Mac laptop

daviesee

vermin wrote:

daviesee wrote:

I would add reliability and longevity - see my post on page 1.
Ribble v Pinarello.
You either appreciate the difference or you don't. (PS - Same could be said for Acer v Sony).

I've never known any laptop be wanting for reliability. Longevity is simply a matter of choosing an up-to-date spec at time of purchase. Arguably, non-Apple laptops have geater longivity because they are generally a bit easier to upgrade as they age.

Point being that I bought a 2005 spec laptop that can still comfortably do 2012 chores - without any mods.
Since you doubt - Anyone still using a 2005 spec Windows laptop today?

roger_merriman

vermin wrote:

I get this

meanredspider wrote:

To step to the defence of the £1000 bill, the attention to design detail is impressive. I love the magnetic charging port for instance - simple but beautiful. And the backlit keyboard with a lovely "feel" is great too. It's all those little things that you pay for rather than the bald tech spec of Gb etc Not everyone wants to pay for them or even appreciates them - I think they are rather nice.

But I don't get this

daviesee wrote:

I would add reliability and longevity - see my post on page 1.
Ribble v Pinarello.
You either appreciate the difference or you don't. (PS - Same could be said for Acer v Sony).

I've never known any laptop be wanting for reliability. Longevity is simply a matter of choosing an up-to-date spec at time of purchase. Arguably, non-Apple laptops have geater longivity because they are generally a bit easier to upgrade as they age.

RAM and Harddrives are normally with few exceptions down the years, very easy to do, Macbook pro's ping the lower base off and get at the RAM/Harddrive etc.

vermin

daviesee wrote:

vermin wrote:

daviesee wrote:

I would add reliability and longevity - see my post on page 1.
Ribble v Pinarello.
You either appreciate the difference or you don't. (PS - Same could be said for Acer v Sony).

I've never known any laptop be wanting for reliability. Longevity is simply a matter of choosing an up-to-date spec at time of purchase. Arguably, non-Apple laptops have geater longivity because they are generally a bit easier to upgrade as they age.

Point being that I bought a 2005 spec laptop that can still comfortably do 2012 chores - without any mods.
Since you doubt - Anyone still using a 2005 spec Windows laptop today?

2005 was the year that Apple finally ditched their clockwork procs and joined the modern world using intel, IIRC. Because of this change, they were behind the tech vanguard, so their 2005 spec machines were actually using 2004 spec components.

To answer your question, yes, of course people will still be using 2005 spec non-Apple laptops, probably running Windows 7 or 8. The top non-Apple 2005 spec was more advanced than the top Apple 2005 spec, so the non-Apple machines will be more capable of doing 2012 chores than the Apples (assuming the same budget spend in 2005). However, people using Windows-based laptops are far more likely to upgrade their machines (sell on and replace) simply because such upgrades cost half as much as equivalent Apple upgrades. The suggestion that the Apple has some otherworldly longevity built in is nonsense.

stuaff

+another 1 for the 13" MBP. The consensus of reviews of the new 13" Retina version seems to be that as lovely as it is, it doesn't have the same edge over the regular 13" (no boost in graphic chip performance despite the higher resolution), though the screen is very, very nice. The retina version is lighter though, presuming you can do without a DVD drive.

daviesee

vermin wrote:

[To answer your question, yes, of course people will still be using 2005 spec non-Apple laptops, probably running Windows 7 or 8. The top non-Apple 2005 spec was more advanced than the top Apple 2005 spec, so the non-Apple machines will be more capable of doing 2012 chores than the Apples (assuming the same budget spend in 2005). However, people using Windows-based laptops are far more likely to upgrade their machines (sell on and replace) simply because such upgrades cost half as much as equivalent Apple upgrades. The suggestion that the Apple has some otherworldly longevity built in is nonsense.

The point you are missing, or I am not making clear, is that the problem is not the components, but the OS.
Windows clogs the machine up and slows it down over time. There are probably ways of cleaning it up (beyond emptying the trash and a defrag) but most people either don't know how, or don't bother.
That's been my experience and others that I know anyway and explains why people who simply want to use it without tinkering prefer a Mac once they get one.
That initial cost will be offset by not having to tinker, upgrade or replace. Plus as said above, you can upgrade if you want.

meanredspider

To jump into this argument, I've found Windows laptops generally pretty unreliable. My mid-spec HP was rubbish - frankly never ran properly and eventually just wouldn't turn on (at under 3 years old) - I think the MoBo failed (ironically I got £150 off my MB Air trading it in sans HDD). My daughter's relatively high end Acer Travelmate went back because the screen failed. Her Tosh's DVD drive failed (Tosh replaced it). Work laptops have been really hit-and-miss. And, I totally agree, the Windows OS doesn't help - it constantly needs maintenance else it gets slower and slower and takes forever to boot.

