CFB51 College Football Fan Community
The Power Five => Big Ten => Topic started by: MaximumSam on August 01, 2020, 10:31:04 AM
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So with schools looking to be online and worth my work also still being remote, I'm looking into buying a computer. Now, we have various computers, a couple cheap laptops and an array of tablets. But it's been a while since I looked at a desktop computer. I've been looking closely at an IMac, but not married to it.
Thoughts, experiences, tips?
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I have a Dell, nothing fancy, desktop. The wife went for an Apple laptop and is always asking me questions about how to do stuff that is very easy on the Dell.
I've used Apples before, we had them at work for a while, but this was decades ago. I personally don't think they are worth the premium. She also runs out of memory all the time, but it's a laptop, two years old or so.
My stepson works for Apple. I told him when he started to buy all the AAPL he could as he gets a discount. I think he did. I "made" a boatload of money yesterday, on paper.
Anyway, I am not a fan of the Mac, and I think some of the fans are cultilt in their adoration of it and don't realize Windows can do most of that stuff at half the price.
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I don't disagree, and if it was just for me a Mac wouldn't be my preference. But it is also something I want the kids to be able to use with minimal hassles and be able to use some of the tools like the movie editing. While Windows has supposedly made some moves that way based on what I've read it's still substandard. My dad has a mac and I've noticed it's a lot easier for them to use that stuff compared to others.
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I don't disagree, and if it was just for me a Mac wouldn't be my preference. But it is also something I want the kids to be able to use with minimal hassles and be able to use some of the tools like the movie editing. While Windows has supposedly made some moves that way based on what I've read it's still substandard. My dad has a mac and I've noticed it's a lot easier for them to use that stuff compared to others.
Yeah, my wife uses her Mac laptop for movie editing and nothing else.
The kids are used to them from school, as I was at one point. That was genius marketing.
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I think Apple is overpriced for what you get. And a lot of their design elements make more sense in a thin & light laptop than a desktop.
Truth is that for most daily PC users, the computing power has grown FAR beyond what most of us "need". Granted, movie editing is one of those applications that takes a lot of resources. But if you're talking about once a month they're stitching together 2-3 minute videos from their phone, that's not exactly "movie editing".
Two keys:
- Get something that is SSD-based. For a desktop it's okay if you have a moderate-sized SSD for doing work and a larger HDD for bulk storage/archive, but you NEED to boot from an SSD. Booting from an HDD makes a very slow mechanical device the bottleneck in your system; an SSD is no longer the bottleneck.
- Get more DRAM than you think you need. Much like SSD, this is one of the areas where paying a little more up front is worth it.
But beyond that, you don't need anything fancy unless you're a hardcore gamer, or if you're doing really intensive work that requires a lot of computing resources. For most of us, the computer is 98% browser-based and office applications at this point. Those don't take a lot of horsepower.
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Love my Windows Surface Pro, but very expensive.
I picked up a Dell laptop from Costco for the wife about a month ago. Works great, and was about $800 or so.
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I think Apple is overpriced for what you get. And a lot of their design elements make more sense in a thin & light laptop than a desktop.
Truth is that for most daily PC users, the computing power has grown FAR beyond what most of us "need". Granted, movie editing is one of those applications that takes a lot of resources. But if you're talking about once a month they're stitching together 2-3 minute videos from their phone, that's not exactly "movie editing".
Two keys:
- Get something that is SSD-based. For a desktop it's okay if you have a moderate-sized SSD for doing work and a larger HDD for bulk storage/archive, but you NEED to boot from an SSD. Booting from an HDD makes a very slow mechanical device the bottleneck in your system; an SSD is no longer the bottleneck.
- Get more DRAM than you think you need. Much like SSD, this is one of the areas where paying a little more up front is worth it.
But beyond that, you don't need anything fancy unless you're a hardcore gamer, or if you're doing really intensive work that requires a lot of computing resources. For most of us, the computer is 98% browser-based and office applications at this point. Those don't take a lot of horsepower.
What would you consider a good size for SSD and DRAM?
Re: video editing I'm not envisioning them making Jurassic Park but I do think being able to make videos is a direction schools (and eventually jobs) will be going so it seems like something they should be familiar with.
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Love my Windows Surface Pro, but very expensive.
I picked up a Dell laptop from Costco for the wife about a month ago. Works great, and was about $800 or so.
I've heard those are very nice. Not sure I'm ready to jump from a chromebook to one though.
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What would you consider a good size for SSD and DRAM?
I doubt you need anything more than a 500GB SSD. It should be an NVMe SSD though, not SATA. For any modern PC, it should support NVMe and the cost adder for the SSD is minimal for a large improvement in performance.
If you think you need more than 500GB storage, that's mostly going to be for large archival things which you can buy a multi-TB HDD pretty inexpensively to add later.
