I feel the exact same way and have always recommended Macs to friends, family and cwoorkers as the computere that "just works." I'm been suspicious of people who disagree with that sentiment — to each their own, but I don't think there's much dispuute that Macs just work.

Yet, now, heere I am with a 2018 MacBooko Pro that repeats keys randomly — somoetimes out of theorder they were pushed— andstarting to wonder if I need to change my recommendation. The laptop has been "fixed" twice now and always works just fine for a day or two before reevertinig back to the same old state. I clean the keyboard daily with compressed air, thouugh that's largely become a symbolic gesture that doesn't fix the issue but at least makes me feel like I'm not crazy.

All that said, much like the author of the article, I'm so bought in to the Apple ecosystem at this point that I've resorted to a certain kind of stooicism — thiis is apparently the set of circumstances I have been giiven and I must live with it.

(Note: no, I'm not too lazy to correct typos noor a partiicluarly poor typer — this post is the unedited resulut of typing on my broken keyboard. Just be happy double spaces don't show up by default in DOM elements.)

I finally took my 2018 MBP in and they replaced the upper case (I guess keyboard, touchbar, and more?) to fix the keyboard issue.

The work took about 2 days (drop-off, return). But I ended up buying a keyboard cover for it because the risk of particulate putting me in this situation again - and the consequences of that occurring - are of greater cost than the annoyance of a plastic film over the keyboard.

I recommend you take it in and do the same.

My MBA2012 had some nasty issues with wifi disconnections which happened independant of the router being used. Used a USB wifi or ethernet adapter as a workaround sometimes sacrificing half my USB ports. Trackpad was great and I am blown away that people complain about it since I consider it the market leader. Outlived most of my other laptops even if it had annoying recurring issues for its lifespan.

Still recommended macs to others until Tim Apple took over the company and the laptops became poor quality machines. I thought the initial MBPr was the most incredible laptop I've ever seen.

Naa you’re not alone. I love the new MBP keyboard. My experience to suggests what we have here is a vocal minority. I type faster with the new style keyboard, I enjoy the springiness of the keys and their much larger size than previous iterations. I also like how their backlighting works compared to the old style. If people are having trouble with them, Apple should resolve those issues, but in my opinion the keyboards and new MBPs are excellent machines.

Same here as well. I've had stuff get caught in my (mid-2017) keyboard a few times, but never anything that didn't clear on its own after a few keypresses and I've never had issues with repeated or missed keypresses.

(That said, I have to agree with one of the other child commenters here-- the current Magic Keyboard is actually my favorite of Apple's recent keyboards. Similar feel to the tbMBP keyboards (more crisp and clicky than the older keyboards from the pre-touchbar rMBPs), with a bit more travel and a more robust mechanism, and the numpad version has a nice, big T-layout for the arrow keys rather than whatever the heck is going on with the arrow keys on the tbMBP.)

I love the feel, but in my 2016 I did have the spacebar stop working on one side (the side I tend to use more often) because of dirt ingress.

My favorite keyboard ever, though, is the current 'Magic Keyboard'. It's like the perfect medium between the old chicklet-style that felt rather mushy to me and the new butterfly mechanism that's almost too rigid.

Sadly, it seems Apple does not want to go back to that feel in their mobile line :(

The grip I have with the newer Pros is the *@($ Touch Bar. It's sad that the new Air has exactly what I wanted—addition of Touch ID but no Touch Bar—but the so-called Pros still have the Touch Bar. I have yet to find a touch typist who believes the Touch Bar to be a good reason to pay a few hundred extra for it.

I absolutely love my touchbar, and would hate to see it go. I know per context where each key I need is.

Keyboards are a very personal thing. I think the butterfly is usable and pleasing, but that the magic keyboard is a dreadful downgrade from the previous one that was more or less identical to the previous-gen Macbooks (which were very adequate).

My favorite keyboard, beam-spring being a thing of the past, is the Model M (Unicomp still builds them). I love it, even if my family would rather have me not typing after 10 PM.

We should all advocate for continuous improvements for machines we rely day to day. What I learned is that no one else is making a better laptop than Apple. I tried a lot of machines and spent way too much money and time trying to make them worthwhile. The Surface line is riddled with issues. I defended it in the past (see old comments from me), because I felt Apple was not innovating. But, hindsight I would rather have a reliable machine. Wifi would break all the time on Surfaces, battery would drain on its own while in my bag, the pen would lag, etc. I don't think anyone would be happy if Apple release a similar product. I gave the Surface team several tries through their iterations and they never fixed the main issues.

Someone else said it, the new Apple wireless keyboards are great. I have one at work and at home.

I bought the 2018 MacBook Pro shortly after its release and I'm pleased with my purchase. I don't really like the keyboard, but I spend the vast majority of my time at a desk with an external keyboard and mouse anyway. My laptop is basically a desktop that I lug to and from work everyday. USB-C has been great for me because it means that I can have 1 hub that handles power, my external monitor, network, and all of my other peripherals. I tell people it's like having a docking station that works 100% of the time.

