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tomptoday at 10:01 AM16 repliesview on HN

Because Mac laptops are lightyears ahead of any other hardware.

Build quality (aluminum), charging (magsafe), screen resolution, battery life, noise (or lack thereof), trackpad…

It’s like other vendors aren’t even trying.

Also the OS mostly “just works”, just last week my Linux laptop disabled NVIDIA GPU (and almost bricked itself?? Not sure, had to fix apt) during automated updates


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liendolucastoday at 10:59 AM

Of course it works and is beautiful hardware and all that.

But don't fool yourself. You're subverted to Apple's rules the same as Microsoft users are to Windows.

I prefer to fight a little bit on an update on a unix system on something that is not working 100% to give up choices. When you use Windows, MacOS, Android you do not have choices. Choices are dictated from above, like it or not.

As for me every time I have to interact with something that is not BSD or Linux I suffer miserably.

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egeozcantoday at 10:08 AM

I have to agree, unfortunately. Macbooks have their issues, and give me violent tendencies like any piece of hardware every now and then, but when it comes to UX and reliability, they are far, far ahead of anything I tried, and I tried a lot of hardware.

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MarkWayneNewtontoday at 11:30 AM

Macs are for people who think they know how to computer but actually don't know anything at all.

whhtoday at 10:20 AM

Not to mention that once you're in this ecosystem, it's usually pretty reliable.

It seems that no other device makers are seeing the value in Apple's many-devices-acting-as-one approach. It makes for some serious vendor lock.

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bayindirhtoday at 10:29 AM

Also don't forget calibrated screens, great speakers, long-life (you can use one for a 7-8 years without even trying), and durable keyboards which doesn't become smeared wear-fests which defaces itself within a single heavy development session.

I always run Linux (Debian primarily) on my desktops and servers with a zealot-ish dedication, but what Mac and macOS brings to the table as a portable machine is irreplaceable with anything else.

Even a top end ThinkPad with a well groomed Linux distribution can't come close, sorry.

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vitrotoday at 10:12 AM

Mac build quality is nice indeed. And Nvidia sometimes doesn't play along, but that is a small price to pay for an everyday peace of mind.

My both parents use linux and are happy with it. If you mostly use just the browser and reading e-mails, I don't see any better system even for someone who is non-technical.

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dathinabtoday at 10:45 AM

> “just works”

if you use distros which ship the latest _stable_ release of software

and have enough Linux know how to fix the occasional hick up

but it can sometimes "just work" for a long time without any issues, something I haven't exactly had with either Windows or Mac

like my current gaming setup from a year ago(roughly) was setup once, I had to fiddle some minor tweaks during setup and since then it "just works tm". No issues, not know how needed, nothing. (At least for the Games I play.) But also not Nvidea which has in recent years increasingly more QA issues across _all_ OSes and _all_ hardware including their supper expensive AI cards... But that is more a Nvidea then a Linux Problem, by now, was different in the past.

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prodigycorptoday at 10:06 AM

We're 30+ years into trackpads on laptops and they're still terrible on Windows machines. Make it make sense.

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xeyownttoday at 11:15 AM

I'm not sure the hardware is worth the price.

As for the OS, everytime I tried MacOS, I find rapidly major showstoppers. It's like people are just blind to them.

If I'd qualify each platform, I'd say Windows is a toy, Mac is a piece of art, Linux is a tool. I picked my category.

andy99today at 10:42 AM

Agree unfortunately. I hate apple, for the same reasons as everyone else, but I have both a MacBook and iPhone and can’t do much about it. It’s like politics a little, you can only choose the least bad, there is no good.

I have a Linux server, and use cloud Linux machines extensively, but at least the last time I checked, Linux desktop sucks. There are always memory management issues, doing a video call makes my fan sound like a jet taking off, not sleeping, put my laptop in my bag and it gets to hot to touch - that’s just off the top of my head, I’ve tried Linux laptops on multiple occasions and they suck.

eks391today at 10:42 AM

This actually just happened to me... How did you fix it? I just finished proving that my issue isn't my peripherals or cords so it must be the GPU

fizzynuttoday at 10:41 AM

Do regular people care about these things or is this a hn thing?

I find a trackpad (even a Mac one) is absolutely infuriating to use compared to a decent mouse.

Battery life/screens/magsafe I'm plugged into a dock 99% of the time so it's irrelevant, but when forced to occasionally, the ergonomics of looking down at a single small 1x in screen is just terrible if doing it for hours and also makes my back feel horrible.

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pjmlptoday at 10:17 AM

At work we can choose between Apple laptops or Thinkpads, I choose thinkpads, using Windows and WSL.

Previously either VMware Workstation or Virtual Box.

Also I am not speaking from a position of no experience, as some projects require being assigned Mac Books, that I gladly return after delivery.

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eloranttoday at 10:50 AM

Windows on laptops also just works, especially for high end ones. It’s the Linux on laptops that’s hit or miss.

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piskovtoday at 10:12 AM

This has changed recently

For example this dell is superb, has tandem oled with 200% scaling and runs linux (dhh runs this on onarchy)

https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/laptop-computers/spd/xps14da...

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ho_schitoday at 10:13 AM

Aluminium is not build quality. It makes lying stuff inside cheap. And feels horrible on skin contact.

The good ThinkPads with Magnesium feel much better (both for hand and lap) and are lighter. And the expensive and complicated build allows maintenance (replacing a keyboard is a bless on the X13). Lenovo is just stupid and also allows to purchase low quality screens, low quality frames and even a Windows. A thing that Apple never allows, you cannot purchase a bad configuration.

The MBAs at Apple figured out much earlier, that a rigid metal frame is cheap and gives the impression of quality.

Aside from that?

Customers are guilty, wanting a shiny and quick solution. And governments and companies by following ultra rigid and outright stupid purchasing guide (ISO craziness and “we can drop Windows, we invested another 300.000 in a Windows only Application).

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