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Comment by homebrewer | Hacker News Reader

Is upgrading every 5-6 years to be able to write code considered normal in the Apple world? I'd been comfortably writing code in several languages using latest toolchains on a decade-old Intel machine just a few months ago, and was forced to upgrade because one of the components died. Otherwise I'd be using it for at least five more years.

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> Is upgrading every 5-6 years to be able to write code considered normal in the Apple world?

Yes, pretty much

I thought this was pretty normal for anyone writing code in larger code bases in these slow to compile languages in the first place…

frankly, late intel macs just sucked with their power-to-capability ratios. progress since M1 haven't been that incredible.

I mean.. upgrading every 5-6 years is pretty normal outside the Apple world too, if you are a professional programmer. I don't expect my mom to upgrade her computer that much (she's happy with her 2011 (!) model iMac).

But for those of us who use a computer every day, surely it makes sense to stay a bit cutting edge and it won't break the bank either since it is literally our income.

Is it sustainable?

The curve has flattened a lot - on mobile phones it is extremely noticeable, but I would say that apple’s M series is also the last significant jump in the laptop world (because laptops weren’t really ‘mobile’ before with such a bad battery life). So, yeah, I would say it can be reasonably sustainable.

I don't see why would anybody complain that the tools they bought 10 years ago don't magically do the things that the new tools are doing. It's not like the old tools stopped doing the things they do, right?

Anyway, you sel the old machine and get the new one is pretty normal as the Apple devices tend to hold value.

let the record show that we're talking about 6 years

Which is about the same time it takes a high school student to get his masters degree in computer science, get into a FAANG and get promoted.

6 years is a lot. It runs about 14$ a month if you throw away you tool at the end. It's probably more like 10$ since you are likely to be able to sell that tool at reasonable price since its Apple.

We are talking about Software though.

It's not really sustainable to throw buy new stuff all the time when there's not a technical reason for it

That still doesn't mean that the tooling is bad

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