Mac, PC, or Linux OS
PC
 60%  [ 14 ]
Linux
 30%  [ 7 ]
Mac
 8%  [ 2 ]
Total Votes : 23

Okay, I know that somebody already posted for help about what computer to buy, but they didn't give any specific details that I am looking for. I am looking for a good quality laptop that I will use when I go to college in 3 years. I am looking for >=16 gigs mem, at least 260 gigs storage, a decent display, and a life at least 10 years. I am currently using a macbook air mid 2012, which works fine for ordinary stuff, but since I am learning video editing, and want to run development applications, I need something significantly more powerful. And if it helps, I am probably going to do something related to computer science/development in college.
Thank you in advance! Very Happy

UPDATE: I ended up building a powerful PC and I'm going to buy a 14 inch Macbook Pro for in-class work and portability.
My PC specs are the following:
-CPU: Ryzen 7950x 16 core, 32 threads, 4.5-5.7 GHz
-GPU: GeForce RTX 3060
-Case: Lian Li Dynamic Evo
-CPU Fan: Noctua NH-U12S Redux
-Monitor: Acer 2560x1440p 144Hz
-SSD: 1TB Crucial M.2. SSD
-Motherboard: ROG Strix X670E-A
Razer Blade, install Arch Linux
those are even more expensive than macs!
If you want to stick with Apple, the M1 Macbooks perform very well and if you apply a thermal pad to the regular Macbook, you can increase its performance to Macbook Pro levels. Will it last you 10 years? I kind of doubt it as the M1 is a first generation SoC. Personally, I'd get a last gen Macbook and spend a bit on a decent desktop. That way you can upgrade your desktop and just remote into it as your laptop ages.
Graphing Calculator
If you really need the power you say you need, a Raspberry Pi isn't going to cut it, especially not for video editing.
no, im not using the raspberry pi for that. i just needed a place to post the picture.
You may be interested in looking at swappa, there are often some nice deals there. What price range are you looking for?
I would strongly recommend that you do not purchase a Mac if you are planning to do any serious programming. Macs have many, many issues that complicate development (sometimes to the point of being unusable).
Hardware:
Macs with the M1 chip have serious flaws. Examples:
Don't charge through a USB hub or you might brick it (the Mac).
Connecting an M1 mac (Intel works fine in this regard) to an external display results in extreme screen flickering.
The hardware is far less powerful than you'd expect, given the price.
Software:
MacOS is a registered UNIX operating system. It's funny, because being a UNIX OS means nothing. MacOS is still missing numerous components (I'm looking at you, clock_nanosleep) and what components that are there don't always work properly (mutex?).
Since the userland is pretty much ripped from BSD, the tools available are all either the BSD ones, or Apple's own (proprietary) ones.
Good luck getting anything to build. Pretty much any large project won't build. (GCC4TI, for instance). Many times, I've tried to build something, (because it isn't available in either Macports or Homebrew), and it's had /usr/bin/gcc
hardcoded in the build scripts. MacOS, however, doesn't come with gcc - it uses clang. /usr/bin/gcc is a symlink to clang, and you can't change it without jumping through hoops. (Play twister on the keyboard while booting to get into recovery mode terminal, disable SIP, reboot). Only then can you remove the symlink and install gcc. Even then, because of all the different tools, stuff doesn't build.
And, lastly, MacOS is proprietary. It has backdoors, like most other proprietary software, and, like all proprietary software, it hides what it does from you, the user.

Tl;DR: MacOS is okay for if you're just surfing the web, but it's nasty under the hood, and that's where you'll be going if you're doing serious development.
You should just get a different computer, install Arch Linux, put "BTW I use Arch" in your sig, and tell everyone you're better than themno don't
okay, well which computer would you advise me to get, then?
MacBook Air M1
I'd stay away from any kind of Apple hardware and software: overly expensive, often fragile (though I understand that your current computer had been reliable, my experience with a work computer at my former day job and the experience of several other persons has been terrible on the reliability front), and the proprietary closed-minded walled garden mindset.
For serious usage, good air flow is a must, and from that POV, the MacBooks I used and saw were the worst designed machines I know of.

Not all laptops last for a decade, that's for sure, especially if they're working nearly 24/7 for years. I have a couple Asus laptops and a Dell laptop which have reached that age, one of the Asus laptops is even getting close to 15 years and has been used at 100% CPU nearly 24/7 for 10+ years - I had to change the PSU and the internal fan, but it still works, though I don't use it much anymore.
Lionel Debroux wrote:
For serious usage, good air flow is a must, and from that POV, the MacBooks I used and saw were the worst designed machines I know of.

