INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
When reviewing hardware, it important to integrate it into your life as much as possible
If you can, swap it in for your existing devices for a few days or a week, to really get an idea of what it like to use it day to day.
There
are certain nuances you can only discover through this approach
Of course, that easier said than done in most cases
Switching between phones and computers every week isn&t nearly as glamorous as it sounds, especially when juggling multiple operating
systems.
As a MacBook Pro owner, however, this one was a fair bit easier
In fact, there very little changed here from an aesthetic standpoint, and beyond the quieter keyboard and Siri integration, there not a lot
that immediately apparent in the 2018 MacBook Pro refresh for me
That because I&m not the target demographic for the update
I write words for a living
There are large portions of my job that I could tackle pretty easily on an Apple IIe (please no one tell the IT department).
This upgrade is
for a different class of user entirely: the creative professional
These are the people long assumed to be the core user base for the Mac ecosystem
Sure, they only account for around 15 percent of Mac users, according to the company estimates, but they&re the people who use the machines
And as such, it precisely the group of influencers the company needs to court.
In recent years, however, some vocal critics have accused
the company of taking that key demo for granted
Apple has seemed more focused on a populist approach to its technology
The simplification of pro software like Final Cut X and the seeming abandonment of the Mac Pro have been regarded as exhibits A and B.
For
the first time in recent memory, the company has serious competition for the hearts and minds of creative pros, including Microsoft, which
has made the category a focus with its high-end Surface line.
But the last two years have seen Apple fighting back
The company was uncharacteristically open about the status of the Mac Pro line, which has been undergoing a fundamental rethink
In the meantime, it released the iMac Pro and added a bunch of new features to macOS aimed firmly at that category.
The new MacBook Pro
continues that trend; the form factor remains the same, and the changes are largely under the hood
But these are in fact extremely powerful machines but around the premise that, in 2018, one shouldn&t have to compromise power in order to
Well, maybe a little — but in those cases where you need some intense graphical processing, there always an external GPU, which makes the
machine capable of VR and other process-intensive tasks.
The new Pros top out at a bank-breaking $6,699, presenting a healthy jump over the
highest-end models money could buy last year
For the rest of us, however, the starting price remains the same, at $1,799 for the 13-inch and $2,399 for the 15.
Keys to quiet
There a
First, as many pointed out in the initial announcement, Apple didn&t alter the fundamentals here — they just made the loud typing a bit
That was a surprise to many, given everything that happened on that front over the last several months
After all, if the company was going to go out of its way to update the technology, wasn&t a fundamental rethink in order here
A couple of
First, things (and lawsuits) didn&t really start getting hot and heavy on that front until recently
The first major class-action suit was filed back in May
Hardware iteration happens slowly, especially with a massive company that supports so many users
After all, you want to get things right — especially when correcting a known issue
A couple of months is hardly sufficient lead time.
https://techcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/old-keyboard.wavOld keyboard
Second,
Apple says the actual instances of real keyboard failure are a small minority
I&m inclined to believe that the case, though the internet certainly has the tendency to amplify these kinds of things
But still, there seems a reasonable possibility that some bigger fix is in the works.
The company will also point out that, in spite of
pushback, many users like the new keyboards
Based on the multiple threads of discussion we had after the news was announced, I can tell you that this is anecdotally true among the
TechCrunch staff.
Things got better with gen two, and I&ve certainly become more used to typing on it
I still didn&t love it at first, but I&d say I&m pretty much keyboard-agnostic at this
point.
https://techcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/new-keyboard1.wavNew keyboard
Along with the mechanics, the key travel is the same
So if you had issues with the typing being too shallow for your liking, sorry, you&re out of luck here
An early teardown points to a thin, silicone membrane sitting on top of the keyboard switch that serves to help protect the undercarriage
from spills, food particles and the like
I once got a small piece of something stuck under there once, and it hampered movement entirely.
In my case, it was nothing that a blast of
canned air couldn&t fix (we don&t all have one lying around, but we really should), but clearly not everyone has been so lucky on that front
It seems as though the muffling of the sound and the extra sense of tactile pushback was a happy accident of a kind here, but hey, we&ll
take it.
Here a longish thing we wrote after getting our hands on the system
We enlisted Anthony Ha, TechCrunch Loud Typing World Champion five years running (they tried to recruit him out of college, but the allure
of writing about VCs was too strong) to try it out
Even with Anthony downright punishing the keys, the result was noticeable.
The new keys aren&t silent, but they&re a lot less likely to get
you kicked out of the library
There not a huge difference between the actual decibel levels between the two, but the older model more staccato typewriter clacking sound
has become more dull and less harsh on the ears, which likely makes it sound that much quieter.
Another tidbit here for people who focused
on such things: The keys& cap color is ever-so-slightly lighter than the last
I thought I was going crazy at first, but there you go
I mean, I still think I&m losing my mind, but for non-keyboard-related reasons.
About those specs
Apple didn&t splurge on the specs with
the review unit it sent along
The model sports:
2.9 GHz Intel Core i9
32 GB of DDR4 memory
Radeon Pro 560X
4TB of storage
Configured on Apple site, that will run you a
cool $6,669 — about the same as the monthly rent on a studio apartment in San Francisco from what I understand
It worth noting here that it the SSD storage that really pushes the cost into the stratosphere
That an additional $3,200 over the default 512GB.
Again, 4TB is probably overkill for the vast majority of users
All of the above configurations are really, but they&re there if you want/need them
Apple was able to push memory up to 32GB courtesy of finally introducing DDR4 to the MacBook
That move does come with a hit to the battery life, however, so the company went ahead and increased the battery size to offset that
hit.
