Earlier quoted context omitted.
Pretty sure Mac laptops haven’t been upgradable since 2015.
Does any laptop have any kind of upgrade path? I've always cheaped out and treated them as disposable.
The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned
331–340 of 348 posts
Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned
#332I have bought an M1, and so far I am slightly disappointed. Intel macbook pro was quite fine, too. Firefox is still occasionally slow. No significant improvements in compilation speed (well, homebrew still relies on Rosetta 2). Instant wakeup is cool, but not a life-changing improvement. Etc.
Homebrew works without Rosetta 2, maybe you have to reinstall it so it runs natively. It should be installed under /opt/homebrew
Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned
#333Earlier quoted context omitted.
this is what people meant prior to the m1 coming out with "macs are a horrible deal" they used to be priced at roughly 3x markup compared to the market. they finally fixed their co-dependency with intel and suddenly wow the price gouging goes out the door because gasp the macbook air could have always been the pro it was just never possible with using old chips. ANYTHING using arm absolutely FLIES open your eyes peop…
> they used to be priced at roughly 3x markup compared to the market Were they though? With comparable displays and build quality, I think their laptops have been competitive with the upper end of the market for a while now, with maybe a 10-20% markup on that.
Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned
#334Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sounds awesome! Can you share what type of laptop are you using?
Right now it,s an xmg which is a seller of clevo probably i will remain with that because I can change parts without voiding warranty , my reseller leave me add rm and hdd of my choice after the sale, i can buy without hdd and ram.. aalso have swappable battery and even if touchpad may not be apple quality i usually use mouse or trackball , but with the next I'll take a look at what Lenovo, hp dell etc will offer by…
If I were to apply your logic, I could then declare that my POWER9 2U blade is a portable device ahem laptop (technically, I can carry it around as well as keep the blade on my laps, yes) that surpasses any other known laptop in terms of hardware configurability, and Linux compatibility will be even greater, too.
Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned
#335Yeah, right - if you choose to ignore the following: You can't upgrade the RAM, you can't upgrade the SSD, it doesn't have replaceable battery and you are forced to run a crippled OS on it (macOS Big Sur deliberately cripples VPN and firewall on it so that select Apple softwares can bypass them, allowing Apple better access and control over your data and softwares). (And if you don't care about any of the above, then…
As an owner of a 2015 Macbook Pro, I'm pretty okay with that. Haven't upgraded anything the past 6 years. Honestly I'd like an SSD and RAM upgrade but it's not that big of a deal. It costs money, too, and there's a bunch of stuff that doesn't improve with it like the CPU and battery which are key. And secondarily, any improvements to formfactor, screen, webcam, keyboard etc, although that's not as significant nowaday…
It's not just about upgrades, but repairability too.
Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned
#336Yeah, right - if you choose to ignore the following: You can't upgrade the RAM, you can't upgrade the SSD, it doesn't have replaceable battery and you are forced to run a crippled OS on it (macOS Big Sur deliberately cripples VPN and firewall on it so that select Apple softwares can bypass them, allowing Apple better access and control over your data and softwares). (And if you don't care about any of the above, then…
Using a computer and extending a computer are two different problems. If I'm test driving a car, I'm not judging it for how serviceable the tires are. However, I'd factor that in for a purchase.
Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned
#337Earlier quoted context omitted.
I got the 1TB SSD. Wouldn't call that tiny. Then I have external arrays for bigger datasets. How much space would you need? IIRC they go up to 2TB or maybe even 4TB.
It's expensive and is still not upgradeable is the point.
My 2008 Sony Vaio VGN-Z17GN laptop is, technically, upgradable. But, the chipset does not support more than 4Gb of RAM, and I already have 4Gb installed. So I do not have the RAM upgrade option. I replaced a HDD with a SDD years back, and it was a fairly risky enterprise with a high chance of the laptop incurring a permanent damage due to how the Vaio keyboard is wired up with the mainboard. The laptop is still very much usable even for moderate development activities since it has been running Linux for years.
