For all the shit I talk about Apple, I've got a 2012 i7 MBP that still has a working Radeon. It is interesting - because I only use it for things that don't bang on the GPU - so it is a powerful i7 that basically has an Apple self-destruct on it. I'm torn between just nurturing it around so I have an Intel Mac and burning out the GPU so I can send it away and have the hardware GPU disable hack done to it and not worry about it, and then GPU things will run on the integrated Intel HD graphics fine. 

I also have a G4 Quicksilver, and a G4 Graphite (the Graphite has MorphOS on it... which is personally, in my opinion, overpriced and under-delivering by today's Amiga expectations) - and a PowerMac 8500/500. And I run a number of Basilisk Mac 68k emulators. 

I like OS X a lot. It is a GORGEOUS OS. As long as you're coloring in the lines of Cupertino, they tend to be bullet proof for 99.5% of what people WANT to do with a computer. The integrate better with Wacom tablets than ANYTHING else designed for graphic artists - and they're *beautiful* machines. 

They're not magic, and they're not worth what they charge - and Apple's fixation on cramming as much high powered hardware into as little space as possible makes them difficult to work on and prone to premature heat death. 

And their walled garden can be infuriating. They do so many DUMB things and it all seems driven by pride and hubris. Their userbase are the biggest bunch of assholes this side of a Commodore convention. 

Wed Apr 21 2021 15:38:28 EDT from Nurb432

I did hear that some team is getting close to getting Linux to run correctly on them, and it may end up in mainline kernel.   But no accelerated GPU drivers as of yet. 

It does mean cheap Intel hardware soon, but who wants a device you cant replace the battery or update ram?    I tried to update the m.2 on my office machine, of course its not a standard socket and had to buy an adapter.   Just to find out that the screw holding it down,was pre-stripped from the factory. 

Of my own i actually do have an old Macbook. But it was when you could flip open the back panel, replace the battery, replace a hard drive, add ram..  I got it cheap, and since it was still 'fixable' i figured why not.  Ran OSX for about a day. Then off that went.   Had a Lombrard G3 before that, since i was a PPC fan.  And again,  you could still open the sob and do stuff.  Long gone. probably should have kept it. 

Wed Apr 21 2021 14:57:22 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

Oooooooh, anyone want the new and boring stuff?

M1 iMacs, only $1,299! And they're available in four colors ... or $1,499 for other colors!

Spring Loaded, everyone. It's innovative and the next big thing.

 

Mine is a core duo, not i7. But it does do the job when i need it.  Runs much better with Linux than OSX ever did.  My shop mac laptop, its perhaps 3 years old.  I only use it to run VMs via vBox so didnt really care about OSX, but after a few OS updates it started getting unstable, so off it went and Linux went on.  Later i dumped vBox and went KVM. but that is a different story, and not the fault of Apple. 

Had a G4 wind tunnel back when i still used the Lombard G3, and i agree, other than the apple part, they were great machines back then, if you didnt need windows.   That was before the 'great lockdown' movement they embarked on and ruined things ( for people like me at least )

I don't fully understand getting a Mac and then running Linux or Windows on it. Non-Apple PC components are so much less hassle to run a Non-Apple OS on in general... component repairs are generally cheaper, upgrades are often cheaper, compatibility across components is usually more generic. Running a Non-Apple OS on a Mac seems like asking for extra issues to me. 

MorphOS is a pretty decent alternative to OS X - but it is an OS designed, like OS X, with a limited range of PPC equipment in mind. They've got a target hardware platform in their sites. Linux and Windows are trying to run on everything. 

Thu Apr 22 2021 09:48:43 EDT from Nurb432

Mine is a core duo, not i7. But it does do the job when i need it.  Runs much better with Linux than OSX ever did.  My shop mac laptop, its perhaps 3 years old.  I only use it to run VMs via vBox so didnt really care about OSX, but after a few OS updates it started getting unstable, so off it went and Linux went on.  Later i dumped vBox and went KVM. but that is a different story, and not the fault of Apple. 

