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    Your Elvenar Team

seeking laptop advice

Myne

Oh Wise One
1MB? Sit down by the fire my child. Let me tell you stories about the old, forgotten days of the Commodore 64. In this ancient, forgotten era the 64 meant 64 KB, not 64 MB. It was a terrible, dark era in gaming. But those few brave souls of us who gamed back then would valiantly shovel coal into our computers every day to keep them running. ;)

And dark era was that damn DOS game that had no pictures and you had to quest by text only...and it hated cuss words and talked back.

Edit: And try playing mechwarrior on one of those computers. hahaha
 
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ajqtrz

Chef - loquacious Old Dog
Until I retired I ran an IT company for 26 years. I retired in 2019 so anything I say is from that era.

1) Apple laptops are, generally speaking, about 10% more reliable and 10% more "cutting edge" than Windows based laptops.
2) Apple laptops are 2-3 times the cost.
3) Apple laptops are 3 times more expensive to repair and many computer repair places don't/won't/can't do them.

I've repaired, perhaps 500 apple laptops. They really aren't that hard to do...but if you break it in the process they are very expensive to repair what YOU broke. (And in my company we never blamed the customer or charged them for what we broke -- you'd be surprised how often our competitors did).

I've also repaired about 2000 Windows PC's. Having said all that, here's my take.

1) What are you going to do with it? First question you ask.
2) At what level are you going to do it? (Hobby, semi-pro, pro?)
3) What software will you need to run it at the level you are going to run it?
4) Which laptops will do what you want at the level you want for the next 3-5 years (with possible upgrades if necessary).
5) What's the cost of ownership for the Apple vs Windows PC over the time of use. You take the cost, the upgrade costs and any other costs, and add them up).

Once you find a list of three or four systems that will do what YOU want, ask yourself if the difference in the cost of ownership is enough for you to take the second choice over the first. If the first is $4,000 and the second is $1500 and the performance/usability is only 10% in favor of the first, maybe the second isn't so bad?

Finally, you might note that I've not said the Apple system is the wrong choice. I have 2 apple systems and 5 or more Windows PC's. Each does what I need it to do at the level I need it do it. The Apple's are 6-10 years old and I'll probably never buy another (they were used/trade-ins) because I find the quality/price ratio for an Apple out of my range of justification.

If I were to buy a laptop for music today, I'd probably go with the ASUS ZenBook Duo. Asus consistently has better sound quality than some other, cheaper, brands. And it's usually right up there with the Apples.

That's my take, anyway.

AJ
 

crackie

Chef, Scroll-Keeper, Buddy's #1 Fan
haha. well, good news! $2k-$3k is NOT a poor man's budget! here i thought you're trying to cram down all the bells and whistles into a $500 machine. you can get a pretty powerful machine that can handle even the tougher number crunching tasks like video, graphics, CAD, etc. with that budget. even if that computer blows the specs off the roofs of a mac, you'll prob still not be comfortable adapting to the OS though (and then prob blame the computer). as in my conversation with @Sir Squirrel, people have to remember the computer is just a tool. a more expensive machine doesn't necessarily make you more productive or creative!

If I were to buy a laptop for music today, I'd probably go with the ASUS ZenBook Duo. Asus consistently has better sound quality than some other, cheaper, brands. And it's usually right up there with the Apples.
haha, a best buy employee once tried to tell my friend asus is a gaming company. well his first mistake was thinking i was the helpless damsel and my friend was there to help me shop for a new computer when it was the other way around, where i played the role of the nerd pitbull. i called BS and he doubled down to say they only make gaming rigs. i was like dude, they have a line called ProArt, you know like it says in the name that it's for "professional art" creatives THAT BEST BUY SELLS ON THEIR ONLINE STORE!!! no joke, the dude still didn't believe me and looked it up on his phone before finally changing his tune. needless to say, my friend felt like we just encountered a snake oil salesman and chose not to buy anything so we left. i was like, "hold me back!" there's plenty more where that came from!

asus is one of the manufacturers that was an ODM for apple in the past. they made the ibooks and powerbooks i believe. as far as innovation, i think they're currently way ahead of the curve compared to apple. even microsoft's surface line is doing more pushing the limits of re-imagining the laptop. besides the chip that they're bringing in-house, what has apple done in laptop innovation besides the poorly received emoji bar (hahaha) and removing all ports so they can charge overpriced dongles galore to bring in easy buck? most of it is just higher res camera and faster processor, in case you need to enlarge your photos to cover the side of skyscrapers.
 

