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Microsoft builds MacBook Pro rival with NVIDIA-powered Surface Laptop Ultra

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Re: Microsoft builds MacBook Pro rival with NVIDIA-powered Surface Laptop Ultra

#311

Post by 866-RON-0-FEZ »

mandeepj wrote: post #306

Whatever they all do, they can never, ever match the quality of Apple! I've bought many Macs so far, and many Windows machines (Dell, Sony, 1st and 2nd Gen of Surface) as well. All of those Windows machines died within less than 2 years, while the Macs, which were bought more than 10 years ago, are still working fine. So, I'm not going to buy a new Windows machine anytime soon.

> Whatever they all do, they can never, ever match the quality of Apple!

It's a pretty low bar to meet.

Every Mac I've owned has had a hardware failure. Keyboard (x3). Dead trackpad. Display backlight. Logic board. LCD failure. Multiple drive failures. One Apple TV that shit the bed. Many within warranty, some not.

Apple's warranty service is pretty good, but to gloat about "quality"... it's more like when Sonny Corleone throws money at the guy's feet after he smashes his camera.

Re: Microsoft builds MacBook Pro rival with NVIDIA-powered Surface Laptop Ultra

#312

Post by toraway »

newdee wrote: post #291
pqtyw wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You literally have to hack it with shell commands Well on macOS you need to do the same to install and/or run applications so its not that fat ahead.

This is false in my experience. You can use the cli to clear the quarantine bit, or you can take the (admittedly annoying) trip to system preferences to override. This is rarely something I need to do; most software is already signed and notarised. Also not at all equivalent to being forced into linking an online account before being allowed to use your computer at all.

You can still bypass the login requirement for Win 11 and that annoyance only happens once during install vs. every time you try to run a non-notarized app.

It’s easily in my top 3 most hated things about my MacBook. Plus, knowing Apple and the history of that “feature”, it will only ratchet towards becoming even more of a pain over time (it was actually tolerable back before they removed the hotkey to bypass).

For me, after running Win11debloat one time Win 11 disappears into the background 95% of the time, like an OS should. Unfortunately I don’t the luxury of doing something equivalent on MacOS without completely disabling SIP.

Re: Microsoft builds MacBook Pro rival with NVIDIA-powered Surface Laptop Ultra

#313

Post by ChuckMcM »

I know it feels snarky but I didn't ever expect to read that Microsoft was pairing with MediaTek to make an ARM cpu to run Windows. So many years of the WinTel hegemony I guess :-).

I've had several Surface devices over the years, the original SurfaceBook, and a Surface Pro 4 and Surface Pro 6. The Pro 4 was the most reliable and the Pro 6 was prone to overheat. But execution in the mechanical build was quite good.

That said the battery in my SurfaceBook went all Spicy Pillow on me, the Pro 4's power slot ended up dying, and the Pro 6 just stopped responding one day (it was a work laptop so I just gave it back but still). I'm still waiting to see how folks with Macbooks experience the end of life.

If MediaTek would partner with Framework to make a motherboard I'd totally try it out :-).

Re: Microsoft builds MacBook Pro rival with NVIDIA-powered Surface Laptop Ultra

#314

Post by 866-RON-0-FEZ »

RankingMember wrote: post #170

My experience with Surfaces and, particularly, the Surface Book and its accompanying dock were such that I'd have to be paid to use one again. For example, the dock would get its own updates silently and brick itself randomly and the proprietary magnetic connector between the dock and the computer was prone to a poor connection. I remember many occasions trying to work and my screens just randomly blinking in and out…

Thunderbolt docks being absolute dogshit is universal across the market, it's not limited to one manufacturer.

Apple doesn't have this problem because they don't even make docks they're so problematic. Enjoy dongles, Mac users.

Modern docks usually run their own internal OS and require frequent reboots to even attempt to appear stable.

The worst part is most use docks to get Ethernet, but docks nearly universally use low quality USB Ethernet controllers internally (vs PCI) making the whole exercise rather pointless.

Re: Microsoft builds MacBook Pro rival with NVIDIA-powered Surface Laptop Ultra

#317

Post by jwrallie »

denysvitali wrote: post #302

The Surface line is, HW-wise, very good IMHO. Too bad the software is awful. Thankfully the Linux Surface community is pretty strong. Proprietary Microsoft drivers don't make it easy, but we're getting there... https://github.com/linux-surface/surface-pro-x I'll buy another one if there's some commitment from Microsoft to be more open source friendly, but since this will never happen, they can keep their HW.

Depending on how easy it is to run Linux on this as opposed to the new MacBooks may make this attractive for Linux users.

Anyway, the whole trend to change from x86 to Arm on laptops is bad news for compatibility. It might be that the era where you can download an iso and expect Linux to run on a random laptop is over, and Linux users will have to stick to only a couple of devices with well known support. Did Valve release a laptop yet?

Re: Microsoft builds MacBook Pro rival with NVIDIA-powered Surface Laptop Ultra

#318

Post by exmadscientist »

mschuster91 wrote: post #256
whateverboat wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They ordered in every single competing dock they could find, from that era's products, and found that every last one was garbage in some way or other, usually fatally so. It is so hard to believe that when more than 1000 employees at my employers are also using at least one dock (Dell and Thinkpad both) and using them very well.

We are talking about a situation some years past. I member there were USB docks that if you had them attached to external power and ethernet, but not a laptop, they'd instant-kill the network by sending garbage frames that would cause switches to fault off. Only around 2024-ish the situation with USB and TB docks seemed to stabilize.

Yes, this would have been around 2015. (When I said "Surface Book" I meant the original!)

Docks were bad, bad products in those days. They were no longer the dedicated bulky-but-reliable things of years past, or the modern finally-debugged dongles we've got now.

This was Intel's Alpine Ridge and it was hell. (At least, I think that was the one. Certainly, it was hell!)

Re: Microsoft builds MacBook Pro rival with NVIDIA-powered Surface Laptop Ultra

#320

Post by tw04 »

denysvitali wrote: post #302

The Surface line is, HW-wise, very good IMHO. Too bad the software is awful. Thankfully the Linux Surface community is pretty strong. Proprietary Microsoft drivers don't make it easy, but we're getting there... https://github.com/linux-surface/surface-pro-x I'll buy another one if there's some commitment from Microsoft to be more open source friendly, but since this will never happen, they can keep their HW.

I get it’s not what you’re asking for, but WSL on windows is a lot more friendly than anything Apple has done in the last decade to assist in Linux support.
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