I would never be able to convince anyone else I know that it is an option. So yea, you can get a reliable car for a lot less than a cheap airplane only if you don’t have some irrational bias against older cars.
That says a lot about the community you live in.
These machines are just for souvenirs
I'm always so jealous of these people, 60hz is just so bad for me now and even make me a bit motion sick.
I can see it in everything, moving the window, scrolling, the cursor.
For screen with 60 FPS, the difference between 30 FPS and 60 FPS was pretty obvious and I could guess it 100% of the time.
For screen with 144FPS, the difference between 72FPS and 144FPS was not obvious at all and I couldn't reliably guess it at all. I also checked it with a few other persons, and they all failed this simple test.
So now I'm holding firm opinion, that these high-FPS displays are marketing gimmick.
https://pastebin.com/raw/hwR62Yhi here's HTML, save it and open. left click reveals which half is "fast" (full FPS) or "slow" (half FPS), scroll changes speed, F5 generates new test.
While I agree the jump from 60 -> 140 hz/fps is not as noticeable as 30 -> 60, calling everything above 60 a ”marketing gimmick” is silly. When my screen or TV falls back to 60hz for whatever reason I can notice it immediately, you don’t have to do anything else than move your mouse or scroll down a webpage.
There's less ghosting in 240hz.
And scrolling on 60hz to me looks blurry.
I'd like to think that those who don't notice the difference have improved brain GPUs that can compensate for ghosting.
Wow. My perspective was those that did notice the difference were more perceptive. Thank you - now I realize there is a completely different take. (I'm not sure that it's helpful mind you... but it gives me something to chew on).
Specially between 60hz and 120+.
Scrolling looks blurry/ghosted in 60hz.
I guess I could vibe code an app to set monitor Hz randomly in either 60 or 280 and test.
But it would be a waste of time from how clearly I can tell the difference.
Can't go back to non-oleds.
When I use a desktop display, my pattern is: load page, read content for 10-30 seconds, scroll, repeat.
When I use a phone, the read-time-before-scroll is more like 1-5 seconds due to the much smaller display.
I notice the scrolling blur in both places on 60 Hz displays, but it bothers me way more on a phone because I'm scrolling so much more.
I would live a much happier life.
There is nothing groundbreaking about 120hz.
It’s unfortunate if it bothers you. I have the same reaction to 30Hz.
In tracking motion your eyes/brain can see improved motion resolution (how clear the details are in an object moving across the screen) up to 1000Hz.
Personally I've had concussions and bad screens do make me sick. Even 60hz TVs if I'm sitting somewhat close, particularly for certain content. All the chaos of Dr. Strange / Multiverse was too much for me to watch.
I agree on the nano-texture display having used one in person for a little bit. It's sort of like an ultra fine matte texture that isn't noticable while using it, but is noticable compared to other devices in the same room. I hope it becomes a more standard option on future devices.
That said, I've used Thinkpads with matte displays and while not as fine, they mostly have the same benefit.
I ran that thing for like 6 years til the replacement for the failed GPU failed again.
More matte screens please!
My mom has an M1 air, and its resolution is not great. Everything looks a bit blurry compared with my 4K Dell XPS my wife’s MacBook Pro m4 display. I guess the air’s native resolution means it has to do fractional scaling.
Just to be pedantic it is integer scaled (from 1440x900 to 2880x1800 but then resampled down to the native resolution of the MBA 2560x1600 via something better than bilinear).
Meanwhile if you need widespread compatibility nearly everything supports exFAT and if you need a real filesystem then the Mac and Windows drivers for open source filesystems are less likely to corrupt your data.
That would both get you easier compatibility between Mac and Linux and solve the NTFS write issue without any more trouble than it's giving people now because then you'd just install the ext4 driver on the Windows machine instead of the NTFS driver on the Mac.
My money is on apple not having the will to do thar.
> Like a better finder experience.
> Or keeping screen on.
Do you mind linking or naming which tools you use for those 2 purposes?
