Slashdot Mirror
"Maybe It's a Piece of Dust" (theoutline.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: I was in the Grand Central Station Apple Store for a third time in a year, watching a progress bar slowly creep across my computer's black screen as my Genius multi-tasked helping another customer with her iPad. My computer was getting its third diagnostic test in 45 minutes. The problem was not that its logic board was failing, that its battery was dying, or that its camera didn't respond. There were no mysteriously faulty innerworkings. It was the spacebar. It was broken. And not even physically broken -- it still moved and acted normally. But every time I pressed it once, it spaced twice. "Maybe it's a piece of dust," the Genius had offered. The previous times I'd been to the Apple Store for the same computer with the same problem -- a misbehaving keyboard -- Geniuses had said to me these exact same nonchalant words, and I had been stunned into silence, the first time because it seemed so improbable to blame such a core problem on such a small thing, and the second time because I couldn't believe the first time I was hearing this line that it was not a fluke. But this time, the third time, I was ready. "Hold on," I said. "If a single piece of dust lays the whole computer out, don't you think that's kind of a problem?"
Oddly enough, I'm seeing Dell start to be what Apple was, especially with their new Latitude models. Some of Dell's items are better MacBook Pros than Apple's offerings, especially because they include much-needed ports.
Of course, there is the customer service difference, but with Dell, the trick is to buy the business class, and their pro level of support, and it is decent.
Has been since new ownership. All click-bait headlines and not an ounce of adult vocabulary or even basic copy-editing to catch grammar or spelling errors.
Sometimes just copy-and-pasted headlines from other click-bait factories. Shame really. Comments section still has good people and you occasionally learn something. But the whining kids have increased in number. Probably baited by the clickbait headlines. C'est la vie.
Honestly, it's kind of amazing how quickly it was picked up by all different web sites and blogs! I've probably read 5 different discussions on the original article already this morning.
The thing is? The "Genius" used the wrong terminology, in my opinion, which made things sound worse than they really are. A speck of dust is most assuredly NOT enough to jam up one of the new Apple keyboards. CRUMBS, however, from people eating by the machine? Absolutely possible.
I had one of these "New Macbooks" when it first came out. Ordered the "high spec" configuration to test it out at work, using it as my own personal work computer, to get a feel for what it was and wasn't really capable of doing for us. (We have a lot of highly mobile employees who care more about a computer being lightweight and easy to carry around, plus long battery life, than raw CPU power. So it was potentially a good fit, vs. the Macbook Air 13" machines we've issued to most of them for years.)
I really despised the keyboard design on it. Practically no key travel and just too easy to mistype things when I wasn't purposely typing extra slow. The 2017 edition has a slightly revised variation of the original keyboard and I tried that out at an Apple Store. IMO, still pretty awful, though MARGINALLY better tactile feel.
I finally resold the thing after concluding it just wasn't enough of a full-fledged notebook computer for our needs. (I'd really just classify it as Apple's high-fashion/style idea of a netbook.) But I never had sticking keys on it. With that little bit of key travel though, it's clear to me you're going to have to take extra care to keep this machine clean. (Wash your hands before typing on it if you were just eating some toast or bread, for example.) It won't take much to get some crumbs or grains of sand or salt or what-not in there, messing up one of the small scissor type key-switches under the key-caps.
I'll also say though, in Apple's defense? I've been using one of the latest models of external keyboards that's wireless, with the built-in rechargeable batteries that charge when you connect it via USB. After typing on that one quite a bit at home, still no real key issues. I try to keep it as clean as I can, but don't go to extrodinary lengths to do so either. Maybe the external ones just hold up a little bit better, or it's the fact they're not getting taken around so many different places where the environments aren't always as clean? Whatever the case, it's worked as well as can be expected. Still dislike the limited key travel on the new designs though, vs. what they had previously.
The touch bar is just the opening volley. Meanwhile Apple is doing the boiled frog thing with key travel, slowly getting users used to less and less key travel.
Eventually, they will probably replace the entire keyboard with a touch-board of some kind and expect that users will simply adjust. I think they've lost the plot somewhere.
Note this is not my original idea -- Merlin Mann mentioned it on the Back to Work podcast and I think he's spot on. And he's a huge Apple fan.
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Nice slashdot clickbait. msmash searching the sewers of the internet for someone bitching about Apple.
Meanwhile, all those Android phones are still not patched and fully exposed to many exploits. And Google does nothing. Except bow down low to the Twitter insane asylum when they add a calorie counter to Maps.
But yeah, let's highlight one guy's problem with his keyboard.
Think about how many religious people believe "We don't know what happened before the big bang." is a weakness in the theory, or indeed a weakness lurking behind all cosmological science.
As a religious person, I've never understood this. Science says "there was a point in time when nothing existed, and then everything existed." Isn't that what Genesis says? I would think that "Science can't explain what happened before that" isn't a weakness to either science or religion.
There may have once been nothing, not even a substrate or set of laws from which things could emerge. This idea breaks causality. There may always have been something, or at least a substrate or set of laws from which things could emerge. This idea breaks causality. The universe can't possibly have begun, and the universe can't possibly have always existed. Yet here we are.
Scientists don't claim to know why, which many religious people consider a sign of weakness. Religious people claim they do know why, which many scientists consider a weakness. One thing I think we can all agree on is that Apple's design philosophy sucks.
I actually had a computer that would exhibit odd behavior, somewhat based on positioning.
I opened it up to change some RAM out of hopes it would be an inexpensive fix.
Ended up that is was a screw rolling around shorting stuff out (I found the loose screw), bigger than dust, but seems possible based on the symptoms described (your joke is what made me thing of it).
I'd say more likely a metal shaving that's a little bigger than dust.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg