Moving from Macbook to Linux • Hacker News Board

Re: Moving from Macbook to Linux

#41

Post by masklinn » Fri, Nov 20, 2020, 7:49 PM UTC

fsflover wrote: post #18

vondur wrote: post #6

I think this is going to be a tougher sell for laptops as the M1 chip seems to be a game changer for battery life and performance. Once the majority of software gets native ARM support, it will only get better, not to mention this is only the first iteration of a desktop class Apple Silicon. I do understand from a philosophical point of view why people may not want to use MacOS, particularly after last weeks code sig…

You can find GNU/Linux ARM laptops, too: https://www.pine64.org/pinebook-pro/ (slow, but it's a start).

> slow, but it's a start

That it's slow makes it a bad one.

It's the issue endemic to existing ARM laptop offering: in the best cases, either the performances are lackluster and the battery life is good, or the performances are terrible and the battery life is great. Sure the pinebook is super cheap, but the performances are bad and it gets 6-8h battery.

Re: Moving from Macbook to Linux

#42

Post by NullPrefix » Fri, Nov 20, 2020, 7:50 PM UTC

tomwojcik wrote: post #30

anderspitman wrote: post #12

I got into Linux when I was younger because I thought it was cool, and I had plenty of time to fix it when things broke. It's been my daily driver for ~10 years now. But there's quite a bit too learn. If I were to try and switch from Windows or Mac today I'm not sure I'd succeed before giving up. But I'm grateful every day to have a machine that I have some semblance of control over. I use a rolling release distro. I…

> I use a rolling release distro This might be the first time someone could have said 'I use Arch' but decided not to.

Maybe it's because he uses gentoo?

Re: Moving from Macbook to Linux

#43

Post by buzzert » Fri, Nov 20, 2020, 7:50 PM UTC

Archive link in case you don’t want to pull in a hundred scripts just to read it: https://archive.is/wsnUY

Re: Moving from Macbook to Linux

#44

Post by driverdan » Fri, Nov 20, 2020, 7:50 PM UTC

bsaul wrote: post #25

The fact that many people reading this post title (including me) look at it with sarcasm is telling on how apple scored big points with its new cpu. Keeping up with mac OS and the trackpad was already quite hard, but CPU could be the killing blow. Which could lead us in a few years to a situation where mac developers will face the same fate as ios developers : forced to buy hardware to sign their app, forced to push…

> That future looks extremely scary. What can we do, now, as developers ?

Stop buying, using, and supporting the Apple ecosystem. Vote with your money. The new chips are faster. So what? The laptop you have today works fine, you don't need the latest and greatest hardware.

Re: Moving from Macbook to Linux

#45

Post by fsflover » Fri, Nov 20, 2020, 7:50 PM UTC

vamsipk wrote: post #20

I'm in the market for a new one now. Are Thinkpad T/P series still the best for running Linux? How about the Dell XPS series which seem to have a better resolution and screen?

Why just not buy preinstalled Linux? https://puri.sm/products/.

Re: Moving from Macbook to Linux

#46

Post by aaomidi » Fri, Nov 20, 2020, 7:51 PM UTC

vr46 wrote: post #31

anderspitman wrote: post #12

I got into Linux when I was younger because I thought it was cool, and I had plenty of time to fix it when things broke. It's been my daily driver for ~10 years now. But there's quite a bit too learn. If I were to try and switch from Windows or Mac today I'm not sure I'd succeed before giving up. But I'm grateful every day to have a machine that I have some semblance of control over. I use a rolling release distro. I…

What do you use? I have tried this multiple times and always give up. I ran FreeBSD for a decade as a server in a datacentre and have a deep and abiding love for it, but it doesn't sound it makes a usable desktop these days. Ubuntu appears to be the desktop of choice, but I find it buggy, sluggish and tedious. I'd like a practical and speedy OS that is responsive and configurable. But I don't know enough :)

Not OP but I do recommend PopOS. It's worked really well for me.

The sluggish performance you're getting is honestly probably related to CFS (the default linux process scheduler). Windows does an AMAZING job with scheduling for UI applications. You almost never feel like your computer is struggling because anything UI related gets scheduled first. CFS does not do this.

I've found that changing the scheduler to something that may be less efficient overall, but is aimed at desktop use makes my experience so much better.

Re: Moving from Macbook to Linux

#47

Post by brabel » Fri, Nov 20, 2020, 7:51 PM UTC

kowlo wrote: post #5

In my opinion: generally speaking, not yet! But of course, you are making your switch in 2021 which is great. I have tried every year and always end up going back to either Windows or MacOS. However, I'm fed up with Windows now, so I've invested in MacOS for now. I'm saying this from my i7 MacBook Pro 2018 with fans blazing because HN on Safari can be demanding.

> with fans blazing because HN on Safari can be demanding.

You've got to be joking?! I have a MacBook Air from 2020, which should still be less powerful than a MacBook Pro from 2018 and even on huge websites full of crap the fans won't kick in, let alone on HN which is the lightest website I frequent often.

The only time I hear the fan is when I compile a large project on my IDE or when the IDE re-indexes the JRE!

Re: Moving from Macbook to Linux

#48

Post by mettamage » Fri, Nov 20, 2020, 7:51 PM UTC

bsaul wrote: post #25

The fact that many people reading this post title (including me) look at it with sarcasm is telling on how apple scored big points with its new cpu. Keeping up with mac OS and the trackpad was already quite hard, but CPU could be the killing blow. Which could lead us in a few years to a situation where mac developers will face the same fate as ios developers : forced to buy hardware to sign their app, forced to push…

I don’t look at it with sarcasm. I have an issue that laptops and PCs are not having the same ISA.

Re: Moving from Macbook to Linux

#49

Post by melenaboija » Fri, Nov 20, 2020, 7:51 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #16

> but with Apple downgrading its hardware (but still keeping those Apple prices!), the problems just kept stacking up. I get that the author wound up with a lemon, but the idea that Apple is "downgrading its hardware" with more problems arising is ludicrous. Especially now that Apple fixed the keyboards, its hardware is better than it's ever been. You might not like Apple for plenty of other reasons, but the notion t…

Macbooks getting worst has been the trend for the last 10 years and they released a new chipset 1 month ago.

Maybe they will recover all of their fans but it might take more time for some of us. I think today there is still room for doubt.

Re: Moving from Macbook to Linux

#50

Post by skohan » Fri, Nov 20, 2020, 7:51 PM UTC

anderspitman wrote: post #12

I got into Linux when I was younger because I thought it was cool, and I had plenty of time to fix it when things broke. It's been my daily driver for ~10 years now. But there's quite a bit too learn. If I were to try and switch from Windows or Mac today I'm not sure I'd succeed before giving up. But I'm grateful every day to have a machine that I have some semblance of control over. I use a rolling release distro. I…

I use Ubuntu for my media PC, and I feel like for the casual user, it's plenty easy enough. I use it as an appliance with a steam client and a browser. Do most users actually need more than that?

It's arguably easier to use than windows and macOS because it doesn't require a bunch of separate sign-ins to do things.

I think the only "hard part" for the average user is getting into the boot settings to actually install ubuntu. For a developer I think it's a non-issue.