11–20 of 179 posts
No laptop is going to substitute for something like a used $800 Dell poweredge r910 with 32 cores or a selfbuilt, new, 16 or 32-core threadripper or epyc machine.
The 12" MacBook (not air) is a great little laptop if you can deal with the single usb-c port.
I wrote up a few more details here: https://tylerayoung.com/2018/07/23/the-worlds-shortest-revie...
Unfortunately, from the epoch until very recently, UNIX has had GUIs ranging in quality from absolute shit to mediocre. That's finally changing with Free Desktop (Wayland + GNOME/KDE, and support libraries).
OS X gave programmers a UNIX core with a beautiful user interface layered on top. And what a joy it is to use.
But these days, you can easily make do with a much, much cheaper laptop running GNU/Linux if your budget and/or conscience dictates, and have a pretty good experience.
The attraction of programmers to macOS née OS X has always been its UNIX foundations. Programmers love UNIX. Programmers made UNIX for programmers. Unfortunately, from the epoch until very recently, UNIX has had GUIs ranging in quality from absolute shit to mediocre. That's finally changing with Free Desktop (Wayland + GNOME/KDE, and support libraries). OS X gave programmers a UNIX core with a beautiful user interfac…
I was considering buying a more powerful laptop for the trip, but I'm glad I put it off.
If I needed more power, then I would just ssh to Linux box. I even used X forwarding once! It worked with XQuartz -- my first time I using it, and it was passable.
Anyway, I really like the Macbook Air -- and I used it for everything -- coding, presentations, taking videos/pictures, video conferencing, listening to music, watching Netflix, health data, etc.
I ran BOTH an Ubuntu VM and a Windows VM on the Macbook Air too! Computers can do everything now!
As a developer, you'd be well served by a 2015 (if you like the old keyboard), 2016 or 2017 MacBook Pro. Why do you want to spend so much money to pay for Apple Corporate to get even wealthier? Even something like a certified refurbish machine will get you what you need (with full Apple warranty), AND leave you enough money for peripherals and accessories.
Buy a tool of course, that works for your job, but don't be clouded by the idea that you need the newest, the latest gadget to do basic development.
I recently upgraded from my 2015 rMBP to the 2018 model you’re looking at. I agree the Touch Bar is a dumb gimmick (for a dev’s purposes at least), but the keyboard has grown on me, and the 6-core/12-thread CPU is a serious boon for dev work. I wrote up a few more details here: https://tylerayoung.com/2018/07/23/the-worlds-shortest-revie...