The strip is context sensitive and will display relevant action buttons depending on what I have opened. The final Apple-specific feature is the Touch Bar, a digital touchscreen strip that replaces the F-keys on keyboards. The MacBook Pro is a very polished device.

Much more useful to me was Siri support, because I was able to summon it by voice to help fact check as I'm typing articles. While useful, I turned it off because I prefer accurate colors when examining photos and editing videos. The former is Apple's smart tech carried over from the iPad Pro and iPhone X that automatically adjusts display temperature to better suit the lighting in the environment. This type of quick response is commendable.Īlso new to this year's laptop is TrueTone display and Siri support. It's worth mentioning that the top tier i9 model did suffer from throttling problems during the first week of launch, as first noticed by tech YouTuber Dave Lee, but Apple has since fixed it with a software update. Even when pushed to do intensive tasks, such as outputting 4k videos, my unit never got warm nor made the loud fan noises that I'd get from Huawei's MateBook X Pro. Not once during my testing period did I see the dreaded 'spinning ball' that now dominates my 2012 MacBook Air. And with the new processors paired with Apple's T2 chipset, these laptops are blazing fast. There's a base model with an i5 and a more premium i9 model that's only available on the 15-incher. Let's get to the real reason the new MacBook Pro exists: the 8th-gen Intel silicon bump. But people who jump between a MacBook and a desktop or even another laptop will be reminded of Apple's weird flat keys. People who make this MacBook Pro their sole computing machine (a realistic usage scenario, given the prevalence of smartphones) will get used to the keyboard and not think much about it. The butterfly keyboards won't be a dealbreaker for most. I have a 2012 MacBook Air at home, and I still like that keyboard better. Ben SinĪpple claims this change was made to improve keyboard stability, but I've never heard anyone complain about Apple keyboards pre-butterfly. My score on 's Aesop's fables test with the MacBook Pro.

Macbook pro 2018 keyboard