Asking out of pure curiosity, as for keeping the screen on, I just use `caffeinate -imdsu` in the terminal. Previously used Amphetamine, but I ended up having some minor issues with it, and I didn't need any of its advanced features (which could definitely be useful to some people, I admit, just not me). I just wanted to have a simple toggle for "keep the device and/or display from sleeping" mode, so I just switched to `caffeinate -imdsu` (which is built-in).
As for Finder, I didn't really feel the need for anything different, but I would gladly try out and potentially switch to something better, if you are willing to recommend your alternative.
OP: I've tried all the Finder replacements. Path Finder, for example. At the end of the day, I went back to Finder. I always have a single window on screen with the tabs that I use all day. This helps enormously. I show it on YouTube here (direct timestamp link): https://youtu.be/BzJ8j0Q_Ed4?si=VVMD54EJ-XsxkYzm&t=338
You can use Raycast to directly open files. I show that here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKbtoR2q_Ds&t=482s - still doesn't make it a Finder replacement.
Back/forward operate on history, not on hierarchy; at least have an "Up" button. There's no easy way to navigate the non-prescribed folders without adding every folder to the favorites list; hell, there's not even a "Home" link by default. Simple location navigation is hidden behind Cmd+G versus being evident. Easily jumping up the tree from your current location is hidden. Etc, etc, etc. It acts like the iPhone file manager, except the filesystem isn't a sandbox on macOS and you regularly need to navigate around it.
I'm sure if it's the only FS manager you ever use then it's just fine and you've learned all the quirks. But for people that regularly use other (better) managers on other OSes, it's severely lacking in ergonomics and functionality.
Still alt-clicking on the window title to see the whole folder hierarchy is easy to remember and doesn't clutter up the UI (err cmd-clicking? It's muscle memory so I forget). The fact that it works on most native apps with file titles as well I awesome.
`caffeinate -d` in the terminal - it’s built-in
And that's when they let you modify/use your OS the way you want.
It's not what is implied by the parent post - where the mac is limiting the brightness only to have the app unlock it.
No; you can adjust screen brightness just fine with the built-in settings, including with the F1 and F2 keys (plus the Fn key if you've got them set that way).
This Vivid app is specifically for extra HDR levels of brightness. I've never had a problem with my M1 or M4 MBPs, either inside or outside, with the built-in brightness levels. (But, to be fair, I don't use it outside a lot.)
This reduced overall image quality and caused pixel-fine details, such as small text, to appear smeary on high-density LCDs. In contrast, well-designed glossy displays provide a superior visual experience by minimizing internal refraction and reflecting ambient light at high angles, which reduces display pollution. Consequently, glossy screens often appear much brighter, blacks appear blacker without being washed out, colors show a higher dynamic range, and small details remain crisper. High-quality glass glossy displays are often easy to use even in full daylight, and reflections are manageable because they are full optical reflections with correct depth, allowing the user to focus on the screen content.
Apple's "nano texture" matte screens were engineered to solve the specific optical problems of traditional matte finishes, the washed-out colors and smeary details. But they cost more to make. The glossy option is still available, and still good.
The glossy era macbooks otoh have been a disaster in comparison imo. Unless your room is pitch black it is so easy to get external reflections. Using it outside sucks, you often see yourself more clearly than the actual contents on the screen. Little piece of dust on the screen you flick off becomes a fingerprint smear. The actual opening of the lid on the new thin bezel models means the top edge is never free of fingerprints. I'm inside right now and this M3 pro is on max brightness setting just to make it you know, usable, inside. I'm not sure if my screen is actually defectively dim or this is just how it is. Outside it is just barely bright enough to make out the screen. Really not much better than my old 2012 non retina model in terms of outdoor viewing which is a bit of a disappointment because the marketing material lead me to believe these new macbooks are extremely bright. I guess for HDR content maybe that is true but not for 99% of use cases.
They were absolutely noticable. Contrast was crap. I immediately went with glossy with my next MBP around that same period.
OLED glossy on the iPad Pro is even better.
I also use 60Hz screens just fine, saying that getting used to 120Hz ruins slower displays is being dramatic. You can readjust to 60Hz again within 5 minutes. But I can still instantly tell which is higher refresh rate, at least up to 360Hz.
