Chrono Compendium
Zenan Plains - Site Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: PrincessNadia78 on September 28, 2018, 07:58:46 pm
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Ok you guys are some of the most tech savvy people I know so I need some advice.
So I have a Macbook from 2011/2012. Last year the motherboard died on it and I believe I was told it would cost about $250-$300 for a new one. Should I fix this one or look into buying a new laptop?
Thanks! :)
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I prefer to fix, but I have the associated skills to manage all that. I mean, a new Apple laptop is $2k. A motherboard is $300 tops based on your estimates (and that seems pricey).
Opening up the laptop and installing your own motherboard is likely to void any warranty, but then again, your laptop is likely outside the warranty period anyway.
You'll just have to be extremely careful with the actual work -- make sure to wear a grounding cable (can buy off of the internet for $5), be careful with the CPU and RAM, etc. Hell, you could buy some more RAM and upgrade if you want it to run a bit faster.
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Oooooo franken-Macbook! I love, love, LOVE this idea! I'm so glad I asked!
I mean, I probably could do it. I consider myself to be fairly smart. Well most days. LOL I could always check YouTube for tutorials.
Thank you!
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I built my first gaming PC with literally zero experience. Internet research and PC part picker go a long ways.
The only thing with laptops is you have to be REALLY careful about the parts -- they have to be special laptop-sized parts, not what you'd normally plug into a PC. So make sure you do your due diligence before you buy anything.
Oh, and -- I read an article that said Apple will be installing rootware that bricks Apple products with unofficial repair or edits. I don't know much about it, but it has the internet in a rage. Something else to consider.
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At this point if I buy a new laptop it will probably be a Windows. For what I use a computer for, I can't really justify the cost of an Apple. Plus I can put in more RAM and such if I want. Thank you for the heads up on that!
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I loved Apple in the early 2000s when I was studying graphic design. I now think they're crooks. They favor simplicity of use over customization and functionality, and they have dangerous anti-consumer practices. Good call on making the switch (to be honest).
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I'd agree. Unless you absolutely need OSX for some reason, a Mac simply is not value for money. Their hardware is good, but overpriced.
Also, never tinker with the guts of a Mac (laptop or desktop) unless you know exactly what you're doing. OSX is picky about what hardware it'll run on--it doesn't accept the full range of parts available for normal PCs. This is why hardware lists for Hackintoshes (non-Macs built by enthusiasts to run Apple operating systems) tend to be very specific.
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I've always been loyal to Windows... not because I loved the brand or anything, it just seemed to be the most widely accepted platform for hardware and software. Macs are pretty, that's about it.
I still have yet to try out Linux,but have always heard excellent things. I believe Mauron only uses Linux if I'm not mistaken.
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I've always been loyal to Windows... not because I loved the brand or anything, it just seemed to be the most widely accepted platform for hardware and software. Macs are pretty, that's about it.
I still have yet to try out Linux,but have always heard excellent things. I believe Mauron only uses Linux if I'm not mistaken.
Mac really used to dominate the music and film industry. They still have a fairly strong hold, but Windows has really crept into the market. In fact, some programs that originated on Mac that helped solidify the platform actually perform better on Windows now.
I would argue that Macs don't even hold the "pretty" factor anymore. There are several Window's devices that I personally think look better now-a-days. That may be due to the fact that Mac hasn't changed it's design in 10 years though...
If it isn't clear, I'm a Windows fan. :D
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I believe Mauron only uses Linux if I'm not mistaken.
I've used Linux in the past, but too many programs I use are Windows only for me to switch.
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I've used all three major OSs at one time or another and settled permanently on Linux more than twelve years ago now (where I have the option, anyway--I'm stuck with a Windows machine at work because some people there are addicted to Excel spreadsheet macros). It's all a tradeoff. In my case, knowing what the guts of the machine do and being able to fix anything that goes wrong is more important than Windows' wider software compatibility or OSX's . . . actually, I've never been sure why any technically competent person would pick a Mac unless they grew up with them. I was never all that impressed by them.
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I've always heard people sing Linux's praises but I've never understood why. My only experience with it was in college around the turn of the century. My lab partner installed it on our shared computer and it was a massive pain in the ass to get it to do even the simplest things. Just opening the text editor was an ordeal. It seemed like it was deliberately designed to be as unintuitive as possible. Has it gotten better since then? What do people see in it?
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Turn of the century was a while ago. Yes, it's probably improved over what you remember. However, it still may not be for you.
There's a tension in computer user interface design between discoverability (the ability to find a function you don't use often, which may be almost everything on the computer for some people) and usability (the ability of an advanced user to make the system do more complex things easily). Linux has always been a highly usable system at heart, but its discoverability varies according to what add-ons you have installed over the base system. Most other OSs specialize in discoverability, but are less usable.
Why use Linux? Here are some reasons:
- You can have absolute control over what your computer does--everything else these days phones home behind your back.
- Old or weird hardware? Once a driver is in the Linux kernel, it'll continue working until it bit-rots away (and even then, if it matters enough to you, you can probably hire someone to fix it if you can't do that yourself). Your hardware won't be yanked out from under you because Microsoft or some hardware firm has decided it's not worth the return on investment to update the driver. And Linux runs on hardware most people have never even heard of (MIPS, frex).
- Ultimate customizability. Windows and OSX (and Android and...) offer a single graphical environment that can be tweaked only as much as they allow you to. Linux has, typically, 6-8 different ones at any given time (granted, some of them have greater longevity than others--the one I use is >12 years old, and still recognizable as the same thing I was using in 2005, but there are far newer and flashier options). You can also have a Linux system with no GUI at all, if that's better for what you're doing with that particular machine. It can fit on some pretty small embedded devices.
- If something's supposed to work, and it doesn't, with enough patience and reading of documentation, you should be able to make it work.
- The makers of your Linux distribution will provide you with a software repository--a large set of programs that you can install with a couple of keystrokes or mouse-clicks. Sort of like an app store, but free and more carefully curated. You're not required to install from it, but anything you take from there should be safe to install and Just Work with the rest of your system.
Why not use Linux? Well, there are reasons for that, too:
- Stuff that "just works" 99.9% of the time on other OSs may only "just work" 95% or so of the time on Linux, and require you to poke around to fix something.
- Usually people telling you how to fix something will have you go to the command line. There are good reasons for this (it's much easier to explain what you need to do without screen shots or video, for one), but command lines scare some people.
- Some hardware Just Isn't Supported because the manufacturer supplies no drivers and no one working on the kernel has been interested in that particular device.
- Much software Just Isn't Supported. This is especially a problem with games--for most productivity software, you'll be able to find an equivalent that does work with Linux.
- Many of the advantages aren't relevant to people who just want a web browser or media consumption device.
I'm a programmer and a control freak, so Linux in general and the distribution I'm using in particular suit me well, but I would still recommend Windows to someone who needs to run old MS Office macros, or Android to someone who just wants to watch cat videos.