Linked by Thom Holwerda on Tue 27th Mar 2012 22:17 UTC
For years and years now (since the first G4 iBooks), whenever someone asked me for advice about what laptop to buy, my standard answer was simple: get an Apple laptop. Doesn't matter which one. Apple was so far ahead of the competition it just wasn't funny anymore. This past weekend, though, marked the end of an era for me: for the first time, I advised someone to get an Asus ZenBook instead.
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RE[3]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!!
by Thom_Holwerda on Tue 27th Mar 2012 23:11
in reply to "RE[2]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!! "
Member since:2005-06-29
Yep, but Tom recommends a Zenbook to his family.
That recommendation is a terrible idea because it's a waste of money.
That recommendation is a terrible idea because it's a waste of money.
It's Thom.
I have terrible experiences with Boot Camp. Apple's drivers have proven to be horribly unreliable for me, with blue screens all over the place on an Air, MacBook Pro, and Intel iMac right after installing them. Battery life also suffers greatly when using Boot Camp.
As for waste of money - Windows costs money. Add in the license costs and that hypothetical resale value is no longer an advantage. I say hypothetical because that laptop won't be resold.
RE[4]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!!
by sergio on Tue 27th Mar 2012 23:26
in reply to "RE[3]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!! "
Member since:2005-07-06
RE[4]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!!
by kaiwai on Wed 28th Mar 2012 01:35
in reply to "RE[3]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!! "
Member since:2005-07-06
It's Thom.
I have terrible experiences with Boot Camp. Apple's drivers have proven to be horribly unreliable for me, with blue screens all over the place on an Air, MacBook Pro, and Intel iMac right after installing them. Battery life also suffers greatly when using Boot Camp.
As for waste of money - Windows costs money. Add in the license costs and that hypothetical resale value is no longer an advantage. I say hypothetical because that laptop won't be resold.
I have terrible experiences with Boot Camp. Apple's drivers have proven to be horribly unreliable for me, with blue screens all over the place on an Air, MacBook Pro, and Intel iMac right after installing them. Battery life also suffers greatly when using Boot Camp.
As for waste of money - Windows costs money. Add in the license costs and that hypothetical resale value is no longer an advantage. I say hypothetical because that laptop won't be resold.
My impression of the bootcamp is that it is something that Apple is reluctant to provide rather than really putting their weight behind - a stop gap measure that allows people to transition over to Mac OS X rather than a real long term solution with Apple's full backing.
IMHO if you're going to be running Windows 90% of the time then quite frankly to hand over the amount of money one does for MacBook simply for 'ooh shiny' or 'great build quality' (what ever that means - a more sophisticated version of 'ooh shiny'?) is a pretty bad argument to make. If you're buying Mac it is because you want Mac OS X and thus willing to pay slightly more for a laptop to run that said operating system but if you're simply going to purchase one to run Windows 90% of the time then quite frankly you're wasting your time and money.
As for the operating system itself - as I've said multiple times the issue I have with PC laptops isn't the hardware given that if you spend enough time you can find hardware of equal build quality to what Apple provides but the fact that your choice is Windows, Windows, or Windows when it comes to wanting a mainstream operating system that is supported by big name software titles (games and applications) and good hardware support. If you like Windows then all power to you but don't try to muddy the argument by exclusively focusing on the hardware whilst claiming (through the lack of attention on the matter) that the operating system doesn't matter.
RE[4]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!!
by lucifer on Wed 28th Mar 2012 02:48
in reply to "RE[3]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!! "
Member since:2006-08-20
RE[4]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!!
by Anonymous Penguin on Wed 28th Mar 2012 13:00
in reply to "RE[3]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!! "
Member since:2005-07-06
RE[4]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!!
by henderson101 on Thu 29th Mar 2012 01:03
in reply to "RE[3]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!! "
Member since:2006-05-30
I've had Windows 7 on my MacBook for a couple of years and BootCamp is just fine. I do mid level audio engineering on it. Latency is an important factor and it's fine.
I virtualise all of my Windows installs though these days. VMWare Fusion.
I get the feeling you're just unlucky though Thom.
RE[3]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!!
by fran on Tue 27th Mar 2012 23:11
in reply to "RE[2]: Non-sense: commodity hardware with expensive price!! "
Member since:2010-08-06
Yep, but Tom recommends a Zenbook to his family.
That recommendation is a terrible idea because it's a waste of money.
That recommendation is a terrible idea because it's a waste of money.
