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Ask Slashdot: Best Laptops For Fans Of Pre-Retina MacBook Pro?
stigmato writes "Once upon a time the MacBook Pro line was well-regarded amongst IT professionals for their quality, performance, serviceability & upgradeability. As appealing as the new Retina displays are, I don't want a device I cannot upgrade or repair. Glued in batteries and soldered in RAM with high prices have made me look to other manufacturers again. What are you buying, /. community? System76? Dell? Old article but still rings true with the latest models. I post this from my 2010 MBP 13" with a 256GB SSD, 1TB HDD in the optical bay, 8GB (possibly 16GB soon) and a user replaced battery."
I really like my Lenovo T-series laptop. Sure, it may not live up to the legendary build quality back when it was an IBM, but it is still pretty good. It has all the user replacement options that are standard, a good keyboard and screen. It's not getting an award for its looks, but well, who cares.
I bought a MacBook air a year ago. The first one exploded to blew my hand off. The next one killed my dog. It wouldn't run DR-DOS at all. The wifi screwed up and sterilized my nuts.
Overall I was left with a really bad feeling about all Apple products, which obviously must all have similar defects. Anecdotes by unverifiable semi-anonymous internet posters prove that to be true.
I like having a slim laptop (mine's a non-Apple ultrabook, but same build tradeoffs). The specs are adequate, it's fairly cheap, and failure rates are acceptably low.
I'm not firmly against the end of upgradability/repairability for laptops. It was always kinda spotty anyway.
If I can fix sealed phones surely this laptop is repairable.
This sounds like hyperbole. Ungluing a battery is not impossible. If the ram goes, sure you are out a mobo, but that is pretty normal for ultrabooks. Either you want it small or you want it easy to repair.
I'm very happy with the System 76 I purchased a few months ago. I'm a Windows user, so I installed Windows 7 on it and downloaded all of the Windows 7 drivers from the System 76 web site, and it's been rock solid and a really good performer.
Since I have a really slow upgrade cycle, I am mostly just holding out hope that Apple releases a more maintainable MBP again sometime over the next few years. I found my 2006 MBP to be surprisingly maintainable, with parts easy to get and swap out, but nothing was glued in place. Every once in a while I poke around to see if there are any others that I like but so far not much luck.
I will make the argument these devices are mostly tools and professional quality ones should be ordered loaded with CPU & RAM that works on the factory warranty & the hard drives can still be easily changed out. Our time is worth a decent amount of $s per hour, after all, and we do NOT have unlimited time.
A professional laptop recently seems to retain its usefulness for at least 3 years, so these laptops remain functional for a long enough time to justify ordering them loaded with options to make our life and work easier.
If I had the money, I would go with a 17.3" Bonobo Extreme from System 76 - It's beefy as is and you can crack it right open for upgrades. The display is very nice, however I really don't know if it goes so far as to meet your Retina requirement. My first order of business would be to wipe out the hard drive and install elementary OS Luna - if you've never used it I promise you will fall in love pretty damn quick. I used Macs exclusively from 2005 until two or three months ago when I gave up OS X for a full migration to eOS after getting hooked on it - something I would have otherwise never believed possible.
Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
Apple has realized that making serviceable devices is a dead end when the processor hardware is good enough to be future proof. And their solution is the same solution many sectors of the economy face. Our automobiles are disposable consumer oriented devices, our kitchen appliances are as well, washing machines, you name it all service and repair departments are being down graded to expedite product end life.
Obsolescence is not just planned it has become a manufacturing industry mantra. With essentially slave labour doing the recycling of these goods, either that or illegal at sea dumping operations turning over the used goods we are headed down a technical path to environmental and consumer driven stupidity!
This message was not sent from an iPhone because Peter Sellers really was a deviated prevert without a dime for the call
Asus still makes some great laptops but I still miss 1200P res!
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
As far as the RAM, meh. It's not windows, there's not a lot of cases when you would upgrade the RAM for OSX.
Battery on the other hand is a real issue. Yeah, the "new batteries" aren't supposed to have recharge issues, but PC makers have been using that line for over a decade.
It's not like Apple spends it time having a Seance to talk to Steve's ghost just to figure out how to piss people off. You want an ultra-thin notebook and you're going to sacrifice serviceability. You look at windows based ultrabooks and the serviceability is better than Apple, but not by that much. It's still a hassle to fit a battery into that space and an even bigger hassle to replace the battery. You start making the laptop more modular and a few things will happen. 1) You'll compromise on size and weight. 2) You start getting flex issues issues in the case (like it or not the glue on apple products has more to do with durability and case flex than it does with repairs). It become even more pronounced with plastic cases. 3) You end up with design compromises that make the overall experience horrid.
So where does that leave the IT professional? Well, if it's for work there's likely a service contract. The glue is the problem for some guy at the referb factory. For home? Either put up with it/get applecare contract, or hackintosh one of the cheaper ultrabooks out there and live with what that entails.
The SSD is the ONLY internal storage option, and the extra bay previously available for expansion drives has been removed. If you want the storage professionals are accustomed to and require on these macs, you won't be able to have a standalone laptop. It will all be external drives and network storage. This is simply not viable, functional or ergonomic for graphics professionals. It is a typical Apple move to take away functionality and feature in a new device, to then slowly reintroduce it as "new" at a premium price. Give me a break, its like walking up a down escalator with them, and frankly they've crossed the line of viability.