Had a G4 wind tunnel back when i still used the Lombard G3, and i agree, other than the apple part, they were great machines back then, if you didnt need windows.   That was before the 'great lockdown' movement they embarked on and ruined things ( for people like me at least )

In my personal case:

At office i could either have an under powered windows laptop if i wanted something small enough to carry around to meetings.  Or a behemoth boat anchor that woudl be a nightmare to lug around and is meant to spend most its life tethered to a docking station. Or i could get a mac, which had the power of our 'developer laptop' option but in a smaller form factor than our 'standard' laptop.   We get a set list to choose from, we cant go outside of that list.

At home, it was a deal i could not pass up due to the cost. 

I still hope their entry in to the ARM market means it will become mainstream, and costs on the 'PC' side drop.

Dont get me wrong i like my Pinebook Pro a lot, but its still meant to be a 'maker laptop'. The current 'consumer' ARM laptops, i think there are 2 choices, and they are overpriced for what they are.   Higher end ARM chromebooks are in the same level as my PBPro, other than storage options.  But they are packaged for the consumer, so i guess that is a win there.

Thu Apr 22 2021 10:40:18 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

Right ... I'm not sure why anyone would spend that kind of money on hardware if they didn't intend to live inside the Apple walled garden. You can buy a very nice non-Apple desktop and a monitor for far less than $1,299 ... and I probably don't need to re-hash the whole conversation about having to throw away a perfectly good monitor when the computer built into it becomes obsolete.

But the point here is ... where is the wow factor. These are super-premium prices for meh-level evolution. These computers have the M1 chip and a fresh coat of paint. Magic Pancreas Man wouldn't have let these machines out the door without adding something revolutionary to dazzle the people and make everyone want to buy one.

Apple needs to get its mojo back.

💯

This is kind of intrinsic to the argument I've been making in other rooms about the change to Arm. That in itself isn't actually revolutionary from the end user experience. Even if it does open up something that couldn't be done before, if they're not DOING that thing - what is the matter? "It is cooler on your lap" is neither magic nor revolutionary. 

I'm also puzzled that among iMacs, the m4 has a memory limit - and they still offer Intel iMacs that have much higher memory capacity. 

So, basically the M4 is for fairly routine, grocery-getting, Chromebook style consumer applications - but Apple is still making Intel Macs for the foreseeable future for power users. 

So, Apple *isn't* dumping Intel - they're augmenting their line up with a midrange - and that makes it sound like x64 binary support won't be going away anytime soon.  

Thu Apr 22 2021 10:40:18 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

But the point here is ... where is the wow factor. These are super-premium prices for meh-level evolution. These computers have the M1 chip and a fresh coat of paint. Magic Pancreas Man wouldn't have let these machines out the door without adding something revolutionary to dazzle the people and make everyone want to buy one.

Apple needs to get its mojo back.

I had not heard that, i only heard there would be a rather short transition, like last time and the M1 laptop was the first step.

Thu Apr 22 2021 13:17:56 EDT from ParanoidDelusions

but Apple is still making Intel Macs for the foreseeable future for power users. 

 

That is what I keep hearing - and heard for a long time *before* the M1 came out - and I wonder how long it will continue to be the story. 

The point is, Intel Macs are not the dead end at the moment that the industry seems to be making them out to be. I keep reading headlines "Apple Ditching Intel" "Apple Dumping Intel". 

Apple seems to be more moving toward an open Friends with Benefits relationship with Intel. 

This article is an interesting take on it. 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/why-apple-is-right-to-dump-intel-for-arm-in-some-macbooks/ar-BB15fFXY

Thu Apr 22 2021 13:23:26 EDT from Nurb432

I had not heard that, i only heard there would be a rather short transition, like last time and the M1 laptop was the first step.

Thu Apr 22 2021 13:17:56 EDT from ParanoidDelusions

but Apple is still making Intel Macs for the foreseeable future for power users. 

