Episode: 2457
Title: HPR2457: Getting ready for my new Macbook Pro
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr2457/hpr2457.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-19 03:27:59

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This is HPR episode 2457 entitled Getting Ready for My New MacBook Pro.
It is hosted by ITWI and is about 19 minutes long and can remain a explicit flag.
The summary is ITWI is about ordering a new MacBook Pro and share some tips and tricks.
This episode of HPR is brought to you by an honesthost.com.
At 15% discount on all shared hosting with the offer code HPR15, that's HPR15.
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Hey there, Hacker Public Radio.
This is Nightwise from the Nightwise.com podcast calling in with another random show.
Now excuse the road noise.
The little soft tapping that you might hear, which sounds like the rustling of fire in
an open fireplace is not my car burning down, but me driving through the rain.
On holy maintains rainy Belgian freeways towards an appointment that I have a little bit later on.
So please excuse me for the road noise.
I will keep it down to a minimum and I will entertain you with some content instead.
So what I wanted to talk about today is the preparations that I'm doing to get my new laptop.
As you know, I'm a cross-platform slider.
I am constantly on either a Linux machine or a Windows machine or a Mac.
And I regularly update my devices.
I'm a freelance consultant, so the MacBook Pro that I bought for my company that I've used
over the last three years was complete right off from my taxes, so it was time to upgrade
it.
And within a few days, hopefully a week or two, I'm going to be getting my MacBook Pro.
My new MacBook Pro.
What an order.
I ordered a 13-inch MacBook Pro I5 with a 3.1 gigahertz processor 16 gigabytes of RAM
and a 512 gigabytes SSD drive.
I know what you're going to say, oops, above the 2000-year-old mark, that is an expensive device.
Yes, it is.
It is an expensive device, but swaying the pros and cons against each other, it is still
a viable purchase for me to make.
It's a good right off and it has good resale value.
As I noticed, when I sold off my own MacBook Pro 3-years-old last week, for half the price,
which is pretty good for a computer, I dare you to do the same with the Toshiba or an
Acer or Lenovo for that part.
So that being said, the new MacBook is on the way.
So after spending hours online choosing the right model, reading all the reviews, watching
YouTube videos of over enthusiastic vlogging half-gods, you talk about their Mac and what
they do with it, I was convinced that yes, the MacBook Pro is the next Mac for me, although
I was in a phase of a little bit of having a doubt if I would ever buy another Mac again.
But yes, I will have to yield and I will go for the new Apple device with zero USB-A
ports, zero thunderbolt ports, zero display ports, and all nice USB-C ports, four of them
that being the case, not like with the MacBook, where there is actually zero, oh no, one.
Yeah, I read the reviews, I listened to what people had to say about it, the doubts that
they had, the comments that they made, but in the end, hell, it's a working machine.
I do a lot of multimedia things, I do videos, not as much as I would like to, but I'm going
to do more.
I do, let's see, I do audio productions, I do presentations, and for that I use a Mac
because it's the most reliable platform to go with, at least, onto this day.
So that wraps up the choice of device, and I want looking to find a good reseller who
can help.
We get one.
Here's the funny part, in your consumer protection and warranty isn't like what it's
like with the U-Americans, where you can basically return the product after buying it, having
dinner with it, having had intercourse with it and bringing it back.
Here, no, you just can't do that, you can't just turn the device back in to the retailer.
And on the other hand, there is also the issue of warranty.
