This is ridiclous
Introducing the new Apple Power Bottom.
Optional $200 dock with satisfyingly clicky lever mechanism that is activated from the front.
Looking forward to see the 3D prints made to fix this “feature”.
Apple insider are already framing this as not a design flaw but an advantage somehow
Guess the Magic Mouse design team was getting bored
Asahi Linux 👀
?
Don’t worry, there will be suitable USB accessories available for this.
Only $299!
“that’s insane!”
gets wallet out
“I can’t believe this!”
gets out card
“unbelievable!”
And a $199 stand for it, sold separately.
The generic Chinese version that does the same thing: $12
No, it’ll be paired to specifically to your computer and doesn’t work on anyone else’s computer.
It’s going to Bluetooth since the Chinese version does not want to pay for the licensing fees.
Just like a Raspberry Pi needs a dongle for a power button, except the Mini has one already.
Does macOS respond to external keyboard power button presses because if so this could very well be as easy money-making real product
Just run it upside down.
At least it does mean your cat can never turn off your pc ever again with this
excellent marketing strategy to get us talking about their stuff that would otherwise get almost completely under our radar.
i mean fuck where the power button of a product ill probably never need is.
They clearly want you to let this one running 24/7, or, can you turn it on using the keyboard and that low power BT thing?
Part of the new Apple power bottom design strategy.
Apple is finally appealing to my interests
Hello.
okay, I was gonna say that it’s not that big of a deal because you can just slightly lift it when you want to turn it on (or just slide your finder under it, if they’re small enough) but judging by that photo, it seems like the power button is at the back of the computer? whyyyy??
anyways, im more impressed by the fact that their new shiny mouse who finally uses USB-C still has the charging port at the bottom. im starting to think they think it’s a good design???
I just think it’s weird that people are complaining about the power button and the mouse charging situation, but no one is complaining that this DESKTOP computer does not have any USB-A ports. If you want to use any wired keyboard or a Logitech mouse with the adapter you’ll need to attach a dongle. Crazy.
I’m not an Apple fanboy, nor have I ever purchased one of their products (and I don’t plan to), but I’m actually fine with this because there are lots of USB-C mice and keyboards on the market these days in every price range. At the very most, you might have to buy a different cable because the ones I’ve bought tend to come with USB-C to USB-A cables instead of C to C. But eventually that will change as USB-A is inevitably phased out.
I actually do buy Apple products and I can accept your logic for a laptop because I use a docking station. The point of the Mac Mini is to be the cheap Mac and adding extra cords or dongles just increases the cost and creates a mess behind the machine.
A hub costs $10 if you really need all those ports.
Most people buying these machines don’t, which is why it lacks the ports.
It’s a desktop, so you will obviously need an external monitor. Most of the new monitors these days also work as USB hubs - you just run a USB C cable from the computer to the monitor and you get both display and additional ports.
I personally use a dock that has three Thunderbolt downstream ports with my MacBook and run USB-C to DisplayPort cables connect two screens. If you have one monitor then you can ignore 90% of what I’m griping about. I just think it’s interesting what people notice. The old high end Mac Mini had 4 Thunderbolt USB-C and 2 USB-A. All ports including headphones were on the back. I don’t mind a front audio jack but prefer it on the back since I use it for speakers. This machine is still a major upgrade no matter what. Thunderbolt 4 is bandwidth limited if you want 3 hi-dpi screens or two 4K 60, so Thunderbolt 5 is a big deal on the Mini Pro.
My MacBook has just two USB-C sockets. When I bought it I picked up a couple of A adapters on Amazon for a few quid each. It’s never been an issue. Even less so with a desktop, as you’re able to leave the adapters in all the time.
Yes but we are bitching about trivial things and the lack of USB-A is far worse than the location of the power button on a desktop. I don’t accept the mouse criticism because it’s not required to buy a Magic Mouse. I have a MacBook but I use a Thunderbolt dock so in my use case the usb-c port increases convenience.
USB-C has been out for years. The only issue IMO is that since USB-C negotiates power delivery, it might not be as easy to split out a USB-C port into multiple USB-C ports. Spitting USB-A ports is easy since they only do 5V, and spitting USB-C into multiple USB-A ports should be fine. But if your peripherals all become USB-C, you might find yourself running out of ports fast.
I am not an expert. I probably got something wrong there, but that’s my understanding.