As for the specs - we ran some tests at work between comparable spec Windows and Mac laptops running the same statistics package and the Mac trounced the Windows machine.

All of these things lead to Macs longevity. They hold their value much better too. The "cost to change" therefore isn't dissimilar.

vermin

Enjoy your Macs then.

gabriel959

daviesee wrote:

vermin wrote:

daviesee wrote:

I would add reliability and longevity - see my post on page 1.
Ribble v Pinarello.
You either appreciate the difference or you don't. (PS - Same could be said for Acer v Sony).

I've never known any laptop be wanting for reliability. Longevity is simply a matter of choosing an up-to-date spec at time of purchase. Arguably, non-Apple laptops have geater longivity because they are generally a bit easier to upgrade as they age.

Point being that I bought a 2005 spec laptop that can still comfortably do 2012 chores - without any mods.
Since you doubt - Anyone still using a 2005 spec Windows laptop today?

My wife is.

gabriel959

meanredspider wrote:

My daughter's relatively high end Acer Travelmate went back because the screen failed. .

Those 2 don't go together.

Go and get a Thinkpad.

gabriel959

You see, you are going to buy a 13" inch laptop with 4gb of ram to someone who is going to do video editing. That is some torture. I have a 17" laptop with a high res IPS screen, with a lovely back lit keyboard with a decent graphics card, which I can upgrade, which can have 2 hard drives and lovely warranty which costs the same as the midrange 15" 4gb apple machine.

daviesee

gabriel959 wrote:

My wife is.

To do what?
Surfing the web, playing music and communications doesn't count.
I was referring to photo and video processing. Stuff that tasks the machine.

UndercoverElephant

gabriel959 wrote:

You see, you are going to buy a 13" inch laptop with 4gb of ram to someone who is going to do video editing. That is some torture. I have a 17" laptop with a high res IPS screen, with a lovely back lit keyboard with a decent graphics card, which I can upgrade, which can have 2 hard drives and lovely warranty which costs the same as the midrange 15" 4gb apple machine.

But my guess would be that you're not working in video editing; more likely a software guy who likes gaming too.

Admittedly a 13" screen may be small for video, but the portability makes up for it.

We use relatively high-end Dell machines for work, they may have a higher base-spec than the more expensive Apple machines, but they are in no way as nice to use. Poor screen, poor keyboard, poor trackpad, awful battery life, heavy as hell and very unreliable. The only time they're anywhere decent as computers is when they're docked and then they're hardly a laptop any more.

Paul E

gabriel959 wrote:

You see, you are going to buy a 13" inch laptop with 4gb of ram to someone who is going to do video editing. That is some torture. I have a 17" laptop with a high res IPS screen, with a lovely back lit keyboard with a decent graphics card, which I can upgrade, which can have 2 hard drives and lovely warranty which costs the same as the midrange 15" 4gb apple machine.

4gb of ram is enough to to run Avid software (same the BBC use and many others), I know because I used it for years so unless you are a video editor I don't know how you can say all that above, the screen res on the 13" MBP is the same as most 15" windows machines I had used at the time so it being slightly smaller is a moot point.

Impressive you can upgrade the graphics card in your laptop but as most editing software and compositing software don't use the grunt of the GPU's then being able to push a few more pixels a bit quicker isn't going to help.

I would edit off usb hard drives with no slow down so not having two drives in the machine isn't going to hold anyone back and yes I have edited on my 13" MBP with it's lowly core2 duo (it's a 2009) and guess what, it coped fine without the windows bloat slowing it down.

gabriel959

UndercoverElephant wrote:

gabriel959 wrote:

You see, you are going to buy a 13" inch laptop with 4gb of ram to someone who is going to do video editing. That is some torture. I have a 17" laptop with a high res IPS screen, with a lovely back lit keyboard with a decent graphics card, which I can upgrade, which can have 2 hard drives and lovely warranty which costs the same as the midrange 15" 4gb apple machine.

