New MacBook Pro?

[PaladineUK]

Anyone got the new MacBook Pro yet? I have been very lucky and a client of mine is buying me one for my birthday - it should be ordered today and I should have it in about 4-5 weeks according to Apple's web site. I will be getting the 15" 2.7GHz i7, 512GB SSD and Radeon Pro 460 GPU - have to say I am pretty damned excited.

 

[pastrychef]

Wow! That's awesome of your client. You have officially made me extremely jealous. Happy birthday!!

 

[PaladineUK]

Wow! That's awesome of your client. You have officially made me extremely jealous. Happy birthday!!

Yeah I am pretty lucky. Now I can sell my 2011 MBP (which is upgraded with max ram and 2x SSD in RAID0) and buy a new HTPC for Kodi (will probably either buy a small itx Linux system or a Mac Mini).

 

[PaladineUK]

There were some problems getting it ordered - my client is based in a different country and couldn't order it from their Apple Store because they wouldn't ship to Poland, so we had to order it directly from the Polish Apple Store. It should be here around the end of December (I am hoping it gets here earlier) and I will do an unboxing/review once it arrives.

Now I have to say I feel very lucky that I am getting this for free but at the same time I do have a couple of criticisms:

1. Only 16GB maximum RAM
It would have been really nice for Apple to offer 32GB (and even 64GB) configurations to give this refresh a longer life. I am disappointed that the maximum RAM is limited to 16GB and not upgradeable (soldered onto the mainboard).

2. SSD upgrade price - to upgrade from 512GB to 1TB would have cost around 1800 PLN and nearly 5k PLN for upgrade to 2TB - come on Apple you are not serioulsy expecting us to fall for that are you?

3. Keyboard Choices
I really wish tech companies would stop limiting keyboard choices based on region. This is 2016 ffs, we live in a world where many people live in countries different to where they were born. I am British, I would really like British keyboard but because I have ordered in Poland I am limited to International English (which undoubtedly means I will have issues with £ @ " ~ and | keys). Apple make a British keyboard so let me order a British keyboard - I don't mind if it delays shipping by a week or so. I will survive with the International English but it will bug me and taint the experience a little.

4. USB-C to Lightening cable or adapter.
Come on Apple - if I have spent almost 15k on a new MacBook you can pretty much guarantee I have at least an iPhone 6S and probably even a 7 (I have the 6S Plus) and you provide no physical means for me to connect the two devices? Should have included a dongle at least.

All that said - yeah I am really excited for my order to arrive and I suspect I will forget most of the problems very quickly (although not the keyboard because it is just bloody stupid and will bug me over the long term).

 

[CaptainKernelPanic]

How'd it work out for you?

 

[ori69]

View attachment 220448

There were some problems getting it ordered - my client is based in a different country and couldn't order it from their Apple Store because they wouldn't ship to Poland, so we had to order it directly from the Polish Apple Store. It should be here around the end of December (I am hoping it gets here earlier) and I will do an unboxing/review once it arrives.

Now I have to say I feel very lucky that I am getting this for free but at the same time I do have a couple of criticisms:

1. Only 16GB maximum RAM
It would have been really nice for Apple to offer 32GB (and even 64GB) configurations to give this refresh a longer life. I am disappointed that the maximum RAM is limited to 16GB and not upgradeable (soldered onto the mainboard).

2. SSD upgrade price - to upgrade from 512GB to 1TB would have cost around 1800 PLN and nearly 5k PLN for upgrade to 2TB - come on Apple you are not serioulsy expecting us to fall for that are you?

3. Keyboard Choices
I really wish tech companies would stop limiting keyboard choices based on region. This is 2016 ffs, we live in a world where many people live in countries different to where they were born. I am British, I would really like British keyboard but because I have ordered in Poland I am limited to International English (which undoubtedly means I will have issues with £ @ " ~ and | keys). Apple make a British keyboard so let me order a British keyboard - I don't mind if it delays shipping by a week or so. I will survive with the International English but it will bug me and taint the experience a little.

