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I just got an iPhone for the first time, and it is a noticeably better device than my previous Android phones. One downside is that I can't use iMessage on my

I just got an iPhone for the first time, and it is a noticeably better device than my previous Android phones. One downside is that I can't use iMessage on my Windows and Linux computers. Will look into pypush Honestly, the iPhone is nudging me further to giving a Macbook/OSX a try one day, but the major blocker to me is the poor state of gaming on Macs.

arjvik 3y ago
Look into Beeper for iMessage support on Linux and Windows!
nortonham 3y ago
> the iPhone is nudging me further to giving a Macbook/OSX a try one day, Gaming isn't great on Mac (depending on what games you play), but macbooks are great imo. A pro or an air with apple silicon is worth the money. I've never really appreciated the build quality of a mac before. > I just got an iPhone for the first time, and it is a noticeably better device than my previous Android phones. In what way? What Android phones did you use in the past?
- catlover76 3y ago
  My last phone was a Samsung Galaxy A50, and it was pretty good as far as the hardware went. But I felt that Android was bad; I couldn't help but notice that a number of the apps loaded very slowly and had other small glitchy issues. Nothing that would compel a person to switch phones, just a lot of mostly minor inconveniences, except for 2 that really stick out right now: the Android messages web app always had a hard time connecting to my phone even when the phone was clearly on, had the messages app open, and was connected to same wifi as my computer; and second, Chrome recently just started becoming unopenable (like it would open and then immediately close for some reason). These are just a couple data points in a bag of info and anecdata that has made me question whether Google is a company whose products are worth investing in, gives a damn, etc. As to what exactly about the iPhone seems so good in comparison, the things that really stand out are the crisp aesthetics (noticeably better "graphics" than my Samsung) and the speed of everything. It's also just pleasant to touch/interact with--I think part of that is Apple's craftsmanship, and part is simply the fact that the phone is new.
  - lyton 3y ago
    which iPhone model did you go for?
    - catlover76 3y ago
      iPhone 15 (normal)
  - nortonham 3y ago
    >the Android messages web app always had a hard time connecting to my phone even when the phone was clearly on, had the messages app open, and was connected to same wifi as my computer; and second, Chrome recently just started becoming unopenable (like it would open and then immediately close for some reason). Those are definitely annoying and off putting. On my pixel 5 chrome always worked well (but I use other browsers), and messages app was trouble free... Wonder if it was a problem with that model of phone you had. But it's true, apples ecosystem is definitely a draw
selykg 3y ago
Personally, the approach I took to this was just to game on consoles. In my personal experience, the upgrade cycle is far far better for me. I don't feel like I've missed anything as a result either.
crossroadsguy 3y ago
Personally, for communication I never use a device platform specific/locked app/service. Maybe you could keep using the app(s) whatever you were.
- frizlab 3y ago
  I’m curious, what do you use then?
  - crossroadsguy 3y ago
    WhatsApp (this mostly - I live in India). SMS. Telegram (2 groups). Discord (3 groups). Signal (with 1 friend) and iMessage (with 2 friends) — these 2 apps are more of a hobby (a thing?), we four usually use WhatsApp. I mean I could fight it or just fall line. I fought and lost :D Notifications off for all.
  - gumby 3y ago
    There are lots of choices depending on your community and desired feature set: whatsapp, fb messenger, instagram messenger, telegram, signal, discord, or the direct messaging features of other programs like Slack. imessage is an outlier in that it also has a bidirectional link with SMS. I just read today that FB messenger used to have this (who knew?) but no longer does. My reading of the EU's complaint is that if imessage didn't have this feature they would not be in trouble since they'd be no different from the other services in being a silo. Weird!
    - frizlab 3y ago
      Unless I’m mistaken literally all of these services are locked down too, and few have E2E encryption… iMessage is indeed “Apple-only” but the rest is on “all” platforms only for purely economical reasons, as much as iMessage is on Apple platforms only for the same reason. At least iMessage falls back to SMS (soon RCS) when available, which is much more ubiquitous than the rest tbh… If you truly want to avoid a lock down you should host your own messaging solution.
samtheprogram 3y ago
