Earlier quoted context omitted.
Most people have laptops now, in my experience of large corporations.
I got the RAM upgraded in my work laptop.
Last time I requested that, they just swapped my laptop for a newer one with more RAM
MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
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Re: MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
#302Earlier quoted context omitted.
Chromebooks exist at a lower price point with even less RAM.
and they suck
No, that's just OS war tribalism talking. I regularly use a M1 Macbook, Lenovo Ideapad 14 Pro with Windows 11, and an ARM Lenovo IP Slim 3 Chromebook. Each have their strengths and weakness at different price points.
Chromebooks (typical) strengths are 1. zero maintenance/instant updates 2. 10 years of OS support 3. battery life 4. touchpad 5. value/$ with options at very low price points.
I paid around $150 for my Lenovo ARM Chromebook (came out a few years ago) and got around 14-15 hours of battery life new with no noticeable fans/heat. Has virtually no self-discharge when in deep sleep and boots in I use the Linux VM in ChromeOS for light dev work (and disabled Play Store/Android), the touchpad is absolutely fantastic (which isn't unusual on even cheap Chromebooks, Google actually prioritizes driver support for multitouch/palm rejection unlike the cheap Windows crap models), security is rock solid with essentially no risk of malware/viruses/etc and have literally no maintenance/stability issues that waste my time. Chromebooks are by far the best choice if the question is truly "how do I minimize Grandma needing help solving computer problems", even current locked down MacOS has so many more ways it can break/confuse compared to ChromeOS.
This is the fifth or so Chromebook I've owned over the years, having used both the ultra-premium end of the spectrum (original Pixelbook) and the very cheapo end, and this machine is one of my favorite tech purchases overall in the last few years. I'd definitely recommend 8GB of RAM if possible, but for the typical Chromebook casual web browsing use case 4GB is perfectly serviceable (especially on a newer ARM SoC).
A $150 Chromebook is not intended to replace a $3000 Macbook with 64GB of RAM to run a half dozen Docker images, etc so sure, they'll "suck" in that match up, but they are an extremely competitive option on most metrics for the "someone just needs to browse the web and I don't want to be pestered by IT issues" case.
Re: MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
#303Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The thing about Apple is that as the "IT" guy for my family, its ecosystem is the one which needs the least attention from me. This is true in business/enterprise IT also. Any big company that's done a switch, or at least offered an employee choice, almost immediately saw a huge drop in help desk workload from mac users. Legacy win32 apps aside, it's baffling to me that Windows is still the dominant share of comput…
Part of that reason is Microsoft office is a third class citizen on macOS. Edit: Not sure why this would get downvoted. Weird. It absolutely lags behind windows version of the products by years. Excel did not get ribbon key shortcuts until 6 months ago. It’s a pretty terrible experience for most power users.
I don’t know why you are getting downvoted, agree with you, Microsoft Office is awful on macOS, it just doesn’t work the same, has awful integration with Sharepoint (and Sharepoint in MS Teams and OneDrive), and continuously forgets its properly licensed and complains with a big message that it isn’t licensed - sometimes downgrading to read only. It’s just a terrible thing to use.
Re: MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
#304Earlier quoted context omitted.
Enterprise Mac still has occasional problems -- mainly due to Microsoft crapware IT departments insist on installing.
What's the proper way of managing Mac endpoints?
Since SIP, it's MDM with DDM and you can basically leave engineers be local admins as it has no impact on the system state anymore.
Re: MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
#305Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I suspect Apple is going to cannibalize some MBA sales with the Neo ... Hopefully it allows for the macbook air to return to being a ultra light machine, I held an Asus X14 ARM at 900 grams and it felt so much better. There's also a huge market for the M1 MacBook Air because of the old form factor of being ultra thin even if faking it with bending the shell, the boxed layouts dont fit with MBA to me. Too bad there…
The wife just bought an Air and it’s incredibly light. Not as thin as they used to be but shockingly light still!
100% but I suggest doing the 1-handed pick up test with the lid open, a 900g laptop feels weightless against the 13 air at 1200g
Re: MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
#306Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm probably one of the few people who prefer Linux+KDE stack over macbook software ecosystem. But hardware wise, macbooks are just blowing other laptops out of water after M3-M4. It's not that mac have become much better but that the rest of the lapto pindustry has just gone to shit: 1. Windows pulling more and more shenanigans 2. Normal laptop hardware becoming as pricey as Mac. I could get much better performance…
I have an M3 ultra and a coworker got a Linux laptop with Omarchy which blows my machine. Don't remember the hardware. Needless to say my M3 also sucks compared to a very good desktop.
Depends on the workload.
The M3 Ultra is no slouch. It sits at the top with best processors on both single-core and multi-core x64 processors.
Meanwhile my mini PC with a Ryzen 7 8845HS processor, which is nowhere near an M3 Ultra, feels much snappier using it as a day to day desktop in both Linux and Windows. I think this speaks more to the sluggishness of the macOS experience rather than hardware performance.
But, then I start doing something data/gpu/local LLM intensive and my M3 Max shines.
Re: MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
#307I bought two Touch-ID models as gifts and while doing the setup I must say the lack of keyboard backlight is the only thing that bothered me A LOT. Great machines otherwise.
Re: MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
#308I wonder if this will cannibalize their other more expensive product lines. I know some people and have recommended this to folks that would have purchased more expensive laptops otherwise. My grandpa never needed the macbook air he has continually repurchased over the years. I am planning on purchasing one of these for my oldest, would have opted for a more expensive macbook air as well otherwise. Others that thought the macbook air was too expensive may have purchased used or not at all so this does bring in some more money with that demographic. I have to imagine the margins are smaller if the product is cheaper. I guess time will tell.
Re: MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
#309I ended up getting two (one for each of my daughters). The thing about Apple is that as the "IT" guy for my family, its ecosystem is the one which needs the least attention from me. It really just works. They have used Windows and Linux before (my kids and wife, that is), but something is always not quite right and needs my involvement. These days gone 100% Mac, my interventions are usually initial setup and whenever…
As a fellow family IT specialist, about a decade ago I took the stance that if it's not Apple, I'm not fixing it. I'm not dealing with some bullshit issue with weird proprietary drivers or crapware. The straw that broke the camel's back was a Dell laptop that wasn't working with the Wifi until I turned off IPv6.
It's also why I don't use Linux for a desktop unless I have to. I've had years of debugging weird issues with drivers, editing /etc files, changing X settings and so on.
MacOS isn't perfect. In fact, I think Apple keeps making it worse because they have no real product vision now and it's just a bunch of teams making local changes to justify their own existence. But you can look at MacOS in one of two ways: as a better Windows (by having a UNIX-like core) or as a better Linux (by having a better UI subsystem). Either way it's a win (IMHO).
I'm torn on the Macbook Neo, personally. It really is just a giant iPhone 18 with a keyboard. Plus you can get a Macbook Air at times for $900. That's $200 more than the high-end Neo. Like is it that different to a (cheaper) iPad, which you can also get a keyboard for? I guess it's just not for me.
Re: MacBook Neo is so popular that Apple doubled production
#310Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does not run on the Neo, unfortunately.
Well if you're looking at XPS13 then a comparable machine is a MacBook Air M1 or M2, not a Neo. You can get an M1 refurb for 600 USD, AFAIK Costco sells them at that price in the US. Or buy used for even less. It will still match or surpass that XPS13's performance and battery life.
I think they were talking about the upcoming XPS 13 that's based on the new Intel Wildcat Lake platform and will be priced very close to the MB Neo, so it's pretty comparable. It wouldn't be fair to compare it to something that starts at $1000.