2017 Apple Store experience

[Kaido]

Visited one of the local Apple Stores for an iPhone issue today. Thoughts: (warning, I'm gonna be kinda whiny)

1. Awkwardly creepy. The original ultra-clean store designs were cool, but at least at this store (a newer one), everything was...waaaaaaay too pristine. Every shelf was perfectly stocked. All of the boxes from all of the vendors met a certain white design criteria. I used to like stopping by the Apple Store to check things out but it felt really...weird.

2. No bathrooms. No place to sit. They don't even have a Genius Bar anymore...they just disappear behind a door that is the same color as the wall to fix your stuff. Like I said, kinda creepy lol. And annoying, if you have to spend any amount of time in one!

3. The new Mac Pro absolutely looks like a shiny metal trash can

4. Not impressed with the iPad Pro's stylus. Not very responsive. I've been a Wacom Intuos users for years; was expecting better.

5. The LG 5K display was glorious. Odd that it was black & not silver. Image quality was great though. Really really great. Retina-quality great. I want one!

6. I still can't believe they haven't updated the Mac Mini. It looks super out of place next to everything. Intel is killing it with the new NUC (NVMe, 32GB RAM, 4K, i7, etc.). Hopefully Apple updates it this month...

7. Biggest surprise to me was the OLED touchbar on the new Macbook Pro laptops. It actually works awesome! Zero lag, great graphics & animations...I could see actually being super useful if you're not a keyboard shortcut person. Stuff like rotating photos worked great!

8. Not to be super judgemental, but they had a class going on for teaching OS X...everyone at that table would be far better off (including the teacher) if the iMacs & Macbooks ran iOS, as much as I hate to say (or imagine) that. But with how things have been going (Mac App Store, neutering Final Cut, killing off Aperture & Shake before that, etc.), why not right?

I used to be a huge Apple fanboy & ate it all up when Steve Jobs was still alive. It feels like they've halted all progress with innovative development since then. I still prefer iPhones (Androids feel like too much of a computer to me & I feel like they're even more insecure than a Windows machine at this point), but with even Dell coming out with twice as awesome laptop designs at half the price, it's hard to get really enthusiastic about Apple these days. It's 2017 & the iPhones aren't even waterproof, you know?

TL;DR: The Apple Store has crossed the line to weirdness. OLED touchbar turned out to be amazing. Kinda want to put a NUC in a trashcan & call it a Hack Pro.

 

[Commodus]

Visited one of the local Apple Stores for an iPhone issue today. Thoughts: (warning, I'm gonna be kinda whiny)

1. Awkwardly creepy. The original ultra-clean store designs were cool, but at least at this store (a newer one), everything was...waaaaaaay too pristine. Every shelf was perfectly stocked. All of the boxes from all of the vendors met a certain white design criteria. I used to like stopping by the Apple Store to check things out but it felt really...weird.

2. No bathrooms. No place to sit. They don't even have a Genius Bar anymore...they just disappear behind a door that is the same color as the wall to fix your stuff. Like I said, kinda creepy lol. And annoying, if you have to spend any amount of time in one!

3. The new Mac Pro absolutely looks like a shiny metal trash can

4. Not impressed with the iPad Pro's stylus. Not very responsive. I've been a Wacom Intuos users for years; was expecting better.

5. The LG 5K display was glorious. Odd that it was black & not silver. Image quality was great though. Really really great. Retina-quality great. I want one!

6. I still can't believe they haven't updated the Mac Mini. It looks super out of place next to everything. Intel is killing it with the new NUC (NVMe, 32GB RAM, 4K, i7, etc.). Hopefully Apple updates it this month...

7. Biggest surprise to me was the OLED touchbar on the new Macbook Pro laptops. It actually works awesome! Zero lag, great graphics & animations...I could see actually being super useful if you're not a keyboard shortcut person. Stuff like rotating photos worked great!