Most people who’ve used both 60 and 120 could tell, definitely if a game is running. Unless you’re asking me to distinguish between like 110 and 120, but that’s like asking someone to distinguish between roughly 30 and 32.
North of 120 it gets trickier to notice no matter what IMO.
I can live with 60 but 85+ is where I’m happy.
On a perfect display you should see just a faint grey circle.
Another test is moving cursor fast across the white page and tracking it with eyes. On a perfect display it should be perfectly crisp, on my display it blurs and moves in steps.
So basically on a perfect display you can track fast moving things, and when not tracking, they are blurred. On a bad display, things blur when tracking them, and you see several instances otherwise. For example, if you scroll a page with a black box up-down, on a bad display you would see several faint boxes overlayed, and on a perfect display one box with blurred edges.
However, I'm typing this on my Dell monitor which only does 60 Hz. It honestly doesn't bother me at all. Sure, when I scroll long pages I see the difference: the text isn't legible. But, in practice, I never read moving text.
However, one thing on which I can't go back is resolution. A 32" 4k screen is the minimum for me. I was thinking about getting a wider screen, but they usually have less vertical resolution than my current one. A 14" MBP is much more comfortable when looking at text all day then my 14" HP with FHD screen. And it's not just because the colors and contrast are better, it's because the text is sharper.
The jump forward doesn't even necessarily feel that huge but the step backward is (annoyingly) noticeable.
Especially wellness.
I’m always baffled people insist otherwise.
Used to have a 27" 2560x1440 monitor at home. Got a 4K 27" at work, and when I got home, the difference was big enough that I (eventually) decided to upgrade the home monitor.
At least to me, with corrected vision, a high quality 1080p video looks better than streaming quality 4k at the same distance.
But a fraction of that distance to my monitor makes even 4K barely good enough. I’d need a much smaller 4K monitor to not notice pixels.
Glasses make a huge difference when watching TV, and are the dividing line between being able to tell the difference between 4K and 1080p and not being able to discern any.
My eyesight isn’t perfect, either.
While it serves a useful purpose by diffusing unavoidable point light sources in uncontrolled environments, it's honestly not much of an improvement over its glossy contemporaries in sunlight and other brightly-lit environments, as diffusing already diffuse reflections has little effect.
What I've found, is that inside, the HP is much better at handling reflections. However, outside, the screen gets washed out and is next to unusable. Whereas on the MBP, I can usually find an angle where reflections don't bother me and I can spend hours using it.
I am with you in preferring matte. For me, mostly because of reflections on glossy screens.
There's a graininess to the screen that makes it feel a little worse at all times, meanwhile I never had a problem in daylight just cranking brightness into the XDR range using Lunar.
It's especially noticeable on light UIs, where empty space gets an RGB "sparkle" to it. I noticed the same thing when picking out my XDR years ago, so it seems like they never figured out how to solve it.
This is nearly my preferred setup, only I have wall lights on the wall behind the monitors so it's not truly a dark room (which is horrible for your eyes). No over head lights allowed on while I'm at the keyboard.
Not my experience in lit environments. Looking at a mirror-like surface trying to distinguish content from reflections is exhausting.
Unless I blast my eyes at full brightness which is more exhausting.
You guys need to stop reading apple advertisement material and take it for gospel just because it has some fancy scientific words in it.
I always thought matte photos were more readable, but glossy used to be more wow and have “deeper blacks”.
I guess Apple cheaped out on their glossy displays, because I definitely didn't care for mine in full daylight
When your screen can do 1,600 nits, daylight isn't as much of a problem
I'd much rather do that than to have a granier screen with worse viewing angles all the time I'm not in direct sunlight, so next time around I'll be back on glossy.
To get to actual 1600 nits you need to use scripts.
https://github.com/SerjoschDuering/macbook_1600nits
Not sure the impacts to display health or battery running the screen full bore like this.
But if there’s a window or something bright behind you, the specular reflection from the glossy and generally not anti reflective coated screen can be so bright and so full of high frequency details that it almost completely obscures the image.
And since I might be trying to work involving text in a cafe as opposed to doing detailed artistic work in a studio, I would much prefer the matte surface.
You know what's glossy? Movie posters and postcards.
