Nitpick: those are (sharp) edges, not corners. Maybe the next generation of MacBooks will also actually have exactly 90° non-rounded corners? I guess that's the next logical step...
Also, TIL that Bosch also makes files. I was under the impression that they only made powertools (or electronic measuring devices, or other things with a battery or power cord).
You mentioned Bosch and I can't think of anywhere or anyone else who'd be interested in this little bit of trivia, so a random comment on a thread about filing the edges off a laptop seems like a fitting place to share it.
Bosch dates their appliances using a thing called the Fertigungsdatum Number. The first two digits represent the year of manufacture, the second two are for the month. Except the year doesn't align with the actual year, you first have to add 20. Why 20? Well, Bosch first started using their internal dating system back in 1920 and appliances from that year started with the code "00". I had an oven that had a date of "7808", which means it was manufactured in August 1998 (it lasted almost 30 years before we finally had to replace it last month).
In 2020 the system wound back around and started with "00" again.
Their main bread and butter is components for cars and ebikes, their (power) tools / DIY stuff is like 22% of their business. Or so I learned just now.
Great article and happy to see that I'm not alone. I don't get why on such a well thought-out and built device as this, the corners are so sharp.
From how I use the trackpad, the bottom of my thumb always feels sore-ish after a day's work and it took me a while to trace this to the sharp cornern of my macbook.
I love the animation on the background of your website.
And I totally understand what you mean about using a tool, if it's too delicate to do the job, then it's not doing its job. Imagine buying a hammer and trying to keep it clear of scuffs, it's obviously going to impede your work.
Yeah I think the grief OP was getting over that statement in some of the other comments is unwarranted, I understand completely what they mean about tools. You have people who buy expensive guitars and barely play them for fear of scuffing them for example, depriving themselves and the tool of the thing it's actually for. I'll never understand that mentality.
I don't like to be precious about my tools either, scratches and so on are evidence it's being used for what it's made for!
...and don't even get me started on people who buy a Rolex Submariner - the quintessential tool watch (and luxury symbol, by all means - but it wasn't always so) and then ask whether they should take any special precautions after accidentally showering with it...
I'm probably missing something here but if I have to worry about getting an expensive watch that calls it "Submariner" wet of all things, at the very least, it's badly named.
I think the bigger point is that people think they “afford” a luxury item as soon as they barely afford to buy it and forget that owning also has a cost. They are too afraid to use the damn thing out of fear that they damage it somehow. Their luxury item loses all meaning and use beyond showing ownership of an expensive thing.
Thanks for the encouragement, glad you like the background :-) Yeah I phrased it a bit badly initially. But what I meant was pretty much what you stated!
I bought a 1973 Fender Jazzmaster that was immaculate and should have been my forever guitar. I was so afraid of "ruining the value" that I sold it. I couldn't play it, I was so paranoid. It got into my head. Instead, I ended up buying a '65 AVRI Jazzmaster body and put on an EGC aluminum neck and a Tuffset bridge. The price was about 2/3 of the vintage one, but I have no qualms about playing this one. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
You remind me of Nigel Tufnel of the Spinal Tap rockumentary fame and his guitar collection. The clip on Youtube is a must watch if you're not seen it.
That contains mostly placeholder stuff from Wikipedia and does not go much into detail, I didn't get around to finishing it yet. I'll try to write it up in more detail
Never knew that there are more people like me who get irked at such things. But yeah, I do not have the heart to do this to my laptop, so I end up using my laptop on a solid surface xD
Maybe I drank the cool-aid, but I like the corners on my Mac, and it took a lot of empathy from me to accept “the other” authors filing job, but this looks beautiful.
This is my number one complaint about the M-series MBP line. Especially true of the cutout in the middle that has points so sharp they can cut you if you accidentally scrape it with your hand.
I hate the vents on my work macbook, when I rest it on my lap, the edges dig into my thighs and leave imprints. One time after getting in the flow, I didn't notice how it was cutting into my flesh and ended up with a bruise
Yeah the sharp edges have bothered me since they started with the unibody. Luckily I'm completely off Mac these days. But really the last mac I enjoyed using was my powerbook. It had really nice plastic gaskets for the edges, a keyboard with really good travel and cupped keys, it was wonderful.