The company says the laptop gets around 10 hours of use in its testing
I admittedly put it through something a bit more rigorous than standardized testing when incorporating it into my daily usage, recording a
podcast on Skype, listening to music while working/browsing the web (it part of my job, I swear) and got a few hours less than that.
As for
performance, Apple not messing around here
Running Geekbench 4 (a popular PC benchmark), I got an impressive 5540 on the single core and 23345 with the multi core test
Geekbench got similar — if slightly lower — results in its own tests on the high-end
Here founder John Poole on the findings:
For the 15-inch models, single-core performance is up 12-15%, and multi-core performance is up
Since the underlying processor architecture hasn&t significantly changed between the 2017 and 2018 models, the increases in performance are
due to higher Turbo Boost frequencies, more cores, and DDR4 memory.
The 2018 MacBook Pro is the most substantial upgrade (at least regarding
performance) since the introduction of quad-core processors in the 2011 MacBook Pro.
Taken together, that represents a significant upgrade
Individual performance will vary depending on a lot of different topics, but there no doubt these are powerful machines.
Hey, Siri
The
addition of hands-free Siri functionality didn&t get a lot of play here, but it an important one — if not for the computer itself, then
for Apple broader ambitions
Like Google play, Siri was mobile first.
But Apple assistant has always been about building a broader ecosystem of contextual search that
can help the company tailor its offerings to individual user needs
We saw this manifest itself last year with the addition of HomePod, a typically Apple high-end approach to the insanely popular world of
smart speakers.
The assistant has actually been available on macOS since Sierra (10.12) rolled out back in late 2016
This, however, marks the first time hands-free voice interaction has been available on the desktop
Apple says it was the T2, introduced on the iMac Pro, which allowed for the capability — just one of an extremely long list of features
the company has offloaded on the proprietary chip.
Like other key features, Siri is enabled during setup
If you&re the sort who sticks masking tape over your webcam, you can also simply opt out of having the MacBook microphones listening in for
And you can always untick the &Listen for ‘Hey Siri&& box in Settings.
Setup is more or less the same as on iOS
You&ll be prompted to speak a couple of phrases to train the AI on your voice
Device interaction functions similarly as other assistant hardware ecosystems
The moment you say, &Hey, Siri,& your iPhone/Mac/HomePod, et al
communicate with one prioritize either the device the heard the query the best (likely the closest) or was most recently used.
I ended up
disabling the feature on my phone in order to test it on the desktop, because there were too many instances of the phone picking it up or
having Siri pop up on both at once and then disappearing on the one that was de-prioritized
When the feature was switched off the phone, however, its desktop counterpart was plenty responsive.
All of this leads to a key question: Is
a desktop smart assistant ultimately very useful The primary driver of voice functionality is the ability free up your hands from having to
Presumably, however, you&ve already got your hands at or near the keyboard if you&re close enough for Siri to hear you.
Multitasking seems
to be the primary use-case here
Say you&re typing and want to know the weather or find movie times, you can definitely do that
Ditto for sports scores — it took a query or two, but &did the A win yesterday& got me the answer I wanted, with a conversation reply,
&the Athletics eked out a win over the Giants in the Bay Bridge Series by a score of 4 to 3 yesterday.&
Hey Siri, a win is a win,
okay
Multimedia functionality, which seems like one of the most logical applications, is still limited here
Siri will find and play things in Apple Music, but ask her to play something on Spotify and that a no-go — you&ll get an Apple Music link
and Wikipedia entry instead
Siri knows which side her bread is buttered on
Ask her to play a movie and she&ll confess that she can&t do that.
More functionality is surely on the way
For now, however, Siri on the desktop is more a nice addition than necessary feature.
Toning it down
Like Siri, True Tone is opt-in during
You can toggle it on and off at the beginning, which I suggest, just so you know what you&re getting yourselves into
And like Siri you can always go back into settings later to adjust if it not to your liking
Clicking Option and the Touch Bar bright icon will get you there, as well.
The effect, which debuted on the iPad Pro (and rolled out to
other new iOS devices) utilizes a light sensor (new for the Mac) to determine the ambient color and brightness of its surroundings
It a sort of more sophisticated version of the brightness detection Apple computers have had on board for some time now.
If you&ve ever
fiddled with a camera (even the one on your phone in most cases), you recognize the importance of white balance
That the thing that turns objects weird colors when you step into different lighting settings
It a key to perceiving contrast getting lifelike reproductions of images
I have two 15-inch MacBooks in front of me right now (that just how I roll), and it like night and day
You&ve got no idea how blue the screen you&ve been staring at is until you see it up against another True Tone-enabled display.
For a
majority of us, it a nice feature, but for photographers, video producers and designers who rely on a MacBook for their work, it a much
As recently published support documents point out, the feature will also work with a handful of secondary displays, including Apple own, and
LG Ultrafine 4K and 5K.
Upgrade time
I&m staring at my now 2017 MacBook Pro as I type this
It always tough to compete with the latest and greatest, especially when it been specked out like crazy
I&m going to miss the quieter keyboard and True Tone display, for sure
Hands-free Siri, I can really take or leave at the moment based on current functionality.
But I&m not ready for upgrade just yet
For a majority of users, the upgrades on the high end will mostly amount to overkill
Thankfully, however, the low-end price points remain the same at $1,799 and $2,399 for the 13- and 15-inch, respectively.
Those who expect a
lot more from their machines will no doubt be excited to see what these laptops can do
The new MacBooks aren&t a fundamental rethink by any stretch of the imagination, but they&re a welcome acknowledgment that the company still
considers creative pros a key part of its DNA.