Sprite1313

Well-Known Member
Acer is another company that makes good windows-based platform, that is relatively inexpensive (compared to Dell, Toshiba or Sony, for example). Both Asus and Acer are based in Taiwan. I don't know if they have a line dedicated (or designed to support, I suppose) graphics design, but I know their gaming systems are robust and highly customizable. Windows 11 is trying to feel more like MacOS, but (in my opinion) not succeeding very well.

If getting your MacBook repaired doesn't work, I would recommend shopping online. You will find lower prices and more-customized builds. Lots of places take the base chassis and upgrade it for you on the cheap (and it sounds like you aren't in a position right now do disassemble a laptop and make modifications yourself, probably lacking the necessary tools and clean space (if the laptop doesn't have access ports for the guts you want to upgrade)).

And, of course, if you are looking for less expensive and have the space - a desktop is the way to go (as Soggy said).

And I'm consulting @crackie the next time I need to buy a new laptop. ;)
 

crackie

Chef, Scroll-Keeper, Buddy's #1 Fan
I don't know if they have a line dedicated (or designed to support, I suppose) graphics design, but I know their gaming systems are robust and highly customizable.
Acer's line is called CreativeD and ASUS's line is ProArt. Acer's starting to "think outside the box" too, but their aesthetics need some work! A lot of people coming from Apple ecosystem will have a problem with fugly though :)

And I'm consulting @crackie the next time I need to buy a new laptop.
Are you sure you don't want me to just revisit the blow torch on your current rig? I should warn you though. It seems pretty obvious my tech services come with a shenanigans surcharge, but it still catches people off-guard. For example, sometimes before giving back my friend's computer, I will take a screenshot of their desktop and set it as their desktop image. Then I sit and wait for emails or my phone to buzz to see how long it takes them to tell me (a) I didn't fix their machine :supply::supply::supply: or (b) there's a new problem because nothing happens when they click on their desktop shortcuts. :D:D:D
 

Aritra

Well-Known Member
haha. well, good news! $2k-$3k is NOT a poor man's budget! here i thought you're trying to cram down all the bells and whistles into a $500 machine. you can get a pretty powerful machine that can handle even the tougher number crunching tasks like video, graphics, CAD, etc. with that budget. even if that computer blows the specs off the roofs of a mac, you'll prob still not be comfortable adapting to the OS though (and then prob blame the computer). as in my conversation with @Sir Squirrel, people have to remember the computer is just a tool. a more expensive machine doesn't necessarily make you more productive or creative!


haha, a best buy employee once tried to tell my friend asus is a gaming company. well his first mistake was thinking i was the helpless damsel and my friend was there to help me shop for a new computer when it was the other way around, where i played the role of the nerd pitbull. i called BS and he doubled down to say they only make gaming rigs. i was like dude, they have a line called ProArt, you know like it says in the name that it's for "professional art" creatives THAT BEST BUY SELLS ON THEIR ONLINE STORE!!! no joke, the dude still didn't believe me and looked it up on his phone before finally changing his tune. needless to say, my friend felt like we just encountered a snake oil salesman and chose not to buy anything so we left. i was like, "hold me back!" there's plenty more where that came from!