 

 

I mean - the first case is just corporate budget and IT policy nonsense. They probably have preferred vendors but have been forced by the employee/userbase to accommodate Apple products... but there are absolutely Intel PCs that have the power and form-factor of whatever Mac you ended up with from corporate. Surface. Surface Book - Lenovo Thinkpads. Let me guess, your preferred PC vendor at work is Dell? They make crap laptops. The rub here is that the Microsoft or Lenovo products that are comparable to whatever Mac you got are probably cheaper. But... I get it that IT doesn't want to be supporting a dozen different vendor platforms - so that is what it is. I'm surprised they'll let you install a non-Apple OS on a company Mac, though.

My personal experience is that for IT Management, this is a huge headache. The C level staff tends to:

A: See all PCs as commodity items that are all the same regardless of price - which is why staff and management ends up with POS Dells when they see the budget difference between Dells and Lenovos. 

B: Are often the ones driving the initiatives to have Apple product support, including Macbooks - which they think are somehow more powerful or reliable. 

I fought tooth and nail to replace Dell with Lenovo for our laptop users (people at desktop workstations are an entirely different ballgame - and I actually prefer Dell for desktops, and even servers, their game is strong in those segments). Employee productivity went up, trouble tickets went down, repair costs went down. 

I've said a while you can tell the button-down business folks from the rest of the people at the airport gate by who pulls out PoS PCs, who pulls out Macs, and who pulls out Lenovos. That has changed a little in the last 10 years or so. You see more MS Surfacebooks and Surface Pros and more button-down business people have drank the Cupertino kool-aide - but in general, it still holds true. 

And at home, I paid $80 for my MBP 2012, allegedly bricked. It was running Windows and Linux when I got it, but wouldn't take an OS X image. I fixed that. 

Thu Apr 22 2021 11:22:10 EDT from Nurb432

In my personal case:

 

At office i could either have an under powered windows laptop if i wanted something small enough to carry around to meetings.  Or a behemoth boat anchor that woudl be a nightmare to lug around and is meant to spend most its life tethered to a docking station. Or i could get a mac, which had the power of our 'developer laptop' option but in a smaller form factor than our 'standard' laptop.   We get a set list to choose from, we cant go outside of that list.

 

At home, it was a deal i could not pass up due to the cost. 

 

 

This is very individual. I used to like a big hulking 17" for all the same reasons. These days, I like a tiny little 12" and will sacrifice a lot of those features for the convenience of it being a breeze to get through TSA security. I think my last corporate notebook was a Lenovo X12 of some sort. I mean... right now I use an MSI 17" gaming PC for my company computer - but I needed something cheap with discreet GPU. The hinges have cracked so it basically is a desktop, now. 

Thu Apr 22 2021 13:53:42 EDT from darknetuser

At office i could either have an under powered windows laptop if i
wanted something small enough to carry around to meetings.  Or a
behemoth boat anchor that woudl be a nightmare to lug around and is
meant to spend most its life tethered to a docking station. Or i
could get a mac, which had the power of our 'developer laptop' option

but in a smaller form factor than our 'standard' laptop.   We get a

set list to choose from, we cant go outside of that list.

I find that the limiting factor with portable computers is how comfortable they are to use rather than how much power they pack, for most users.

My main laptop of choice is the size of a house, not because I want a powerful computer (that is a bonus only), but because a big computer means a big screen, it means integrated DVD drive, an RJ45 socket, and a list of goodies smaller ones lack. If getting stuck in a coffee shop with a laptop and a job to do is something that may happen to you, I much prefer to be able to work on a computer with a keyboard which is comfortable to use.

Our desks have a docking station, and on average 3 - 21 inch or larger monitors.  Our conf rooms have overheads or huge 50" screens.

So for us, its rare we are stuck with a tiny screen, so the real choice is between portability or horsepower.   And since in the old days i traveled on foot a lot between customers across the campus and outlying buildings we rent, portability was most important to me, but there was a lower limit due to something things i do that isn't on the server ( reporting/queries/data analysis ) and the smaller 'PC' choice, was below that. 