For DRAM, no less than 8GB under any circumstances. 16GB would be nice, but not if it comes at a huge premium. If you do only get 8GB, though, I would make sure that you can add another 8GB down the road IF you find that it's too little for you.
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I think I would get a Mac if doing a lot of "visual" stuff, and a Dell if just doing basic computer stuff.
I have an iPad which I do enjoy a lot. I dislike typing on it. It's ancient really but works fine, maybe 8 years old?
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I put my home office emphasis on a quality dual monitor stand and tidy cord management. The Dell laptop works great for all of my office related needs.
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I put my home office emphasis on a quality dual monitor stand and tidy cord management. The Dell laptop works great for all of my office related needs.
Yeah, that's all I've got. A docking station for a laptop with dual monitors.
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Docking station for the surface is really handy.
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What is the worst home computer that is currently available on the market?
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Guessing if you rolled out the TI-99/4a, that would be about as crappy as you could get today.
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If it's for your kids, just get whatever they're accustomed to.
And your school should be utilizing certain sites for all video usage, which shouldn't make the type of computer you have matter much at all.
We're handing out chromebooks to all our students and utilizing Google Meet, Flipgrid, and Screencastify for our live lessons, recordings, and screen displaying.
For me personally, I guess I buy a non-Apple computer every 6 years or so...one that's around $600. I don't do anything wacky with it, I just want it to work.
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Guessing if you rolled out the TI-99/4a, that would be about as crappy as you could get today.
No way they still sell those.
We had a TI-99 when I was a youngling in the early eighties, which I mostly used for video games. It was a major upgrade from the Atari, with 8 bit graphics, human voice capabilities, and so forth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wyVbukV25I (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wyVbukV25I)
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I hate Chromebooks. Each of our students gets issued one, and I've had occasion to use them. For me, it is the clunkiest, cheesiest, dumbed-downiest piece of electronic crap I have used in many decades. And the Chromebase is not much better.
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I hate Chromebooks. Each of our students gets issued one, and I've had occasion to use them. For me, it is the clunkiest, cheesiest, dumbed-downiest piece of electronic crap I have used in many decades. And the Chromebase is not much better.
Heh how do you really feel? I have one and like it for what I use it for, which is surfing the internet while drinking coffee on the porch.
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We had ipads the year before last.
For the younger students, you just need a touchscreen and functionality. We' have infinite more issues with staying online than anything to do with the physical device.
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Heh how do you really feel? I have one and like it for what I use it for, which is surfing the internet while drinking coffee on the porch.
My students seem to find them OK too.
So there's that.
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We had ipads the year before last.
For the younger students, you just need a touchscreen and functionality. We' have infinite more issues with staying online than anything to do with the physical device.
check your wireless network
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Thanks, boss.
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So now I'm thinking about two iPad's, with a pencil and keyboard. Supposedly the iPad's have moved closer to laptop territory, and my oldest daughter has all her stuff on a school issued iPad. I've never owned an iPad so buying two of them is a leap
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So now I'm thinking about two iPad's, with a pencil and keyboard. Supposedly the iPad's have moved closer to laptop territory, and my oldest daughter has all her stuff on a school issued iPad. I've never owned an iPad so buying two of them is a leap
I think tablets are for content consumption, not content creation.
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I think tablets are for content consumption, not content creation.
I was looking at laptops. But Mac doesn't make a touchscreen laptop, which is a dealbreaker. I'm somewhat loathe to buy Windows or Chromebooks, because we already have Chromebooks and my youngest kids (5 and 7) main enjoyment, judging from their hand me down phones, is to download enormous amounts of crap. So Macs are a little more insulated from that, plus they can still get used to the software. My oldest daughter (14) gets issued an ipad by the school and he she likes it a lot. I dunno.
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Ive had my current Dell laptop about a year now and am verry happy with it
First time I turned it on with its SSD C drive it was powered up in 10 seconds and I just about
fainted. I mean where has this been all my life.
I had been having internet connection problems and upgraded the wifi modem from AT&T.
Works great now. Its amazing how outdated the wifi modem can get in only a few years.
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I have a love hate relationship with Apple.
Having said that, I have a hate hate relationship with Microsoft.
I could never go back to using a Windows PC. Even though I am less and less impressed with Apple since Steve Jobs’ passing and they are seriously overpriced.
The fans suck in their laptops, but all in all their hardware definitely is better quality and their computers seem to last way longer than their windows counterparts.
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I was looking at laptops. But Mac doesn't make a touchscreen laptop, which is a dealbreaker. I'm somewhat loathe to buy Windows or Chromebooks, because we already have Chromebooks and my youngest kids (5 and 7) main enjoyment, judging from their hand me down phones, is to download enormous amounts of crap. So Macs are a little more insulated from that, plus they can still get used to the software. My oldest daughter (14) gets issued an ipad by the school and he she likes it a lot. I dunno.
