Comment by da_n | Hacker News Reader

Comment by da_n | Hacker News Reader

I'm not an Apple hater, I use a MacBook Pro at work (funnily enough, either SSH remote linux server or running Linux VM through vagrant), for my personal machines I run 100% Linux. It is solid hardware, but I think the OS is becoming a hindrance to me as a developer. It seems like every iteration closes yet another door on the underlying UNIX base, making it harder and harder to get things working, Homebrew helps but seems like it needs more and more workarounds and often breaks with esoteric conflicts. Nowadays I just use OS X as a VM shell, so I might as well be using Windows. I don't use any Apple "apps", I never touch their cloud because of all the horror stories I've heard, and I fear in a couple of releases the OS is just going to be completely locked down so I'll have to move to Windows at work to get work done. The hardware is definitely the best in class, but the software is becoming unusable to me as a developer. I hope it means more linux usage but I'm not delusional and know that desktop linux is basically just a niche and probably always will be (which saddens me greatly). I think it's a shame Apple has taken this direction.

I have a similar situation, and agree. I actually keep Linux installed on a separate partition on my 2015 Retina MBP. I shrink the OS X partition as much as possible, and install grub on the EFI system partition, alongside OS X. When in OS X, I use VMWare (with an EFI-based VM) to boot the Linux partition and slowly over time I'm working on getting the thing to run Linux smoothly as a Desktop alternative to OS X. This involves some weirdness. For example I had to recompile my kernel yesterday with some patches just to get suspend/resume working in Linux due to hardware changes introduced circa 11,4. This is an example of the challenges Linux/other free software OSes face which companies like Apple don't on the Desktop -- a tight coupling between OS development and hardware design. It's actually quite remarkable how far Linux has come in spite of this.

I cannot recommend strongly enough using Docker for Mac. It provides any form of environment of which you can think, all while running at native performance. For now, we're just using it for development. Postgres on Mac has subtle differences to Postgres on Linux.

So you spin up a Ubuntu instance on your Docker app and do all of you coding and such in there? As sort of a replacement for Vagrent? I may try this out if its overall been a positive experience over dealing with the weird installs the OP is talking about.

The hardware is "best-in-class"? I keep hearing this, but the specs and personal experiences just don't match up with it. Their devices are, and have always been, way underspecced, and they pull stupid crap like abusing the case as a heatsink (because they're too cheap for fans?), soldering in RAM and gluing in batteries (seriously, WTF?), and using proprietary connectors for everything.

Their software is a trainwreck, their hardware is even worse. Why on earth do people give this company money?

You might not agree with their choice but you don't seem to even try to understand why the do things they do. They do glue RAM to make laptops smaller. They glue batteries for the same reason. They try to get rid of fans because they are mechanical thing that can break, sucks dusts and use energy. Its not great for ppl who want to have hackable devices but it works great for the rest of people.

> They do glue RAM to make laptops smaller. They glue batteries for the same reason.

Oh yes, because glue takes up so much less space than a screw.

> They try to get rid of fans because they are mechanical thing that can break, sucks dusts and use energy.

That's like a car manufacturer saying that exhaust pipes clog up too often, so let's just pump the smog into the passenger cabin instead.

Except that Apple computers don't kill people.

I've got three Macs currently, none of which have ever overheated. I use a MacBook Pro on my lap while wearing shorts for hours at a time. It gets warm, but not too warm to use on my lap.

You seem angry about Apple's choices, and clearly they're far from perfect, but it seems like there are a lot of people who value the things Apple does, like very quiet operation and compactness and so on. We're not all as stupid as you suggest.

Because Jobs hated the sound of spinning fans supposedly.

The macbooks are not the first in that regard.

Various Apple products over the years have had problems with overheating because of this.

Supposedly one variant of the AppleII has a service recommendation of lifting and dropping it on to the desk. This because the lack of fans would make the logicboard buckle from heat, unseating some chips.

I do believe a certain Cube was also fanless, and had trouble keeping itself cool. Never mind that it had a power switch that would be flipped by a stray piece of paper...

If I have to agree with Jobs on anything, I'll start w/ the noise of spinning fans.

I find them a necessary evil.

This because you only get so much cooling passively, and you only get so much computing done pr unit heat (something that even mobile phones are discovering).

End result, you can only compute so much on a passively cooled system.

> The hardware is "best-in-class"? I keep hearing this, but the specs and personal experiences just don't match up with it.

Whose hardware do you consider best-in-class currently?

Best in class doesn't mean best in spec. They're relatively best for quality and longevity. My '12 rMBP has the best keyboard and trackpad on the market, there is no laptop that is better than this and these features are what I use all day long. I'm still using it and I have no plans to replace it for another 3-4 years. That's something I cannot say for any PCs I've bought in the past.

Also, no one is buying Macbooks to take it apart, so the RAM/batteries/connectors are the least of majority of the market's concerns.

I don't claim any loyalty to any platform but I rather run software on my Macs because I know it lasts a long time. Prior to my '12 rMBP, I had a Macbook that I've used for 4-5 years and I sold it for a decently nice price, it held it resales value.

Just because you can't understand it, doesn't mean it is not the best for others.

I have no problem with macOS, it's fine for my purpose. I had far more issues with Windows 10 than I had with macOS and I actually have a Surface Pro 4 as well.

My personal laptop is a Thinkpad, when comparing it to a MacBook Pro it's a joke. Build quality is mediocre, the screen is garbage, trackpad is only OK etc. The keyboard is miles better though. I still prefer to own it over a MacBook as I run Arch on my personal machines, but from personal experience Apple hardware has always been of superior build quality than PC alternatives.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com