After my gaming computer started rebooting (probably needs a new power supply in order to hit peak power draw), I tried out my new M2 Pro for gaming again. I've been using Codeweavers Crossover to play games that are Windows only, and it's been surprisingly fine. I never fixed my gaming PC (for gaming, at least) and converted it to an at home server. It's been a couple months now. I just lent a friend my GPU. Epic Games doesn't seem to work, but you could always use Legendary for those titles -- I just don't have any titles on Epic that I want to play. I'm hoping in one of the future updates that Crossover can activate macOS Sonoma's Game Mode for the games running within Wine, because I assume it'll improve performance even more. I'm also having a bit of buyers remorse -- I didn't plan to use this for gaming, and now I'm wondering how much better an M2 or M3 Max would be for more demanding titles.
- catlover76 3y ago
  Ehh yeah the prospect of using such patching software doesn't appeal, and I don't want to run the risk that games work poorly or not at all even with that kind of fiddling (which is something I abhor about Linux, so why would I want it on my expensive and supposedly superior Macbook).
  - philsnow 3y ago
    Just want to throw out there that ~20 years ago I sometimes got better framerates in linux than windows on the same hardware for certain FPS games
beretguy 3y ago
A much more major issue with Macs is planned obsolescence. It’s the only reason I am not buying any Macs.
- bobchadwick 3y ago
  My late-2013 MacBook Pro recently gave up the ghost. I'd used it daily in the ten years it worked. Are there other PC manufacturers who make laptops that are still useable after ten years?
  - fsckboy 3y ago
    > other PC manufacturers who make laptops that are still useable after ten years? my Lenovo Thinkpads are working great after 12 yrs, with 16G ram and disk upgraded to 4TB SSD
  - IntelMiner 3y ago
    Both desktop and laptop computers have been perfectly serviceable for that long for a while now. Computers are "good enough" for tbe overwhelming majority of tasks most users (note, most regular users, not the HN crowd) would throw at them
    - eropple 3y ago
      Desktops, I'd agree. My experience with most Windows laptops, non-Thinkpad class, is that they physically haven't been able to survive that long. Like, people rag rightly on the butterfly keyboard era of Macbook Pros, but until recently you'd see pretty drastic hinge or keyboard or touchpad or case failures on even fairly expensive laptops. Especially as you get into more slimline/ultrabook form factors; I've seen some really bludgeoned Dells and HPs in particular. (Though I liked my Spectre x360 aside from the party where it fell apart in normal everyday use.) I recently took a 2012 rMBP out of rotation (~five years dedicated use, the last five intermittently as a Logic Pro workstation) and now it's a Kubernetes homelab node. But I took it out because Thunderbolt 3 now means I can just slot my M1 Max into my workspace and don't need a dedicated box; the keyboard, touchpad, hinge, screen, and case are all pristine, I didn't remove it due to hardware expiry.
matwood 3y ago
But the internet keeps saying the iPhone is just marketing. /s I’ve developed for and used both, and I’ve settled on iPhones for the last few generations. Though, I think flagship devices of either are fine nowadays. The ‘slab of glass’ phone is basically a solved problem at this point.
- jjeaff 3y ago
  I think Google does a good job with the Pixel line. I believe it is likely they are the 2nd most secure consumer phones after iPhone due to their quick updates and Google's good security record. The fact that I can easily side load apps on Android make it a much better, ad free experience for me.
vips7L 3y ago
Windows Phone Link does support iMessage now.
- roskelld 3y ago
  Windows 11 only for iPhones. Sigh.
- catlover76 3y ago
  surprisedpikachu.gif edit: just set it up and gave it a test--seems to work pretty well!
  - tech234a 3y ago
    I don't believe they actually did any reverse engineering for Windows Phone Link. iOS makes SMS/iMessages available over Bluetooth as part of its support for the Message Access Profile [1], intended for sending messages using a car infotainment system. This requires a physical iOS device to be located in proximity of the Windows device. [1]: https://support.apple.com/en-us/102842 https://support.apple.com/en-us/102842
  - josefresco 3y ago
    It works... "ok" but doesn't handle group messages. I find sometimes it just doesn't connect. They do post frequent updates though so there's clearly an active team managing the app. I love being able to easily send URLs and other copy+paste items to my iMessage contacts from Windows!
ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
Not sure if that will ever improve. I don’t really use the Mac for gaming. However, Apple Silicon may change the landscape
dzader 3y ago
[dead]

arjvik 3y ago

Look into Beeper for iMessage support on Linux and Windows!