I don't think that being able to upgrade really matters. In fact, even if you can upgrade, you will soon run into barriers.
I've upgraded my 2007 MacBook Pro to a 500 GB SSD and 6 GB RAM. The CPU and GPU or everything else can't be upgraded.
So where is a Retina MacBook Pro worse with respect to upgradeability? The SSD can also be swapped - and it's probably much easier than swapping the SSD on a 2007 MacBook Pro, which has the disk deep inside. Well, the RAM cannot be upgraded on the new model... but wait, I can't go beyond 6 GB on the old one, either (actually, it's already above the official 4GB limit). So if I order a Retina MacBook Pro with the maximum RAM, it does not make a difference at the end of the day.
Claus
is a Thinkpad 540p. Great laptop. Battery pops off the back. There's a port to access the ram. It's also a lot less expensive than a MBP.
because a) they're cheap b) fit into backpack c) don't overheat. d) fullhd e) fast enough for gaming for at least two years. (though I guess now most 15"'s are fullhd?) refresh every 2 years or so(1000-1200 bucks).
of course, not ultra slim or anything like that but if you want something that doesn't have everything soldered down... the second hdd bay was a bit of a bitch to access on this though. as for size, I just think 13"'s are not that good to work with and getting decent performance in that size tends to heat up and cost an arm and a leg and still leave you figuring out if you want ssd or space.. just a bit bigger and you can have both(and still keep the optical drive).
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Apple is quite succesful in marketing their thin computers, first the popular Macbook Air, now the Macbook Pro is nearly as thin. And thent here is also the slick ipad Air. I notice that most of my friends love the slick, thin design of these devices, rarely if every people wonder about repairability.
In this case, i am not sure it is such a big issue in practice. I would recommend to buy the machine with enough RAM to begin with, and despite the battery being glued I understand that Apple can easily exchange it for another one. The screen's lack of easy repairability, yes I can see that issue, but if you take Apple Care (as many do) then you do not need to care about that for three years. Even when repairable, when a laptop screen gives the ghost after say 5 years, most people would rather buy anew computer then rather than repair.
So, all in all, I am not sure how much of a dealbreaker these elements, esp. Considering that on the plus side you will have a marvelously thin and thus easily portable device.
I do expect that similar construction will soon be ubiquitous also amongst pc laptops. Most People tend to prefer the stylish presence of elegant, "trim" laptops. It will be difficult to offer both easy upgradability and sleekness together.
Dell Latitude e6430 with Intel graphics. Ubuntu certified. I run Linux Mint that works perfectly too. Everything "just works". Highly configurable. Excellent service manual and easily serviceable without voiding your warranty. Standard parts. Docking station that, again, "just works" with Linux. Built like a tank. Available on refurb from Dell outlet. It's not the smallest or lightest or prettiest cheapest but those are not priorities for me. It's the corporate fleet laptop. I've yet to find something to complain about it.
-73, de n1ywb
www.n1ywb.com
"Once upon a time the MacBook Pro line was well-regarded amongst IT professionals for their quality, performance, serviceability & upgradeability. As appealing as the new Retina displays are, I don't want a device I cannot upgrade or repair."
Translation:
"I once thought the price premium for Apple products was worth it, but I do not any longer. Please help me decide which other vendor to throw my money at so I don't have to do any research."
And here is one simple answer, so we can close this thread up and move on: Decide which features are most important (HD screen, ram upgrade-ability, large keyboard, etc) and make a list of vendors who offer that, then pick the cheapest one from the list. Dell, HP, Lenovo, Asus, Acer, and Samsung all make feature rich, upgrade-ready laptops. The "Best" is strictly a function of your budget divided by your important feature list.
I recommend Asus because they have good build quality, accept most aftermarket parts, and are reasonably priced. The k55 model in particular is interesting because of how many variants there are. Most of the parts are interchangeable and upgradeable. The k55n-ha8123k I purchased was upgradeable to a 1920x1080p display panel, matte or glossy. The dvd rom drive was easily thrown in the garbage and replaced with a second hard drive. The external bezel for the dvd rom drive also cleanly fit over the hdd caddy, preserving the look of the laptop. The processor is upgradeable from an a8-4500 to an a10, The ram can be upgraded to low voltage 1.35v ddr3. The wifi card can be upgraded to an intel wireless AC/bluetooth combo card for only 30 dollars.
Oh, and the base price of the laptop was $330 at best buy of all places. You can view the laptop on newegg here: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834231019
"Do you want to stick with OSX or are fine with a different OS?" If the former you are stuck. If the latter then decide on a feature set must haves and price point and buy what meets those needs. Dell, HP, Leveno all make good machines so it really comes down to what meets your needs.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
I'm in the same boat as you. I have the same year MBP as you, but I have the 15" and I went out of my way to get a matte screen on it. And THOSE are no longer available, which is MY biggest problem. Those retina screens are all glossy.
I could almost live with the non-upgradable stuff.
Here's my problem, though.
I need OS X. And no other laptop will give me that.
