Buying a new Laptop

[John Marks]

Hi, I need to buy a new laptop and I can't decide between any asus laptop, which will have linux installed on, or a macbook pro (maybe with linux too). I have no price limit.

Thanks

 

[MRoss]

Ask MRoss.

Oh wait...that's me. PM me with details you would like to see. Having no price tag is nice but do you want small? Light? Fast? Big screen? Battery life? Let me know. I'll do my best to help.

 

[Barny]

Macbook pro

 

[Andy Nguyen]

I have both a PC and MBP. Computers are commodity these days and any new machine is more than enough to meet most everyday tasks. Some people pay more for various reasons.
If you want a pre-installed Linux, then just get an Asus.

 

[MRoss]

Ok.

1st: Ignore Barny. You could need a new kitchen table and he will tell you to stack up some Macs and that they are sturdy.

2nd: Andy, people usually have something other in mind when asking laptop advice. I don't know how much research John does for himself, but he might be disappointed by buying a laptop with good reviews and finding it has <3 hours battery life. There are many details that are involved...if he posted some more information we might be able to give him a decent answer. Screen size, battery, resolution, ram, etc.

 

[John Marks]

15 inch MAX.
Full HD
The longest the battery life the better
At least 8gb Ram
SSD

 

[alain]

Ignore MRoss. He changes laptops every couple of weeks.

I like my MacbookPro with Retina display and 16gb of memory.

 

[Barny]

Ignore MRoss. He understands nothing about computing or about what makes a computer good or bad.

 

[MRoss]

Ignore MRoss. He understands nothing about computing or about what makes a computer good or bad.

I have been offered moderator positions on 2 very popular(10k+ users, 100k+visitors) laptop/tablet sites due to my impressive contributions. While I do not need to defend myself from your annoying "Buy a Mac" mentality or unnecessary personal attacks, I certainly have an much more impressive computer background. In 3rd grade I won second place in my school science fair by putting together a pc from just components and then writing a Basic program in front of the judges. I had no practice.

Either way and surprisingly, I would tell the OP to buy the Macbook Pro (if he doesn't care about weight).

See here: https://www.quantnet.com/threads/laptop-thread-2012.10871/

 

[Barny]

I have been offered moderator positions on 2 very popular(10k+ users, 100k+visitors) laptop/tablet sites due to my impressive contributions. While I do not need to defend myself from your annoying "Buy a Mac" mentality or unnecessary personal attacks, I certainly have an much more impressive computer background. In 3rd grade I won second place in my school science fair by putting together a pc from just components and then writing a Basic program in front of the judges. I had no practice.

Either way and surprisingly, I would tell the OP to buy the Macbook Pro (if he doesn't care about weight).

See here: https://www.quantnet.com/threads/laptop-thread-2012.10871/

That is some impressive achievement, dude. Aged 8 I was making simple PC games in visual basic. Aged 10 (around 1998) I started my own business building and selling computers from scratch. I also repaired and upgraded PCs for friends and family. Aged 12 I learnt HTML and Javascript and made my own website, followed by designing and building websites for local businesses. I think you'll agree that's far more impressive than winning your school science fair, but then I didn't expect you to be humble given the narcissistic nature of your posts.

In any event, none of that is relevant to the discussion at hand. I assume you're not versed in remedial logic and hence that's the reason you have fallen victim to a basic logical fallacy.

Contrary to your advice, I would not recommend the retina display MBP but the older MBP, since it's much easier to upgrade and repair and won't require you to fork out $x00 for Apple care.

 

[John Marks]

Thanks everybody. Is it easy to install Linux on a Mac?

 

[Barny]

No. And it would be utterly pointless, since Mac OS is a linux based OS. It is basically Ubuntu on steroids, and much more user friendly.

 

[alain]

Thanks everybody. Is it easy to install Linux on a Mac?

Use OSX as host for virtualization and install Linux as a VM. You can run Windows as a VM too if you need it. I've been doing thig for the last 4 years and it works like a charm.

 

[alain]

No. And it would be utterly pointless, since Mac OS is a linux based OS. It is basically Ubuntu on steroids, and much more user friendly.

No. The former part of you answer is incorrect. Mac OSX comes from the BSD family but they break the POSIX standard way before they get to the user layer.

OSX is definitely user friendly but the toolchain breaks along the way. You will have to jump through some hoops if you want the full UNIX toolset up and running (homebrew, fink, macports). IMHO, the VM solution works really well. I currently use a Linux VM as a development environment on my MBP.

 

[MRoss]

That is some impressive achievement, dude. Aged 8 I was making simple PC games in visual basic. Aged 10 (around 1998) I started my own business building and selling computers from scratch. I also repaired and upgraded PCs for friends and family. Aged 12 I learnt HTML and Javascript and made my own website, followed by designing and building websites for local businesses. I think you'll agree that's far more impressive than winning your school science fair, but then I didn't expect you to be humble given the narcissistic nature of your posts.

My goal here is not to promote my own agenda. I am just trying to help others. My posts are well thought out and take a lot of time, while your "Get a Mac" on every computer thread on QN is far from educational.

Either way, I disagree. When I was 8 VB did not yet exist. When I was 12 the web did not exists as it does today. I merely assumed you had no computing experience based on your lack or substance in every one of your QN posts. Since you seem to know something I am no longer going to speculate who is better. That is irrelevant. I apologize if you truly understand computing, but perhaps provide more substantial posts in the future.

 

[Barny]

My goal here is not to promote my own agenda. I am just trying to help others. My posts are well thought out and take a lot of time, while your "Get a Mac" on every computer thread on QN is far from educational.

Either way, I disagree. When I was 8 VB did not yet exist. When I was 12 the web did not exists as it does today. I merely assumed you had no computing experience based on your lack or substance in every one of your QN posts. Since you seem to know something I am no longer going to speculate who is better. That is irrelevant. I apologize if you truly understand computing, but perhaps provide more substantial posts in the future.

I would, but the problem is you exhibit the horrible double of ignorance and arrogance, and arguing with you about the merits of a mac would be like arguing with a Catholic about the existence of God i.e. pointless.

 

[Barny]

No. The former part of you answer is incorrect. Mac OSX comes from the BSD family but they break the POSIX standard way before they get to the user layer.

OSX is definitely user friendly but the toolchain breaks along the way. You will have to jump through some hoops if you want the full UNIX toolset up and running (homebrew, fink, macports). IMHO, the VM solution works really well. I currently use a Linux VM as a development environment on my MBP.

I always thought osx was fully posix compliant?

 

[Andy Nguyen]

You would need 16GB ram on rMBP to get a smooth VM experience, btw.

IMHO, the VM solution works really well. I currently use a Linux VM as a development environment on my MBP.

 

[MRoss]

I would, but the problem is you exhibit the horrible double of ignorance and arrogance, and arguing with you about the merits of a mac would be like arguing with a Catholic about the existence of God i.e. pointless.

"Arguing with me?" A vast majority of the threads are not started by me but people seeking meaningful advice and it's always: "Get a Mac". Regardless, once the substance-less personal attacks come out I no longer care to talk with you. I consider QN a haven where people join to promote goodness and help each other, not to promote self-agendas and call people names.
Perhaps one last piece of friendly advice: Try being nice to people. You would be surprised at how far this will carry you in life.

 

[alain]

I always thought osx was fully posix compliant?

It is compliant in a lot of levels but it's not fully POSIX compliant.