nortonham 3y ago

> the iPhone is nudging me further to giving a Macbook/OSX a try one day, Gaming isn't great on Mac (depending on what games you play), but macbooks are great imo. A pro or an air with apple silicon is worth the money. I've never really appreciated the build quality of a mac before. > I just got an iPhone for the first time, and it is a noticeably better device than my previous Android phones. In what way? What Android phones did you use in the past?

catlover76 3y ago
My last phone was a Samsung Galaxy A50, and it was pretty good as far as the hardware went. But I felt that Android was bad; I couldn't help but notice that a number of the apps loaded very slowly and had other small glitchy issues. Nothing that would compel a person to switch phones, just a lot of mostly minor inconveniences, except for 2 that really stick out right now: the Android messages web app always had a hard time connecting to my phone even when the phone was clearly on, had the messages app open, and was connected to same wifi as my computer; and second, Chrome recently just started becoming unopenable (like it would open and then immediately close for some reason). These are just a couple data points in a bag of info and anecdata that has made me question whether Google is a company whose products are worth investing in, gives a damn, etc. As to what exactly about the iPhone seems so good in comparison, the things that really stand out are the crisp aesthetics (noticeably better "graphics" than my Samsung) and the speed of everything. It's also just pleasant to touch/interact with--I think part of that is Apple's craftsmanship, and part is simply the fact that the phone is new.
- lyton 3y ago
  which iPhone model did you go for?
  - catlover76 3y ago
    iPhone 15 (normal)
- nortonham 3y ago
  >the Android messages web app always had a hard time connecting to my phone even when the phone was clearly on, had the messages app open, and was connected to same wifi as my computer; and second, Chrome recently just started becoming unopenable (like it would open and then immediately close for some reason). Those are definitely annoying and off putting. On my pixel 5 chrome always worked well (but I use other browsers), and messages app was trouble free... Wonder if it was a problem with that model of phone you had. But it's true, apples ecosystem is definitely a draw

selykg 3y ago

Personally, the approach I took to this was just to game on consoles. In my personal experience, the upgrade cycle is far far better for me. I don't feel like I've missed anything as a result either.

crossroadsguy 3y ago

Personally, for communication I never use a device platform specific/locked app/service. Maybe you could keep using the app(s) whatever you were.

frizlab 3y ago
I’m curious, what do you use then?
- crossroadsguy 3y ago
  WhatsApp (this mostly - I live in India). SMS. Telegram (2 groups). Discord (3 groups). Signal (with 1 friend) and iMessage (with 2 friends) — these 2 apps are more of a hobby (a thing?), we four usually use WhatsApp. I mean I could fight it or just fall line. I fought and lost :D Notifications off for all.
- gumby 3y ago
  There are lots of choices depending on your community and desired feature set: whatsapp, fb messenger, instagram messenger, telegram, signal, discord, or the direct messaging features of other programs like Slack. imessage is an outlier in that it also has a bidirectional link with SMS. I just read today that FB messenger used to have this (who knew?) but no longer does. My reading of the EU's complaint is that if imessage didn't have this feature they would not be in trouble since they'd be no different from the other services in being a silo. Weird!
  - frizlab 3y ago
    Unless I’m mistaken literally all of these services are locked down too, and few have E2E encryption… iMessage is indeed “Apple-only” but the rest is on “all” platforms only for purely economical reasons, as much as iMessage is on Apple platforms only for the same reason. At least iMessage falls back to SMS (soon RCS) when available, which is much more ubiquitous than the rest tbh… If you truly want to avoid a lock down you should host your own messaging solution.