Now technically the apps I use can be run on Windows, too, but I am NOT using Windows as my daily driver. Sure, I can get a Lenovo or Alienware (both of which have matte screen options) and dual-boot, but I don't want to do that. I often leave Photoshop open for days (or weeks!) while working on stuff, while I do other things. I do not want to have to shuffle.
So, for me, the choice is really no choice at all. Apple have kind of taken away some features we've become used to, but I am a little bit tied to the platform.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is kinky.
The battery is non-removable. But it is rated for 1,000 charge cycles, which should last for many years if you know what you are doing. (Some people don't. Apparently there are people who put their laptop on the desk, remove the charger, work until the battery is empty, then plug in the charger). The battery isn't cheap, but batteries aren't cheap - unless you get one from eBay that looks exactly like the original but isn't an original.
RAM and hard drive are user upgradeable on the non-Retina MacBook Pro, and if you don't need the optical drive you can build your own Fusion drive. Or you get the retina display and buy it with the amount of RAM you need.
This is the non-ultrabook style that is very easily upgraded.
http://store.apple.com/us/buy-mac/macbook-pro
Very high quality build, excellent specs, battery life that makes going mobile reasonable. Spend $1700+ and you have one hell of a laptop. Dual SSD, great display, gobs of ram, massive video card... The Linux support used to require some optimus tweaking, but these days it should "just work." There was a bug that cause the light sensor in the camera to generate keystrokes, but you can put a smiley sticker on top.
"There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell them." ~ Louis Armstrong
http://www.eurocom.com/
Best fully upgrade-able workhorses out there. Not sexy like a Mac, but damn good machines.
Ex-MacBook user. Written from my Eurocom Racer.
Goodbye Slashdot. You've changed.
My i7 MBP with hard drive and DVD is chugging away, and will chug away forever - or as close to forever as possible.
If you need the old ones they're still on Apple's refurb/clearance page. The only thing you can't get is the widescreen glossy display, which most people hated (though I have one and it's great).
I'm posting this on my Macbook Pro, made of Chinese slaves' retinas. I love it.
I've never felt the urge to perform brain surgery on any of the laptops I've owned over the years. I bought each one pretty much maxed out, and ran it for four or five years. The one thing that irritates me about my latest Macbook is that I can't carry a spare battery with me. But on the other hand, its battery life is very good and it's very rare for me to spend so long between charging opportunities that it's a problem. And the one time it was, well, it's a price worth paying. Other laptops - and I looked at many when deciding which to buy - all found worse ways to suck.
Small
Cheap
Easy to repair
Pick two.
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
These MacBook Pros hold their value surprisingly well. They're also rock solid on reliability. Just plan on replacing it with a new one every 2-3 yrs rather than 4-5 yrs and you will be fine.
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
Clevo is the barebone manufacturer behind System 76, Eurocom, PC-SEX, Malibal, Xotic, Deviltech, and others...
http://www.clevo.com.tw/en/products/index.asp
They don't come with all the software layers you can have on Asus, Dell & co and you can upgrade them to your needs..
Came looking for Apple fanbois to basically tell the OP to shove off and deal with it.
Am not disappoint.
I have the Samsung ATIV Book 7 (formerly called the Series 7). It's pretty similar in size and weight to a 13" MBP, and it's incredibly upgradeable for an Ultrabook. Here's a nice link: http://www.mobiletechreview.com/notebooks/Samsung-Series-7-Ultra.htm You can easily upgrade the RAM and SSD. You should be able to upgrade the battery, though I've never done that myself. Also, the European version of the computer can be had with a discrete graphics card if that's your thing. By the way, the screen, speakers, and touchpad on the ATIV Book 7 are all fantastic. It's a high-quality laptop.
Jesus, haven't people heard the good news about Internet shopping? It's 2013.
I heard intel is going to start selling the processor soldered on the motherboard, it won't be long before even laptops will be like mobile phones where you can only replace the battery. It makes sense for the manufacturers and the end-consumers, SoC designs make things faster, cheaper, more compact less power-hungry. I'm Ok with this as long as the parts with high failure rate (hard drives and batteries) are still replaceable by professionals at least (and don't require custom screwdrivers that no one have Apple!).
I am a HUGE fan of the Dell Latitude series. Extreamely easy to work on. I picked up a older refurbished d630 about 2 months ago - even though its an older model, came with dual-core 2.4GHz processor and 4 gig of ram for $239 at KMart. I picked up an external Blu-Ray drive for $30, and replaced the network card with a 802.11 N for $10. These things are STUPIDLY SIMPLE to take apart.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTPebVcfKRs
The newer Latitudes are just as easy to take apart and work on:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0NCPkxSMYA
As these are business class notebooks, they are pretty durable as well.
At least for the d630, you can replace the six-cell battery with a 9 cell and extend the operating time to over 4 hours (the operating time seems to be cut in half by the 802.11N WiFi card, but there is a physical switch to easily toggle the WiFi on and off).
Why did I pick up a 630? Because I had one of these for work for two years when I worked in desktop support (I'm now in networking) and LOVED the thing. Still do. This model came out around 2007ish, and still outperforms my consumer-grade Compaq that I picked up in 2009. Why don't I still have the Compaq? Trying to take it apart to fix the motherboard resulted in me tearing up two ribbon cables, cracking the case, and the LCD pannel cable breaking, After that, I decided to go back to Dell Latitude series. They are hands-down the most tinkerer-friendly laptops you can find. I've replaced nics, drive, ram, keyboards, LCDs motherboards and processors on these things back in my desktop support days. I've worked on Compaqs, HPs, Apples, Gateway, eMachines, Acers and Sonys, and none are as easy to work with as the Dell.
