[mpg33]

Ports aren't really an issue to me...in a couple of years everything will be USB-C and/or wireless charging/headphones anyway.

Big issue is Apple has no new innovative products. Apple Watch isn't really enough of new product to drive iphone like sales at least not yet and there is nothing else on the horizon.

[ashark]

> Ports aren't really an issue to me...in a couple of years everything will be USB-C and/or wireless charging/headphones anyway.

Everything new maybe, but old audio gear, monitors/tvs/keyboards/drives, et c stick around a hell of a long time. I'll be surprised if my family's at more than 20% of peripherals, displays, and audio equipment on bluetooth/USBC in 5 years, personally. Probably more like 5-10%. 10 years? That's another story. Assuming the standard hasn't shifted again.

[coldtea]

>Everything new maybe, but old audio gear, monitors/tvs/keyboards/drives, et c stick around a hell of a long time.

That's not much of an issue to the kind of customers that can afford a new expensive Apple laptop.

[ashark]

Am I to understand that most people in the market for a $1700 laptop are also going to be OK with replacing $3-10k of perfectly good other equipment at or around the same time?

[coldtea]

Yes. They not be "OK" in principle, but they are the demographic most likely to do it (and to be able to do it) anyway.

You mention: "monitors/tvs/keyboards/drives". Well, keyboards and drives are trivial, as they use USB. So those people can just buy a USB-A to USB-C cable for $10 and be done with it (no dongle required if the keyboard doesn't have a fixed cable, and hard disks don't have fixed cables in the first place).

As for tvs and monitors, not sure how hey wont be able to use them with the new Apple devices, but they can afford a new one if they are so inconvenienced to use an adaptor.

[ashark]

I've had a couple dozen keyboards dating back to the AT over the years, and I can't recall any with a non-fixed cable. That'd be pretty cool. :-/

It's more that I can carry my 2014 macbook anywhere in my house or office or anyone else's and probably connect it to anything I want or need to, without an adapter. Works, say, 99% of the time. With the 2016 it would work 0% of the time today (well, audio equipment excepted I guess, since they weren't courageous enough to remove the headphone jack on the MBP, fortunately), and it would take a half-dozen dongles to come even close to that 99%. I don't expect the success percentage for a dongle-less 2016 MBP to go up much in the next 2 years. That makes stretching my 2014 for another year or two, or switching to another vendor, way more appealing than it might be otherwise, especially with the non-trivial price hike adding insult to injury.

[EDIT] OK, half-dozen was a slight overstatement. At least 4, maybe 5.

[coldtea]

>I've had a couple dozen keyboards dating back to the AT over the years, and I can't recall any with a non-fixed cable. That'd be pretty cool. :-/

High end keyboards sometimes feature one. E.g:

http://www.coolermaster.com/peripheral/keyboards/novatouchtk...

[r00fus]

Are you telling me that dongles aren't adequate? You must have native connectors? Then by all means replace that $3-10k worth of equipment.

That's what the forward march of progressing standards is about - you upgrade some, with adapters for legacy interfaces.

[jaxondu]

I think Apple considered TouchBar innovative, but it's not a product. I keep having the vision of Tom Cruise in Minority Report, while navigating the screen with his fingers, keep looking down at his keyboard/TouchBar for emojis.