Slashdot Mirror
Apple's New 15-Inch MacBook Pros Have Storage Soldered To the Logic Board (macrumors.com)
yoink! writes: The integration loop is complete. Apple's, admittedly very fast, PCIe storage modules are now built right into the main boards of their 15-inch, Touch Bar-equipped, Retina-screened, Thunderbolt 3-ported, MacBook Pros. A few forum posts over at MacRumors reveal the skinny on the quiet removal of the last user-upgradable component of their professional-series laptops. From the report: "MacRumors reader Jesse D. unscrewed the bottom lid on his new 15-inch MacBook Pro with a Touch Bar and discovered, unlike the 13-inch model sans Touch Bar, there is no cutout in the logic board for removable flash storage. Another reader said the 13-inch model with a Touch Bar also has a non-removable SSD. Given the SSD appears to be permanently soldered to the logic board, users will be unable to upgrade the Touch Bar MacBook Pro's flash storage beyond Apple's 512GB to 2TB built-to-order options on its website at the time of purchase. In other words, the amount of flash storage you choose will be permanent for the life of the notebook."
blacklisted from secure environments now
Steve Jobs always wanted Macs to be appliances that the user could not tinker with or modify. Now they have made it for him.
Unfortunately, systems designed that way don't reflect my needs at all.
What about when the SSD craps out? Then it's back to Apple, (or at least to a third-party shop), for an undoubtedly expensive repair job. Great! More stuff that the user has no hope of repairing on his or her own, and more non-renewable materials prematurely tossed into landfill. Tell me again - why in hell would I want a new Apple laptop?
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
SSD wear may be a problem. Once it dies, you now change the laptop.
Upgrades are for frugal customers, Apple doesn't want any.
Or, you know, don't use FileVault on your home folder because that's the quickest way to nearly brick your MacBook Pro and have to reinstall everything from scratch. Been there, done that - decades of practice and they still get it wrong.
No, you can't use File Vault safely - if your computer hangs during power down and doesn't power down "gracefully," File Vault can lock your home folder up tight and throw away the key. (Been there, talked with Carlos in advanced tech support, it's toast man, reinstall from original image.)
They generally last a long time with some exceptions. They've made the occasional model that had something or other that died unexpectedly and often. Given the silly prices they charge I highly recommend an applecare purchase. The oldest mac I have in use at the moment is my wife's late 2008 macbook. I upgraded the hard drive to an SSD and the memory to 8GB. I just bought a perfect condition 2012 15" Macbook Pro to replace my 2011 13" Macbook Pro. I got a good deal on the 2012 as the 2011 works fine. Nice upgrade to i7 and Nvidia graphics it's really a great computer. Too bad they decided to quit making nice stuff. I'm not buying a computer I can't change the HD and Ram on. The funny thing is the computer I use for almost all online stuff is an old Dell E6500 with a core2duo 2.8ghz and 4GB of ram and Nvidia graphics that runs Peppermint Linux 7. I picked it up after a guy tried to install windows 8 on it and gave up and sold it to me for 50 bucks. It's got the best keyboard of any laptop I've ever owned.
That's incorrect. With the X series (and I believe the surface) the RAM is soldered down but the SSD isn't. This is another step worse.
Also this thread seems obsessed with the fact that the storage dying is the end of the machine - I'd be as worried if not more that something else (RAM, GPU etc.) dying means my storage is inaccessible. We've had machines die that have been recoverable because the disk can be pulled out while the mainboard is replaced etc.
You really need to read that comment again. The bit about "deactivate".
ALL 15" MBPs come with 16 GB of RAM. The device can only take LPDDR3, and Skylake only allows a max of 16 GB for LPDDR3, so you couldn't upgrade it even if Apple gave you a fucking button you could push to eject/insert the RAM out of the side of the machine.
Are agnostics skeptical of unicorns too?
It's not only the pro's that are complaining. Even the fanbois are now lamenting the removal of the MagSafe and the SD slot. Apple has lost its way since Steve's ideas have dried up.
-- Cheers!
SSDs/HDDs and batteries are the most frequent parts to fail on laptops, and in most laptops are also the easiest to replace.
Being able to upgrade the ram and drive is also very useful, and a quick/cheap way to increase the longevity of a device as the price of memory and storage is constantly dropping.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
I think the bigger problem isn't the loss of Steve Jobs's ideas, but the loss of his ability to look at something and say, "Nope. Not good enough." I worry about Apple becoming gimmicky. Jobs seemed to be careful not to release things or make changes until they fit cohesively into the whole user interaction, providing an overall good user experience. I don't think he would have let Apple remove the headphone jack, for example, until there were a satisfying alternative method for connecting headphones.
Just a guess, obviously.