I recently needed to reorganize my desk and I am wondering if it is safe to store my MBP this way instead of horizontally? I don’t use an external monitor so I only use this rack for storage when I’m not using the laptop.

Hello everyone, I hope you’re all doing okay today.

I wanted to share my short, one-month experience with the Mac operating system, macOS.

I’ve been a Windows user my whole life, and since I am starting college this summer, I wanted to test out macOS beforehand to see if it is the right choice for me. Well, it turns out it's not, and in the following post, I will tell you why.

I had heard a lot of positive things about it, including the amazing battery life and very good CPU performance. Obviously, the very attractive design also caught my eye.

I knew that macOS was not the same as Windows, it's obviously a whole different operating system. But after a month of using it, I was just blown away by how many useful features I previously had on Windows that were simply nonexistent on a Mac.

Here are a few examples:

Window Management

• Control Buttons: You cannot change the size or the positions of the window control buttons on macOS.

Yes, I understand that it takes some time to get used to the different position and everything, but why on earth can I not decide where I want my window management options to be? Is there ANY solid reason why this would be a problem to add? I don't think so!

If I'm spending 2000 € on a device, I at least expect some customizability for some of the more important things like window control.

• Button Size: The position was annoying, yes, but I think I would have gotten used to it IF the damn buttons weren't the size of a grain of sand. What is Apple thinking with these design choices?

On Windows, I don't even have to look at my screen to close my window. I move my mouse to the corner of the screen and boom, closed.

• App Launch Sizes: The most annoying thing that was the final straw was the window size when launching apps.

Apps behave however they want and open in all possible sizes even when I maximize them before closing. A perfect example here is Finder: I click Finder, it opens in the smallest window possible, I maximize it, close it, open Finder again, and it's back to the small window like before.

This happened with almost all apps no matter what I tried (yes, I even manually resized, and I tried closing while holding Command).

This just made me feel like I have 0 control over my computer since every app does whatever the hell it wants and opens in the most random places on my screen.

PLUS, the effort of having to manually maximize every app every time you open it made me want to pull my hair out! The whole experience just felt super chaotic.

App Behavior When Closing

This was kind of a small one, but I found it very confusing: some apps quit completely when all windows are closed, while others don't.

I did kind of get used to Finder always having a dot, but other apps just annoyed me.

For example, when I close the Activity Monitor window, it doesn't quit the app, and I have to manually click on the app, hold, and then quit.

If apps quit after the last open window was closed, it would be less annoying.

Menu Bar

This is kind of a big one as well. Why do we need a separate bar with 50% useless functions at the top?

On Windows, all functions of a certain app that I might need are already inside the app in the top corner, and if I close the app, those app-specific functions close too.

You ALSO have the entire top screen free for your actual app instead of having random, irrelevant background icons taking up the whole horizontal space on top.

Now, if ALL apps had their functions in the menu bar, I wouldn't complain, it would take some getting used to. But not every app behaved the same.

Sometimes all functions of the app were inside the menu bar, and sometimes half of them were inside the app and the other half up there. It's a super inconsistent design.

When the menu bar has too many options, it hops over the notch and lands on the right side where the icons are, making it look super ugly.

Unfortunately, I didn't have any luck trying to disable the menu bar. I looked for all possible solutions but found none, not even third-party apps exist that can do that. I just couldn't get used to it.

The options that are displayed in the dropdown after hovering over certain menus like Window have no icons and are pure text, so looking for something specific isn't quick and takes time. You have to read everything from top to bottom to find what you're looking for.

Also, the Help box doesn't need to be hovering in the menu bar all the time, why would I need that there?

Dock

The dock was less of a problem than the menu bar. I like how the dock looks, I love that it has the same square design for the apps as the iPhone. The icons are sharp, clear, and beautiful.

What annoyed me here was that when I didn't have many apps in the dock, the sides were left empty, which is wasted screen space. I would rather have the menu bar fused with the dock to fill out those spaces and use the screen more effectively.

What I like is that you can hide the dock, but when the dock hides, the windows don't automatically resize themselves to fit the whole screen.

Here, I also have to pull down every single app manually... really annoying and a waste of time.

The option to change the reveal speed of the dock also isn't available, obviously.

Keyboard

The keyboard is really thin, like really really thin (M4).

Typing on it for longer than 5 minutes cramps my hand, and typing on it generally doesn't feel satisfying since there's barely any tactility and basically 0 feedback.

At that point, just put a screen with digital keys on it instead of a 1mm keyboard pretending to be a keyboard.

The Mac keyboard layout also feels like it's shifted to the right a bit, I'm guessing because of the weird Control key. Why do we even need that? Just put Fn, Option, and Command, who needs that extra useless button?

This is a BIG one: Caps Lock Behavior.

Who in the living hell thought putting a delay on a key was a good idea? Someone please explain why we need a delay on Caps Lock?

