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In Reply to: RE: In fairness... posted by Ivan303 on February 11, 2020 at 10:16:06
Ah yes, the 2015 era MacBook Pros have an excellent keyboard and many built-in commonly used ports so you don't need a bagful of dongles. My wife has an "early 2015" MacBook Pro 13" and it's great! But, its a heavy thick and large beast compared to the current models. Pick your poison.
To Apple's credit (or pressure from users) they have an extended keyboard exchange program so if you do experience a problem, they'll replace it. Oh, and the new 16" MacBook Pros have a different keyboard design. I just roll with the punches because I will never go back to a Windows PC or laptop. That's where I start kicking and screaming ;-)
Follow Ups:
which has no PORTS!I find that the late 2015 13" MacBook Pro is not THAT much thicker and not THAT much heavier than my ole 2011 MacBook Air.
And it still has a TOSLINK port in the headphone jack which makes hooking up to a DAC easy-peasy.
Still use it the same way, as a true LAPtop.
Edits: 02/11/20
If you use your laptop for portability and travel there's a huge difference between carrying a 2015 13" MBP vs a 2017 or later. And isn't that what laptops are really for, portability? The specs don't tell the whole story. Carry a newer 13" MBP and carry the 2015 model. The longer battery life makes a difference too.The biggest power user complaint with the 2016/2017 15" MBP was that it was limited to 16GB RAM. Apple upped that to 32GB in 2018.
The current 16" MBP accommodates up to 64GB RAM, 8TB SSD, and 8-Core 5GHz Intel i9 CPU.... but it'll cost you! Just what I need for playing my PCM music files. You know, the same ones that our $40 RPi can play ;-)
P.S. I found a BH Photo deal on a new 21" iMac that's a couple years outdated. The only thing I didn't like was the 1TB spinning HDD inside as I wanted a SSD. But with the iMac's super fast Thunderbolt / USB-C port, I attached an external USB-C SSD and made it bootable. The thing screams! And at a fraction of the cost of a new iMac.
Edits: 02/11/20 02/11/20
The new models may look better on a store shelf, but not when you have dongles hanging off of them.
The 2015 models had a couple of Thunderbolt ports, a couple of USB3 ports, a card reader, and even HDMI. All I need is the laptop and power brick.
If I bought a new MBP 13, I'd need to also carry the multiport digital AV adapter and SD card reader. I think the volume and weight of the dongles probably exceeds the savings from the thinner laptop design. And they're certainly less convenient.
It's not about looks, it's about weight and portability if you travel. We have both, wife owns the 2015 13" MBP and I have a company issued 2017 model.
The size and weight of the older 13" MBP is unwieldy compared to the 2017 models and newer. There's nothing you can do about that size and weight and it makes a big difference when traveling.... which is what a lot folks like me use laptops for.
The 2017 and newer 13" MBP are significantly lighter, thinner, smaller, with longer battery life. You may optionally hang a couple dongles off of it but you don't always need them.
When I travel, I carry only my lightweight 2017 13" MBP on my flight (in a very small laptop carry bag) and keep one multiport dongle in my luggage in case I need it later [One Thunderbolt port breaks out to: USB & HDMI]. I used to carry an Ethernet dongle but every hotel now has excellent wifi or I use my phone as a wifi hotspot. And every company field office that I visit also has excellent wifi.
At home, the 2017 13" MBP laptop plugs into a powered dock over one Thunderbolt 3 cable. I have the CalDigit TS3 Plus dock that gives me the following connectivity:
2 x Thunderbolt 3 ports
1 x DisplayPort 1.2
5 x USB 3.1 Type-A (Gen1-5Gbps/5V 1.5A)
2 x USB 3.1 Type-C (5V 1.5A)
(1 x Gen1-5Gbps) (1 x Gen2-10Gbps)
1 x SD Card Reader (SD 4.0 UHS-II)
1 x Digital Optical Audio (S/PDIF)
1 x Gigabit Ethernet port
1 x Analog Audio In (Stereo)
1 x Analog Audio Out (Stereo)
It's probably one of THE best docks on the market. I've had other multi-port docks that are hit or miss for reliable peripheral connectivity.
The difference in size and weight isn't meaningful to me. The new model is 0.12" thinner (1/8 inch) and 0.44 lbs. lighter. That's a small stack of papers. Given the difference, I'd rather take the bigger one and skip the dongles.
They offer the MacBook Air for people obsessed with thin and light. It's limited to the dual-core i5, but that has plenty of power for general office/productivity work.
The MacBook Pro used to be a work horse, but they've turned it into another Air.
It's hard to distinguish the Air from a MBP of the same size. Apple was rumored to drop the Air but it's still around.
Without looking at the specs I believe the main differences are screen resolution, brightness, number of Thunderbolt ports, and processor cores / speed. But the price difference isn't huge making the Air a relative poor value - IMHO.
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