8. Not to be super judgemental, but they had a class going on for teaching OS X...everyone at that table would be far better off (including the teacher) if the iMacs & Macbooks ran iOS, as much as I hate to say (or imagine) that. But with how things have been going (Mac App Store, neutering Final Cut, killing off Aperture & Shake before that, etc.), why not right?

I used to be a huge Apple fanboy & ate it all up when Steve Jobs was still alive. It feels like they've halted all progress with innovative development since then. I still prefer iPhones (Androids feel like too much of a computer to me & I feel like they're even more insecure than a Windows machine at this point), but with even Dell coming out with twice as awesome laptop designs at half the price, it's hard to get really enthusiastic about Apple these days. It's 2017 & the iPhones aren't even waterproof, you know?

TL;DR: The Apple Store has crossed the line to weirdness. OLED touchbar turned out to be amazing. Kinda want to put a NUC in a trashcan & call it a Hack Pro.

Touching on a few of those:

3. Not so new when they were released in 2013! I believe there's been murmurs of Apple finally releasing a new pro machine this year, but it could be a while.

5. Wouldn't be surprised if it's the same panel as in the 5K iMac (which I'm using to write this).

6. If the Mac mini carries on, it likely needs Kaby Lake (to move to Thunderbolt 3) -- that wasn't an option at all until January. Not sure Broadwell or Skylake would've accomplished much.

As for the rest: how about the Apple Watch? Smartwatches aren't a huge sector right now, but the Apple Watch is still considered the gold standard in terms of the combination of hardware and software. Also, the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus are waterproof! Well, water resistant, but in the same way as the best phones on the market (that is, you can submerse them entirely for extended periods).

 

[Tegeril]

Visited one of the local Apple Stores for an iPhone issue today. Thoughts: (warning, I'm gonna be kinda whiny)

1. Awkwardly creepy. The original ultra-clean store designs were cool, but at least at this store (a newer one), everything was...waaaaaaay too pristine. Every shelf was perfectly stocked. All of the boxes from all of the vendors met a certain white design criteria. I used to like stopping by the Apple Store to check things out but it felt really...weird.

2. No bathrooms. No place to sit. They don't even have a Genius Bar anymore...they just disappear behind a door that is the same color as the wall to fix your stuff. Like I said, kinda creepy lol. And annoying, if you have to spend any amount of time in one!

3. The new Mac Pro absolutely looks like a shiny metal trash can

4. Not impressed with the iPad Pro's stylus. Not very responsive. I've been a Wacom Intuos users for years; was expecting better.

5. The LG 5K display was glorious. Odd that it was black & not silver. Image quality was great though. Really really great. Retina-quality great. I want one!

6. I still can't believe they haven't updated the Mac Mini. It looks super out of place next to everything. Intel is killing it with the new NUC (NVMe, 32GB RAM, 4K, i7, etc.). Hopefully Apple updates it this month...

7. Biggest surprise to me was the OLED touchbar on the new Macbook Pro laptops. It actually works awesome! Zero lag, great graphics & animations...I could see actually being super useful if you're not a keyboard shortcut person. Stuff like rotating photos worked great!

8. Not to be super judgemental, but they had a class going on for teaching OS X...everyone at that table would be far better off (including the teacher) if the iMacs & Macbooks ran iOS, as much as I hate to say (or imagine) that. But with how things have been going (Mac App Store, neutering Final Cut, killing off Aperture & Shake before that, etc.), why not right?

I used to be a huge Apple fanboy & ate it all up when Steve Jobs was still alive. It feels like they've halted all progress with innovative development since then. I still prefer iPhones (Androids feel like too much of a computer to me & I feel like they're even more insecure than a Windows machine at this point), but with even Dell coming out with twice as awesome laptop designs at half the price, it's hard to get really enthusiastic about Apple these days. It's 2017 & the iPhones aren't even waterproof, you know?

TL;DR: The Apple Store has crossed the line to weirdness. OLED touchbar turned out to be amazing. Kinda want to put a NUC in a trashcan & call it a Hack Pro.