The things that I would plug into a computer are generally peripherals, webcam, printers, scanner, etc. They generally come with USB A plugs. Also nearly every useful USB-C hub is designed for a laptop and has a built in short cord. The new Mac Mini has three Thunderbolt 4 ports which is more than adequate for high speed applications and video. TB4 allows for hubs like the CalDigit Element Hub which has 4 USB-A and 4 Thunderbolt 4 ports but costs $180.
I read someone else musing that they must have thought that keeping it plugged in all the time would be bad, so the made it impossible to use the mouse while plugged in. Seems plausible. I suppose it would degrade the battery? Or the cord drag would be bad?
The design forces the user to use it wirelessly. Apple just wants their products to look better, meaning NO CORDS EVER. It’s entirely about aesthetic.
They should have just released a mouse pad that can charge the mouse wirelessly then.
I think Sun made mice that didn’t work without their metallic mouse pad, that had some sort of grid on it.
Apple’s problem is in following:
There are industrial designers, fashion designers, managers and engineers.
Apple doesn’t have industrial designers. Only fashion designers pretending.
In a normal company managers consult designers and engineers back and forth, both figuring out some compromise and also asking the other group whether there is a better way.
Not in Apple. Their designers are clearly superior hierarchically to engineers.
And in the end their products are of inferior quality (for that price).
Apple’s idea of how things should look and work, when expressed in words, is absolutely fine! It’s actually wonderful. And perfectly possible, it’s actually the same goal as with industrial ergonomics.
Except they don’t have the process they need to fulfill that. They only have the PR to pretend.
If I worked at Apple, I’d hire you right here, right now.
$7.000
im surprised they haven’t done this tbh
Apparently Logitech does have this out now, so I wonder if they patented the “concept” and it will be another 20 years before anyone can do it. Assuming that someone else didn’t already do it 20 years ago and that patented already ran out.
Ive seen one at least 10 years ago already. But that didn’t exactly charge the mouse, instead the mouse relied on always being on the pad to work.
That’s not true. It charges very slowly, about 12 hours to charge a completely dead battery, but it does charge
The bigger problem is that it’s expensive af, and since current gen Logitech mice have months of battery life and charge in an hour with the usb cord it’s really pointless.
Their trackpad can and does work via USB so ???
I have one of their trackpads and it works great with Ubuntu over USB but not over Bluetooth for some reason. (It connects, but Ubuntu doesn’t handle it well.)
It’s literally just the same body as the OG Magic Mouse, which had a bay for a pair of AAs underneath. All they did was remove the bay, put a rechargeable battery in there, and a socket to charge it. It takes a couple of minutes to give it 9 hours of juice.
There’s no grand conspiracy.
I’ve said too much they’re coming for me they know they know they know
If that’s the case, then why does the wireless keyboard have the port on the back?
“But it looks bad and could be bad for the battery!”
Every other wireless mouse has it in the front, Apple has no valid reason to leave it at the bottom.
The fact that everyone hasn’t taken on this design trend just shows how stupid it is.
They also take on stupid design trends, like removing the headphone jack.
This one is just several degrees more stupid.
There’s the unsolvable problem - to prevent companies doing stupid things.
And there’s the solvable problem - have enough competition so that companies doing stupid things would become or remain small.
Which is why all the stupidity in computer industry in our days is a result of patent laws and protectionism.
On the battery, they should have been able to do whatever they thought best in the battery management system, in that case.
Simple answer is easiest, that they are obsessed with the “clean” minimalist look and want to abolish every visible port and buttin they can.
Surprised though that the mouse didn’t do the magsafe thing.
My theory is: free publicity. Just like the fashion industry comes up with ridiculous clothes that no one would ever wear, attention whores will constantly do outrageous things so that people will talk about them. The number of electrons spilled over this stupid mouse port placement over the years is uncountable. But the repeated conversations keep Apple in the public consciousness as a fashionista.
I think it’s more just their minimal design combined with the fact that a normal user will never press the power button. Most people don’t shut down their computers, and if they do, a key on the keyboard turns it on.
The only argument I’ve seen to this being bad is in a server rack environment.
Apple doesn’t want people using the mouse with the cable attached because it would cost them a fortune due to failed charging ports within the warranty period. It’s a wireless mouse. Using it plugged in will fuck it up.
I fix computers and an apple mouse with a bad charge port is just a throwaway.
Hahaha I thought this was the onion and the button was the big fugly thing that covers the whole bottom
Yes, and if you complain to much they’ll put the power input on the bottom too next year.
Just be thankful they didn’t put the power cord there like they did with the mouse.
Imagine! a computer that you can’t use while it’s plugged in.
I think they call that Windows.
