Out of the box it can't cannot any other devices expect USB-C. You need to buy hubs and docks for a computer you already paid for.
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If Apple thought the future of ports is USB-C, why is Apple bringing back more types of ports?
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No, a pro laptop should have BOTH. Large selection of thunderbolt ports (4+) AND HDMI, SD, MagSafe. That's a "pro" statement if there ever was one.
many creatives complained about the lack of SD card.
They keep all 4 TB ports and HDMI. Not enough bandwidth.
They're not necessarily equivalent. If I have 1 thunderbolt port and 4 HDMI ports, I can't magically transform one HDMI port into a thunderbolt port. If I have 4 thunderbolt ports and 1 HDMI port and I need to connect a third display over HDMI, I can transform one of the thunderbolt ports into a HDMI port via an adapter. One is clearly more powerful than the other and I would trade the HDMI ports for thunderbolt if I could. It's nice having a HDMI port built in but if I'm going somewhere with my laptop and charger there's no way I won't have room to store a thunderbolt to HDMI adapter in the bag too so it's not that big of a deal.
You can't have BOTH. 4 TB ports use a lot of bandwidth. Since the MBP 14" and 16" come with a display already they cannot have 4TB and HDMI.
Unlike the Mac mini, which can have 4TB and HDMI because it does not come with a display.
Nothing that Apple couldn't solve given that they're now in control of basically every aspect of the machine's hardware
This "bandwidth" problem you keep citing is a solvable issue, it's not a law of nature. Maybe if Apple were actually invested in pros they would see it as a problem worth solving.
That's a bad argument, why would a laptop need 4 HDMI. I would rather have 4 USB-C than 4 HDMI.
Anyway back on track. My question is WHY did the stubborn Apple decide to bring back HDMI or SD Card?
Because there is a demand.
Really, Apple could not even add 3 external monitor support to the M1.
Nobody's saying a laptop needs 4 HDMI ports, I'm saying thunderbolt 4 is more valuable than HDMI or an SD card slot. If Apple wanted to bring those back they should have found a way to keep both instead of removing an extremely useful, highly adaptable thunderbolt 4 port.
Find one, just one Windows laptop that has 4 TB/usb-C, HDMI, SD Card.
You will find none, because even x86 intel/amd laptop chips are bandwidth limited
And before Apple Silicon came along there were no chips on the market that matched its power to performance ratio. I'm advocating for Apple to solve the bandwidth issue and use it as a marketing statement: show a musician hooked up to multiple instruments, control panels and an external display at once with a single MacBook Pro. The message being the MacBook Pro is a portable laptop that has the I/O bandwidth necessary to act as a desktop computer. That was sort of the messaging with the USB-C ports when they were first introduced but there's much to go in terms of pushing I/O bandwidth capability.
They wouldn't do that because it would be catering to the minority of people that actually want to push their laptop to the very extremes. Another name for them would be "pros." That's the same reason they thermally throttled the USB-C MBPs since launch, they put the investment into design thinness rather than pro functionality (albeit, you could argue they were limited by Intel's outdated chip architecture). Now that they have the Apple Silicon platform they should solve the problems that Intel and AMD have chosen not to address due to their attachment to ancient x86 principles.
Claiming that a rumour about a returning port, being justified because its the most common, evidenced by the supposed return in the rumour is what we call "circular logic". Congratulations.
Wow I didn't realise Gurman had been hired as a PR spokesperson for Apple. When did that happen?
Even if it does - that doesn't really answer the question, because the question wasn't "how do I use ethernet on this laptop". It was about people using four TB3 ports. Which could do ethernet. Or 10G ethernet. Or dual 10G. Or any other thing. Are you suggesting those things will all be supported through the power brick?
Do you understand how an example works?
The point was that single-use ports (I used DisplayPort, so you'd maybe understand that it's not just about "I dont like HDMI"; I use DisplayPort connections for my displays - doesn't mean I expect a laptop to have physical DP ports on it) cannot adapt to other uses.
HDMI can carry a 100Mbps ethernet. Even if it wasn't pitifully slow, I don't think I've ever once seen an adapter or cable that would allow using the HDMI port to break out regular ethernet traffic.
My car didn't come "out of the box" with a tow bar (trailer hitch, for Americans). That doesn't mean it's incapable of towing a trailer.
You're worried about what's convenient for you, out of the box.
I'm worried about what's even possible, at all.
I can't even begin to explain how little you understand about this.