1. I don't find this necessarily creepy. It's just very ... very organized.

2: Maybe just that store. All the modern ones modeled after the grove style that I've been in have *tons* of seating all around that can be moved throughout the store (SF, London, others). They also do have bathrooms but they tend to be through a random non-descript door. The grove style basically sets up certain unlabeled tables for service...they seem to have just decided to make the space feel less like a bar. I dunno if I think it's better or worse, just different.

4. I agree. I find it to be no better than the previous best options on the market. I'm looking forward to advancements with pencil mark 2.

5. I agree, though the 21.5" 4k one is too small

6. I love my mini and would love to see a good update.

7. Typing this on a touchbar MBP... I actually find it more responsive than the pencil. My hopes are up for future iterations on that thing.

 

[Ichinisan]

3. The new Mac Pro absolutely looks like a shiny metal trash can

"New?"

It's 2017 & the iPhones aren't even waterproof, you know?

Where've you been? They're pretty much waterproof. Even the iPhone 6s was highly water resistant (Apple didn't advertise that feature). No coincidence they became much more water resistant when Apple started the "iPhone every year" program. It seems Apple doesn't want to encourage people to expose devices to water, so they downplay the water resistance feature. A seal can be compromised countless ways, but the iPhone is pretty much waterproof.

 

[Zaap]

"New?"

That was my thought. Then I thought: "necro? Nope, 2017". Then I thought: "Wait, did I miss something?! Apple came out with a new Mac Pro?! Finally?"

Alas, nope.

 

[Eug]

I find the Apple Stores too chaotic these days. Too many people, and no structure.

 

[Kaido]

Touching on a few of those:

3. Not so new when they were released in 2013! I believe there's been murmurs of Apple finally releasing a new pro machine this year, but it could be a while.

5. Wouldn't be surprised if it's the same panel as in the 5K iMac (which I'm using to write this).

6. If the Mac mini carries on, it likely needs Kaby Lake (to move to Thunderbolt 3) -- that wasn't an option at all until January. Not sure Broadwell or Skylake would've accomplished much.

As for the rest: how about the Apple Watch? Smartwatches aren't a huge sector right now, but the Apple Watch is still considered the gold standard in terms of the combination of hardware and software. Also, the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus are waterproof! Well, water resistant, but in the same way as the best phones on the market (that is, you can submerse them entirely for extended periods).

New to me is the trash can ones, old is the tower ones. Maybe they'll release an update, but I'd imagine they'll just use the same chassis due to the compact size & thermal design.

The 5K iMac is glorious, my friend has one. Really really great screen. The LG is also excellent. It's great to see Retina-quality in a monitor! Just wish we had that in VR haha.

I think they could do amazing things with a Kaby Lake Mac Mini, especially with how compact you can make the new GTX1000 series of chips. They could be a serious contender in the gaming market if they wanted to be!

Personally, I am not a huge watch or jewelry fan. I don't even like wearing my Fitbit, tbh. They do have some nice-looking bands, but I just have no use for an Apple Watch. I mostly just have a Fitbit to stay within my target heartrate zone.

Yeah, regarding water resistance, I'm curious if they'll really come out with a 100% sealed iPhone with something like Qi charging, traducer or bone conduction speakers, etc. They've already dumped the headphone jack & haven't gone to USB 3.0 on most of their iOS devices (iirc only the iPad Pro & iPhone 7 Plus, not the regular 7, support USB3 speeds). Why not go the extra mile & just make the whole thing a solid slate?

 

[Kaido]

1. I don't find this necessarily creepy. It's just very ... very organized.

2: Maybe just that store. All the modern ones modeled after the grove style that I've been in have *tons* of seating all around that can be moved throughout the store (SF, London, others). They also do have bathrooms but they tend to be through a random non-descript door. The grove style basically sets up certain unlabeled tables for service...they seem to have just decided to make the space feel less like a bar. I dunno if I think it's better or worse, just different.

4. I agree. I find it to be no better than the previous best options on the market. I'm looking forward to advancements with pencil mark 2.

