Further, those readers seem to be made /just/ fast enough to read ahead of the current speeds, so when new speeds come out, you need a faster reader. That works fine if you have a USB 3.1 or USB 3.2 adapter, but not so great if the reader is built into a laptop with an otherwise much longer life.
That's the issue - you are speaking only from an Apple user perspective. Android (and other non-apple) phones allow us to extend our storage with sd cards, and they are mostly used to store and transfer photos and videos.
/me looks glumly at my Apple-ized Samsung Galaxy S6Edge, with no SD card or removable battery. (Both of which would make the S6/GearVR combo significantly more useful...)
It does. Micro-sd-card reader fits even in raspberryPi Zero ... Neglectable "space saving" advantage vs huge usability disadvantage.
> The point of a laptop is to strike a balance between portability and usability.
I think MacbookPro should be about philosophy of amplifying creative person with power tools for creativity in a portable way. Not a dumb machine mimicking more and more some TV . While this it should also do easily it shouldn't do just this, I think.
Look at my use-case: https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=26271855
From my perspective of extensive use of a laptop some people barely use laptops at all and thus perhaps they better be designing something else because for me it appears they have no idea what 'Pro' usage is. When you travel you never know what environment you'll have and therefor ports and connectivity make a difference between: Creative idea done/ not done.
>Requiring the extra like two cubic inches of space in your bag for a dongle is assuredly not a design concern.
It's not 2 cubic inches. It's huge adapter with all missing ports. Why Pro Laptop should consist of two parts is beyond me.
Again look at my use-case. I have no place for dongles nor time for dealing with them.
If those real 'Pro' requirements are not a design concerns then perhaps MacbookPro should not have 'Pro' in the title in my opinion.
Its ~2 cubic inches and doesn't dangle on a cable so you don't need a table/lap.
As for your more detailed post you just linked to:
> Only for that purpose more ports are justified because I would prefer to have 4 at least to connect all 3 iOS devices plus hard_drive for backup etc. If there is additional monitor around that I could use I would love to use it which means I need HDMI/display port.
USB4/thunderbolt 4 allows for type c hubs that also support alt-modes like displayport alt-mode so you can have a small cellphone-sized hub to significantly increase your ports: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08RYZJY8M
> I would also need HDMI/DP/DVI or even VGA port to have external screen connected.
Surely you're not suggesting that laptops built in 2021 should have a VGA port? This is exactly what tomtheelder was referring to when he said:
> I'm pretty sure that in 2021 that is an _extreme_ niche use case [...] 99% of people who own Macbooks or whatever don't own an SD card dongle because they don't need it. However, and extra USB-C port can be used for a multitude of things
Just think of all the extra thickness Apple would be adding to their laptops just to fit a VGA port 99.9% of people would never use.
Thank you for the link. Unfortunately it only looks so.
It satisfies only partly because it's still headache to remember where it is, remember to take it and when something like that sticks out of your machine probability to break it when there are people around is very high and not unusual. Also you can tilt accidentally your laptop and it cat potentially break the port completely.
With all that said the reality now for instance that it is simply not available in the country I am right now unfortunately. I cannot move because of the covid situation and I am limited with what I can order. My MacbookPro has died gracefully (you can read how if you wish: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25809097) I have managed to get M1 machine but now I'll have to deal with adapters that are available around.
Because I do not have sd-card-slot my photography is limited to zero currently until I find adapter that would work. I have additional headache to choose one that works, and they lie about the specs and you never know what you get so this is the reality of all those theories about 'oh you can get a dongle'.
I just wish to add that when you are really mobile and travel in different countries it is Not unusual situation. Even if it's developed country it's not easy to order something in a small town or even in a big town. Usually small towns do not have something you need, you can count on that. Probably you can buy a new Mac probably like I did but it's M1 with 2 ports and some nice adapters will be not available there. Again this is the reality , not the theory where you can access everything you need whenever you need it.
The second item you've mentioned is nice. Thank you again. It can be useful when I'll be able to reach it. Right now all my drives are usb3 to fit MacbookPro I had. This hub is also requires power supply brick as I understand and again it would be simply impossible to get the hub you've mentioned where I am at the moment.
So in my case it will be huge adapter hanging on wire and let us pray it will work as expected.
>Surely you're not suggesting that laptops built in 2021 should have a VGA port?
No, I am not suggesting that. HDMI an micro-sd-card reader do not add any thickness though and are still very useful for flexibility in real world. When I took my previous Mac I thought I will not use HDMI but mobile reality made it so that at some point it was the only way I can use it and extract data from it and the external port allowed me to boot gnu/linux. The M1 Mac on the other hand become not bootable in the first day because of the bug in DiskUtility and I needed 'another Mac' to make it even bootable again so from my perspective I did not upgrade I have downgraded.
>_extreme_ niche use case [...] 99% of people For me it's not about how many people use something it's about what a portable computer allows you to do and how flexible , productive and creative you can be with that tool. I do not want to go further about what else 99% do not do ... following majority was never too exciting for me.
More recently there's the PinePhone as well. It's not just expandable storage, you can boot off the SD and have all your OS and files there.
I would say I definitely use SD cards more than flash drives now.
Can we explore that a bit? Laying around your house? Or like on the ground at work?
I seem to remember some corporate espionage that relied on people looking at random SD cards they found on the ground...
Thankfully random SD cards should be much safer than random USB devices, but it's probably better to be careful.
You could hav put your laptop on a network with heaps of monitoring going on, and then mailed it back to NSA/GRU/MSS/Mossad as required based on the ip addresses your machine started connecting to...
;-)
Dongles are both cheaper and more flexible than replacing the cable, at the cost of having a slightly shittier experience.
It's completely logical.
> The whole point of laptop is to save YOU space and headache or space in your BAG!
It most certainly is not. The point of a laptop is to strike a balance between portability and usability. Requiring the extra like two cubic inches of space in your bag for a dongle is assuredly not a design concern.