So in July I decided to get a 21.5‑inch 4K retina iMac, instead, and I’m still not regretting the decision. But when the 2016 MacBook Pros adopted the same keyboard, I was hugely disappointed. Back then I hoped it was something specifically tailored for the 12-inch retina MacBook, to keep it as thin and svelte as possible. I just dislike the design direction Apple took in 2015, when for arbitrary, thinness-driven reasons they introduced the new flattened keyboard with the butterfly mechanism. When the time came to upgrade my main Mac back in July, I decided I was done with Apple laptops. I also managed to find a unit that was well taken care of: its battery is at 94% health, has a low charge cycle count, and still lasts more than eight hours on a charge. The 2013 vintage means it has two USB 3 ports, a Thunderbolt port, a better graphic chip (Intel HD 5000), and that it can run the latest version of Mac OS. Quick specs: It’s a mid-2013 model, with a Core i5 CPU at 1.3 GHz (turbo boost to 2.6 GHz), 4 GB of RAM, and a 128 GB SSD.

And another pleasant surprise was that the Mac looked even better than how it was described. The Mac arrived on December 18, amazingly quickly for an international shipping just before the Christmas holidays.

So, after a promising message exchange, I decided to go for it. But the seller had a very high transactions-to-positive-feedback ratio, the pictures used in the auction were of the actual product (I asked them anyway for confirmation), the seller offered a three-month warranty plus a 30-day no-question-asked return policy. It’s also absolutely quiet (yes, I checked, the fan works) and it’s instant-on.īeing an eBay purchase, I was wary. It’s very compact, it’s very light (1.08 kg), it’s still a thin machine by 2018 standards, it has a long-lasting battery. This Mac really invites you to treat it as a pro tablet + keyboard. When it arrived by post a couple of weeks ago, I joked on Twitter: Loving my new 11-inch iPad Pro!

Macbook 11 inch 2014