I used to have a high end desktop too, but they took those away from us "you must use laptops, and take them home EVERY day, no RDP back to the office because the world might end tomorow" The disaster planning guys scared the executives and got them to do that.   Tho, to be fair, we did have a flood 2 floors down that summer, and it took out everyone's desktops there too. so they were sort of hosed.   

But now we have a lot of VDI..  And in fact some BUs mandate that if you are remote. Even if you have a shop owned laptop.   At this point we have to use VDI too, if you want to access a server, even if you are on site..  Its annoying.

Oddly, we have some apps that people use that supposedly wont work on windows...  ( cant say that is the truth or not, but it got them a mac ) But it is a small % of people who have them, and we dont really support them beyond replacing them if they die. 

I had to get an exemption to get one.  If we were allowed to have a decent and small PC laptop, id go with that ( and get windows off it :) ) .  But, if i never make it back to the office, its academic i guess as its in a bag and has been for a year. And now that so few people are around, may not be much 'walking around' to meetings anymore even if i do go back.  For right or wrong, the world IS different than it was a year ago.

Thu Apr 22 2021 13:45:47 EDT from ParanoidDelusions

I mean - the first case is just corporate budget and IT policy nonsense. They probably have preferred vendors but have been forced by the employee/userbase to accommodate Apple products... 

I had a 12" Lenovo at my last "real" job. I loved it. It was a full fledged Thinkpad - not like an airbook. It was user serviceable - battery and ram and hd...  It was just tiny and a breeze at airports. 

lenovo is banned for us. Chinese issues.

Even if we wanted to get our vendor changed from HP (! arrgh crap ) we would not be able to. 

Mon Apr 26 2021 11:43:33 PM EDT from ParanoidDelusions

I had a 12" Lenovo at my last "real" job. I loved it. It was a full fledged Thinkpad - not like an airbook. It was user serviceable - battery and ram and hd...  It was just tiny and a breeze at airports. 

 

Hadn't considered that. Back then, China wasn't such a perceived threat. 

Tue Apr 27 2021 09:13:44 EDT from Nurb432

lenovo is banned for us. Chinese issues.

Even if we wanted to get our vendor changed from HP (! arrgh crap ) we would not be able to. 

Mon Apr 26 2021 11:43:33 PM EDT from ParanoidDelusions

I had a 12" Lenovo at my last "real" job. I loved it. It was a full fledged Thinkpad - not like an airbook. It was user serviceable - battery and ram and hd...  It was just tiny and a breeze at airports. 

 

 

We are seeing this more and more. I get daily advisories from above with increasing numbers of Chinese chipsets that we are directed to not implement. This is recent. Major vendors are on the blacklist now.

Tue Apr 27 2021 13:36:53 EDT from ParanoidDelusions

Hadn't considered that. Back then, China wasn't such a perceived threat. 

 

Tue Apr 27 2021 09:13:44 EDT from Nurb432

lenovo is banned for us. Chinese issues.

Even if we wanted to get our vendor changed from HP (! arrgh crap ) we would not be able to. 

Mon Apr 26 2021 11:43:33 PM EDT from ParanoidDelusions

I had a 12" Lenovo at my last "real" job. I loved it. It was a full fledged Thinkpad - not like an airbook. It was user serviceable - battery and ram and hd...  It was just tiny and a breeze at airports. 

 

 

 

I only see this increasing, across many industries. Its going to get pretty rough for a while i think. While i dont trust the CCP as far as i can throw them, and dont want them to take over, you have to admit that lower cost goods have increased general quality of life for many people. ( and hurt others, i do agree. Like the ones in china doing the work for nothing )

Things like a fender for a car, or a cheap pot and pan set isn't a security threat, but it does fund the CCP to a %. But it also lets some of their citizens eat ( who i dont dislike. its the CCP i dont like ), who would have no income otherwise, which IS free market. No easy answer to this mess.