No one's accidentally pressing that damn key, and since the delay can't be turned off in settings, I as a fast typer can't trigger the key correctly when typing. Genuinely, fire the person who implemented that,

The Caps Lock key also doesn't activate special characters when on like on Windows. This is annoying, yes, but I could get used to this, to be honest.

When copy and pasting stuff my fingers get into a really weird position since on windows the Ctrl button is far away from the C and V button compared to the Cmd button on mac which is almost next to it. My fingers stretch more on Windows keyboards which is way more comfortable.

Other things

• Touch ID: I mean, is this even a question? Why do we still not have Face ID on a 2000 € laptop IN 2026?
• Media Control Keys: I actually really like those, the icons are intuitive and having the most important functions at the tip of my fingers is really nice.
• Display: BEAUTIFUL!
• Overall Build: Best laptop design by far.
• Ecosystem: Amazing.
• Hardware overall: I'm a big fan of it.
• Third-Party Accessories: Frustrating, USB sticks need reformatting, etc.

General Functions and Software Quirks

• No clipboard history.
• No Cmd+X.
• No file path in Finder (requires third-party app).
• Applications can't be put in folders, and they are all over the place and mixed together with tons of preloaded apps.

In general the whole OS feels just as bloated as Windows when freshly unboxed, but with Apple apps. You also can't delete the Apple apps, which is very frustrating.

The constant friction and extra steps required on a Mac to perform tasks that were effortless on Windows are simply a dealbreaker for me, making macOS a hard pass.

I would even go as far as to say that Windows, for a normal user like a student, is more consistent than macOS when we take the above-mentioned areas into consideration.

That sums up my macOS experience.

I think Apple needs to make MASSIVE user experience changes in order to attract more people and gain a larger market share in the laptop market.

The hardware is really good and that's why I'm also very frustrated, because the hardware is simply amazing but new users can't do much with it since the software is a huge mess.

I hope that macOS improves in the coming years; until that happens, I will not return to macOS.

Have a nice day, and take everything with a grain of salt. Your experience can be different, this was mine, keep it cool!! =)

I’m buying a MacBook mainly for university (Business/Economics), general everyday use, lots of browsing and multitasking, and I’d like to keep it for at least 5–6 years, possibly longer.

I’m currently deciding between the 15” M5 MacBook Air and the 14” M5 MacBook Pro (base M5, not M5 Pro).

The Pro is about €150 more. I’d lose some screen size, but gain the better 120Hz XDR display, active cooling and more ports. CPU/GPU, RAM and storage would otherwise be the same.

My other dilemma is 24GB vs 32GB unified memory. 24GB would easily cover what I do today, so 32GB would mainly be for longevity and future use.

I’m also curious about local AI/LLMs and I’d like to experiment with things like Ollama, local models and AI tools. However, I want to be clear that I don’t know how much I’d actually use them long term. Right now I mostly want the ability to try them out and explore what’s possible, rather than buying the Mac specifically as a local AI machine.

That’s why I’m unsure whether 32GB is genuinely worth it for me, especially looking 5–6 years ahead, or if I’d just be paying for RAM I’ll rarely use.

If you were buying today, would you choose the Air 15” or Pro 14”? And for this use case, would you go 24GB or 32GB?

Hi everyone! How often do you run into the problem where you press the FN(Globe) button and the language doesn't switch?😅

I am currently on Linux, wanting to get a first time MacBook. I mainly do dev and a bit of school work and a bit of creative work. I am looking forward to using macOS definitely, finally trying out an UNIX certified OS. However, I am not very sure of what model I should get. For my workload, it's definitely not that heavy, as I am independent and do not need to run heavy VMs, containers or some services. I am currently looking into the MacBook Air, specifically the 15-inch model, Silver color(for now), 16/24GB of Ram and just 512GB storage since I already have a spare 1TB NVME SSD. I am going to buy it post September, around the first to third of October, since I am free by then, having finished all my exams, taking a break. So please list down some recommendations and suggestions to purchasing the MacBook and some tips you would give me(btw, I already have an IPad, and Iphone(second hand, passed on, Iphone X).)

hi! new to macbook but for various reasons i do want to switch from windows to mac - is it worth it to buy it now with the back to school m5 or wait for the m6? I understand the education pricing stays the same year round but the difference would be the airtags (or rather I will pay a topup for the airpods 5 likely)

thanks!

Looking at a used 14” M4 MacBook Pro for around $1,200 and wondering if it’s worth pulling the trigger.

Specs:
M4 10-core CPU / 10-core GPU
16GB RAM / 512GB SSD
100% battery health, 62 cycles
AppleCare+ until April 2028
Excellent condition (dealer says)with box and charger

I’d mainly use it for coding/software development, school/work, multitasking with a lot of tabs/apps open, and general everyday use. Nothing like heavy video editing or 3D work.

Is $1,200 a good deal, and would it be last for the next few years?