Europe has a very good deal, and us as a consumer get two years of full warranty on any
electronic device, which is great, Apple being Apple just offers you two, if you really
want to, because you're a consumer, then you get two, but if you buy Apple care, then
you get three, but actually you get one, especially if you own a business, then you get
one, one year, I don't know why, I suppose because I use my MacBook Pro to deep trenches,
getting ready for World War III, or I use it as a baseball bat, I don't know, what professional
use versus, well, Lehman's use differs in, all I know is that I only get a one year warranty
from Apple, and I don't like that, yes you can buy Apple care, yes I can buy Apple
care, I will legally buy something that I am, I will financially buy something that
I am legally entitled to, two years of warranty, screw you, Cupertino, looking around a little
bit, I found an online reseller, coolblue.nl, which is a Dutch online electronic shop,
kind of like the Amazon, but then for electronics, who have a very good service, who give you
a pretty good price, you know, the price is all the same, it's the Apple price, there
it is, but they offer you two years of warranty, even if you are a business, so that's where
I'm going to get it, I'm going to get my MacBook Pro there, so I have two years of warranty,
that's what I want, that being said, I am still excruciately careful with my devices, I
kind of shut up, when I see people just shove their laptops into a bag, sometimes not
even a laptop bag, just a plain bag, it gives me the Yibi Yibi GB, I really don't like
it, because, you know, your device gets scratched and damaged, and I know what you're going
to say, but likewise, that's what the thing is for, and you are correct, partially, that's
what the device is for, it's meant to be used, and if there are usage marks on the device,
well, hence that's the fact that it's been used, but even so, I don't like it, one, because
as I said, I am very neat about my devices, I hate the sight of dinged up scratched and
dented laptops, and I even hate the fact of dirty laptops, I hate that more, people who
just keyboard looks like, I don't know, manure truck went over on it, I don't know, I absolutely
discussed that, so I hate a dirty computer, and I hate a dinged up laptop, so I like to
protect my devices for one other reason, that is, resale value, aha, of course, I'm planning
on selling this Mac three years down the road to the next Apple enthusiast who's going
to be more than happy with a three year old device, that looks brand spanking you, that's
why I keep the box, I keep the files, I keep the wrappers, I keep the elastic bands, I
keep the invoice, I keep everything, so it, and I also keep my Mac in pristine condition
by using a case or a cover, in this case I went, this case, not intended, I looked around
a little bit at the Urban Armor gear case for the MacBook Pro, which makes your very
elegantly Johnny Ives designed MacBook Pro look like a tank, and it's cool, it's really
cool, but it also makes it look like a tough book, and it adds quite a bit of thickness and
a bit of weight to the MacBook Pro, which I don't despise, I like my devices to be tough
and well protected, but, you know, they don't have to be too thick, and there are some
issues about the Urban Armor tough case that I don't really like that much, so I decided
perhaps I can go for something else.
The other alternative that I have was the a case from Moshe, Moshe makes, makes good
stuff, makes, makes very nice screen covers and keyboard covers for MacBooks, but they
also make a case, and this is one of those silicone snap them around, doesn't add a lot
of weight to your Mac if you don't really notice, you don't notice it's there, cases.
Nice, pretty, even add some room for a nice decal on the Mac, which I'm going to put
on there, I've also got some ideas on my head which I can use, so happy with that, but
as for protection, there's not a lot of protection there, it protects it against scratches and
stuff, that'll be fine, but, you know, things and drops, idiot, sorry, stupid guy with
car trying to get in my way, as opposed to dropping it, it's not going to protect it
that much, so I kind of went like, maybe not, so I went for something in between that resembled
a fool bumper that I bought on my previous Mac, now this is a black bumper for around
your Mac, so you snap it on the top and the bottom, and it kind of makes your Mac a little
thicker, it makes it a little easier to grip, and it also protects it when, you know, you
drop it, and oh they've got great videos on the fool website about this product, and
it's absolutely horrifying, you know, the slow-mo crash videos of a very expensive MacBook
hitting the ground and like shattering, and it's really, you know, if you're into that
thing, it's cool, but, I don't want that to happen, so I bought a second fool case for
this MacBook Pro, because the old one of course doesn't fit, and I sold it off with my
old MacBook Pro, so I used that for, I used that for cover, and then I went for a screen
cover, because quite frankly, I think that it should have one, I saw a coworker of mine
who had a mushy, mushy, not mushy, mushy, mushy screen cover over his MacBook Air, added
protection against scratches and figures and stuff like that, but it also gives it a little
bit of a matte shine, sorry, and that's something I like, because I hate absolutely the test
the glossy Mac screens, I don't like it, I don't like glossy screens, period, I don't
know why we should have glossy screens, there is no added value to add reflection, so
you can't have, you know, if I buy glasses, they don't say, you know, we have angi-reflective
ones, and we have glossy ones, so let's take the glossy ones, there's like light reflection
you know, all over the place, but hey, it's glossy, so I don't understand why, so I ordered
me one of those, I ordered me a mushy, I visor screen guard, which gives my little new
MacBook Pro a little bit of a matte shine and protects the screen, so, warranty covered
two years, case and look and feel of the Mac, you know, structural integrity covered,
we've got a bumper case for that, screen optimization for matte screen and anti-scratches
