Laptop Reccomendations

Got the laptop in from amazon today. Dang is 17.3" Huge!!! I've had a lot of 15.4", 16" and 17" laptops but the 17.3" just makes it seem like siting at a desktop.

dafyre

Yepp! This makes them excellent for gamin--erm... Video editing. 8-)

Ended up returning this one. It's nice and all. But, it's like the reviews say if you barely touch the dvd drive it will eject. I though this was no big deal at first but got to be very annoying. When I spend $2,000 on a laptop it better dang well work correctly down to how the rubber feet are on.

creayt

specious said:

The entire point of the Mac Platform is to allow you to be more creative because hardware issues are minimized because of standardization and the removal of low end hardware. There is no cheap underperforming barely have enough specs to survive systems that I have to work around.

This is specious at best. Though the MacBook Pro has legit hardware it's the software, OS X, that glitters almost every single action you can take on the laptop w/ latency and sporadic slow. The HiDPI approach is nice, and makes half of everything very beautiful, but OS X and or the graphics drivers just cannot keep up with an expert computer user, unless they tend to interact w/ a computer slowly enough that the rampant latency doesn't frustrate them. I personally just cannot write code on a mac, I find myself almost screaming as I watch the OS flounder and try to keep up with my keystrokes and interactions, and have almost thrown a MacBook Pro out a window before because of it, not exaggerating.

Macs have crashed on me and had "hardware related issues" so, so, so much more than Windows machines that it makes me snicker when people make claims like this.

creayt

@thecreativeone91 said:

Ended up returning this one. It's nice and all. But, it's like the reviews say if you barely touch the dvd drive it will eject. I though this was no big deal at first but got to be very annoying. When I spend $2,000 on a laptop it better dang well work correctly down to how the rubber feet are on.

I just ordered an MSI Stealth Pro w/

A 5th gen quad w/ turbo to 3.5Ghz ( i7-5700HQ )
16GB DDR3L 1600MHz
GTX 970M 3GB
17.3" Full HD eDP Non Reflection
128GB M.SATA + 1TB (7200RPM)
Killer E2200 Game Networking, Killer N1525 Combo ( 2*2 ac )
Triple monitor support ( 2 mini DP, 1 HDMI )
0.85 inches thick
5-6 hour battery life on the integrated graphics

for $1529. Seems like a pretty legit option for your needs too.

Reid Cooper

That is one nice laptop! Post a review once you've had some time with it.

creayt

@Reid-Cooper said:

That is one nice laptop! Post a review once you've had some time with it.

Definitely will. I'm super excited about it. The biggest drawback it has is that 16GB is its max, and I'm used to 32 on my current workstation.

creayt

@creayt
Oh, and also that it may be very ugly. Hoping to cover up the branding on the lid w/ something from tab tag.

Probably this: http://www.tabtag.com/products/cat

JK.

s.hackleman

@creayt I keep hearing this claim from several people, but I just haven't seen it. Now, keep in mind I have never used Mac before my current system. However, I run Visual Studio on a Win7 VM, Xamarin in my Mac, have a Copy of Ubuntu 14 up at all times, and I have yet to see a single slow down. I'm not trying to call you out, but I am curious how long ago this was, and why I don't see it.

creayt

@s.hackleman said:

@creayt I keep hearing this claim from several people, but I just haven't seen it.

No, I totally get it, and a lot of people have shared your experience. Sometimes I wish I was one of them. Having owned every single Mac model in the last 5 years or so with the exception of most mac minis and the newest Mac Pro ( though I have used a handful of the minis ) and the newest MacBooks w/ the single USB, and having experienced it on and each and every single one of them, I feel pretty expert in commenting on the subject. It's very perceptual and personal. The types and instances of latency in OS X ( which can be very random, sometimes the exact same task w/ an identical load will create a delay, stutter, or hesitation that 7/8 other times it won't, it's almost like OS X is sending analytics on everything you do up to its servers sneakily in the background and the IO somehow cock blocks the entire machine unpredictably intermittently ).

Don't get me wrong, there are a good handful of things I like and even prefer about OS X to Windows, the interesting and artsy-looking text aliasing, the interesting and useful add-on projects that help bandaid its glaring usability holes and add new features ( I can't use a mac for more than an hour or so without installing Zooom 2 and Jitouch ), the ability to quit programs mid-Command+Tab, the idea of attempting to make an operating system beautiful ( even if they fail as often as succeed ). I just don't think it's subjective to say that OS X as an operating system is very slow compared to Windows in most important ways to a user like myself at least. Independent of how a system performs when pledged into rich benchmarking for specific usage patterns, encountering random, frequent, consistent latency in your overall experience w/ an OS is much more important than say a rendering finishing a few minutes slower. The point is that the more your OS instantly reacts to your actions the more quickly you can use it. If you're having to mentally monitor the interface as you interact with it and switch files/contexts/tasks/apps/workspaces, and conscientiously slow yourself down waiting for the system to be ready for you, it becomes not only very palpably counter-productive, but frustrating. I notice the latency even in little things like how long it takes after depressing the keys until the app switcher comes up ( Command + tab ). To most people I've talked to it feels instant, but as someone w/ terribly responsive ADD and perfect eyesight and who consumes energy drinks regularly, the delay is there. And it's gone when you install Windows in Boot Camp.

Anyway, I always say that it'd be incredible if Apple focused on and mastered performance engineering the way Microsoft has, but I won't hold my breath because Apple is run w/ more of a business and profitability focus, so as long as the experiences their very limited set of options provide are good enough ( and furthermore, they don't want things to be too fast as a rule because then if so they can't tell you the new thing is 200% faster in 6 months and sell you on a replacement ), they're fine with it. Microsoft, on the other hand, attempts to get their software to run as closely to instant on all hardware as a rule, which is why the OS performs noticeably faster and more responsively on any mac than OS X does.

creayt

@creayt said:

MSI Stealth Pro w/
A 5th gen quad w/ turbo to 3.5Ghz ( i7-5700HQ )
16GB DDR3L 1600MHz
GTX 970M 3GB
17.3" Full HD eDP Non Reflection
Triple monitor support ( 2 mini DP, 1 HDMI )
0.85 inches thick, 5-6 hour battery life on the integrated graphics for $1529**. Seems like a pretty legit option for your needs too.

Also worth mentioning, there's a bug in Best Buy's checkout process that lets you get their fastest shipping option for free. Looks like mine will actually be here tomorrow.

@creayt said:

specious said:

The entire point of the Mac Platform is to allow you to be more creative because hardware issues are minimized because of standardization and the removal of low end hardware. There is no cheap underperforming barely have enough specs to survive systems that I have to work around.

This is specious at best. Though the MacBook Pro has legit hardware it's the software, OS X, that glitters almost every single action you can take on the laptop w/ latency and sporadic slow. The HiDPI approach is nice, and makes half of everything very beautiful, but OS X and or the graphics drivers just cannot keep up with an expert computer user, unless they tend to interact w/ a computer slowly enough that the rampant latency doesn't frustrate them. I personally just cannot write code on a mac, I find myself almost screaming as I watch the OS flounder and try to keep up with my keystrokes and interactions, and have almost thrown a MacBook Pro out a window before because of it, not exaggerating.

Macs have crashed on me and had "hardware related issues" so, so, so much more than Windows machines that it makes me snicker when people make claims like this.

Agreed. They used to be target at creative professionals now the are consumer. I do have a work macbook air but I simply use it because it's lightweight and it was bought for someone who didn't like it. Even with as big as our accounts are apple is just about the only one who will not let us return anything.