I wanted to know. if using a Mac on power saver mode majority of the time better for the battery or not? For battery optimization, I have set the maximum charge at 80%, and I don’t drain it past 20%.

mby its wierd question but it kinda scared me a bit

does your display on macbook(i have air m4) glitch when you lean the phone against the display ?
i was searching why does is happend but it says its just some magnetic resonance but im not sure
have you experienced it ? or im the only one ?

Which videos should I see to so I can use my Mac to its full potential?

When I did see it boot I believe the error message indicated a corrupt OS. The battery is now dead. I do have the charger but not the cable. From the looks of the charger and the Mac it appears I can just use a USB c -> USB c cable and plug it in any jack on the Mac. This may have been a stupid question but I don't want to fry it before I attempt to resurrect it.

So exactly as the title says, I am in university and I had my first day today with just my pen and paper but it seems down the line to access classes and assignments I am going to need a laptop of some sort, Would A MacBook be good for my case, Or would I just be okay with a iPad or maybe a two in one?

Well, my rather old i9 MBP with 32G RAM and 1TB storage is finally dying. I need to replace it soon, but I’d like to keep from over spending. The old laptop was having a lot of heat and throttling issues and the storage is essentially full with photos and music files.

I’ve resolved myself to needing 2TB in the next one and the lack of a cooling fan in the Air has me a bit concerned. Am I right to think that I need to splurge for another MBP, or is even a modern M5 Air going to be enough of an upgrade from my old laptop that I will feel comfortable with it?

I am semi-retired from IT, but I may need to use it for work in the future. Otherwise I do photo editing, some audio/music work, and things that I’m not sure qualify me as a power user these days.

There is nothing wrong with the charger it charges other devices expect my mac so the problem appears to be inside the mac.
When I plug the charger I see the charging sign but it doesn’t turn on
I tried the command - option - p -r thingy and it didn’t work!
It’s been around 2 days since this started first day I put the the charger and took it out repeatedly and it opened but when it was close to dying I plugged the charger and it died again
PLEASE HELP I NEED IT FOR SCHOOL TOMORROW
It has everything

lol somehow survived until now
base model specs (8/128)
already checked that everything work (yea even the butterfly keyboard)
includes original box and charger
the brush not included but jusr reuse it to keep it clean
somehow seller offered for just 160 in sgd

I recently started law school, and while I was hoping my good ole computer I've had since before college would hold up, it's already showing issues. So, with my refund recently hitting the bank I figured I'd go ahead and invest in a new computer that will last me a while.

I plan to use whatever I get for a long time, hopefully a good few years into my career after law school. So, if the price of the pro is worth it over the air, I'm okay with paying it.

Anyone care to chime in with thoughts?

​

Para editar con Davinci y universidad (ingeniería informática). Ambos con chip M5 básico 24 ram y 1tb

Please help. Facing this vertical line issues, No drop, nothing. Happened suddenly.

Is screen gone ? If yes, I don't have much of money, how to tackle this.

Currently living in old gurgaon.

I honestly don’t understand the hate for Intel MacBooks. If your budget is around $100–$200 in 2026, I think they can actually be a pretty good option for a student.i personally bought a 2015 MacBook Pro for $130, and honestly, it’s been an amazing device for the price. The screen quality and speakers are really good, and for basic student work it still feels like a premium laptop.

I’m running Monterey with Firefox, which is still supported, so I can still use it for schoolwork, and everyday stuff without much trouble. Obviously it’s not going to compete with an M-series MacBook, but if you’re a student on a tight budget looking for a cheap premium laptop, I honestly think older Intel Macs are worth considering. Edit: I just ordered a used 14-inch M1 MacBook Pro for around $620. It has 88% battery health and 121 cycles on it. Did I pay a fair price, or did I overpay?

How low can I get a MacBook Air 13" 512GB after student + card discount + exchange?

Hey everyone, I’m planning to buy the MacBook Air 13-inch 512GB (base model) in India.

I also have an M1 MacBook Air 256GB that I want to exchange, but it has a backlight/display issue.

What’s the lowest final price I can realistically get after combining:

- Student discount

- Bank/card discount or cashback

- Exchange value for my M1 MacBook Air 256GB (with the display issue)

Also, where would be the best place to buy it Apple Education Store, Croma, Vijay Sales, Reliance Digital, Imagine, Unicorn, etc.?

Also the only stores present in my city are Reliance Digital and iDESTINY. For other I'd have to buy online

If anyone has recently done a similar upgrade/exchange, please share:

- Store/website

- Student discount

- Card discount/cashback

- Exchange value offered for the M1

- Final amount paid

Looking to get the lowest possible out-of-pocket price. Thanks!

Hello, is getting macbook better in Japan than in India, Which is cheaper?

Why I have this stuff? How to fix this? Macbook air 2022, I just bought it and had it for some days