My 2018 MacBook Pro has finally been retired in favor of a 2024 MacBook Pro. I found a good deal on Amazon that landed me a 14 inch MBP with M4 Pro, 24gb RAM, and 512gb disk space for $1800 after tax. Comparing that to the $2500 I spent on my 2018 model, this was pretty wild.

It got me thinking about technology and its advancement. There really is no point to buying top-of-the-line, brand new technology unless you truly need it right now. Otherwise, it’s best to just buy what you need at the time, and upgrade to the next adequate machine when the need arises.

Everything about this 2024 MacBook is better than the one I just got rid of. But my favorite part so far is the keyboard! Hence why I came to my journal.

On my 2018, the “e” key had fallen off. I taped it back on and kept using it, but needless to say it was no longer reliable. The butterfly keyboard that they installed on those things was a mess. This keyboard is back to the old style that I had on my first MacBooks back in high school and college.

That brings me to the touch bar. I couldn’t stand that thing from day one. And over time, it became completely unresponsive.

In Apple’s defense, I put more use into that machine than it was probably meant for. My usage was close to 12 hours per day on average over my 7 years of ownership. I know that this new MacBook will eventually suffer the same fate. But it’s going to be a minute.

Overall, I’m excited to have replaced my laptop. Not only that, I was also very selective about my migration. I used iCloud Drive to transfer only what I truly wanted, and reorganized my directories in the process.

This allowed me to delete a bunch of abandoned projects, random images, and other crap that had been on my laptop for the past decade, serving no purpose other than to bloat the hard drive. I managed to cut down from 200gb to 78gb of storage, without losing anything important, while doubling capacity.

Maybe I did lose a few things here and there, but thankfully, the old machine at least still boots up. As I use this one, if I discover anything I missed, I can boot up the 2018 and find it and transfer it over.

I don’t really have another option, because as it turns out, the 2018 about kicked the bucket this afternoon while moving all those files around. It had really gotten that bad.

Here’s to no longer being totally and completely broke. Definitely not out of the woods yet, but on my way. With the old MacBook, I achieved serious success. This new one will hopefully enable more of the same.