samtheprogram 3y ago

After my gaming computer started rebooting (probably needs a new power supply in order to hit peak power draw), I tried out my new M2 Pro for gaming again. I've been using Codeweavers Crossover to play games that are Windows only, and it's been surprisingly fine. I never fixed my gaming PC (for gaming, at least) and converted it to an at home server. It's been a couple months now. I just lent a friend my GPU. Epic Games doesn't seem to work, but you could always use Legendary for those titles -- I just don't have any titles on Epic that I want to play. I'm hoping in one of the future updates that Crossover can activate macOS Sonoma's Game Mode for the games running within Wine, because I assume it'll improve performance even more. I'm also having a bit of buyers remorse -- I didn't plan to use this for gaming, and now I'm wondering how much better an M2 or M3 Max would be for more demanding titles.

catlover76 3y ago
Ehh yeah the prospect of using such patching software doesn't appeal, and I don't want to run the risk that games work poorly or not at all even with that kind of fiddling (which is something I abhor about Linux, so why would I want it on my expensive and supposedly superior Macbook).
- philsnow 3y ago
  Just want to throw out there that ~20 years ago I sometimes got better framerates in linux than windows on the same hardware for certain FPS games

beretguy 3y ago

A much more major issue with Macs is planned obsolescence. It’s the only reason I am not buying any Macs.

bobchadwick 3y ago
My late-2013 MacBook Pro recently gave up the ghost. I'd used it daily in the ten years it worked. Are there other PC manufacturers who make laptops that are still useable after ten years?
- fsckboy 3y ago
  > other PC manufacturers who make laptops that are still useable after ten years? my Lenovo Thinkpads are working great after 12 yrs, with 16G ram and disk upgraded to 4TB SSD
- IntelMiner 3y ago
  Both desktop and laptop computers have been perfectly serviceable for that long for a while now. Computers are "good enough" for tbe overwhelming majority of tasks most users (note, most regular users, not the HN crowd) would throw at them
  - eropple 3y ago
    Desktops, I'd agree. My experience with most Windows laptops, non-Thinkpad class, is that they physically haven't been able to survive that long. Like, people rag rightly on the butterfly keyboard era of Macbook Pros, but until recently you'd see pretty drastic hinge or keyboard or touchpad or case failures on even fairly expensive laptops. Especially as you get into more slimline/ultrabook form factors; I've seen some really bludgeoned Dells and HPs in particular. (Though I liked my Spectre x360 aside from the party where it fell apart in normal everyday use.) I recently took a 2012 rMBP out of rotation (~five years dedicated use, the last five intermittently as a Logic Pro workstation) and now it's a Kubernetes homelab node. But I took it out because Thunderbolt 3 now means I can just slot my M1 Max into my workspace and don't need a dedicated box; the keyboard, touchpad, hinge, screen, and case are all pristine, I didn't remove it due to hardware expiry.

matwood 3y ago

But the internet keeps saying the iPhone is just marketing. /s I’ve developed for and used both, and I’ve settled on iPhones for the last few generations. Though, I think flagship devices of either are fine nowadays. The ‘slab of glass’ phone is basically a solved problem at this point.

jjeaff 3y ago
I think Google does a good job with the Pixel line. I believe it is likely they are the 2nd most secure consumer phones after iPhone due to their quick updates and Google's good security record. The fact that I can easily side load apps on Android make it a much better, ad free experience for me.

vips7L 3y ago

Windows Phone Link does support iMessage now.

roskelld 3y ago
Windows 11 only for iPhones. Sigh.
catlover76 3y ago
surprisedpikachu.gif edit: just set it up and gave it a test--seems to work pretty well!
- tech234a 3y ago
  I don't believe they actually did any reverse engineering for Windows Phone Link. iOS makes SMS/iMessages available over Bluetooth as part of its support for the Message Access Profile [1], intended for sending messages using a car infotainment system. This requires a physical iOS device to be located in proximity of the Windows device. [1]: https://support.apple.com/en-us/102842 https://support.apple.com/en-us/102842
- josefresco 3y ago
  It works... "ok" but doesn't handle group messages. I find sometimes it just doesn't connect. They do post frequent updates though so there's clearly an active team managing the app. I love being able to easily send URLs and other copy+paste items to my iMessage contacts from Windows!

ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago

Not sure if that will ever improve. I don’t really use the Mac for gaming. However, Apple Silicon may change the landscape

dzader 3y ago

[dead]