The M1 Macbook Air doesn't even have a fan, or any openings in the case for air flow.
i said this to the other guy who didn't give any details about what kind of laptop he wanted, but CHECK OUT DEALS ON COSTCO YOU ARE GETTING SO MUCH BANG FOr THE BUCK!! Its awesome. The lenovo ideapad series has some awesome deals. I have a few options here for my future laptop possibilities.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/11SYTN4SxS9jOrt245P8Kfobd3GuXYpzBa3dnD_J91iw/edit?usp=sharing
My current and previous laptop were HP Spectre x360s, and I have been reasonably pleased with them. There are certainly a few quirks with build quality (most notably, the rubber feet fall off, just like our dear calculators), and the battery life is nothing to write home about, but the hardware seems solid, they're light and thin, and they're quite capable. I spec'd my current laptop with a Core i7-1065G7, 16GB RAM, 1TB NVMe SSD, 4K AMOLED (!) LCD that looks beautiful, finger and digitizer touchscreen, and convertible (screen fold back into a tablet form factor).
KermMartian wrote:
My current and previous laptop were HP Spectre x360s, and I have been reasonably pleased with them. There are certainly a few quirks with build quality (most notably, the rubber feet fall off, just like our dear calculators), and the battery life is nothing to write home about, but the hardware seems solid, they're light and thin, and they're quite capable. I spec'd my current laptop with a Core i7-1065G7, 16GB RAM, 1TB NVMe SSD, 4K AMOLED (!) LCD that looks beautiful, finger and digitizer touchscreen, and convertible (screen fold back into a tablet form factor).


Yeah, Hp Spectres are really nice, the Dell XPS series is really good too, but most models are over $1000 but i dont know if Randomguy has a price limit. If you want that pure POWERI would go for an i7 or AMD Ryzen 5 or 7. I prefer AMD because they have better Cpus for a much better price. I would get a Dell XPS for their amazing build quality but the nicer ones are really expensive.
I am trying to spend <= 2000.
Edit: The dell xps looks pretty good for the price!
https://www.dell.com/en-us/work/shop/dell-laptops-and-notebooks/new-xps-15-laptop/spd/xps-15-9500-laptop/smx15w10p1c1400?gacd=9646510-1025-5761040-266794296-0&dgc=st&ds_rl=1282786&gclid=CjwKCAjwgZuDBhBTEiwAXNofRO9YVFzqmpmLYzRZsqozROqjRDvinuCNUEkZJb1wk4Zp-NSwR8TfchoCPq4QAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds
Quote:
The M1 Macbook Air doesn't even have a fan, or any openings in the case for air flow.

The M1 micro-architecture's high efficiency makes it quite appealing, but being vent-less means very low power and/or high internal temperatures directly causing lower reliability.
The Air series has always been about portability, but roughly equivalent Chromebooks used to be 2 to 3 times cheaper.

The recent mobile Ryzen processors are pretty nice indeed. Some of the mobile 11th-gen Intel processors can rival or slightly beat them in single-core performance because Intel pushed the Turbo Boost frequency, but in highly parallel computations, they lose by a significant margin, because the TB effect is much reduced / eliminated, and they have fewer cores.

2000 USD is a pretty comfortable amount, especially if you're not buying overpriced Apple hardware Smile

As time passes by, it's getting ever harder to find 15" laptop computers with a powerful 4+-core CPU, 32 GB of RAM, 1 TB HDD, but small SSD, but without a powerful dGPU or AI acceleration hardware crap.
Here some few tips and tricks Razz

  • Just make sure it's used or refurbished.

  • Make sure cpu speed is higher than 1.5ghz.

  • It does not matter if it's a mac, windows, or chromebook.

  • Prefer something without a fan in it as you don't want your fan going turbo mode in the middle of class.

  • Overall just make sure it's portable.
Alvajoy123 wrote:
Here some few tips and tricks Razz

  • Just make sure it's used or refurbished.

  • Make sure cpu speed is higher than 1.5ghz.

  • It does not matter if it's a mac, windows, or chromebook.

  • Prefer something without a fan in it as you don't want your fan going turbo mode in the middle of class.

  • Overall just make sure it's portable.

This is all horrible advice lol
  
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