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Every single laptop I owned before switching to Apple was a huge piece of shit, in hindsight—like, probably shouldn't have been saleable, just a straight-up lem

Every single laptop I owned before switching to Apple was a huge piece of shit, in hindsight—like, probably shouldn't have been saleable, just a straight-up lemon by design. ... except an IBM (yes, it's that long ago) Thinkpad that was super-underpowered even for the time. Though, it did have the ~2-3hr actual-in-practice battery life that was typical of laptops at the time, no matter what they promised, so like all the rest the battery was really just for hopping from one outlet to the next (I don't know if Apple laptops were like that at the time, but I do know that no subsequent laptop let me feel like I could leave my power brick behind when getting up from my desk until I got a Macbook) If I ever go back to PC-land, it'll be to an underpowered device from a business-oriented line. Worked once, so, maybe it'll work again... > Two years ago I bought a Lenovo gaming laptop for my son. This especially is a big part of your problem. Discrete graphics card in a laptop = 2x the problems—and that holds even for Apple (in the Intel days, anyway). Gaming-marketed on top of that? Add another 1x for 3x the rate of trouble over baseline. Avoid, avoid, avoid.

thrill 4y ago
"If I ever go back to PC-land, it'll be to an underpowered device from a business-oriented line." If I ever need a PC again, it'll be by running Parallels on a Mac Air.
- baq 4y ago
  If only they made a Mac air with 64GB of ram. Alas market segmentation department won’t hear any of it.
  - paulmd 4y ago
    Supply-chain rumors suggest the launch of a 15.6" MBA in the near future, leakers suggest it has M2 Pro as an option. If so it might offer 32GB (or like the mini vs studio, maybe that will remain a segmentation point). Current rumors are maybe June launch. I agree though, 16GB is tolerable for casual usage and consumption without massive swapping, but, 32GB would really be nice.
IggleSniggle 4y ago
You know what? I’ve only had my Steam Deck for slightly under a year, but I’m honestly astounded at the amount of abuse it has endured without showing any apparent problems. I’m very curious to see how long it lasts. I doubt it will be competitive with a Switch for durability, which is the closest mirror to a Deck that also has some similarities to Apple-style hardware-quality + lock-in. But that said, I’ve had problems with Apple laptop keyboards after only a couple years of use, and had a laptop monitor from Apple start to yellow bizarrely after less than a year. Nintendo joycons started having issues after under a year. Sometimes you’re just at the bad-end of the bell-curve. It’s a shame that online reviews aren’t that helpful anymore; it can be hard to know what’s real with consumer tech, and hard to know how big the lemon segment is.
- Vrondi 4y ago
  Maybe Steam will give us a line of gaming laptops with the same build quality...
  - colejohnson66 4y ago
    Wasn't the "Steam Machine" supposed to be an attempt at a gaming PC, but it failed?
    - dpkirchner 4y ago
      IIRC the Steam Machine was a specification and not a product you could buy, so quality varied. I'd bet that contributed to its failure.
bonestamp2 4y ago
The T series Lenovos are still great business machines -- I wouldn't buy any other Lenovo. I prefer my macbook for the most part, but sometimes you need different hardware. It's out of my wheelhouse, but I am looking for a gaming laptop manufacturer recommendation that is high quality...
deleted 4y ago
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bradstewart 4y ago
> If I ever go back to PC-land, it'll be to an underpowered device from a business-oriented line. I've had great luck with exactly this--used, midrange Dell Latitudes.
lrem 4y ago
I agree with Apple being the king of the hill... But it really isn't all that bad on the other side. There are some Windows laptops that will last you a work day on battery, albeit none of them can do considerable compute. I've seen some non-Apple hardware last for 5-ish years all right too. And if all you need from the laptop is Chrome and SSH, then Chromebooks are actually a pretty sweet deal. I still run a 6 year old Pixelbook as the daily driver. Battery deteriorated to the point of lasting only 6-ish hours, but I have nowhere near that many meetings in a day. A new premium Chromebook should reliably last 10 hours and stay good for 5-ish years.

thrill 4y ago

"If I ever go back to PC-land, it'll be to an underpowered device from a business-oriented line." If I ever need a PC again, it'll be by running Parallels on a Mac Air.

baq 4y ago
If only they made a Mac air with 64GB of ram. Alas market segmentation department won’t hear any of it.
- paulmd 4y ago
  Supply-chain rumors suggest the launch of a 15.6" MBA in the near future, leakers suggest it has M2 Pro as an option. If so it might offer 32GB (or like the mini vs studio, maybe that will remain a segmentation point). Current rumors are maybe June launch. I agree though, 16GB is tolerable for casual usage and consumption without massive swapping, but, 32GB would really be nice.

IggleSniggle 4y ago

You know what? I’ve only had my Steam Deck for slightly under a year, but I’m honestly astounded at the amount of abuse it has endured without showing any apparent problems. I’m very curious to see how long it lasts. I doubt it will be competitive with a Switch for durability, which is the closest mirror to a Deck that also has some similarities to Apple-style hardware-quality + lock-in. But that said, I’ve had problems with Apple laptop keyboards after only a couple years of use, and had a laptop monitor from Apple start to yellow bizarrely after less than a year. Nintendo joycons started having issues after under a year. Sometimes you’re just at the bad-end of the bell-curve. It’s a shame that online reviews aren’t that helpful anymore; it can be hard to know what’s real with consumer tech, and hard to know how big the lemon segment is.

Vrondi 4y ago
Maybe Steam will give us a line of gaming laptops with the same build quality...
- colejohnson66 4y ago
  Wasn't the "Steam Machine" supposed to be an attempt at a gaming PC, but it failed?
  - dpkirchner 4y ago
    IIRC the Steam Machine was a specification and not a product you could buy, so quality varied. I'd bet that contributed to its failure.

bonestamp2 4y ago

The T series Lenovos are still great business machines -- I wouldn't buy any other Lenovo. I prefer my macbook for the most part, but sometimes you need different hardware. It's out of my wheelhouse, but I am looking for a gaming laptop manufacturer recommendation that is high quality...

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

bradstewart 4y ago

> If I ever go back to PC-land, it'll be to an underpowered device from a business-oriented line. I've had great luck with exactly this--used, midrange Dell Latitudes.

lrem 4y ago

I agree with Apple being the king of the hill... But it really isn't all that bad on the other side. There are some Windows laptops that will last you a work day on battery, albeit none of them can do considerable compute. I've seen some non-Apple hardware last for 5-ish years all right too. And if all you need from the laptop is Chrome and SSH, then Chromebooks are actually a pretty sweet deal. I still run a 6 year old Pixelbook as the daily driver. Battery deteriorated to the point of lasting only 6-ish hours, but I have nowhere near that many meetings in a day. A new premium Chromebook should reliably last 10 hours and stay good for 5-ish years.