MagSafe is a big bummer of a loss. Especially since it was a safety thing. Makes no sense to remove it completely. Did they do testing and find that no one ever tripped over their cords anymore? Because that seems silly.
Especially as Macs got thinner and lighter, I've seen many of them pulled off desks from people tripping over the cord.
The original MagSafe connectors, and MagSafe 2, only protected against vertical movement. Unless the edge of the notebook was at the edge of the desk, so that the MagSafe connector was hanging over it, it wouldn't do a lot to protect the device.
If the cord was pulled over the edge of the desk, it meant that the force directed on the connector was horizontal and would still pull the notebook.
Here's a quick example that I found:
It's not MagSafe 1 vs 2 as they claim however; both are MagSafe 1 connectors.
Their conclusion is that the original connector is better, but I greatly preferred the L-shaped connector.
They were far more durable in my experience, and if you are at a desk, the L-shaped connector meant that the cable would hang over the back rather than the side. That meant if someone walking past were to catch the cable on something or trip on it, it would pull the connector off.
If someone is walking past the regular MagSafe connector and it catches or they trip over it, that movement is still going to pull it off the desk.
MagSafe was a
big improvement over the barrel connectors on older devices though. I've seen so many PowerBooks with bent corners because the casing was made of soft aluminum and it would bend if someone tripped on the cord.
I do generally prefer the magnetic connection, as it does a good job protecting the
port, even from things like a cable being bent in it if you are using it plugged in on your lap, it just didn't do nearly as good a job protecting the
device as claimed.
