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A single Thunderbolt (or HDMI) output. Then it could double as a Mac Mini on a desk. That would help justify about 1k of the total spend. I know it sounds a bit

A single Thunderbolt (or HDMI) output. Then it could double as a Mac Mini on a desk. That would help justify about 1k of the total spend. I know it sounds a bit ridiculous, but I think it's less ridiculous than a 3,5k (minimum) face computer that, for most people, will not be getting nearly as much facetime (pun intended) as a normal desktop. One wired output, just one, for the love of God.

bottlepalm 3y ago
Can I get one of those for my iPhone as well? It has more than enough power for general purpose computing.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- wkat4242 3y ago
  If you're not bound to iOS: yes. Samsung DeX is just that. I can plug it into the Lenovo dock at work and have a personal pc on the go. Id imagine this kind of thing is way too geeky for Apple to make though.
  - bottlepalm 3y ago
    Microsoft could have given the Windows phone some significant value with this kind of functionality. We’d be living in a different world.
  - jc_dc 3y ago
    Have you actually used it for general computing tasks? If so, how was it?
    - wkat4242 3y ago
      Oh yes, a lot. Our work environment is incredibly restricted so I can't easily connect to my home stuff. I have everything behind VPN which is blocked on the company network, I have no admin rights to do anything etc. I also require yubikeys (openPGP mode) to log into pretty much everything at home and the toolchain for this also can't be installed on my work stuff. SSH is also blocked, etc. So, what I do when I have something I need to mess with at home, is plug in my personal phone into the work dock. It has a completely independent 5G connection so I can do whatever I want, without needing to circumvent company protections, and without even using the company network at all. In DeX I mostly use outlook, webbrowser and Termux (which is amazing) for SSH using OpenPGP (using OKCAgent and OpenKeyChain to talk to the Yubikey). The office apps are also nice and very dex-enabled (they have a UI much more like a desktop than like a tablet in DeX mode) but I rarely use them. Same with Chrome etc, it has a full tab bar etc. Unfortunately firefox is not quite there yet, it's pretty sucky in DeX. I use element for all my chats (using matrix bridges to whatsapp etc) and that works OK in DeX. It also lacks a good "desktop-style" interface unfortunately. But overall it's pretty ok, it's definitely workable. There's a few annoying quirks but they're all pretty easy to work around. One of the issues is that the screen on the phone is often activated for no reason (leading me to worry about burn-in), but force-killing the apps in phone mode and then opening in DeX mostly fixes that. I wish Samsung would go all the way and really streamline this, but right now they're in a phase where DeX is basically neglected. Every few years they have a big marketing boost and they polish it up again but now they're in neglect mode :) Nevertheless it works ok though. PS: One major usecase I've seen people use is also to use remote desktop in fullscreen which solves a lot of its quirks obviously but it's not quite as standalone as I'd like. TL;DR: Great feature for when you need it and have a suitable dock nearby (or hotel TV and bluetooth keyboard/mouse), not something I'd use as a daily driver at this point.
pzo 3y ago
Unfortunately apple doesn't have courage to cannibal their other devices contrary to Steve Jobs that allowed iPhone kill iPod. Which is weird considering Macs (especially iMacs and Macs mini) are really tiny part of their revenue and apple is trying to diversify and earn from services. They sell just around 25m macs per year comparing to 250m iphones. MacOS still has around 10% market share. They definitely have big opportunity to grow here and move more people to their ecosystem. Similarly with Apple TV - great specs and cheap device but too much restricted. Wish they make tvOS more open, apple TV having at least one usb-c port and allow to add some magnetic modules to add smart speaker, router, local backup (with removable ssd), wireless charging for smart devices.
kj99 3y ago
Why not just buy a Mac? It really does sound ridiculous to ‘justify’ the price this way.
gnabgib 3y ago
You certainly do keep saying it again[0] [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/context?id=39267923 https://news.ycombinator.com/context?id=39267923
- ThePowerOfFuet 3y ago
  What did you hope to gain from this comment? What does it add to the conversation?
rlupi 3y ago
It has a usb-c charger and cable... it must have a usb-c or thunderbolt port. Did they cripple it on purpose?