asus is one of the manufacturers that was an ODM for apple in the past. they made the ibooks and powerbooks i believe. as far as innovation, i think they're currently way ahead of the curve compared to apple. even microsoft's surface line is doing more pushing the limits of re-imagining the laptop. besides the chip that they're bringing in-house, what has apple done in laptop innovation besides the poorly received emoji bar (hahaha) and removing all ports so they can charge overpriced dongles galore to bring in easy buck? most of it is just higher res camera and faster processor, in case you need to enlarge your photos to cover the side of skyscrapers.
Yeah. Not a budget. Just an expected cost, which would have to be financed because I am poor (with good credit). I'm considering MacBook Air instead of MacBook Pro because I'm not sure the difference is needed. That alone would save a few bucks and more likely to retain the sound/visual quality I'm used to (I assume/expect). Leaving Mac altogether would still get expensive because of the software and I am not confident in the product (higher rated quality doesn't save significant bucks).
 

Nerwa

Well-Known Member
HAHAHHA I had one of those too!! 5 1/4 floppies anyone?

Pshht. *My* first computer (courtesy of my uncle) was a RadioShack motherboard; memory was a regular tape cassette. You need a cassette player with counters - the ones that said how far along into the tape you were. Then you had to keep a hard-copy list of where your program was stored on the cassette so you could forward to the correct spot before uploading. The Commodore 64 & random-access floppies were a huge leap forward.

I didn't get into gaming much until college (Atari was cool in theory, but Pong got old pretty quickly...). The first RPG I got seriously sucked into was "Scarab of RA", which you can still find online in an emulator. Many, many hours spent wandering through mazes; I still hate those damned monkeys!

I also remember the first time I saw Myst. Talk about *blown* *away*.
 

Myne

Oh Wise One
Pshht. *My* first computer (courtesy of my uncle) was a RadioShack motherboard; memory was a regular tape cassette. You need a cassette player with counters - the ones that said how far along into the tape you were. Then you had to keep a hard-copy list of where your program was stored on the cassette so you could forward to the correct spot before uploading. The Commodore 64 & random-access floppies were a huge leap forward.

I didn't get into gaming much until college (Atari was cool in theory, but Pong got old pretty quickly...). The first RPG I got seriously sucked into was "Scarab of RA", which you can still find online in an emulator. Many, many hours spent wandering through mazes; I still hate those damned monkeys!

I also remember the first time I saw Myst. Talk about *blown* *away*.

YIkes!! I never heard of such a thing. lol My brother spoiled me I guess.
 

Nerwa

Well-Known Member
YIkes!! I never heard of such a thing. lol My brother spoiled me I guess.

What, tape cassettes as memory? It actually wasn't that weird, given media tech history. Recording data rather than audio was a new thing, but using counters & splicing the magnetic tape was established practice for low-tech sound engineering. (Possibly mid-level engineering as well; I never got past low-level, myself.)

I helped with lights & sound in a local community theater during the early/mid 80s. Your show needed sound effects (voice-overs, music, random sounds)? You put it all on however many cassette tapes (usually 1 for intermission music & 1 for the production itself); made a cue sheet of every sound FX - the "time stamp" (i.e., counter number), how long to play it for, sound levels, and actual cue (whatever was happening on stage); and then whoever was running sound followed it religiously. If the tape broke, you'd better have a spare cued up and/or a splicer & Scotch tape.

That was still being done in the early 90s - I did lights for a college water ballet team & sat next to the sound engineer. CDs were still new tech & decent players were outside the budget of most theaters.

This doesn't even get into cutting & splicing actual film. Digitally-shot movies really only took over Hollywood about a decade ago.

More weird magnetic tape cassette history: Before video recorders were common - or not available at all - particularly obsessive fans of various TV shows might record the audio of their show to have some way of experiencing it again. A college friend recorded the first couple seasons of Hart to Hart that way (her parents eventually got her a VCR). And I heard stories at SF/F cons about how people had recorded stuff like Star Trek that way. Occasionally someone would then splice out commercials (physically cutting out the relevant length of tape & re-connecting with Scotch tape), re-record onto fresh tape, and then set up distribution.


Good times.
 
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