$600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft • Hacker News Board

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#271

Post by supernovae » Sat, Sep 01, 2018, 9:48 PM UTC

samstave wrote: post #236

jenscow wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, this "vendor crap" is now part of the OS.

True, I was using my brothers machine, which is win10 - and I havent used windows in years - and I was disgusted by the crappy UI/UX I was given - with its inbuilt notifications which even pop-up to tell you that you went into full screen mode and told it not to pop-up.... Also, the start menu looks like a freaking spyware minefield they way it takes up 60% of the screen when it is activated. Windows is absolutely a…

Windows 10 start menu doesn't take up that much screen unless the user has configured it as such.

Start menu from store is pretty clean. Go to a microsoft store and mess around with devices from there - they are "signature devices" that are clean.

Windows isn't a mess these days in any sense of the word, It's just people who have a negative opinion of it speak about it with sympathy from others who have a negative opinion.

The Windows subsystem for Linux is awesome, the app store is a move in the right direction (damned if you do, damned if you don't) and they're closing out a lot of legacy design elements with their annual updates. (dark mode, better high res / high dpi support, consistency of legacy/new elements. yaddy yaddy yadda)

With a few minutes of trying you can all but customize the entire interface to your liking.

ChromeOS has the benefit of not having decades of legacy to preserve - and Android is suffering many of the negatives you speak of with regards to Windows and iOS has completely the opposite problem being a controlled absolute dictatorship err walled garden.

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#272

Post by supernovae » Sat, Sep 01, 2018, 9:48 PM UTC

tonyedgecombe wrote: post #214

ChrisSD wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These are what Microsoft calls "suggestions" (aka adverts). I think they only actually install when you first click on them. Fortunately they're UWP apps so are easy to completely remove. Turning off the "Show suggestions" settings will stop them coming back.

Then they all come back with the next update.

I'm in the insider program, they don't/haven't come back in ages.

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#273

Post by supernovae » Sat, Sep 01, 2018, 9:50 PM UTC

mikelward wrote: post #165

sarcasmic wrote: post #24

Any Chromebook more than $400 right now is just there to absorb even more disposable income from the market, because they ship with nicer finishes and faster processors, but they are anemic on memory and storage, making them subpar for intense multitasking, or getting certain types of work done. The situations in which they excel can be reliably hit by Chromebooks around a $400 price point, and even cheaper Chromeboo…

> Any Chromebook more than $400 right now is [...] anemic on memory and storage From the first link in the article: > The Yoga Chromebook is an altogether more powerful system. It has a four-core/eight-thread 8th-generation Core i5 processor, with 8GB RAM and either 64 or 128GB of eMMC storage. i5 CPU/8 GB RAM/128 GB eMMC puts it in MacBook/Surface territory.

eMMC puts it on par with the 399 Surface Go. I wish there would be some evolutionary jump in perf on eMMC, its so terrible with multitasking

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#274

Post by supernovae » Sat, Sep 01, 2018, 9:52 PM UTC

gd2 wrote: post #252

mabbo wrote: post #5

I was an intern at Microsoft the day that ChromeOS was announced. Conveniently, a few days later the head of Windows was giving a talk to all the interns. Overall, spoke well, but during Q&A someone asked him what he thought about ChromeOS. He laughed. He said it was a joke. He made it very clear that he didn't understand what Google was even thinking. And that stuck such a sour chord on me. Here's a company well kno…

I also remember that for a few season, MS did the vaporware thing. Spreading false rumors that they would be releasing a Surface in a few months that would cost about $200, and be better real computer compared to the new Google backed toy. Then after a few delays the surface limited devices came out at nearly $500, and were soon abandoned.

The surface 7" device was supposed to be priced around 200(ish) but we cancelled because 7" devices are largely rejected by the industry.

The 399 go is a step in the right direction.

BUT, i do wish we had a legit 7" that wasn't a Chinese malware knockoff or a really outdated Samsung or Android 5.0 devie. The 7-8" formfacter is such huge utility for pilots, GPS navigation and ebook reading. Shame even apple doesn't update the ipad mini anymore :(

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#275

Post by supernovae » Sat, Sep 01, 2018, 9:53 PM UTC

godzillabrennus wrote: post #35

mabbo wrote: post #5

I was an intern at Microsoft the day that ChromeOS was announced. Conveniently, a few days later the head of Windows was giving a talk to all the interns. Overall, spoke well, but during Q&A someone asked him what he thought about ChromeOS. He laughed. He said it was a joke. He made it very clear that he didn't understand what Google was even thinking. And that stuck such a sour chord on me. Here's a company well kno…

First they laugh at you. Then they fight you. Then you win. - Microsoft should have known this but they had made too much money for too long.

Microsoft makes more money today than they ever had. They're on their way to Trillion dollar valuation.

Lets not forget Google said the surface line was a disaster too.. They all poke at each other

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#276

Post by scarface74 » Sat, Sep 01, 2018, 9:57 PM UTC

londons_explore wrote: post #115

dragontamer wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's more of a sign that most people don't need more than 4GB to 8GB of RAM, and that storage isn't about TB anymore but about speed (HDD vs SSD). SSDs are roughly 100x faster than HDDs, so they're superior despite offering less TB. Unless you're a gamer constantly downloading new 50GB games, most people are fine with ~300GB of storage. People want faster storage, as opposed to more storage.