covered, so all right, aside from, you know, wrapping it in a, I don't know, a mattress,
I think I've predicted my MacBook as good as I can, now it's time for cables, because
this is USB-C, you need an adapter, you basically need an adapter for everything, you even
need an adapter for other Apple products, which is insane, but hey, that's what it is,
and this is where our lovely little, Oli-Baba-based adapter resellers really go to town, if you're
going to buy an adapter at the store, where you get the Mac, my god, their profit margins
that they lack on the MacBook Pros is going to be, I don't know, quadrupled on whatever
accessory they can sell you, yes, don't ever buy your accessories at the Apple store or
at a store, that sells Apple products, because that's where their profit margin is, and you
pay too much, so you went online, went looking around and then nearly got a heart attack,
some of these adapters cost like 40 euros, 60 euros, 90 euros, and let's see, how much
was the most expensive, oh yeah, 149 euros for an adapter that's pretty much provided
me with USB-2 to everything, so not parallel ice scusy ports or something, but pretty close,
I decided that was too much, it's too expensive, I'm not going to spend that on a stupid adapter,
so I looked and I said which are the ports that my Mac has right now that I use the most,
and those are my Thunderbolt 2 connectors, and of course my USB connector, so what I did
is I ordered two of them, two of each, so I've got a Thunderbolt connector, USB-C to Thunder
bolt connector, on which I will connect my screen, I've got a big 25 inch display port driven
blip Dell UltraShark, and a USB-C to USB-A adapter, which is connected to my USB-3 hub
on the back of that screen, and with these two connectors playing them in, I can basically do
everything that I want, so I only have need for that, because all of the other accessories I have,
so it's pointless to buy an adapter that is also converting to HDMI, and that is also converting
to SD card, and it is also converting to, I don't know, VGA, I have all of these adapters,
Thunderbolt 2, all of these adapters, so all of these adapters that have this little brick that
has a VGA, HDMI, DVI, and mini display port connection, which I take with me when I go on public
speaking tours to make sure that I can just about connect my Mac to everything, and I just connect
that one to the USB-C to Thunderbolt connector, and boom, it works. Yes, I know, I'm Daisy Chaining,
but I don't want to buy yet another bunch of connectors just because I bought a new Mac,
so I'll try to keep, you know, perhaps over the course of time, I will replace those adapters
that I use the most, but for now, USB-C to USB, and USB-C to Thunderbolt is all that I need,
I have one pair for home, and one pair which is permanently settled in my bag, so I can connect
to whatever I need to connect to, period, and well, that is actually all that I'm buying
to get ready for my Mac, this is the whole package I think that, including taxes, it brings me to
about 2,400 euros. I bought a lot of the connectors on Amazon because they're basically cheaper there,
and I only bought the Moshe case at the online retailer where I'm getting the Mac because I
wasn't really sure if the screen would fit, and I didn't feel like returning stuff to Amazon
in Germany, so because we don't have an Amazon in Belgium, we have to shop at Amazon Germany,
which is basically, you know, powerful. So good, that all being said and done, I am complete
you're ready to receive my Mac, and now it's of course a fact of how do I set it up? A lot of
people kind of copy the data from their old Mac to their new Mac, I never do that, I despise
that, if I have the chance to do a clean install, I will do it. Luckily I have found out a cool trick
to install all of the apps that I need without, you know, a major hassle. So when my Mac arrives,
I will boot it, I will run all of the updates, and then I will go to the store, and I will go to
the purchased tab of my app store app, and click on all the applications that I use, they get
downloaded and installed automatically. As they are doing this, I am installing HomeBrew. HomeBrew
is a command line tool for the Mac that lets you install apps via the command line. For example,
Linux apps, like it lets you install IRSSI, it lets you install SSH Apple, it lets you install
MPS YouTube, all of the cool command line apps that you have on Linux, bam, you can install them
on your Mac using HomeBrew. And then there is a second command line tool that I install, and that
is Cask, which is an extension from HomeBrew, and which will do what app get us with apps. It will
download the latest version of a shitload of popular apps, and all you have to do is say like
app cask install, I will put the links in the show notes to give you the right command line syntax
because I don't like to read them out on a podcast, it's too darn boring. But you just type
cask install, and then the name of the application cask install Google Chrome, Firefox,
FileZilla, Spotify, Clementine, Audio, Audacity, and so forth and so forth, and it will all
install them to your applications, it will download them, it will unpack them, it will put them in
their application folder and boom it's there. So I have already made this one big script that
installs basically everything. So when my Mac arrives, as I'm downloading apps from the store,
I'm going to run this script so it will install all of my applications, and all I need to do when
it's done is make sure that my preferences are in place, that I've got my icons just right,
that I've got the right tools on my toolbar, and that I've picked the right wallpaper, and then
my new Mac is ready to go, and this is how I roll. I hope I inspired you a little bit,
give you some ideas, perhaps if you're going to buy a Mac, or perhaps if you want to re-boot
nuke your Mac, a boot nuke nut, no, nuke and pave, sorry, nuke and pave your Mac,
perhaps there will be some interesting tips in there. Well, I hope you enjoyed the show,
until next time, this was Nightwise, signing off, signing off.
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