No, Dell is not paying me to say this. :-) I think some of their business desktop models are crap. But IMHO nothing beats the Latitude line in terms of user servicability!
get this trash off slashdot
ON THE CONTRARY IT IS LINUX FUD! There is nothing that Microsoft would love more than to see everybody buy new Surface devices every 2 to three years the way the Apple sheep do with their products. Soldered in ram, batteries, locked down boot loaders make Apple and Microsoft's consumer hardware division leaders have wet dreams in the billions of dollars. As Bill Gates clearly stated "the only thing to fear in computing is Linux" and they are aggressively making sure that the fud keeps going against other devices than the ones that run WINDBLOWS. Try putting Linux or Android on an iPad, or Surface Pro or RT then come back and tell me who is full of fud. As it is my IBM T42 runs like a Russian tank and it still does everything I ask of it and I can still repair it if necessary! AS LONG AS I AM RUNNING LINUX on it.
This message was not sent from an iPhone because Peter Sellers really was a deviated prevert without a dime for the call
This is why, when the 15" MBP-Retina was announced in 2012, as I was preparing to replace my late 2006 15" MBP, I immediately went to Apple's online store and bought a refurb late 2011 17" MPB. Although the battery isn't "user replaceable" the older MBP is still at least serviceable by a tech skilled user. The new ones aren't. And for that reason it may very well be the last Apple laptop I purchase. Regrettably.
Jobs is no longer CEO (again) and Apple is losing its edge (again).
I can see the fnords!
When the first retina models went to soldered-on RAM, it was obviously that all MacBook Pros would ship this way in the future.
I miss the upgradability, but I ran the numbers on my non-retina 15" into which I installed two 512GB SSDs and 16GB RAM (the max you can do with two SODIMM slots due to current DRAM density and JDEC standards). It turns out that an equivalent retina MBP with 1TB SSD and 16 GB RAM is roughly the same price (within 10% of the cost).
Not having swappable batteries and RAM means you don't need a reinforced frame, rugged connectors, screw holes, and cover. That's all space that can be used for more battery and/or reducing size and weight. It's a trade-off, but ultimately I consider it to be worth it.
Plus I rather enjoy having a nice Mac OS GUI that I don't have to worry about, but can run macports and build Unix utilities from a terminal window.
Natural != (nontoxic || beneficial)
If you're only changing out the hard disk or the RAM, you lack imagination. I bought a Thinkpad T61p off eBay for $99. For another $137, I doubled the RAM, got an Intel 6300N wireless chipset, extended battery, and DVD burner (which could have been a Blu-Ray drive if I wanted). The screen has a line through it now; I may need to spend another $50-$60 to change it out. I've had laptops with failed screen inverters that I've swapped out.
Why not max out RAM now? because 32GB of RAM is stupid expensive now, in a year it'll likely be half the price. No sense in letting the OEM mark it up and throw away your money. Also, RAM and hard disks are the two things most likely to die in a laptop, so being able to change them out is a VERY good thing. Extra storage capacity may not be immediately needed, but be incredibly useful a year or two out.
Saying that unibody = reliable is not necessarily a direct correlation. There may be some overlap, but the problem is that if something does break, you're completely screwed to the point where one must really, REALLY hope that Apple will hook you up, because Microcenter cannot.
I've never had a problem buying memory within a few years. If you let it go really long then it can be an issue, but as long as you're only one generation behind the current then you're likely still fine.
I have a Dell Precision M6400 (Quad Core Extreme) Mobile Workstation and it is built like a tank - it has fallen from 4' while open running and hasn't suffered for it. The hinges are still tight, it has two internal HDD bays and has a desktop chipset (Q43) and so is really fast for a laptop - plus all the ports except power on the sides. The notebook is very serviceable - I have opened it up to upgrade the processor (originally had a Core 2 Duo) and have had it open several times since to fully clean the heat sinks. It also has a Quadro video card which was quite fast for the time.
When I do upgrade I will probably go with an M6700 or whatever its replacement is at the time of upgrade. Battery life isn't as long as the mobile chipsets offer, but even with the 4 year old battery I still get 90 minutes out of it (with power management enabled).
I have worked with quite a few M6700s and they are similarly built but have the drawback of 1080p screens instead of WUXGA and some of the ports have moved to the back. I am not sure who the original manufacturer is but I think it's actually built by Clevo (there are no indications internally). I like the M6700 but I am going to keep the M6400 as long as it makes sense because I like having more vertical screen estate.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Have you *seen* how much Apple/Dell/IBM etc want for RAM? They're charging double (or more) what it costs to get the equivalent stuff elsewhere.
I can save a hundred bucks getting 16GB of RAM from elsewhere, it's absolutely worth the 10 minutes of my time spent ordering and installing it.
Similarly, if I want 5GHz wifi but the manufacturer doesn't offer it in the specific model I want, it's only about $25 to buy a wifi card and minutes to install it...assuming the machine uses standard parts.
and it's still going strong...