Some new model Ultrabooks is coming out soon. Dropping the price to around $600. The biggest difference is going to be the aluminum casing is swapped for good quality plastic.
There is also some Ultrabook type laptops coming out this year that is even cheaper. They resemble ultrabooks in sleekness and power but comes with AMD cpu's. It will run the trinity APS's and will bring very thin laptops mainstream.
Edited 2012-03-27 23:12 UTC
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/25/13 0:45 UTC
"So in summary... Google has pulled the plug on support on a protocol they've helped popularize, after years of promising interoperability, for reasons that are dubious at best, and in a way that leaves people who don't jump to the new Hangouts app unable to talk to their contacts without any feedback that their IMs aren't getting through... And they've done that with no warning to anyone. I imagine there's a bunch of people out there wondering where some of their buddies have gone, or why their messages aren't getting responses, because this isn't documented anywhere." Google really messed this up. Such a dick move.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/24/13 23:59 UTC
The Tizen Greek Community has some screenshots of a very recent build of Tizen running on a Samsung GT-i8800. It looks wholly unremarkable.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/24/13 22:33 UTC
Joint statement to The Next Web from Microsoft and Google: "Microsoft and YouTube are working together to update the new YouTube for Windows Phone app to enable compliance with YouTube's API terms of service, including enabling ads, in the coming weeks. Microsoft will replace the existing YouTube app in Windows Phone Store with the previous version during this time." Good to know these children stopped acting like little pricks. Can we have full Google support in Windows 8 now, please?
Linked by Howard Fosdick on 05/24/13 21:41 UTC
Yahoo is acquiring Tumblr, the microblogging and social networking website, for $1.1 billion USD. Tumblr offers little revenue but lots of eyeballs if Yahoo can monetarize them. Now Yahoo is bidding for Hulu, the streaming video service. After years of ineffective responses while Google, Facebook, and others took large chunks of the online advertising market, Yahoo is fighting back. Can Yahoo reignite the momentum it had at the turn of the century? What do you think?
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/24/13 14:44 UTC
"Sources have described iOS 7 as 'black, white, and flat all over'. This refers to the dropping of heavy textures and the addition of several new black and white user interface elements." I couldn't be happier.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/23/13 23:22 UTC
"Ilja van Sprundel, a security researcher with IOActive, has discovered a large number of issues in the way various X client libraries handle the responses they receive from servers, and has worked with X.Org's security team to analyze, confirm, and fix these issues."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/23/13 22:04 UTC
"Google is facing a new antitrust probe by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission into whether the company is using its leadership in the online display-advertising market to illegally curb competition, people familiar with the matter said." Sucks to be Google today, apparently.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/23/13 22:01 UTC
"In the midst of the major press blitz surrounding its annual I/O Conference, Google dropped some unfortunate news about its instant messaging plans. In several places around the web, the company is replacing the existing 'Talk' platform with a new one called 'Hangouts' that sharply diminishes support for the open messaging protocol known as XMPP (or sometimes informally Jabber), and also removes the option to disable the archiving of all chat communications. These changes represent a switch from open protocols to proprietary ones, and a clear step backward for many users." That's why I always say: only suckers trust companies.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/23/13 17:52 UTC
"The wave of departures is a sign of internal struggle, but amidst all the bad news, there is a glimmer of hope. According to an anonymous HTC executive cited by WSJ, the crucial HTC One is selling 'pretty good so far'. The executive revealed that HTC sold about five million One units since launch, a performance that is deemed encouraging. However, sales have been limited by the persisting supply issues that still plague the production of the HTC One." Finally some good news for HTC. Five million units amidst supply constraints is very impressive.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/22/13 22:23 UTC
"Sony gave the PS4 50% more raw shader performance, plain and simple (768 SPs @ 800MHz vs. 1152 SPs & 800MHz). Unlike last generation, you don't need to be some sort of Jedi to extract the PS4's potential here. The Xbox One and PS4 architectures are quite similar, Sony just has more hardware under the hood. Weâll have to wait and see how this hardware delta gets exposed in games over time, but the gap is definitely there. The funny thing about game consoles is that itâs usually the lowest common denominator that determines the bulk of the experience across all platforms. On the plus side, the Xbox One should enjoy better power/thermal characteristics compared to the PlayStation 4. Even compared to the Xbox 360 we should see improvement in many use cases thanks to modern power management techniques." AnandTech does its usual in-depth thing.More News »
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Member since:
2005-07-06
Yep, but Tom recommends a Zenbook to his family.
That recommendation is a terrible idea because it's a waste of money.