5. I agree, though the 21.5" 4k one is too small

6. I love my mini and would love to see a good update.

7. Typing this on a touchbar MBP... I actually find it more responsive than the pencil. My hopes are up for future iterations on that thing.

This was a newer-built store (aluminum-style walls & lots of glass). There was only one door in the back, for the employees to take your equipment into to fix (I had to wait a long time between testing my phone so I wandered). It had a very weird vibe. I like the older-style stores where the environment had a warmer feel haha. I know it's a minor thing to whine about in relation to buying hardware, but it had kind of an Orwellian feel going on lol.

Yeah, I thought the Apple Pen would be like, super responsive. It doesn't even touch a Bamboo imo, let alone an Intuos. Kinda odd given all of the competition that Wacom has, from the Cintiq Pro (now available in 4K) to the standalone MobileStudio Pro tablets.

Although 4K @ 21.5" is too small, it looked great with OS X. Windows is awful with small 4K screens. Heck, or big 4K screens. Sadly, Windows 7 looks better than Windows 10 does in 4K too. I setup a lot of digital signage machines & even though Windows 10 has better scaling (well, ish), Windows 7 renders fonts & other stuff better and looks better overall. The 27" 5K is a much better size; I'm actually surprised they don't offer anything bigger (or curved, or ultra-widescreen, etc.).

Again with the Mac Mini, a lot of people want a Mac but can't afford $1,000+ for a laptop or iMac, but the design is super dated at this point & a 1.4ghz i5 doesn't sound super appealing to me when there are way better options out there. Although they just dropped the 500gb Mini to $399 at Best Buy, so it is crazy affordable for a "new" Mac:

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/apple-m...z-4gb-memory-500gb-hard-drive-white/7814097.p

Yeah again with the OLED touchbar...as much as I laughed about that in the launch thread, they really did do a stellar job on it. If I wasn't a keyboard shortcut guy, I would be using it all the time if I had one. It looks great, it feels great, graphics are great, animation is great, responsiveness is great, zero complaints having actually used it now. It would be really awesome if they released like a Magic Touchpad that was a giant OLED touchbar with custom buttons & gestures, and also put the same one in the MBP. Even one for the desktop would be pretty cool, especially for non-technical users, like this rendering:

 

[Kaido]

"New?"


Where've you been? They're pretty much waterproof. Even the iPhone 6s was highly water resistant (Apple didn't advertise that feature). No coincidence they became much more water resistant when Apple started the "iPhone every year" program. It seems Apple doesn't want to encourage people to expose devices to water, so they downplay the water resistance feature. A seal can be compromised countless ways, but the iPhone is pretty much waterproof.

Yeah, I still differentiate the trash can as new & the tower as old, haha.

Water resistant, sure, but like I said earlier, why not go the extra mile & make it completely waterproof? I'm curious to see what they do in the iPhone 8. A 100% sealed phone would be really amazing!

 

[Kaido]

That was my thought. Then I thought: "necro? Nope, 2017". Then I thought: "Wait, did I miss something?! Apple came out with a new Mac Pro?! Finally?"

Alas, nope.

Kinda hard to believe the MP trash can has been out that long!

And sorry to get your hopes up

 

[Commodus]

Personally, I am not a huge watch or jewelry fan. I don't even like wearing my Fitbit, tbh. They do have some nice-looking bands, but I just have no use for an Apple Watch. I mostly just have a Fitbit to stay within my target heartrate zone.

Yeah, regarding water resistance, I'm curious if they'll really come out with a 100% sealed iPhone with something like Qi charging, traducer or bone conduction speakers, etc. They've already dumped the headphone jack & haven't gone to USB 3.0 on most of their iOS devices (iirc only the iPad Pro & iPhone 7 Plus, not the regular 7, support USB3 speeds). Why not go the extra mile & just make the whole thing a solid slate?

I'd still say the Apple Watch is an example of the company being innovative... even if the concept of a smartwatch wasn't new, Apple made it relatively practical and accessible.