I got a plastic MacBook eventually which I filed down too because the edges were really sharp there. And plastic is easy to file. Also replaced the screen with a matte version, on the plastic MacBook that was also easy because the screens were readily available and there was no glass overlay.
Then I had a unibody MBP 15" matte. Less sharp and with off factory matte display. Not great keyboard though.
The current MBP I find abhorrent. Even after they switched from the horrible butterfly mistake the travel is still way too shallow. I just can't work with that anymore. These days I just don't buy laptops anymore. Only desk PCs.
On a similar note, people are way too precious about their dead-tree books. Feel free to chuck them in bags, make notes in the margins, fold pages, underline, and strike through text in them. It's yours. Make it yours! Your scribblings don't detract from what's in there – they elevate it to something unique.
(This is particularly true if it's a book that's still in print, or was in large enough print runs it's easy to buy another second-hand copy when the one you have falls apart. It's still somewhat true even when that's not the case.)
I use a low-power sff pc with a i5-9500T for everyday tasks and it uses 50% cpu and 100% gpu ! The background is nice indeed but it makes the website sluggish.
Good to see a recognition that power tools are powerful. Too many amateur videos of people experimenting without nearly enough control and messing up projects
Yeah that's been a major headache. I ssh into my server/desktop most of the time anyways, so there is no friction there. Then also I was surprised by how well VMs with OrbStack on Mac run. With yabai and skhd I've gotten it pretty closely to where I previously was with i3.
Even still, I'm looking forward to the day where I can run Asahi on this
Three employers in a row insisted on handing me a macbook, and three times in a row I ported Gentoo to it out of pure spite and disdain for third parties trying to control the binaries I use to do my job.
At the time they called this crazy and unproductive, but those obsessions with control of my tools built the foundational skillsets that drove my career.
The Helm is great. I'm not sure it really solves the wrists problem, at least for me since for how I use it the height of the laptop makes a huge difference in ergonomics. The MacBook Pro is already tall, and the Helm makes it taller, creating pressure on the wrists. Meanwhile I don't have this problem on my carry everywhere MacBook Air since it's so thin.
Sorry you did not like that part! All I was trying to express was that even though this thing is nice and shiny, it is a tool in the end so if modifying it would make it serve that purpose better, one should not be scared to do so. I wasn't trying to give a definition, but perhaps I should rephrase that. Thanks!
Some people would like to pretend means of production are holy assets you're supposed to value and trade (INVEST!!! making value is for losers and _these_ workers), when it's just a consummable that should serve a purpose right now.
A computer is a tool and customizing the case is not unheard of.
Thank you for desmystifying the Mac.
Users know best.
Nitpick: those are (sharp) edges, not corners. Maybe the next generation of MacBooks will also actually have exactly 90° non-rounded corners? I guess that's the next logical step...
Also, TIL that Bosch also makes files. I was under the impression that they only made powertools (or electronic measuring devices, or other things with a battery or power cord).
You mentioned Bosch and I can't think of anywhere or anyone else who'd be interested in this little bit of trivia, so a random comment on a thread about filing the edges off a laptop seems like a fitting place to share it.
Bosch dates their appliances using a thing called the Fertigungsdatum Number. The first two digits represent the year of manufacture, the second two are for the month. Except the year doesn't align with the actual year, you first have to add 20. Why 20? Well, Bosch first started using their internal dating system back in 1920 and appliances from that year started with the code "00". I had an oven that had a date of "7808", which means it was manufactured in August 1998 (it lasted almost 30 years before we finally had to replace it last month).
In 2020 the system wound back around and started with "00" again.
Their main bread and butter is components for cars and ebikes, their (power) tools / DIY stuff is like 22% of their business. Or so I learned just now.
Bosch is one of those companies that makes a lot of different things. I own powertools, kitchen appliances and car parts from them.
Oh, Bosch makes all kinds of things.
Bosch's logo is something like a sparkplug (the thing used in internal combustion engines). To this day, the 'mobility' division is the biggest one. See https://www.bosch.com/stories/creation-of-the-bosch-logo/
Decades ago I actually had an offer to work for them as a research student working on optimising internal combustion engines.
Ah right, thanks for the hint. I try to be more precise in more wording, but English isn't my first language so comments like these are really useful.