I still say for comfortable all day viewing and productivity, there is no comparison. Glossy does have more pop on a phone or watching movies in the dark, but I'd go blind doing that all day every day..
I haven't seen a single display that ever overcame that properly for long term work. Sure, phones use it but they increased luminosity to absurd level to be readable, not a solution I prefer for daily long work.
I admit there are corner cases of pro graphics where it made sense (with corresponding changes to environment) but I am not discussing this here.
I receive these highly polished emails from people and am just annoyed. Do you expect me to answer your robot?!
Maybe there needs to be a bad style minimum for a forum in the future. Only human imperfections allowed.
Ok. Of topic maybe.
I love the Nano texture displays. And the glossy glass ones were also great and the best ones out there.
The coatings, which do matter quite a bit when you are optimising for some durability/optical quality tradeoff.
Glass covers make screens more durable, but imply internal and external reflections. Laminated screens on glass panes solves the internal reflections and improve transmission, but do not help with glare and external reflections. Those can be improved by texturing the glass, but at the cost of diffraction and smearing, leading to a decrease in effective resolution. Unless the texture becomes small enough, but then you need it to be durable enough to avoid being wiped or damaged by things that might come into contact with the screen.
It turns out that there is a lot more than the bottom layers that matter in a display. You can see all these problems being solved in succession when looking at the evolution of Apple’s displays over the years (and others’, but it is much easier to find information about the good and bad sides of any Apple product). It’s fascinating, actually.
[edit] add the issue of oils on the human skin and you have do deal with oleophobic coatings for touch screens, which is another very important factor to consider. In addition to how the touch sensors are integrated.
It is probably a pretty good screen, though.
I don’t really like Apple overall. But, to some extent, it’s like… well, maybe that’s a good way of selling incremental engineering improvements.
I don't recall Apple ever "insisting" anything about glossy vs. matte. They simply eliminated the matte option without comment, and finally brought it back many years later.
If you have a reference to a public statement from Apple defending the elimination of the matte option, I'd like to see it.
To be clear, I've been complaining about glossy Macs ever since matte was eliminated, and I too purchased an M4 MacBook Pro soon after it was available.
> “…the MacBook provides incredibly crisp images with richer colors, deeper blacks and significantly greater contrast…”
This is positioning for glossy being superior.
https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2006/05/16Apple-Unveils-New-M...
A sentence in a PR that highlights an indisputable advantage of a glossy display does not position glossy as being superior overall but merely superior in the respects mentioned, which is not controversial.
Moreover, Apple continued to offer a matte display in the MacBook Pro for years after that PR, so why would they sell an "inferior" option?
The other quote is just a list of ways in which the screen is better.
It is YOU that is conflating these and saying that this list of improvements is down to glossiness, not Apple.
Wasn’t the matte option that disappeared just then removing the glass in front of the screen? I seem to remember that (my MBP from that time was glossy).
The nano textured coating they are using now is quite complex and I am not quite sure it was applicable at such scales cheaply enough back in 2015.
A glossy option was introduced in 2006, but the MacBook Pro was still matte by default.
In 2008, the MacBook Pro case was redesigned, and then the display situation changed significantly.
Glossy was an available option, but not the product line wide choice.
The top of the line Late 2008 MacBook Pro (not Unibody) included: > An antiglare CCFL-backlit 17" widescreen 1680x1050 active-matrix display (a glossy display was offered via build-to-order at no extra cost, and a higher resolution LED-backlit 1920x1200 display also was offered for an extra US$100).
https://everymac.com/systems/apple/macbook_pro/specs/macbook...
This is a quiet boon for those who enjoy working outdoors but find the sun/brightness a problem.
I live in a sunny place with big windows and basically use it all day every day. When it turns off my screen feels broken I so prefer the brightness.
Thanks again!
Unless you’re making Instagram content, very few photographers use HDR. Everything else will look the same on both screens.
I think you may have mixed up mini-LED backlighting with OLED and microLED displays. mini-LED backlights merely allow for better local dimming of the backlight behind an LCD, but the number of independently variable backlight zones is still orders of magnitude smaller than the number of pixels. Over short distances, an LCD with local dimming is still susceptible to all of the contrast-limiting downsides of an LCD with a uniform static backlight (and local dimming brings new challenges of its own).