And to me, the Watch is sort of a life companion. I use it for fitness, of course, but it's also really good for triaging email (do I really need to pull my phone out of my pocket?), basic responses to messages (and even calls), checking mass transit times and controlling my home lighting with my voice. It's considerably more expensive than a Fitbit, but there are also many more reasons to use it.

(With that said: unless you're a big runner or swimmer, the lower-cost Series 1 is the better value.)

On water resistance, I don't see there being a need for a fully sealed iPhone yet. Wireless charging is still relatively slow, so it's not as practical as the exclusive charging method for something as large as a phone. That and there may be a negligible benefit when you can already seal ports well enough that they're waterproof for all intents and purposes.

 

[Kaido]

I find the Apple Stores too chaotic these days. Too many people, and no structure.

Yes. It wasn't NY-crowded, but it was lot of people standing around. The employee's shirts also don't make them stand out, so it was hard to tell who worked there & who didn't. And because there's no structure, it was like going to Best Buy...employee after employee would come up & ask me if I needed help when they were already working on my phone in the back. I liked the old style of having the big screen with the next person in line's name on it & having a Genius Bar in the back, made it easier!

 

[Zaap]

Kinda hard to believe the MP trash can has been out that long!

And sorry to get your hopes up

Heh, even if there was a new Mac Pro out... I'd still be gladly using my Hackintoshes! It'll be 10 years this year since my first, and STILL haven't looked back!

 

[Kaido]

Heh, even if there was a new Mac Pro out... I'd still be gladly using my Hackintoshes! It'll be 10 years this year since my first, and STILL haven't looked back!

I'd upgrade mine, but it hasn't crashed in like 6 years, sooooooo...

 

[Spicedaddy]

The one nearest to me is usually full with 99% of the people there for a problem with their iPhone.

I don't buy much from there except for accessories. I usually pay with my iPhone through the Apple Store app and walk in and out without talking to anyone.

 

[ultimatebob]

A 2017 Apple Store experience feels an awful lot like a 2015 Apple Store experience. It's like many products have just stood still for the past two years.

 

[Kaido]

The one nearest to me is usually full with 99% of the people there for a problem with their iPhone.

I don't buy much from there except for accessories. I usually pay with my iPhone through the Apple Store app and walk in and out without talking to anyone.

Pretty much everyone there was in there with a problem with their iPhone. One or two people with Macbook issues.

 

[Kaido]

A 2017 Apple Store experience feels an awful lot like a 2015 Apple Store experience. It's like many products have just stood still for the past two years.

I miss the heydey of the Apple comeback with Steve Jobs. Their events were like nerd Christmas

"One more thing!"

 

[ultimatebob]

My closest Apple Store is the in the Yale campus, so there are plenty of rich kids with broken MacBook Pro's as well.

Nobody seems that interested in the Apple Watch, though.

 

[Oyeve]

I always get hives when I go in one.

 

[HexiumVII]

The 6S line is very much not waterproof/resistant . They did add sticky tape around the front frame. But i get more 6S phones in for water damage than the 6.

 

[Ichinisan]

The 6S line is very much not waterproof/resistant . They did add sticky tape around the front frame. But i get more 6S phones in for water damage than the 6.

It has some kind of spray coating on the board and little rubbery foam bits to keep water away from the internal flat cable connectors.


Multiple torture tests at launch shows 6s/6s-Plus submerged for many hours and come out working 100%.

Apple didn't advertise water resistance that generation because they didn't want people deliberately exposing it to water. Compared with the 7/7-Plus, Apple didn't do as much at that point to keep water out of the device. Water could still get inside, but it was less likely to damage anything in there.

I'm sure water often got past those super-basic rubbery foam things, but I bet water damage incidents for 6s/6s-Plus were drastically reduced compared to the 6/6-Plus. It doesn't make any sense that you would get more.

I think some other design defect is probably being attributed to "water damage."

https://www.wired.com/2015/10/waterproof-iphone-6s/

http://appleinsider.com/articles/15...rproofing-via-vapor-deposition-silicone-seals