I want both . I want 2TB of space and the speed of an SSD, and I don't want to pay much. Hybrid hard drives seemed like the perfect solution (a few GB of flash, combined with a 2TB drive). Sadly, nobody managed to get decent performance on hybrid drives. As far as I'm aware, none really had a good grasp of the filesystem, so none could make decisions like 'these small dll files will likley need low latency reads, sti…

Well. Apple will sell you a MacBook with 2TB SSD for $3700 or 4TB for $5700....

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#277

Post by candiodari » Sat, Sep 01, 2018, 9:57 PM UTC

ChrisSD wrote: post #218

zahrc wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A clean install of Windows 10 (not n versions) is shipped with stupid game installers for things like candy crush, Disney magic and march of empire which you can remove easily, but not just "hide" with disabling suggestions.[1] [1] just did a clean install of win10 home

Yes, I meant disabling "suggestions" stops them coming back again in the future. Although Windows has had update "bugs" whereby this setting is ignored. This is solved by delaying feature updates until at least a week or so after release.

Maybe I'm the only one here, but it seem absurd to me to count on Google, an advertising company, not advertise on Chromebooks.

Not yet ... perhaps. Perhaps. Not ? No way.

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#278

Post by satysin » Sat, Sep 01, 2018, 9:58 PM UTC

supernovae wrote: post #271

samstave wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, I was using my brothers machine, which is win10 - and I havent used windows in years - and I was disgusted by the crappy UI/UX I was given - with its inbuilt notifications which even pop-up to tell you that you went into full screen mode and told it not to pop-up.... Also, the start menu looks like a freaking spyware minefield they way it takes up 60% of the screen when it is activated. Windows is absolutely a…

Windows 10 start menu doesn't take up that much screen unless the user has configured it as such. Start menu from store is pretty clean. Go to a microsoft store and mess around with devices from there - they are "signature devices" that are clean. Windows isn't a mess these days in any sense of the word, It's just people who have a negative opinion of it speak about it with sympathy from others who have a negative op…

My "signature edition" Surface Book 2 running Windows 10 Professional came with a bunch of crap on the start menu such as Candy Crush Saga, Twitter, some travel app, Minecraft, and advert for Office 365 and some other crap I can't remember.

I had to right-click and uninstall them all manually but then a few days later a couple of them returned?! I ended up searching for a PowerShell script that actually removes them. Until a few months later when Microsoft rolled out the April 2018 update and they all magically reappeared again so I had to look up that fucking PowerShell script again.

I could kind of accept this on the Home version but on the PROFESSIONAL version?! No fucking way. Why on earth should my pro version come with Minecraft and Twitter?!

And this is a £2500 laptop made and sold by Microsoft! Not some £200 Acer from PC World.

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#279

Post by supernovae » Sat, Sep 01, 2018, 10:00 PM UTC

reaperducer wrote: post #49

ericcholis wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is entirely due to backwards compatibility.

I think this is entirely due to backwards compatibility. That's the current conventional wisdom. But it's more like an excuse. Windows got bloated because Microsoft relied(s) on cheap masses of mediocre programmers, backed by equally mediocre managers. A pattern that Windows application developers copied. Yes, Microsoft has some really talented people. I knew a good number of them from the Bing and Xbox group when I…

This isn't true at all. The ENTIRE industry had to re-invent itself MANY times - and MANY companies failed and have long since shutdown. Microsoft on the other hand has survived - and not only maintained backwards compatibility but embraced new technologies - and is doing so at a breakneck pace today.

Microsoft research is a top notch research company. Microsoft is also a large, if not the largest, contributor to Linux & Open source.

Horror stories aren't unique to Microsoft... The industry of the 80s/90s and early 2000s was something i'd never want to go back to - but its also something i suffered through and that suffering didn't matter what OS you ran. If you chose Irix it sucked paying 600 bucks for MEDIA to update your OS, if you ran HPUX it sucked having to buy a support contract to update your OS, if you ran Solaris, you were proud of solaris - but it wasn't until sun embraced open source that it really took off because we didn't have to buy a compiler that cost hundreds of dollars if not thousands to license.

Meanwhile, Windows has TurboC, TurboPascal and tons of stuff - and open source gnu started taking off and linux came around and the world started getting better for everyone- opportunity opened up - we crossed the chasim from 8 bit to 16 bit to 32 bit and 64bit and Windows has maintained a level of compatibility second to none to support all that legacy.

They're working hard to compete - Windows "S" mode is windows without the ability to stall win32 - its "Store mode" - it could go a LONG way into making it "suck less" from legacy cruft but by and large the market and developers are refusing to support it - which is odd considering they NEED to support the store model for official chromebooks, android apps or ios marketplaces.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#280

Post by krn » Sat, Sep 01, 2018, 10:01 PM UTC

binmanthrowaway wrote: post #270

krn wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Will these more upmarket Chromebooks (which have x86 CPUs and acceptable RAM & storage) be OK to run any regular Linux distro? GalliumOS[1] is a Ubuntu-based Linux distribution optimized for Chromebooks with a huge list of supported devices[2]. > Right now, Xiaomi laptops are excellent cheap machines to run Linux on (thanks to having just Intel components). Same for Huawei if you are willing to spend a bit more, bu…

Can't see 4k screen. Come on it is 2018 I don't want to see pixels.

This is a budget ThinkPad model, design for small businesses, where 4k display would be an overkill. I actually find FHD to be a better option for a development machine, because of the lower energy consumption and extended battery life.