Also running linux, but work gave me the version with Nvidia+Intel graphics. Grr... There's no benefit to having Nvidia graphics for a coding machine, all it does is use more power.
A professional laptop recently seems to retain its usefulness for at least 3 years, so these laptops remain functional for a long enough time to justify ordering them loaded with options to make our life and work easier.
But then 1 year down the line thanks to Moore's law and friends, you could easily put way much more things that back when you frist ordered it, simply because now these didn't exist already back then (e.g.: 8 GiB was the maximum you could equip. But since then, newer RAM module have been commercialised giving you the possibility to stuff 16GiB or 32GiB in the same machine).
2 years later, simply replacing the aging battery turns the machine into something almost new.
3 year later, you consider that this laptop has outlived its usefullness, and throw it away and buy a brand new one. Or, if it was upgradeable, you could just change a few parts around (SSD, CPU, even-more-RAM) and still have a machine good for the next 1 or 2 years.
Which is:
- cheaper (you only change the part you really need).
- way much more eco-friendly (you only replace the parts that you need, you don't throw away a whole machine).
- a lot less hassle (in some small countries getting an expensive laptop through customs is complicated and are up through the roof. Getting a few RAM modules through the custom, on the other side is well under the minimum limit for tax)
But might take a little bit more time. The key here is having a well done and easily upgradeable laptop, where indeed equipping the upgrades is taking only a few minutes. If it takes several hours to upgrade an "un-upgradeable, glued shut" laptop, your point about geeks' hours costing premium still applies.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Yeah but the guy with the iMac was gone for an hour. The guy with the Dell has to live with that hot mess (literally) for the entire life of the system, no matter that he's still working while a new webcam is shipped in.
That image says way more about you and all Apple Haters totally not grasping why people prefer Apple than you will ever know.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The main issue is that Apple doesn't have a product in the low end of the market.
So yes, if you're shopping in the upper end of the market and you want all the features they offer, then they're good.
However, if all you want is a basic machine for surfing the web, watching videos, writing emails, and doing basic office documents, then Apple is way more expensive because it's overkill for the purpose. I can find a crappy Acer with 6GB RAM and a 500GB hard drive for under $300. The bottom-end Macbook is $1000.
Look, if your time is worth nothing that is fine. It's great there are choices for someone like you that can spend lots of time adding bits to a system. I used to be that person to before I fully committed to programming over hardware tinkering.
But I, like most people using laptops, just want something solid that I can use for about three to five years before I move on to something else.
Being able to replace all those parts doesn't mean anything to me - if the SSD or Ram in my Macbook dies, like I said I just get a new macbook in an hour. I don't have to hope, I know, thanks to Applecare. How is that not also a VERY good thing? In your case to replace them would take time at least to get the new parts in, time I do not want to take before I have a working laptop.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
From a time when desktop computers served and empowered their owners, rather than disenfranchise and enslave them with service contracts, SaaS, and one-size-fits-all lowest common denominator design specs.
Doesn't have Iris graphics
Doesn't have PCIe SSD
7hrs battery vs 9hrs
only available in 13"
Ah, yes, the cry of the well-healed.
I have an early 2008 17" Macbook Pro that still does everything I need -- just max out the RAM and swap in a SSD, and it will keep up with modern-day work. The battery is still swappable, and batteries can still be bought for cheap. The display is crisp and very bright, which is handy when using it outdoors. Adding a right mouse button to the touchpad is a very simple mod: http://www.instructables.com/id/Adding-a-right-mouse-button-to-a-Macbook/ The whole thing cost around $500, plus half that in two broken laptops for spares.
Liberty - Security - Laziness - Pick any two.
(shrugs) I'm still running a Thinkpad T61p from 2007. It now has 8GB RAM, Win7 Pro and a pair of SSDs after upgrades last year.
Unless something goes horribly wrong with it, I'll probably use it until 2014-2015.
(Thinkpads come with 4y or 5y warranties as an option.)
Wolde you bothe eate your cake, and have your cake?
I went from a 2006 model MacBook Pro which I had done all the upgrades on maxing the RAM and putting a 300GB drive in (big for the time I did it) and it is still running. The thing is, while I appreciated that I could upgrade it, it turns out when time came for a new machine I looked at the specs for the i5 MacBook Air and it left my 2006 MBP for dead. I figured, sure, I may not get the 5 years of working life I did out of the Air but it was less than half the price, way lighter, same screen resolution (1440x900) with a better trackpad, way better battery life and an SSD that made it so fast it was nuts. Here I am, two years in and the thing hasn't put a foot wrong. Battery is holding up nicely at just shy of 90% capacity after nearly 200 recharges whereas my old MBP had chewed through 400 recharges by two years and the battery was stuffed and needed replacing (the benefits of twice the run time I guess.)
Anyway, these days I look at the pros and figure I can't be bothered. I can hang all the stuff I want off this machine and the 4GB of RAM isn't terrible, especially now that Mavericks implements memory compression. Very glad I stumped up for the 256GB SSD and the i5 has proven a very good little workhorse. I have a big PC at home that I use for the heavier compute work and also a Mac mini which is my preferred desktop computer but the MBA is what I use 90% of the time. I wouldn't trade the small and light form factor even for a retina Pro. We have one in the office and it is heavier by far and while the screen is nice it behaves like 1280x800 so appears to have less real-estate.