OLED is the mainstream display technology where individual pixels directly emit their own light, so you can truly have a completely black pixel next to a lit pixel. But there are still layers and coatings between the OLED and the user, so infinite contrast isn't actually achievable.
microLED is an unsuccessful technology to provide the benefits of OLED without as many of the downsides (primarily, the uneven aging). But nobody has managed to make large microLED displays economically yet, and it doesn't look like the tech will be going mainstream anytime soon.
The appearance of a lone mouse cursor on a black screen in the dark is mildly amusing for exactly this reason. You can watch as the ghostly halo of light follows it around the screen as you move the cursor.
I'll upgrade my machine when they put an OLED display in it.
Contrast is significantly poorer on the Air display, and HDR is already in your own photos if you have a modern smartphone, so the idea that it’s niche or irrelevant is a naive take.
The perceptual difference between sdr and hdr isn’t a minor bump, it is conspicuous and driver of realism.
If one cares about the refresh rate of their screen, then they’d trivially notice the improvement that high nit displays provide.
Times changed and the best hardware for me right now is a Dell XPS from the model lines a few years back that looked like an aluminum sandwich with a black plastic filling. These machines are fantastic but (1) no OLED, (2) now high speed refresh rate, and (3) the keyboard isn’t great.
Could this modern Apple hardware bring me back to Free OS on pretty hardware, or is there something else I should try?
Which some people do, but I don't think the average person asking this question does (and I don't)
But yeah if you wanna run 600B+ weights models your gonna need an insane setup to run it locally.
Anyway, Apple SoC in M series is a huge leverage thanks to shared memory: VRAM size == RAM size so if you buy M chip with 128+ Gb memory, you’re pretty much able to run SOTA models locally, and price is significantly lower than AI GPU cards
Next.
The MBA should also have the LCD display with 120Hz and brightness from MBP, Vapour Chamber cooling from iPhone Air, and better keyboard.
I've only purchased matte screen laptops because I only use them for travel. Lenovo pretty much.
Also prefer semi-gloss for my monitors as I work in well lit daylight conditions if I can help it. There have been very high quality semi-gloss monitors for ages now.
I don’t know how many milliseconds the difference is, but going back and forth it’s so obvious to me that it’s painful.
The question is more whether it’ll bother you.
Apple is designing pro gear for its target audience.
1ms seems less believable, but I wouldn't be surprised, if some people could notice that too.
Downgrading a M5 machine to 15.x would be impossible not because of a signing issue but because Apple never released a 15.x build that supported M5 hardware.
Mine as well. What is the likelihood this will happen?
I have a hunch it will not and they will either scrap the nano texture completely or keep it as differentiator for the Pro line, but I am curious what others think.
But their keyboards are still the best, and trackpoint is unmatched. As soon as System76 or Framework or any other vendor offer that, I'm giving them my money.
Does anyone have any feedback on the new M5 models?
I was torn between nano and regular glass, but opted for the regular glass.
I would say it's worth the extra, what, $200 or so? on the price of the M4 MBP. If it were much more expensive, I would be less sure.
It is rather shocking how much faster everything feels given I didn't think my old macbook pro was slow. While I expected xcode builds to be faster (and they are), I was a bit shocked when opening a new firefox tab was instantaneous since I hadn't noticed it wasn't before.
Another thing I didn't expect is that the new speakers have noticeably more bass and can get quite a bit louder.
I didn't get the nano-textured display, because having to adjust the display angle to get colors to render correctly is more annoying than having to do it for glare (I don't work in a high-glare environment).
It’s still a great laptop except the battery lasts maybe 75 mins. I just keep it plugged in but despite the fact it’s 6 years old I don’t notice any problems with it.
I’m tempted to buy an M4 laptop just because it’s “new” and “faster” but then I ask myself Why? It’s the same thing with my iPhone. Until my laptop dies or there is something functional that I can’t do with my old laptop I’m going to keep using it.
If page load seems noticeably faster, it’s far more likely that it’s simply a faster machine. Or imaginary.
