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Re: Ultrabook portables

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On Mon, 09 Nov 2015 12:10:58 -0500, Ezekiel wrote:

> "Big Fish in a Small Crotch" <bigfishinasmallcrotch@myself.com> wrote in
> message news:1xihng4k8f0sc.1aix5jvbn4ota$.dlg@40tude.net...
>> On Mon, 9 Nov 2015 11:22:22 -0500, Ezekiel wrote:
>>
>>> So I decided to upgrade my aging laptop. It's an older Acer i5 that's
>>> pretty big and weights about 6 lbs. I have a full desktop and plenty
>>> of CPU+storage on the network so I don't need a really powerful
>>> machine. Decided to go with something light and portable.
>>>
>>> Factors were:
>>>   Size and portability - Extremely important SSD drive - Must have
>>>   Battery life - important DVD-Drive - Do not want at all High res
>>>   display - very nice to have Touch screen - nice to have Gaming - N/A
>>>   100% silent (no CPU fan) - nice to have
>>>
>>> I looked around and decided to go with a Macbook. Not a Macbook Air
>>> and not a Macbook Pro, but the small 2lb Macbook like this one :
>>> https://www.apple.com/macbook/
>>>
>>> It only weighs 2 lbs and is about a 1/2" thick. Not entirely sure but
>>> it might be the smallest/lightest ultrabook available. The display is
>>> 2304x1440 and the battery last 7+ hours in real life usage. The only
>>> other laptop that I considered seriously was the Dell XPS-13 which was
>>> a close 2nd.
>>>
>>>
>>> What I like:
>>>
>>> The Touchpad is the best I've ever used. Period. it's as smooth as
>>> glass because it is glass. It has the force-touch which is very cool.
>>> When you press hard (adjustable) it actually feels like the touchpad
>>> "clicks' down.
>>> But it doesn't move or click at all. it just feels like it does. Try
>>> it out if you can get your hands on one from a friend or at an Apple
>>> Store. You'll be absolutely convinced that it clicks down even though
>>> it doesn't move at all. (The amount of "click" feedback is also
>>> adjustable.) Fantastic touchpad in every way.
>>>
>>> The screen is excellent and the battery life easily gives me a full
>>> day of usage. The 802.11ac wireless is way faster than the Acer's
>>> 802.11g and the backlit keyboard is also something the Acer didn't
>>> have. There's no CPU fan and it has an SSD so it's always 100% silent.
>>>
>>> All the hardware works perfectly. Open or close the lid and it does
>>> the right thing. The power button works and I spent exactly zero time
>>> messing with acpid or apcupsd. It works the way it's supposed to right
>>> out of the box.
>>>
>>> The hardware, build quality and fit-and-finish is top notch. It looks
>>> and feels like a well build device.
>>>
>>>
>>> What I don't like:
>>>
>>> No Mag-Safe connector. The Macbook Air that my wife stole from me 2
>>> years ago has one but this Macbook is so thin that there wasn't room
>>> for one. So it charges with a USB-C connector but I would prefer a
>>> Mag-Safe.
>>>
>>> Since there's no room for Mag-Safe give it a lightening connector
>>> which is pretty ubiquitous for people with other iDevices. I don't
>>> want yet another different cable with a USB-C connector.
>>>
>>> Not easy to open the lid. Maybe my hands are too big but it takes a
>>> fine touch to open the skinny little thing.
>>>
>>>
>>> The Apple eco-system or walled garden:
>>>
>>> Say what you want about this but it "just works" and works incredibly
>>> well and easy. When I powered it up and set it up for the first time
>>> it asked me to sign-in with my Apple-ID. Done. Finished. Nothing else
>>> to setup, configure, edit, whatever.
>>>
>>> Once I signed in with my Apple ID my email, calendar, contacts,
>>> text-messages, photos, documents, shared-photos, todo-list, music and
>>> everything else was synced with my iPhone. I didn't need to configure
>>> a half-dozen apps individually. Everything that I need to stay in sync
>>> and share across devices was done.
>>>
>>> Maybe I don't get some fine level of control that 1% of users might
>>> need.
>>> But 99% of users won't care because "stuff" they otherwise would never
>>> be able to setup on their own "just works" with very little to no
>>> effort.
>>
>> That's the thing about Apple. It just works and you don't have to mess
>> with it.
>> Of course you have to accept the Apple way of doing things but it works
>> so well most people don't even care.
>> All my kids you Apple Mac machines of various types and they never
>> bother with the OS at all. Everything backs up to the cloud and is
>> synced across their various devices.
>>
>>
> Someone could "roll their own" solution and get something like this
> working for just about any app and device. But in most cases it's going
> to require a level of technical knowledge that most people don't have.
> 
> With Apple it's a 1-stop (and 1-step) solution if you use their apps.
> Their apps being mail, contacts, calendar, etc. It's all stored in their
> cloud with your Apple-ID so when you setup a new device you simply login
> and all of this is taken care of for you.
> 
> 
>> About the only complaint I have heard is when a new version of iOS
>> comes out and they have so many pictures and apps on their phone there
>> isn't enough room to install the update.
>> Easily remedied though.
> 
> There's basically nothing that any product can do when there's 500-megs
> of free space left and you need to download a 600-meg software update.
> The solution is to not do the update over-the-air and to plug the device
> into iTunes. The update will temporarily move some data from the
> phone/tablet to the laptop, install the update and then move the data
> back. Short of trying to compress data locally to make more room,
> there's not much chance of getting around the low disk space.
> 
>> Compare this to Linux.
>> Linux is a freaking disaster when it comes to user friendliness.
>> There is a thread over in alt.os.linux.ubuntu where some poor sap is
>> asking how to sync his phone with Linux via wifi or BT. You have to
>> read the replies from these Linux loons. It's literally hysterical.
>>
>> That thread is *the* poster child for not using Linux.
> 
> I've never tried this on Linux. On Windows it's up to the app as to how
> "friendly" it is to syncing with external data. I've managed to get
> things working for the most part but it took some time and some
> tweaking. But with the Macbook it just works without having to do much
> more than just logging in with your Apple-ID. It gets all your
> settings/preferences from their cloud and sets up you desktop apps to
> work. Very nicely done.

Windows 8/8.1/10 do something quite similar though not quite as complete.




-- 
Lloyd

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Thread

Ultrabook portables "Ezekiel" <zeke@nosuchemail.com> - 2015-11-09 11:22 -0500
  Re: Ultrabook portables John Gohde <john.h.gohde@gmail.com> - 2015-11-09 08:40 -0800
  Re: Ultrabook portables Big Fish in a Small Crotch <bigfishinasmallcrotch@myself.com> - 2015-11-09 11:59 -0500
    Re: Ultrabook portables "Ezekiel" <zeke@nosuchemail.com> - 2015-11-09 12:10 -0500
      Re: Ultrabook portables Lloyd Parsons <lloydp211@gmail.com> - 2015-11-09 19:52 +0000
        Re: Ultrabook portables "Ezekiel" <zeke@nosuchemail.com> - 2015-11-09 15:11 -0500
          Re: Ultrabook portables Lloyd Parsons <lloydp211@gmail.com> - 2015-11-09 20:15 +0000
        Re: Ultrabook portables Slimer <.m@nsn.s> - 2015-11-09 16:48 -0500
  Re: Ultrabook portables Lloyd Parsons <lloydp211@gmail.com> - 2015-11-09 17:10 +0000
    Re: Ultrabook portables "Ezekiel" <zeke@nosuchemail.com> - 2015-11-09 12:14 -0500

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