I'll easily get another couple of years out of this machine and then I'll go straight back and buy another with the latest specs. The benefits of the largely solid state design, light weight and the wonderful keyboard and trackpad more than make up for any losses. Oh, and the screen, while not matte, doesn't have a glass cover so is actually very nice with the antiglare finish.
"I have the attention span of a strobe lit goldfish, please get to the point quickly!"
You are a annoying grammar nazi!
Looks more like he started to type "an e-430" and realized people might not realize it was a Lenovo. Problably didn't think the sensitivities of grammar nazis were important enough to fix the typo either. Personally I prefer clarity over correctness and "an Lenovo e-430" is more clear than "an e-430" is correct...
If the hd and ram are replaceable, then it's a drive to frys/bestbuy/microcenter or a 24hr overnight internet delivery away. Otherwise, it's a 2 week wait minimum. If you truly want something up and running again ASAP, you don't want a laptop, you want a self-built desktop.
*drop*
;)
Ah, there we go, I think I've helped you find the major downfall of thin computing products.
If you are actually using the laptop get work done, don't sell yourself short to save a few bucks.
Jesus was a compassionate social conservative who called individuals to sin no more.
The battery is usually the first thing to wear out on a laptop, and others are the hard drive (not sure about SSDs though), the CPU fans, the hinges and the catch in my experiece. Software also tends to need more memory over time. It should be reasonably painless to make this happen..
"XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve your problem, use more." - Anonymous Coward
Do you have one of the 4th gen laptops already? I thought they didn't ship until Dec 20th. If you do, what's the battery life like with the new processor?
I'm with this guy. Get the laptop sufficiently loaded in the first place so you don't have to find parts to add to it to keep it going. Also check out Sager I got one around last Christmas with 2 hard drives and 16GB ram when most Dells only had the option to come with 8GB (and for a hefty price). Don't get me wrong I like Dells, but I wanted 16 gigs and wasn't willing to chop my leg off for it. It runs windows 7 on one drive and multiple flavors of linux on the other.
I refuse to sign
Get a refurbished pre-retina display version from Apple. They are still available, cheaper than a new one, and come with the same warranty. You can even get AppleCare for them last time I checked.
You guys also forgetting that when you new MacBookPro dies and you have no encryption
Except that Apple provides out of box either FileVault to encrypt the whole storage space, or password protected disk images you can mount. The system keychain itself is similarly encrypted and password protected so techs cannot get your passwords either.
If you are worried about protection of data Apple makes it easier than anyone.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Maybe, just maybe he doesnt have an extra $500 (the price of the RAM and SSD upgrades) to throw away on a computer
There's nothing unreasonable about pointing out mistaken assumptions someone might have about laptops you can't easily replace parts in.
$500 is nothing compared to the extra bother that comes about repairing stuff yourself. Wouldn't you rather spend that time doing something else? And in return you get a better product with much faster storage speeds. That alone is worth something too.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I'm using my first retina-screened MBP for development. Before I got it, which was only because I was moving abroad for 6 months and needed an up-to-date portable, I did not think the retina displays were much more than a nice-to-have-but-mostly-marketing feature.
I've totally changed my opinion. I have a standard resolution 21" second screen plugged in and I really don't like using it if I have to. It's like needing glasses after having 20-30 vision (yes, there is such a thing, look it up!).
I haven't had it all that long so I can't comment on whether the non-replaceable battery will be a problem (I have needed new batteries in previous models), but until other laptops come with screens this good, I'm going to be very reluctant to give it up.
Also, 10.9 has made a serious difference to both battery drain and the temperature of the machine in normal use - quite unexpectedly, those changes to power management really work. Since most of my time is in XCode, editing and compiling (rather than watching video say), battery life is almost double over 10.8.
and stop worrying for another three years.
Well-heeled. It's an expression about the quality of shoes the more well-off wear.
Sony ha
I really like my macbook matte 15" with the "betweener" 1680x1050 display. Microcenter has late 2011 apple refurbs for $1399. I have one now and thought about getting another one. They are upgradable with better than normal resolution and the anti-glare screen. It would be a "two year old design" - new machine without USB3.0. GOM18LL/A
Even if you lived next to an Apple Store and they are willing to swap your machine out entirely, you then lose all your apps and data.
Well with an iMac the Apple people can either swap your HD in the store into the new system, or when you get home you restore the entire system from Time Machine which is so easy to use my mom actually uses it - the ultimate test of any backup system.
Non Apple folk dislike the Surface Pro (an amazing machine btw)
Yes, I like it quite a lot, but the Windows world has hurt me too much over my life to ever return to it.
PC folk aren't mindless uniform cogs like the "Think Different" crowd has become.
Mac people aren't either. They are UNIX sysadmins, moms, programmers, engineers, kids, etc. They are everyone, the whole range.