This is, by far, the fastest machine I've ever had. My previous laptop was a more modest M1 mac book pro. And before that I was on a cheapo intel i5 Samsung laptop - a stop gap solution after my last intel mac died when a loose keyboard key destroyed the screen (yep the generation with the crappy keyboards, worst mac I've ever owned). That intel was of course pathetic and shit. I wasn't expecting much and it disappointed me despite that. The M1 was about 3x faster. The M4 Max is a beast. In terms of build speeds, the i5 was unusable while building and would take 15 minutes. The M1 got it down to 5 minutes (10 CPU cores that are faster than the 4 intel ones). But it didn't have enough memory so swapping slowed it down a bit. The M4 max builds stuff in around 30 seconds. No more swapping and the 14 cores are quite a bit faster than the M1 ones. Same project (but of course with a few years of development). We have more tests now, not fewer.
Otherwise it's a great laptop. Keyboard is fine. Touchpad is best in class in the industry (everything else is pathetically mediocre in comparison; it's not even close), the screen is best in class as well (contrast, colors, resolution, everything). And Apple learned it's lesson when it comes to keyboards. Most windows/linux laptops I'm aware off are a compromise between heating/cooling, lousy input and output devices, performance, design, screen quality, etc. Apple nails all of those things. Nobody else does.
High end Macs are not cheap. But for professionals it's a minor expense. If you lease a car for getting your ass to work every morning, you are probably spending 2-3x more at least than what this would cost you. And the whole point of getting to work is to open your laptop and earn a living with it. It's more important than the damn car. It's what pays for that car. I spend less than what used to be 1 hour of my freelance rate per month on this absolute monster. Maybe it's 2 hours for you if you just got started. That's still nothing on 160ish billable hours per month. Employers tend to be less enlightened of course. But if it's your choice, don't be frugal and buy the laptop you need. If a simple browser is all you need, of course get something decent looking like a mac book air or whatever. But otherwise, get the best you can afford. I've compromised once with that Samsung. I did not enjoy that.
My most recent laptop died and it really showed me what I appreciate in a laptop, performance, build quality, lightweight, good battery, low noise, good ergonomics.
I was sick of the recent overheating generation of pc laptops that don't last more than a couple years under my usage.
As a result I decided to try to switch back to a macbook after a decade hiatus.
The hardware is good but the software is absolute garbage. Trialing it for a week the amount of bullshit that is MacOS was enough, and Asahi wasn't there yet either. Instead I decided to get an AMD framework laptop.
Best decision ever.
I have a laptop that's got great quality, can be upgraded without paying a $5k tax, can replace the keyboard for $100 instead of $700, it works with me rather than against me and my wallet.
The thing that mostly irks me about Apple these days is soldered in RAM and non-upgradeable storage. Apple is still the best thing going for doing most pro development work, but it's just so irritating that they shit on us like this. I did buy an M4 Mini and expanded it some. My 2019 MB Pro is siting here on the desk, mostly unused these days. The Intel Macs are basically dead now--still great computers, but no longer desirable. My daughter is doing Graphic Arts in college and is using another 2019 Pro for that. I've used Macs continuously since at least 2014.
Isn't the 'soldered-in' RAM and storage fundamental to the M-series architecture? It's not like there's a board with individual chips sitting in it for the RAM and storage, that could potentially have been 'popped out' if they weren't soldered in. It's all one giant 'chip' now.
But just like Strix Halo, they have to be soldered. There’s no way to reach the signal integrity required with connectors.
Sadly it’s not in many laptops, probably the easiest way to obtain it is in the Framework Desktop or a mini pc.
It didn't require me to switch my region or payment method.
ok, i guess for graphic designers it might matter more?
New super high-res displays are also nice on my eyes. The displays in between, those from the last decade or so, have been hit or miss for me.
i noticed my ola macbook pro was connected to my router even when it was sleeping.. probably sending some private info periodically to apple and cia
Or just search for "Power Nap" (what it used to be called). They usually wake up intermittently for Time Machine backups, wake-on-lane and other stuff.
Curiously, it is able to maintain network connection even through the 1/4" steel of the safe it's stored within. The older Intel MBP doesn't and cannot.