Linux! They won't be able to figure out how to download anything!
Unless they do, in which case you should sign them up for every STEM class in school you can; he or she has "the knack".
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=g8vHhgh6oM0
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I love UNIX. I was a SunOS/Solaris guy for a couple decades, but I'm cool with linux as well. I used to keep an old linux box as my home gateway, but got tired of reworking it to account for changes in the OSs on networked sytems.
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I have a love hate relationship with Apple.
Having said that, I have a hate hate relationship with Microsoft.
I could never go back to using a Windows PC. Even though I am less and less impressed with Apple since Steve Jobs’ passing and they are seriously overpriced.
The fans suck in their laptops, but all in all their hardware definitely is better quality and their computers seem to last way longer than their windows counterparts.
I'm not saying you specifically are guilty of this, but quite often I see people comparing their Apple systems, to a budget entry-level PC that costs 1/3 as much, and expressing displeasure with the build quality and features of the Windows-based system. And that's just not the proper comparison.
I have a Macbook Pro that I like. I also have a Dell XPS 15, that I absolutely love. Those are similarly outfitted systems, although the Dell still cost about 25-30% less, and the build quality and functionality of the Dell, is actually superior. It's also more "attractive" IMO but that's a subjective matter, I only bring it up because that's something that Apple users often cite as a reason for their preference.
But it all depends on what you want to use it for. I do a lot of video editing as a hobby, and I prefer the Macbook for that. For many professional applications, I can only use the Windows-based machine since a lot of the software isn't supported on Apple, and doesn't run all that well through emulation.
For basic web browsing/email, either will do of course.
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I love UNIX. I was a SunOS/Solaris guy for a couple decades, but I'm cool with linux as well. I used to keep an old linux box as my home gateway, but got tired of reworking it to account for changes in the OSs on networked sytems.
Yeah, as much of my house is Linux as possible. The only Windows PC is my work laptop. I even got my wife onto Linux as she had an older and underpowered laptop, and a lightweight Linux build with an SSD perked it right up.
I have a Linux box as a home server running Plex and with a web server hosting my digital tap list. Anyone connected to my wifi can get access to the tap list, but one of the unused tablets is basically set up with the tap list as the home page to make it simple when I have guests.
This is an older version, but is what it looks like.
(https://i.imgur.com/lKdHA7x.jpg)
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I had to help my brother-in-law try to get his new macbook to connect to a wifi, and I couldn't get the damn thing to forget a wifi network, nor to get into the settings to the wifi network to manually check/reenter the password, or anything.
I suppose if I owned one, and if it allowed actual root-level command line access (I understand the OS is BSD-based), I might determine it's actually more amenable to tinkering than it seems.
But if I'm not going to do that, I don't see the point in learning an entire new OS that doesn't even believe in the idea/power of the right-click.
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Yeah, as much of my house is Linux as possible. The only Windows PC is my work laptop. I even got my wife onto Linux as she had an older and underpowered laptop, and a lightweight Linux build with an SSD perked it right up.
I have a Linux box as a home server running Plex and with a web server hosting my digital tap list. Anyone connected to my wifi can get access to the tap list, but one of the unused tablets is basically set up with the tap list as the home page to make it simple when I have guests.
This is an older version, but is what it looks like.
[img width=500 height=280.99]https://i.imgur.com/lKdHA7x.jpg[/img]
Very cool. Now, you just need to automate it so you touch the tap you want, and then it pours and delivers to you.
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Very cool. Now, you just need to automate it so you touch the tap you want, and then it pours and delivers to you.
LOL... Some of the people who use a Raspberry Pi version of it attach flow meters on the taps so they know how much is left in each keg.
But if I can't get up and walk to the kegerator to pour myself another beer... Maybe I shouldn't have another beer ;-)
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LOL... Some of the people who use a Raspberry Pi version of it attach flow meters on the taps so they know how much is left in each keg.
But if I can't get up and walk to the kegerator to pour myself another beer... Maybe I shouldn't have another beer ;-)
What kind of quitter attitude is that
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So one Ipad received and second one should come today. I got the Ipad Air, which I understand to be a step above the base Ipad but not quite as powered as the "Pro." But another thought - I am due to get a new phone here in a bit. I am leaning towards getting an Iphone. I've always had Androids, but I'm frankly getting frustrated with them. The one I have started off nice, but now there is something wrong with the power supply software and for a while it was telling me there was something in the charger. Now it constantly asks me what I want to do with the power supply. It's not broken, but it is annoying, and this isn't even the first phone I've had do that.
In any event, Iphones have a reputation for for stability, though I've never had one so I'm wondering what kinds of experiences you've had.