But my guess would be that you're not working in video editing; more likely a software guy who likes gaming too.

Admittedly a 13" screen may be small for video, but the portability makes up for it.

We use relatively high-end Dell machines for work, they may have a higher base-spec than the more expensive Apple machines, but they are in no way as nice to use. Poor screen, poor keyboard, poor trackpad, awful battery life, heavy as hell and very unreliable. The only time they're anywhere decent as computers is when they're docked and then they're hardly a laptop any more.

Actually I use my laptop solely for business purposes so it is incorrect. My personal computer is just used as a gaming computer and it is a desktop. It has been very reliable for the last 18 months since I bought it (replaced the PSU under warranty, 5 years too). Previous one lasted me 4 years with some upgrades and nothing broke down.

I just fail to see the argument that PCs are poorly made and don't last as long as Apple's. If you buy a decent one they will last as long as any Apple computer.

My laptop does 3 hours on battery, granted it weighs a ton, hence why I have a smaller battery for when I am taking it somewhere else. The graphics card is a Quadro card which is perfect for business and professional needs, go and do the same with the HD4000! My laptop comes with 8GB of DDR3 which is the minimum for audio and video work. You can also have a SSD and a HD... Ah, and a 3 year business warranty.

vermin

gabriel959 wrote:

I just fail to see the argument that PCs are poorly made and don't last as long as Apple's. If you buy a decent one they will last as long as any Apple computer.

That's because it's not an argument; it's a marketing line. Some fall for it, others don't.

Oops, I commented again. Must stop biting.

gabriel959

btw I am not negating that Macs are nice machines but you have to pay into consideration that the cheapest Mac is around £900 and for that amount of money you can buy a nice PC which will last any user at least the same amount of time as the Mac and be of superior spec.

gabriel959

daviesee wrote:

gabriel959 wrote:

My wife is.

To do what?
Surfing the web, playing music and communications doesn't count.
I was referring to photo and video processing. Stuff that tasks the machine.

School work. She could do video editing in it, but it will be slow. The same as your Mac.

mbthegreat

I have a 15" MBP which I love

If you do go down the Apple route, defo get Applecare (their version of extended warrenty), it's a bit pricey but really worth it. I had my laptop brick on my after about two years and got a brand new one, no questions asked. About a year before hand I may have accidentally dropped it down some stairs, so it was not pretty cosmetically, but the Apple shop still replaced it for me. Top service.

meanredspider

gabriel959 wrote:

meanredspider wrote:

My daughter's relatively high end Acer Travelmate went back because the screen failed. .

Those 2 don't go together.

Go and get a Thinkpad.

The RRP for the Travelmate was £700 - not "cheap" by Windows standards 3 years ago (almost in range of Macbook Air)

I have a Thinkpad at work - cheap, nasty thing. All our work Laptops are Thinkpads - constantly failing. All of the serious R&D work is done on Macs - go figure.

@Vermin - not marketing hype just bitter, real-life experience. I used to own a software business - I have loads of experience of this stuff that we relied on to pay our mortgage. Both me and my brother - also in software development as his own business - now run MacBooks.

I'd love to know how many people that switch to Macs ever switch back - not many I'd wager. Hype only works so long.

rjsterry

gabriel959 wrote:

btw I am not negating that Macs are nice machines but you have to pay into consideration that the cheapest Mac is around £900 and for that amount of money you can buy a nice PC which will last any user at least the same amount of time as the Mac and be of superior spec.

I have seen very few nice - as in the look and feel of the thing - PC laptops. I don't know what it is about the various manufacturers, but they just don't seem to think product design is important - well, to some of us it is.

meanredspider

gabriel959 wrote:

btw I am not negating that Macs are nice machines but you have to pay into consideration that the cheapest Mac is around £900 and for that amount of money you can buy a nice PC which will last any user at least the same amount of time as the Mac and be of superior spec.

If you went on bald "spec" we'd all be riding Tiagra (it's got 10 gears ain't it) on aluminium frames. We'd all drive Korean cars and live in Barrett houses. There's so much more to it than the bald spec as I said earlier. Like all of the above, if you don't appreciate the difference or don't want to or can't pay for it, then that's fine.

MrSweary

Wife has to replace her ageing MacBook this Xmas - Gutted that it means we'll be spending £1000 when we could get something that does the same thing for £500 or less if she wasn't so fixated on the shape of the bloody thing.

On the other hand it is useful justification for my extra spending on bike goodies and money is overrated right?

