anchor.diff:  = The state of Macbooks
   :hp-image: /images/macbooks/macbooks.jpg
  -:hp-tags: Apple, Macbook Pro, Macbook, AMD, Intel
  +:hp-tags: Apple, MacBook Pro, MacBook, AMD, Intel
   :linkattrs:
   
   Over the past year, I distinctly recall a palpable frustration with Apple's lineup. Not much had changed tangibly in years and lots of people with lots of different needs were all devouring the rumors waiting for their specific needs to be solved. It was basically a perfect recipe for disappointment and oh has there been disappointment. Unfortunately the need to have top tier gaming performance, be able to run high-teens numbers of VMs, last all day on battery, have both old ports and only new ones, and more just can't all fit into one system. Not even a line of systems.
  
positive.code: 
  *I really don't want a touch screen laptop*. The Touch Bar is just the right amount of touch interactivity without a sea of fingerprints and arm-raised ergonomics.
  
  Apple's 15" Macbook Pro is basically opening the door to the future I want. Just 3-4 weeks to wait...
negative.code: 
  From here we enter the territory of _they literally could not do what you want_ without either shipping nothing or shipping a piece of functionality that compromises the rest of the product too strongly in another area.
  
  1. *It doesn't have Kaby Lake?* There's a lot here. First, there are no quad core CPUs for the 15" line (in the 40-50W vicinity). Second, there are no 20-30W  dual core CPUs for the 13" line. Intel did release 15W CPUs which would be suitable in the Air lineup (or the non Touch Bar MacBook Pro) and 4.5W CPUs for the MacBook, but launching newer generation hardware (with low tangible benefit) on the lowest tier products seems like a recipe for customer confusion.
  
  2. *It doesn't have DDR4?* RAM is a non-trivial power drain on the overall system and Apple uses LPDDR3 modules (LP being low power). Skylake doesn't support LPDDR4. Kaby Lake wont even support LPDDR4. Let's also not forget that switching technologies for switching technology's sake isn't useful. DDR4 provides improvements in only a small slice of computing tasks and otherwise provides minimal if any tangible benefit even with a significant clock speed increase. With greater clockspeed comes greater latency timing.
  
  3. *It doesn't come with a 32GB RAM option?* See above. This would have pushed Apple away from LPDDR3 modules, again, compromising battery life in a way that is not in line with any decision they've made in providing a baseline of battery life for the past 4 years of models of computers. Intel is not helping here.
  
  4. *AMD graphics?* Nvidia approached this generation from the top down, releasing its highest powered devices first and is only now starting to fill in its lower power options suitable for laptops hoping to have any battery life. AMD took a different approach, hitting baseline VR and then filling in its lower power products next. AMD also focuses on OpenCL, whereas Nvidia has continually pushed CUDA. Apple embraced OpenCL a long time ago and isn't likely to make any changes in that area. I know it's tempting to think of the performance of Nvidia's flagship devices, but the battery life compromise (or the weight/portability compromise for having more battery) is again, not something that should ever have been expected in the MacBook Pro line. External GPUs for OS X aren't far. The choices here are in line with the overall performance at every step of the MBP evolution.
  
  5. *The price is so high!* Apple arguably added an Apple Watch in material cost with the Touch Bar and Touch ID sensor. They also are utilizing extremely high performance SSDs. Claiming 3+GBps performance all but guarantees a variation or competitor to Samsung's 960 Pro line of SSDs. The outrage at the _Apple Tax™_ for the +$1200 cost on the 2TB SSD (and respectively the cost of the 1TB upgrade) seems reasonable, but at the time of this writing, the 2TB 960 Pro retails for $1300. It's just what the hardware costs. They included Alpine Ridge controllers, didn't offer an iGPU 15" model, increased the size of the force touch hardware for the trackpad, and once again dramatically improved the display. This all costs money. They filled in some of the price gap with the non-Touch Bar model...
  
  