Crowd Sourcing: Mac Replacement

[dagoski]

My computer is dieing right now. Not quickly, but I need to shop for a replacement in the coming months. The dilemma I face is whether to get a new Mac or go PC with Ubuntu Linux. I like Ubuntu a lot, it's Linux distro that's pretty much ready for prime time. However, I cannot run a great many commercial applicatio...ns directly on it. I'd have to install a Virtual Machine with Window and then install stuff like Adobe's Creative Suite on that. Meanwhile, I directly install what I want on the Mac. The issue here is price. System76 has a line of powerful laptops for half the comparable Mac. What d'yall think? Since this laptop is likely to become my primary professional machine, I'll do a lot of development on it, and that argues for Linux and VMWare on its own.

My current machine is one of the last pre-ban Hemis. Actually it's an genuine PowerPC based PowerBook that I bought for grad school just before the great chip switchover. The hard drive's probably iffy and the DVD drive now jams a bit. I already had to open 'er up and change the keyboard. I will never do that DIY repair again! I will, however, keep the thing and install ginormous SSD drive and a replacement dvd drive. This gives me a backup system and an experimental platform for deviant OS installs. I can achieve geek fame by porting BeOS to PowerPC architecture. Wonder if the OS2 Warp codebase is in the public domain. The fun I can have with a spare system...


The finalists for my replacement candidates are:

System76 Pangolin:

• Core i7-640M Processor ( 32nm, 4MB L3 Cache, 2.80GHz / 3.46GHz Turbo Mode )
• 15.6" HD+ LED (1600 x 900) display
• GB - DDR3 1333 MHz - 2 DIMMs
• ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4570 Graphics with 512MB GDDR2 Memory
• 160 GB Intel X25-M Solid State Drive
• CD-RW / DVD-RW
• Intel Centrino Ultimate-N 6300 - 802.11A/B/G/N Wireless LAN Module

Price: $1681 + VMWare $189 and a Windows 7 disc that I can borrow or obtain through work or school

VS

Macbook Pro

• Intel Core i5 2.53 Ghz processor
• 1440-by-900-pixel LED-backlit glossy display
• 15.6 4GB 1066MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 2x2GB
• 256GB Solid State Drive
• Mac standard wireless etc...

Price: $2649

So far, the only compatibility issue I can think of is I-Tunes. Still it exists for windows and I have VMWare or Wine to handle that.

Comments

[silveradept]

What are you using iTunes for? Most Linux applications can handle everything you'd do with it, excepting perhaps the store and the DRM.

If you've got enough muscle to make the VMWare work with things like Adobe, that's a consideration as well.

And finally, most newer Macs run Intel architecture, and thus, through the proper partitioning and usage, can be dual-to-triple-booted so that you would have a native OSX, Windows 7, and Linux environment to work with. Only problem with that is - needs a relatively big hard drive, and the problem of having to reboot whenever you need to access an application on a different environment.

[dagoski]

Yeah, I just discovered that there are some solid iTunes alternatives under Linux. If I can get a disc or dl AAC files from the iTunes Store by some other route, I'm happy. The more I look into this, the more feasible the Linux option becomes and the less attractive Apple becomes. What Apple charges for is the seriously badass batteries in their laptops. But, I seldom go without plugging in for more than an hour. OTOH, if I'm gonna be more mobile, maybe I do need that kind of battery life. Still, I can always upgrade as batteries improve in general.

[silveradept]

Sounds like you don't need the extra expense. And PC batteries these days are much better than they were, so you'll be able to get better things there soon.

[dagoski]

Yeah, if I can get six hours, do I really need the nine? I mean, really. Also, the new MPBs do not have removable batteries. This bugs me. That's a very failable component. The ability to replace the battery saves you mucho repair costs if it goes. In my opinion, laptops should be extremely modular with the major pieces being swapable just by unlocking at removing the piece. Hard drives, dvd drives, memory and keyboard should be easily replaceable because they're the moving parts that fail. I'd even pay more just for this capability. Too bad the only system that fits this description is a student project over at MIT.

[silveradept]

One can only hope that the student project becomes sellable and popular, then. I'm sure a lot of people would willingly pay for a portable computer where they can actually just swap the parts out they need when they start failing.

Also, is that Joshua A. Norton, First Emperor of the United States and Protector of Mexico in that icon?

[dagoski]

The dude's project has been getting a lot of press so we can hope he goes startup soon. His project is really slick. The computer looks like a machined aluminum lego kit.

My user icon is indeed Emperor Norton. This political era just seems right for him. Around the time I picked the icon I also had a dream that I was offered a tenure track professor position at Cal State Norton. That led me to a week long delusion there actually was a Cal State Norton campus and I spent the entire week trying to remember where it was. Finally realized it was just a convincing dream. So now I'm mentally working up Cal State Norton as a setting for roleplaying campaign. In any RPG campaign with a substantial cyberpunk component, CS Norton is California's virtual reality campus for distance learning.

[silveradept]

Excellent on both counts. Looking forward to seeing how they both turn out.