What they are is people who want a system that works well for a long time that it's easy for them to resolve issues. That's why you want a "repairable" system to, but for those that don't want the time and aggravation that computer repairs can bring, or simply do not have the technical ability Apple has a system that means they can resolve system issues as easily as someone technical - and that is a great thing. It's also nice as I said for someone that CAN resolve those issues themselves, but choses to spend tim on other things.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The highest at the moment, actually: 3200 x 1800 on the (Ideapad) 13.3" Yoga 2 Pro. The Yoga flunks RAM upgradeability (soldered in), but battery and SSD are easily replaceable.
I run a lot of VMs for testing purposes and for work but one of my hobbies is photography and I use Adobe Lightroom & Photoshop. RAM doesn't seem to be a problem right now but my limiting factor is the CPU - import and process jobs take significant amounts of time, with Lightroom pegging the CPU at 100% easily. That's really my achilles heal with this system and although tolerable I've just begun to grow tired of my system being incredibly sluggish when working with RAW files.
My reasoning for not wanting the Retina models is simply out of price savings. Fully loading a MBPr means spending obscene amounts of money on RAM and HDD that I could purchase on my own for cheaper. Thus my desire to have a laptop that I can buy with high spec monitor, CPU, and GPU then upgrade RAM and disk later for cheaper. It seems like there's a general consensus that the Lenovo T540p is the best fit for my goals; having a full keyboard is an added bonus as well.
I did upgrade this laptop repeatedly over its lifespan - first to 8GB, then to a 128GB SSD, replaced the DVD with a 1TB HDD, and then finally jumped to a 256GB SSD. I've contemplated springing $200 to purchase 16GB RAM through OWC if I don't end up replacing it. I did purchase AppleCare and had to use it to replace the motherboard as there was a problem with static on the headphone jack. They didn't care about any of my modifications which was nice. At this point though it has expired.
How does the HP run with that SSD? I have some older laptops including an Atom based netbook that I've toyed around with plugging a small SSD in. Are the results good enough to repurpose those into a parents or in law's device?
I've heard that a co-worker of mine upgraded his MBP's SSD and RAM.
This website, http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/macbook-air/macbook-air-faq/macbook-air-mid-2012-how-to-replace-upgrade-ssd-storage.html, seems to imply that the only thing you need is a funky screwdriver.
Back in the 90s, when computers cost $5,000-$10,000 in today's dollars, it made sense to keep upgrading them. Now the top-of-the-line computers are cheap enough that it's easier to just buy one that you can afford to replace every 4 years or so.
No, I will not work for your startup
The new ones are definitely slick and fast. However I rarely use them as laptops. I plug in the keyboard and monitor and use it like a normal desktop. I would be very happy with a Mac Mini style except the powers at work want to use a laptop instead. Then you could open it up and repair/upgrade/recycle if you need to. I wouldn't mind having the old Macbook Pro that you could open either, the smaller size is not a win really, and it's still portable so thatyou can take it to a conference room. Sleek stops being important once you're no longer a twenty something doing all their daily work while on a train or in a coffee shop and you're no longer trying to impress the strangers around you.
Does the cat pee cost extra? And will cats try to mark their territory when they encounter my laptop?
I'm a little surprised at how cheap the upgrade is to the 1600x900 screen. Seems like a good deal. I've worked with Latitudes in the past and I've always loved how easy they were to work on and the availability of full service manuals on Dell's site.
There are a bunch of great options out there, but nothing has ever replaced the Thinkpad line for me. I have spent time with the new Lenovo Thinkpad Yoga, and if you're in the market for a 12.5" device, it's awesome. First thing I did was replace its built in SSD and wifi chip -- took less than 5 minutes -- and it has all the functionality of an amazing Win8.1 convertible as well.
Then as others have said, there's the tried-and-true T series. The T440s is beautiful in its own way, rugged, and super serviceable.
--------------------- -me, Crusher of those who are Foolish (don't be foolish)
solid body, good keyboard and touchpad.
low latency audio capable.
toolless access to battery, 2 ram slots, (single screw for two hdd slots, wireless card).
graphics card, processor and other 2 ram slots can be upgraded with some effort.
optical drive can be replaced with 3rd hdd.
will connect to second battery if you are going to be away from mains for a while. This also angles the keyboard and keeps your lap from burning.
certified to run SuSE linux if linux is your thing.
It's quite a bit heavier than the macbook pro - the w series are portable workstations. The 14 and 15 inch versions are smaller and lighter.
I have a MBP (2011 spring) and love the computer. But I have upgraded the ram already. When I bought it, I bought it with minimum ram(4GB) because the upgrade didn't seem worth it. But I noticed when I started trying to tinker with developer work and drive several heavier apps at once (once I got an external display so at home it was a proper desktop replacement), that wasn't nearly enough. I really appreciated not paying apple 300 dollars at the time to get 16 GB, and instead paid 100 dollars and popped the ram in myself.
I don't know how my use case will change over the 5-6 years I try to keep my laptops around. And frankly, the build quality on this is good enough and my use case has changed enough that I could see keeping this one around for even longer. As long as the CPU and logic board hold together, I can swap hard drives for an SSD, replace ram if it burns out, etc. I like the ability to keep a working computer around with minimal fuss, and I really like ability to modify the specs to a certain degree to make sure the computer can adapt to my needs as they change. They have changed in the last 2 years, and I expect they will change again when I have kids.