Great article and happy to see that I'm not alone. I don't get why on such a well thought-out and built device as this, the corners are so sharp.
From how I use the trackpad, the bottom of my thumb always feels sore-ish after a day's work and it took me a while to trace this to the sharp cornern of my macbook.
I love the animation on the background of your website. And I totally understand what you mean about using a tool, if it's too delicate to do the job, then it's not doing its job. Imagine buying a hammer and trying to keep it clear of scuffs, it's obviously going to impede your work.
See https://www.brt.fyi/posts/prime-flow-field/ about the background.
Yeah I think the grief OP was getting over that statement in some of the other comments is unwarranted, I understand completely what they mean about tools. You have people who buy expensive guitars and barely play them for fear of scuffing them for example, depriving themselves and the tool of the thing it's actually for. I'll never understand that mentality.
I don't like to be precious about my tools either, scratches and so on are evidence it's being used for what it's made for!
...and don't even get me started on people who buy a Rolex Submariner - the quintessential tool watch (and luxury symbol, by all means - but it wasn't always so) and then ask whether they should take any special precautions after accidentally showering with it...
Sigh.
I'm probably missing something here but if I have to worry about getting an expensive watch that calls it "Submariner" wet of all things, at the very least, it's badly named.
I think the bigger point is that people think they “afford” a luxury item as soon as they barely afford to buy it and forget that owning also has a cost. They are too afraid to use the damn thing out of fear that they damage it somehow. Their luxury item loses all meaning and use beyond showing ownership of an expensive thing.
Thanks for the encouragement, glad you like the background :-) Yeah I phrased it a bit badly initially. But what I meant was pretty much what you stated!
I bought a 1973 Fender Jazzmaster that was immaculate and should have been my forever guitar. I was so afraid of "ruining the value" that I sold it. I couldn't play it, I was so paranoid. It got into my head. Instead, I ended up buying a '65 AVRI Jazzmaster body and put on an EGC aluminum neck and a Tuffset bridge. The price was about 2/3 of the vintage one, but I have no qualms about playing this one. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
You remind me of Nigel Tufnel of the Spinal Tap rockumentary fame and his guitar collection. The clip on Youtube is a must watch if you're not seen it.
yes I want a post about that background, its pretty awesome how it gradually and seemingly randomly builds itself.
At the bottom of the post there's a link to an explainer post about the background: https://brt.fyi/posts/prime-flow-field/
That contains mostly placeholder stuff from Wikipedia and does not go much into detail, I didn't get around to finishing it yet. I'll try to write it up in more detail
I’ve literally calluses on my wrists from those edges.
Never knew that there are more people like me who get irked at such things. But yeah, I do not have the heart to do this to my laptop, so I end up using my laptop on a solid surface xD
Wait, does Apple even allow this?
Maybe I drank the cool-aid, but I like the corners on my Mac, and it took a lot of empathy from me to accept “the other” authors filing job, but this looks beautiful.
Thanks to both authors for sharing the work!
That looks so much better than that other post!
This is my number one complaint about the M-series MBP line. Especially true of the cutout in the middle that has points so sharp they can cut you if you accidentally scrape it with your hand.
Is this unique to the M-series?
My 2015 MBP has this exact same issue.
I'm guessing they meant they had more complaints about the non-M models. Though I also misread the way you did too.
Related: Filing the corners off my MacBooks (1406 points, 3mos ago, 678 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47724352
I hate the vents on my work macbook, when I rest it on my lap, the edges dig into my thighs and leave imprints. One time after getting in the flow, I didn't notice how it was cutting into my flesh and ended up with a bruise
I did this with my first (and only Macbook) in 2014. Did it with a pocket file.
I never thought about blogging about it though. Perhaps something to consider.
Yeah the sharp edges have bothered me since they started with the unibody. Luckily I'm completely off Mac these days. But really the last mac I enjoyed using was my powerbook. It had really nice plastic gaskets for the edges, a keyboard with really good travel and cupped keys, it was wonderful.
I got a plastic MacBook eventually which I filed down too because the edges were really sharp there. And plastic is easy to file. Also replaced the screen with a matte version, on the plastic MacBook that was also easy because the screens were readily available and there was no glass overlay.
