Apple Didn’t Need To Kill MagSafe on the New MacBook Pro
Apple just killed off one of the best features of its MacBook line: the MagSafe adapter. But did they really have to?
RIP, MagSafe
At Apple’s Town Hall event today, Tim Cook and company showed off the latest MacBook Pro models, with the sexy new Touch Bar.
Phil Schiller spent a little time on how great it is to have four USB C ports on these thinner, lighter versions of Apple’s flagship laptop, without mentioning that one killer drawback: there’s no more MagSafe protection.
Just look at how excited Steve Jobs was when he introduced this lifesaving little hardware feature back in 2006:
"How many of you have ever had your notebook go flying off its work surface when somebody caught your power adapter cord in their foot, right? Well, this is going to end that."
- Steve JobsThe applause is well-deserved after his reveal; I still thank Jobs’ team for making this standard on all their laptops since then every time my dog rushes by my MacBook Pro plugged in on the coffee table.
The new MacBook Pros are about 20 percent lower in volume than the previous model. They’re lighter, thinner, and smaller. It might be a fact of current engineering technology that Apple couldn’t fit a MagSafe adapter in there and keep the slimline profile these new MacBooks have.
Thing is, they didn’t really have to. Just take a look at Griffin’s offering.
For more on the new MacBook Pro:
External MagSafe can save the day
Griffin calls its little adapter the BreakSafe, since they probably didn’t want to get sued by Apple for copyright infringement.
This little dongle can sit in a MacBook USB C port and then the magnetized power cable can power the MacBook and still break away when a passing foot snags it, just like Apple’s does now.
Yes, it ruins the lines of the MacBook to have a little pokey thing sticking out, but I’m sure that the geniuses in Cupertino could figure this out. They’ve got us using adapters for our new iPhone 7s, why not a MacBook Pro with USB C?
Apple could have easily given up one of those 4 USB C ports and created this sort of external adapter for a MagSafe, even just as an add-on option. Seems like a no-brainer.
The basic, non-pro MacBook model only has one USB C port, so you wouldn’t want to monopolize that single point of entry, but the Pro models would only benefit from such an approach.
Still, Griffin’s got it going on; if you want to make sure you don’t ruin that expensive new Touch Bar MacBook Pro when your kid knocks your laptop to the floor with a misplaced swinging foot, you probably want to get one of these.