MBP with lunar - to use outside/in bright sun

[Jackpromax]

TLDR: Anyone tried working on normal docs/spreadshseets outside in bright sun (think beaches/on boats) using lunar or better dummy to bump their MBP brightness up a bit? How did you find it?

Ok so I know this isn't relevant for most people, but I've a weird use case...

I'm about to start a job where I'll often be working outside in bright sunlight in random places, and I need a big screen and long battery life. Ie a 16" MBP (yes, I know I don't need the computing power, but I need the screen). Before I replace my wonderful M1 MBA, wondering whether people have tried this and can say whether it's actually materially better to use and XDR screen with brightness bump than just living with, say, the new M2 MBA at 500nits without mini-LED.

Thanks!

Ps: Thankfully it's all tax deductible so I can live with the extra cost. Yes, 16" is conscious choice over 14 - screen size more important than portability 😊

 

[M1956]

I use MBP 14 with Vivid and it’s much better than standard 500 nits brightness. 500 nits is barely enough to see anything at all in the sun. Even when I sit next to a window on a sunny day I sometimes want to crank up the brightness beyond 500. I would say for working outside with MBP 13 or the new air is not enough to be comfortable.
The problem is you won’t get long battery life with brightness set to max all the time. Personally don’t use it enough to give exact numbers, but it seems like half the battery life on 1000 compared to 500 nits. 500 is already quite a bit less then 350-400.
From memory, apple’s estimates were 12 hours of playback on normal brightness (whatever it is) and 4 on max brightness.

 

[bill-p]

Yes, 1000 nits make a massive difference in outdoor use. Nothing else even comes close. My iPhone can become quite bright outdoors as well but it dims down when the device gets hot. The MacBook with Lunar doesn't do that and it is usable for however many hours I need to remain outdoors.

Battery life be damned. I can just bring along a spare USB-C battery bank to keep the device up if I know I'll be outdoor for that long.

It's just amazing to finally have a laptop that is actually usable outdoors under direct sunlight. This was not possible before, or at least I am not aware of any other laptop model that can achieve this.

 

[Jackpromax]

UPDATE: So I did buy it, and it's pretty great if not quite as good as I'd hoped.

Also - thanks everyone for advice 😊

//My set up//
16" M1Pro MBP with lunar - you can crank the brightness up to full XDR and it's super easy to use even in direct California sun.

I also use a bit of xdr when I'm inside in very bright conditions.

Snags:

The screen overheats and cuts the XDR out quite easily. Think maybe 5-10 mins if you're not careful.

But you can eek it out by:
1) Angle the screen so that the sun is incident directly on the top (ie make sure screen has as small a shadow as possible)
2) use dark mode so it's not having to push out 1000 nits for the whole screen
3) I avoid having both night shift and dark mode on - dark mode alone without night shift seems best tradeoff.
4) I wear my polarised sunglasses to reduce glare from the machine itself (I have space grey)

Cautions:

A) It does rip through battery
B) Dark mode in bright sun is def not as easy as light mode in bright sun, but it's still farrr better than 500nits and light mode.
C) For light use, fans tend to run at about 1500 where I am
D) Don't forget your sunscreen like I do sometimes....

 

[ChpStcks]

UPDATE: So I did buy it, and it's pretty great if not quite as good as I'd hoped.

Also - thanks everyone for advice 😊

//My set up//
16" M1Pro MBP with lunar - you can crank the brightness up to full XDR and it's super easy to use even in direct California sun.

I also use a bit of xdr when I'm inside in very bright conditions.

Snags:

The screen overheats and cuts the XDR out quite easily. Think maybe 5-10 mins if you're not careful.

But you can eek it out by:
1) Angle the screen so that the sun is incident directly on the top (ie make sure screen has as small a shadow as possible)
2) use dark mode so it's not having to push out 1000 nits for the whole screen
3) I avoid having both night shift and dark mode on - dark mode alone without night shift seems best tradeoff.
4) I wear my polarised sunglasses to reduce glare from the machine itself (I have space grey)

Cautions:

A) It does rip through battery
B) Dark mode in bright sun is def not as easy as light mode in bright sun, but it's still farrr better than 500nits and light mode.
C) For light use, fans tend to run at about 1500 where I am
D) Don't forget your sunscreen like I do sometimes....

what would you say the average battery life is with it ramped all the way?

 

[Jackpromax]

what would you say the average battery life is with it ramped all the way?

To be honest, battery life isn’t the constraint - with a white document up, it’ll overheat and cut itself after maybe 15-20 mins (dark mode obvs helps hugely).

But you’re still cutting battery life by half or two thirds compared to using at low brightness and low compute load.

 

[Jackpromax]

UPDATE: Just sat in 25c heat and full sun at 25 degrees north (winter) for about 2 hours at full brightness with mostly white backgrounds and the battery went from around 95% to 17%. Didn't overheat once.

So you'd be looking at 2.5 hours in these conditions on a MBP 16" with very light compute use - just wifi and web (albeit I'm far from the router so wifi will be drawing a fair bit of power).