Then I had a unibody MBP 15" matte. Less sharp and with off factory matte display. Not great keyboard though.
The current MBP I find abhorrent. Even after they switched from the horrible butterfly mistake the travel is still way too shallow. I just can't work with that anymore. These days I just don't buy laptops anymore. Only desk PCs.
On a similar note, people are way too precious about their dead-tree books. Feel free to chuck them in bags, make notes in the margins, fold pages, underline, and strike through text in them. It's yours. Make it yours! Your scribblings don't detract from what's in there – they elevate it to something unique.
(This is particularly true if it's a book that's still in print, or was in large enough print runs it's easy to buy another second-hand copy when the one you have falls apart. It's still somewhat true even when that's not the case.)
I would just like to say that with this page open I have ~15% utilization on my GPU. XD
I use a low-power sff pc with a i5-9500T for everyday tasks and it uses 50% cpu and 100% gpu ! The background is nice indeed but it makes the website sluggish.
I checked, too, after your comment. It's ~50% on an M2 (with 10 GPU cores) according to iStat Menus.
I know I know :D I have not done any optimization yet. Maybe I should also add some toggle to disable it or reduce the number of particles
> The moment I am too scared to do something because I might damage the tool, it stops being a tool.
What? You can damage even the most robust and simple tool by using it wrongly or inattentively.
You are correct, that was phrased badly. I've tried to update it, thanks for the comment.
Good to see a recognition that power tools are powerful. Too many amateur videos of people experimenting without nearly enough control and messing up projects
Brave to do this on a blue color MacBook - curious how the filed area will look compared to the rest of the body after some time.
I used a dark blue sharpie to cover up some scratches; works fine and I touch it up every few months.
I'll try to do some updates after a while!
Now try modifying the software that Apple sold you with it.
Yeah that's been a major headache. I ssh into my server/desktop most of the time anyways, so there is no friction there. Then also I was surprised by how well VMs with OrbStack on Mac run. With yabai and skhd I've gotten it pretty closely to where I previously was with i3.
Even still, I'm looking forward to the day where I can run Asahi on this
Three employers in a row insisted on handing me a macbook, and three times in a row I ported Gentoo to it out of pure spite and disdain for third parties trying to control the binaries I use to do my job.
At the time they called this crazy and unproductive, but those obsessions with control of my tools built the foundational skillsets that drove my career.
If you struggle with Yabai I'll reccomend Aerospace, which I think is more performant & reliable.
They don't document the hardware, but it is possible to run unsigned code on the SoC - that's how the Asahi Linux project is able to exist.
https://a.co/d/0hXtPRfC
Amazon link to a debuting tool. It uses sharp harder metal to cut off sharp metal edges.
another example: https://bsky.app/profile/s.ly/post/3mlo7ajrqdk2o Jesse Vincent used a deburring tool.
looks great! not shade to the other guy, but your job is so much nicer looking
Get one of these:
https://www.andar.com/products/the-helm?variant=397924980491...
Pricey, but the lip covers the edge. My current one is 4 years old and lasted a couple of generations of Macbooks.
The Helm is great. I'm not sure it really solves the wrists problem, at least for me since for how I use it the height of the laptop makes a huge difference in ergonomics. The MacBook Pro is already tall, and the Helm makes it taller, creating pressure on the wrists. Meanwhile I don't have this problem on my carry everywhere MacBook Air since it's so thin.
"The moment I am too scared to do something because I might damage the tool, it stops being a tool"
That's just not the definition of the word "tool" at all but okay... whatever
Sorry you did not like that part! All I was trying to express was that even though this thing is nice and shiny, it is a tool in the end so if modifying it would make it serve that purpose better, one should not be scared to do so. I wasn't trying to give a definition, but perhaps I should rephrase that. Thanks!
Calling it a tool is fine.
Some people would like to pretend means of production are holy assets you're supposed to value and trade (INVEST!!! making value is for losers and _these_ workers), when it's just a consummable that should serve a purpose right now.
A computer is a tool and customizing the case is not unheard of.
Thank you for desmystifying the Mac. Users know best.
It made sense to me. If you're to scared to use it without limits, then it is not useful for the scope of its intended purpose.
It implies that it stops being a usable tool. It's still the same item, but it isn't able to be used as such.