bottlepalm 3y ago

Can I get one of those for my iPhone as well? It has more than enough power for general purpose computing.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
wkat4242 3y ago
If you're not bound to iOS: yes. Samsung DeX is just that. I can plug it into the Lenovo dock at work and have a personal pc on the go. Id imagine this kind of thing is way too geeky for Apple to make though.
- bottlepalm 3y ago
  Microsoft could have given the Windows phone some significant value with this kind of functionality. We’d be living in a different world.
- jc_dc 3y ago
  Have you actually used it for general computing tasks? If so, how was it?
  - wkat4242 3y ago
    Oh yes, a lot. Our work environment is incredibly restricted so I can't easily connect to my home stuff. I have everything behind VPN which is blocked on the company network, I have no admin rights to do anything etc. I also require yubikeys (openPGP mode) to log into pretty much everything at home and the toolchain for this also can't be installed on my work stuff. SSH is also blocked, etc. So, what I do when I have something I need to mess with at home, is plug in my personal phone into the work dock. It has a completely independent 5G connection so I can do whatever I want, without needing to circumvent company protections, and without even using the company network at all. In DeX I mostly use outlook, webbrowser and Termux (which is amazing) for SSH using OpenPGP (using OKCAgent and OpenKeyChain to talk to the Yubikey). The office apps are also nice and very dex-enabled (they have a UI much more like a desktop than like a tablet in DeX mode) but I rarely use them. Same with Chrome etc, it has a full tab bar etc. Unfortunately firefox is not quite there yet, it's pretty sucky in DeX. I use element for all my chats (using matrix bridges to whatsapp etc) and that works OK in DeX. It also lacks a good "desktop-style" interface unfortunately. But overall it's pretty ok, it's definitely workable. There's a few annoying quirks but they're all pretty easy to work around. One of the issues is that the screen on the phone is often activated for no reason (leading me to worry about burn-in), but force-killing the apps in phone mode and then opening in DeX mostly fixes that. I wish Samsung would go all the way and really streamline this, but right now they're in a phase where DeX is basically neglected. Every few years they have a big marketing boost and they polish it up again but now they're in neglect mode :) Nevertheless it works ok though. PS: One major usecase I've seen people use is also to use remote desktop in fullscreen which solves a lot of its quirks obviously but it's not quite as standalone as I'd like. TL;DR: Great feature for when you need it and have a suitable dock nearby (or hotel TV and bluetooth keyboard/mouse), not something I'd use as a daily driver at this point.

pzo 3y ago

Unfortunately apple doesn't have courage to cannibal their other devices contrary to Steve Jobs that allowed iPhone kill iPod. Which is weird considering Macs (especially iMacs and Macs mini) are really tiny part of their revenue and apple is trying to diversify and earn from services. They sell just around 25m macs per year comparing to 250m iphones. MacOS still has around 10% market share. They definitely have big opportunity to grow here and move more people to their ecosystem. Similarly with Apple TV - great specs and cheap device but too much restricted. Wish they make tvOS more open, apple TV having at least one usb-c port and allow to add some magnetic modules to add smart speaker, router, local backup (with removable ssd), wireless charging for smart devices.

kj99 3y ago

Why not just buy a Mac? It really does sound ridiculous to ‘justify’ the price this way.

gnabgib 3y ago

You certainly do keep saying it again[0] [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/context?id=39267923 https://news.ycombinator.com/context?id=39267923

ThePowerOfFuet 3y ago
What did you hope to gain from this comment? What does it add to the conversation?

rlupi 3y ago

It has a usb-c charger and cable... it must have a usb-c or thunderbolt port. Did they cripple it on purpose?