Other laptops have their own quirks or limitations of sorts. Now, a few random picks amongst contemporary laptops (Lenovo and Acer):
Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Yoga Gen 5: 8 Gb (i5-10210U CPU) or 16 Gb (i7-10510U CPU) of soldered on RAM and 512 Gb Opal2 NVMe (no information on the SSD upgradability). The 16Gb RAM / 512 Gb configuration is AU$1,100+ more expensive than the 16Gb / 512 Gb 13" Macbook Pro M1 (AU$1,699).
Lenovo ThinkPad X390 Yoga: i7-8565U CPU, 8Gb of soldered on RAM, 256 Gb NVMe (no information on the SSD upgradability). It is AU$400+ more expensive than the 16Gb / 512 Gb 13" Macbook Pro M1 (AU$1,699).
Lenovo ThinkPad P1: i7-8750H, 1x 16GB SO-DIMM DDR4-2666 non-ECC (no information of the max amount RAM supported), 512GB NVMe SSD (no information on the SSD upgradability). It is AU$1,000 more expensive than the 16Gb / 512 Gb 13" Macbook Pro M1 (AU$1,699).
Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Fold: i5-L16G7, 8Gb of soldered on RAM, 512GB NVMe SSD (no information on the SSD upgradability), AU$5,799. It is AU$4,000 (four thousand) more expensive than the 16Gb / 512 Gb 13" Macbook Pro M1 (AU$1,699). This is 3.411 times more expensive than the M1 laptop.
Lenovo ThinkPad T14s: AMD Ryzen™ PRO 4750U CPU, 16GB soldered on DDR4-3200, 512 Gb Opal2 NVMe ((no information on the SSD upgradability). It is nearly AU$500 more expensive that the 16Gb / 512 Gb 13" Macbook Pro M1 (AU$1,699).
Acer TravelMate P614, Intel Core i7, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD, AU$2,299: no information on RAM and SSD upgrade options. The laptop is AU$600 more expensive that the 16Gb / 512 Gb 13" Macbook Pro M1 (AU$1,699).
Acer Swift 3, AMD Ryzen 7-4700U, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD, AU$1,999: no information on RAM and SSD upgrade options. The laptop is AU$300 more expensive that the 16Gb / 512 Gb 13" Macbook Pro M1 (AU$1,699).
Other Acer laptops are less capable, use Pentium or Core i3 CPU's, slower SSD's and are cheaper than M1 laptops; some are twice as cheaper. They are marketed as «student» laptops.
Out of 7 PC laptops above, only one has upgradable RAM, and it is a guessing game whether the SSD can or can't be upgraded. Every PC laptop above is also more expensive than the latest, stats wise comparable, 13" MacBook Pro M1. A few of those are significantly more expensive.
Yes, there are cheaper options, and, yes, some laptops can be upgraded easily or more easily, but that is not the primary market for laptop makers. Wholesale purchasers (corporates) and average consumers do not typically ask whether or not they can later upgrade their laptop.
Also, if one wants an ultraporatble or a compact laptop, they had better accept the fact that RAM and/or SSD will be soldered on, and they won't be able to upgrade them, be it an Apple or a commodity PC laptop. It is a commonplace now.
Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned
#338The most interesting thing about this to me was the bit at the end about Windows and Games. I've heard of Windows emulation on Mac before but this is the first time I've heard of Parallels. > Now you can download Steam and basically install anything and it will probably work. Microsoft really did some amazing magic in getting both 32-bit and 64-bit x86 programs running on arm64. The author makes it sound like you can…
Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned
#339Earlier quoted context omitted.
I got the 1TB SSD. Wouldn't call that tiny. Then I have external arrays for bigger datasets. How much space would you need? IIRC they go up to 2TB or maybe even 4TB.
It's expensive and is still not upgradeable is the point.
Re: The M1 MacBook Air is the best computer I've ever owned
#340Earlier quoted context omitted.
That seems crazy but plausible. Explains why so many people complain about it while my office and home never had issues, it's all laid out so you plug in the power on the right.
It apparently affects all of the USB-C models with ports on both sides, it’s kind of surprising to me that the workaround isn’t more well-known, and even more surprising that it’s gone so many generations without a fix (although honestly I have no idea how involved the fix would be, and it’s probably moot with Mx around the corner).
The sad “thinness” gimmick has driven Apple’s quality to ever-lower levels.