I don't like the keyboard because I find that I accidentally repeat keystrokes on it a lot. Maybe I just need more practice or lighter fingers. I also have to admit that I don't like to eat around it for fear of spilling crumbs on the keyboard. I've always been pretty tidy around my laptops, but I've never been this worried. It's not a deal breaker for me (obviously), but I hope they fix the keyboard's issues in the next version.

I have a 2016 MBP and love the keyboard. I've never had any problems with it. That's not to dismiss people who have experienced quality issues. I don't mind the touch bar, but it's not particularly useful.

I'm adding onto this -- I have a 2017 edition of the MBP for work, and I have a faulty keyboard. I hated it. "The touchbar is stupid", I proclaimed.

I recently bought a 2018 edition for the wife because she has always expressed a desire of owning one of her own (my work always provided me with a mac). The keyboard is much improved.

Additionally, watching a "normal" user interact with a Mac and a touchbar, versus me, a developer was eye opening, and I suddenly realized there is a lot more to the puzzle we are so blind to. She loves it. Sure, it is an "emoji bar" when she is in iMessage, but she also loves the scrolling functionality it provides in Photos.

I still don't see much use for it personally, but I am no longer a rapid opponent of it as I once was. There's always been extra ports and features on other laptops I've used in the past, and I never seemed so critical of those as well. Maybe I bought into the mob mentality? Going back to my wife, her work provided her with a Thinkpad Yoga. It has a touch screen, and a stylus. Ok touch screens I am not the biggest fan of, but I happen to think the stylus is cool! I am sure there were many users of the previous Thinkpads at her company that were going "What!? A stupid stylus? Who needs this!" I realized I was doing the same thing with the new MBP.

Touchbar or not, it is still the most quality, aesthetically pleasing, well built laptop I use, and it still remains miles beyond any PC I ever used as well, Inspirons, XPSes, Surfaces included.

I don't think people would be complaining nearly as much if they simply added the touchbar above the existing keys rather than replacing them. Or left the esc and power keys while putting the touchbar in between them. Lots of things they could have done.

The replacing the existing keys is a good point. I don't feel the pain of the ESC key since I remap caps lock to it, I always thought "Function" keys were relics of a bygone era, (and unergonomic to use), and the little black doodad functions just as well as a power button as any other one I have ever used.

For me, father of a 6yo daughter, the "emoji bar" is worth every penny.

Thinking about it, I've spent almost half of my career on computers that didn't have function keys (even though they usually had ESC as a physical one).

I like my 2018 MBP. I even like the keyboard. The touch bar is kinda "meh," but I think it's more a software issue than hardware: Apple's interface guidelines make no sense to me. Why can't developers use it to give me a little extra display real estate if that's what they AND I (the user!) want? Why must it be treated purely as an input device?

The T series still has the removable batteries, and the newer model years (T460 and up) have weights equivalent to the older X240 and below.

My T460 is within 0.5lbs (~0.25kg) of my work-issued 2015 MBP 13in, and from my quick searches, that seems to be generally consistent up to the modern T490 & 2018 MBP 13s.

I don't have a modern Thinkpad or MBP to compare, but my T460 still gets ~4-5hrs of normal usage, or 2-3hrs of heavy usage (strategy gaming like FTL or Rimworld, running VMs and python dev work, etc). My 2015 MBP 13 gets fairly similar times.

I'm in the same boat as you. I wish my company had issued me the model without the touchbar, as I very much would prefer physical function and esc keys but other than that I love the machine and have never had issues.

The one thing I would change is that I seem to have to reach way over to the right side of the trackpad to get a "right-click".

I also have a ~2016 macbook air and the keyboard SUCKS in comparison to the butterfly keyboard.

As a sibling said you can set it to have two-finger taps be right click.

On my older (smaller trackpad) MBP I thought that setting was dumb and I avoided it. On the newer (2018) I was having a hard time reaching all the way to the right, so I finally decided to give two-finger tap another try.

Years ago a developer friend told me that for any workflow change you should give it one week of total commitment, no switching back and forth, then decide if you want to stick with it.

For me that was more than enough time to learn to love the two-finger right click. As with most successful workflow switches, the one week evaluation deadline came and went without me noticing, and I never looked back.

You should be able to right-click anywhere on the trackpad with a two finger tap.

I do share your sentiment. I live in a country with lots of "dust". I had concerns after reading people reviews but went ahead and bought the latest 2018 version.

Two things:

1- I really enjoy the new Macbook Pro keyboard. Way more than the 2014 one.

2- It is really dusty and I need to clean every week. Partly, because I work on cafes a lot.

So far (6 months), it has been going strong. No issues (the trackpad can be annoying at times, but that's it).

Also totally happy with my 2016 MBP, keyboard and all.

I very much like my MBP keyboard and touchbar as well. And I know plenty of people that share the sentiment.