Thunderbolt ports (when used as Thunderbolt, and not just regular USB-C, or DisplayPort or HDMI alt mode) multiplex (combine) DisplayPort packets with PCIe packets, to send them over one cable.
In most computers, the number of physical thunderbolt ports is greater than the raw supply of either DisplayPort streams, or PCIe lanes. The number of lanes available to actually use per port will depend on how the Thunderbolt controllers are setup and connected - e.g. in the Intel Macbook Pros, a single controller has up to two DisplayPort streams coming in, and four PCIe lanes, to drive two ports.
But the DisplayPort streams aren't on a fixed path - they're routed to the controller that needs them. This is why you can use screens attached to any Thunderbolt/USB-C port you wish, but you can't necessarily use a display connected to every Thunderbolt/USB-C port at once. If the GPU doesn't provide enough streams, you can't connect any more displays.
So, in a hypothetical MacBook Pro with a physical HDMI port, it is entirely possible that the HDMI port would have a hardwired display stream from the GPU, like the Intel and M1 Mac minis do. That stream is always dedicated to the HDMI port and is unusable via any other ports.
That doesn't change how many TB3 ports you can have. It just changes how many displays you can have attached via TB3/USB-C ports.
Alternatively in such a mythical laptop, the display stream to the HDMI port could be switched like they are in the 2019 Mac Pro, so that the stream can be used via the HDMI port, or it can be routed to TB3/USB-C ports.
I would say it’s safe to say most people still use HDMI. It’s in every TV and most monitors made over the past 10+ years. HDMI is the de facto video port standard. SD however, seems like a very niche technology in 2021. Unless you’re a professional photographer, you’re probably not using SD cards on the regular, or ever.
Well said. Trading powerful multi use ports for single use ports all in the name of supposed convenience is debilitating. A real professional tool would focus on enabling the highest end of the professional spectrum so that the only limiting factor in your work and creation is your imagination instead of the hardware of software being the bottleneck. This is the spirit that "pro" devices used to embody but now it's just used as a marketing name to make people feel like they're being productive because their machine says "pro" on the front.
So? That doesn't mean that basic logic doesn't apply.
Given that this is in fact a site based around apple rumours, one would think you'd understand the difference between a rumour and a confirmed fact.
well the leaks schematics show a HDMI port. Thats a fact. Its no longer a rumour when you evidence.
No a Pro machine means more power firstly. You could have a machine with all the ports in the world but if its slow what's the point.
Would you rather use a i5 MacBook Pro 16GB with 4 USB ports or a M1 MacBook Pro 16GB with 3 USB ports.
Hold up.
Let's keep some context here. Sure most people probably use HDMI on their television.
I'm sure a good number of people do use HDMI at some point or another with a Mac - but is it "post people".
Keep in mind that Apple has never sold a display (either their own, or a sold-at-apple 3rd party like the UltraFines) that has HDMI, and none of the ones they've sold for the last decade, are compatible with a HDMI port. They're all compatible (either directly, or via an adapter) with a Thunderbolt 3 port.
For televisions, and cheap ass computer displays? Sure.
For professional/high end displays? Nope.
And this goes back to @zakarhino's point: dropping TB3 ports for a HDMI port, is pandering to consumers and (ok this is my opinion, not necessarily his) middle-management yes-men who feel the need to stroke their ego in a conference room with a "pro" laptop, when an iPad or even an iPhone would run a presentation just as well.
If any Mac notebook makes sense to put a HDMI port on "because presentations", it's the MacBook Air.
Even then it's not a universal thing. Even when they had a SDXC slot in the 2015, any serious photographer was likely using an external card reader, because the built in one was connected via USB2.
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The schematics show cutouts in the upper case for port shapes.
One indeed was HDMI. Three were USB-C.
None of that identifies whether those USB-C cut outs are Thunderbolt 3, USB4, Thunderbolt 4, or just plain old USB3 Type-C ports, like the 24" iMac has.
That was the whole point remember.
You're so busy rushing from assumption to assumption to make up the next rationalisation, you don't even remember what I originally said.
Am I using it as a paper weight? I wouldn't buy/use either of those in 2021 for work, they're missing 3/4 of their memory.
Why does Apple add HDMI to Mac mini and Apple TV?
If USB-C was everywhere and great those devices should only have USB-C.
the one in the upcoming MacBook Pros is UHS II and I am 100% sure they won't use USB2 this time.