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I got one in 2020 at the start of covid for coding. Ultimately, I just sold it and ended up replacing it with a 13" MacBook Air a couple months ago. The main re

I got one in 2020 at the start of covid for coding. Ultimately, I just sold it and ended up replacing it with a 13" MacBook Air a couple months ago. The main reasons were: the case flexes when you pick it up by the corner causing annoying errant mouse clicks, the 4k screen did not have the battery life as advertised (a lower resolution screen would have remedied this, but I had no clue going in), several times it threw missing OS error message coming awake from sleep or updates, and the RAM is now soldered on the motherboard. One of the main reasons I went with the Dell was due to an older XPS 15 that I had and I did several repairs & upgrades myself. I debated getting a ThinkPad, but I went with a Mac because there was a chance I might be getting into iOS development. YMMV.

approxim8ion 5y ago
Good point- I don't think anyone should go for a 4k screen on a laptop. 1080 is already pretty good for laptop screens, 1440 is probably the sweet spot. Aside from the battery savings which are immense, there's not much fractional scaling fiddling needed.
- askafriend 5y ago
  1080 is unusable on laptops for me. HiDpi displays are a must to render text as sharply as possible.
  - approxim8ion 5y ago
    I'm still on 1366x768, haha. I guess it's a matter of being exposed to better and better displays that makes it difficult to go back.
TheHalfDeafChef 5y ago
Notwithstanding the other issues mentioned, but the MacBook Air is not exactly user repairable. IIRC, it is a SOC. So any part that breaks the entire thing needs to be replaced. I got a MacBook Pro 2018 and though it works it still makes wary.
- askafriend 5y ago
  I've not had a single hardware issue in the more than decade I've been using MacBooks. I've literally never wanted to replace anything in a laptop myself in the multiple decades I've been using laptops.
  - danieldk 5y ago
    In a decade of using MacBooks, I had faulty RAM twice, once a broken 'f' key, once a completely unusable keyboard (one of the butterfly generations, keys would often get stuck). But at least the service of Apple Stores was very good. Unfortunately, many Apple authorized service providers are terrible.
    - askafriend 5y ago
      Ah that's unfortunate, especially the keyboard issue which I know bit many people. My main point was that most people probably don't need user repairability since they wouldn't have repaired the issue themselves anyway.

approxim8ion 5y ago

Good point- I don't think anyone should go for a 4k screen on a laptop. 1080 is already pretty good for laptop screens, 1440 is probably the sweet spot. Aside from the battery savings which are immense, there's not much fractional scaling fiddling needed.

askafriend 5y ago
1080 is unusable on laptops for me. HiDpi displays are a must to render text as sharply as possible.
- approxim8ion 5y ago
  I'm still on 1366x768, haha. I guess it's a matter of being exposed to better and better displays that makes it difficult to go back.

TheHalfDeafChef 5y ago

Notwithstanding the other issues mentioned, but the MacBook Air is not exactly user repairable. IIRC, it is a SOC. So any part that breaks the entire thing needs to be replaced. I got a MacBook Pro 2018 and though it works it still makes wary.

askafriend 5y ago
I've not had a single hardware issue in the more than decade I've been using MacBooks. I've literally never wanted to replace anything in a laptop myself in the multiple decades I've been using laptops.
- danieldk 5y ago
  In a decade of using MacBooks, I had faulty RAM twice, once a broken 'f' key, once a completely unusable keyboard (one of the butterfly generations, keys would often get stuck). But at least the service of Apple Stores was very good. Unfortunately, many Apple authorized service providers are terrible.
  - askafriend 5y ago
    Ah that's unfortunate, especially the keyboard issue which I know bit many people. My main point was that most people probably don't need user repairability since they wouldn't have repaired the issue themselves anyway.