Protip : If you wife is a diehard Apple fangirl referring to her laptop as 'that Fisher Price crap' is unlikely to endear.

vermin

MrSweary wrote:

Wife has to replace her ageing MacBook this Xmas

Refer your wife to the above: Macs don't age, they have infinite longevity drives.

il_principe

Another vote for the Pro. I've got the Retina version and it is bloody good and very fast. Swapped over to Apple a few years ago, use it at work and at home and wouldn't go back to Windows if you paid me. Still shudder at the thought of my old Dell laptop.

meanredspider

vermin wrote:

MrSweary wrote:

Wife has to replace her ageing MacBook this Xmas

Refer your wife to the above: Macs don't age, they have infinite longevity drives.

The truth is she'll probably be able to sell it on for more than some Windows laptops cost

gabriel959

meanredspider wrote:

gabriel959 wrote:

btw I am not negating that Macs are nice machines but you have to pay into consideration that the cheapest Mac is around £900 and for that amount of money you can buy a nice PC which will last any user at least the same amount of time as the Mac and be of superior spec.

If you went on bald "spec" we'd all be riding Tiagra (it's got 10 gears ain't it) on aluminium frames. We'd all drive Korean cars and live in Barrett houses. There's so much more to it than the bald spec as I said earlier. Like all of the above, if you don't appreciate the difference or don't want to or can't pay for it, then that's fine.

The point I make is that the spec of my computer is better than anything you can get on a Mac of any price and it works as well. It boots up in less than 15 seconds, its intuitive, fast and I can install as many different bits as I would like. The warranty in most if not all of the components is 3 years at the least too, for nowt.

The fact is bike analogies don't really cut it because it isn't the same thing. That you want style over substance is a fair point, everything else is marketing jargon.

UndercoverElephant

gabriel959 wrote:

The point I make is that the spec of my computer is better than anything you can get on a Mac of any price and it works as well. It boots up in less than 15 seconds, its intuitive, fast and I can install as many different bits as I would like. The warranty in most if not all of the components is 3 years at the least too, for nowt.

The fact is bike analogies don't really cut it because it isn't the same thing. That you want style over substance is a fair point, everything else is marketing jargon.

Indeed. A better analogy would be that Gabriel thinks that kitting out a Raleigh Grifter frame with DI2 and deep carbon-rimmed wheels would make the best bike.

MrSweary

meanredspider wrote:

vermin wrote:

MrSweary wrote:

Wife has to replace her ageing MacBook this Xmas

Refer your wife to the above: Macs don't age, they have infinite longevity drives.

The truth is she'll probably be able to sell it on for more than some Windows laptops cost

Which would be great if she was replacing it with a Windows laptop! I keep telling her it's time she got a grown ups computer but she just starts chasing me round the house with a knife. :?

daviesee

Bottom line is that everybody is happy with what they have, and that is all that matters.

For anyone considering a purchase, read between the lines, come to your own conclusions and live a happy life.

There is nothing more to add here.

gabriel959

meanredspider wrote:

gabriel959 wrote:

meanredspider wrote:

My daughter's relatively high end Acer Travelmate went back because the screen failed. .

Those 2 don't go together.

Go and get a Thinkpad.

The RRP for the Travelmate was £700 - not "cheap" by Windows standards 3 years ago (almost in range of Macbook Air)

I have a Thinkpad at work - cheap, nasty thing. All our work Laptops are Thinkpads - constantly failing. All of the serious R&D work is done on Macs - go figure.

@Vermin - not marketing hype just bitter, real-life experience. I used to own a software business - I have loads of experience of this stuff that we relied on to pay our mortgage. Both me and my brother - also in software development as his own business - now run MacBooks.

I'd love to know how many people that switch to Macs ever switch back - not many I'd wager. Hype only works so long.

That someone who works in the software industry is capable of buying an Acer machine worth £700! says it all really. They are a value brand at the bottom of the pile

Well I work for the second biggest software company in the world and we all use Thinkpads for software developing! Of course they fail but only as much as the Macbook Pro's with their heat issues and crappy assembly work. In fact heat is such an issue that you can even burn yourself if you are holding the damn thing. Of course these are just occasional issues as your Thinkpads failing. Next thing you are going to mention is you can't crash an Apple and you don't get viruses either!!!

By the way the data and evidence show that Asus is the best laptop brand in terms of reliability.