4. USB-C to Lightening cable or adapter.
Come on Apple - if I have spent almost 15k on a new MacBook you can pretty much guarantee I have at least an iPhone 6S and probably even a 7 (I have the 6S Plus) and you provide no physical means for me to connect the two devices? Should have included a dongle at least.

All that said - yeah I am really excited for my order to arrive and I suspect I will forget most of the problems very quickly (although not the keyboard because it is just bloody stupid and will bug me over the long term).

1. The amount of RAM is artificially low so as not to cause internal competition with other mac. (read it)
2. Apple has always taken prices from outer space. In this model, there is no possibility of an exchange SSD.
4. If you need to get used to the adapter. But you probably already next year, USB devices-C will be more.

There's nothing to get excited about. The new MacBooks have a lot of disadvantages. Image problems, 3-4 hours of battery life, high temperature. The principle is that you do not buy the first version.

 

[PaladineUK]

1. The amount of RAM is artificially low so as not to cause internal competition with other mac. (read it)
2. Apple has always taken prices from outer space. In this model, there is no possibility of an exchange SSD.
4. If you need to get used to the adapter. But you probably already next year, USB devices-C will be more.

There's nothing to get excited about. The new MacBooks have a lot of disadvantages. Image problems, 3-4 hours of battery life, high temperature. The principle is that you do not buy the first version.

I think you are being a little alarmist.

1. The battery issue is limited to a very small percentage of MBPs and Apple are doing replacements for those that have the defective batteries.

2. I have read nothing about image problems.

3. Temperatures during testing real world apps (rendering, transcoding etc.) are incredibly good and far better than previous MBPs with temps at more than 20C lower for the same workloads - so your temp argument is completely without merit. Noise from fans is also much lower because the fans are not getting to such high RPMs due to the massive decrease in thermal footprint. The same testing also shows significant improvements in CPU throttling with the new MBP rarely throttling at max load compared to the previous version throttling as low as 2.1GHz during transcoding tests. So yeah...I think you need to do more research instead of repeating the usual alarmist rubbish put out by the media.

Also your link to an article relating to the memory has zero basis in fact and is pure opinion with no legitimate or official source. Apple have not said the platform is not capable of running more RAM - they just chose not to include the option of more RAM - we all know it is artificial and those of us who purchased the new MBP accept that. Would I like more RAM? Yes of course - is it a game changer? No, 16GB is actually quite sufficient for the next couple of years - it would just be "nice" to be able to have more.

Storage-wise - with TB3 I don't need to replace the SSD, I can use incredibly fast external storage and 512GB on board is more than enough (my current hackintosh has a 240GB SSD and I currently have 199GB free).

 

[PaladineUK]

How'd it work out for you?

It is scheduled for arrival next week...

 

[ori69]

1. They tell same always, that this affects just a couple incidents, but then after couple years they introduce exchange program, which apply to all.
Last update 10.12.2, which disappears battery life is similar to making a mark in the iPhone 4.
16 GB of ram, it already had computers in 2010. 256 SSD, it is no longer enough. I changed the SSD in my MacBook AIR 512GB. (Problem, Spider)
2. Graphic problem
3. 16 GB of ram, it already had computers in 2010. 256 SSD, it is no longer enough. I changed the SSD in my MacBook AIR 512GB.

I'm curious of your experience with the new MacBook 15 ".

 

[PaladineUK]

Mine just arrived today and I am absolutely loving it. It is incredibly fast, the thermal footprint is waaaaay lower than my previous MBP, the speakers are unbelievably good and I even love the keyboard. The track pad is a thing of magic (palm rejection is just perfect - no other way to describe it). The screen is vibrant (no graphics issues here) and crystal clear.

Obviously I cannot comment about the battery yet I have only had it out of the box about 2 hours but if there is an issue I will report it here.

As usual it falls back to the Intel iGPU when the Radeon is not needed (which should do a lot of the battery life) and the toucher is actually really fun to use and feels great (incredibly responsive).

So initial thoughts are - very happy indeed. Time will tell if that changes or not.