Yeah.... but System76 takes care of stuff like broken microphone drivers or bad keyboard. They take Clevo and put Ubuntu on it and make sure everything is ok. I have a System 76 Galago Ultra Pro with HDD AND SSD with a ArchLinux and Debian on it and it works great. I have a killer wireles board with open source wifi drivers. They keyboard was not that great but they are sending new ones to everybody who wants them. They developed a brand new keyboard model witch fixes the old keyboard issues. It's easy to change also https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqIj1T-LKrc
This article turned into an Apple discussion. But I don't see a single recommendation for laptops.
I just replaced my pre-retina MBP 17" as well, but it was easy for me because I hardly used OS X on it. My MBP was a neat laptop because it could also boot OS X if I wanted it too. I enjoyed going somewhere, popping it open, and booting to Windows. It was like a practical joke: look my toaster is actually a dishwasher! But I never had a reason to use OS X, other than to cross-compile something just to show "hey, this builds and runs on OS X! Neat!" I tried, but I didn't find it so compelling that it was worth giving up on the entire world just to be there. That decision freed me a lot, and you should consider it.
I angsted for months over the new MacBooks. They just weren't what I wanted. Was I being too old-school and just not "getting it?" But I finally decided that if, for some reason, I really need to build on OS X, I'll just buy a cheap mac to test it on. There's no point in struggling and angsting over the hardware when there are thousands of fine Windows + *nix machines out there that meet my needs for price and maintainability.
I am an IT professional. I have built 4 "Gamer" class desktops for family and myself in the past year. While I love to "tinker" to get a bunch of hardware to all work together with Microsoft Windows, nothing beats my latest 13" MacBook Pro Retina (late 2013), i7 Haswell, 1 terabyte flash storage, 16 GB RAM and a back lit keyboard and the latest OS X. It just works. And if it doesn't work, that is what Apple Care is for. While you may have been able to add an SSD and I am assuming somehow removing the optical drive and cluging in another hard drive, I am wondering about the processor. Your 3+ year old processor is a dinosaur! I have owned 4 Mac's in the past 5 years. The resale value is awesome and that is how I upgrade often. If your passion for tearing about a Mac has lead you away from Apple, you simply don't get it. You buy a Mac so you don't have to "F" with it all the time!
I don't mind soldered-in RAM so much... but only 4GB of it? Ouch.
Personally, I think the newer Dell Latitudes look pretty nice. They work well too. I have an E6520 that is going to get upgraded to a Precision next year. I like the Latitude but I can't get the memory I want in it (maxes out at 16gb). Battery life, keyboard, etc aren't hugely important to me because mine spends 95% of its time in a dock so take that for what you will. Hardware wise, I don't have any complaints. Where Dell really shines is their warranty service, usually next business day onsite to fix any problems and you talk to someone in the USA when you call for help (assuming you pay for it, of course). My company did a brief stint with Lenovo and we couldn't get rid of them fast enough. We had T400s and of the 20 or so we bought I think we had about a 20% rate of them needing system boards replaced over the 2 years we used them. They also had a problem where the USB ports would break if you weren't careful when inserting/removing devices, and when you call Lenovo support all they want to do is argue with you about sending someone out to fix your system, even when you paid extra for accidental damage protection and onsite service. Plus there's always the benefit for some people of supporting an American company.
Perhaps I'm weird. I've owned quite a few laptops over the past 15 years and I only once ran into insurmountable issues regarding the battery. And, now that I think about it, it wasn't actually the battery that was the issue because I bought a replacement and it still wouldn't charge, so it was something else in the power chain.
I think many other people are like me in that they have a laptop and use it quite often while plugged in. As my laptops age, I just don't count on being able to use them away from a plug for long periods of time. Outside of the one unsuccessful battery replacement I mentioned above, I've never bought a replacement battery.
I can see how it is nice for people who do use their laptops daily, but if the 1000 charge cycles hold up, that's almost 3 years. If you use a computer that much every day, you might consider a new model every once in a while.
I do think I will miss the ability to add RAM (well, not in this computer since I maxed it out when I bought it, but, the idea of being able to upgrade) but again, assuming anyone else uses their computer in a similar way to me, it isn't a huge deal.
Like anyone can even know that
2010 15" MBP but personally I think you're crazy to worry about the new models. Just buy one with the upgrades you want. If you need repairs, bring it into Apple. There's really no guarantee whatsoever you could repair a laptop from any manufacturer. A lot of the times the MB goes bad and you're fucked anyway.
Are agnostics skeptical of unicorns too?
waiting for it..
Another shout out for a Lenovo. I moved from my MBP to a Lenovo T430S last year. I compared lots of brands, and the Lenovo came out on top, with a mag alloy frame, 16GB of ram, and an Intel I7 processor, at half the cost of a Retina with the same specs. *At the time*, the only other (than Apple) brand that would meet those specs was Alien, and it was twice the cost and weight.
Mint runs great on it, with absolutely no driver issues at all.
Only one ding against it: the internal speakers are not that good... but I never use them anyway, so it's a very small ding.
Absolutely wonderful repair process. My touchpad died a few weeks after I got it. I called in the problem, the next morning a box showed up FedEx. I pulled the HD out and sent it the next morning, and the afternoon after that I got it back, fixed and ready to go. In this day and age, I was extremely impressed with their service attitude and speed.