(Photo from iFixit.)
The repair experts at iFixit have good news about Apple's new 16-inch MacBook Pro: If the keyboard ever gets gunk inside, it should be easy to fix.
On Friday, iFixit confirmed that the 16-inch model does ditch the error-prone "butterfly switch" keyboards, which have bedeviled the MacBook line for the past four years. So how did Apple fix the issues? Well, the company basically reverted back to using the old keyboard tech it had in the company's laptops.
"Your long butterfly keyboard nightmare is over," wrote iFixit staffer Kevin Purdy, who added: "It feels like a do-over, a throwback, almost an apology."
The old keyboard tech refers to the "scissor-switch," the mechanism that sits under each key. The technology is standard across the PC industry, and repair-friendly. If one key starts to malfunction, you can usually fix it individually, without needing to replace the entire keyboard deck.
"You're going to get crap stuck inside these keys. But you can just pop these keys off and clean it out. And you don't need to go to the repair shop," iFixit CEO Kyle Wiens said in a video examining the keyboards.
The same can't be said for other MacBook models. In 2015, Apple started to transition the laptops to the company's ultra-thin butterfly keyboards, which offer quieter typing. However, the butterfly switches can fail if dust ever gets lodged inside them. Making the problem worse has been the potential fix: In the past, Apple was telling consumers to pay between $400 to $700 to get their whole keyboards replaced. (Last year, the company began offering free repairs, amid class action lawsuits.)
Fortunately, the keyboard on the latest MacBook Pro should be free of the repair headaches. According to iFixit, the scissor-switch actually tends to push out dust and dirt as you type, rather than capture it.
"The new Magic Keyboard in the 16-inch MacBook Pro uses switches that look and feel almost identical to much older Apple devices," Purdy added. The feel is so close that a keyboard cap pried off from Apple's official wireless desktop keyboards will fit over a scissor-switch on the 16-inch MacBook Pro.