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If you didn't have a Mac..

laurihoefs said:
If you are comparing an XPS to a Pavilion, then sure, the Pavilion is flimsy. Compare an HP EliteBook with a Dell Inspiron, and the result is the exact opposite.

But if you actually compare similarily priced laptops from similar product lines, you'll not see much difference in build quality.
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Thats what I like about Apple, you can compare just about anything to a Macbook Pro and the Apple would have reason to be more solid than them. Then again the Dell XPS 15 might break that cycle, but lets see what October 22nd brings.
 
laurihoefs said:
Well, the Latitude, being a durable business laptop designed for heavy use and long lifespan, might not quite fall in the same category as the "crappy Dells" 😉
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Yea, it's a truly nice computer all metal easy to work on 16:10 mini PCI slots etc..

Not crappy at all
 
prior to owning macs, i grew up on custom built computers. at that time, no vendors were really offering anything that aligned with my interests in digital video and 3d. i remember going into a big box store and asking what hardware they had for manipulating video on a computer; they looked at me like i was from another planet - or the future, as it turns out 😉

so instead i cobbled my own systems together with help from a local shop that offered specialty equipment; does anyone else remember the original ati "all in wonder" or the "matrox marvel g400-tv"?

when i finally came to macs in the early 2000s, it was like an amazing realization that there was actually someone making systems optimized for exactly the type of creative tasks i was doing.

since then, apple has swung back into the mainstream, and while the creativity aspect is still firmly in its dna, you can definitely see that their focus has shifted more towards shaping tools and experiences for a broader market.

that said, the majority of what i see from competitors continues to be chunky and/or flimsy plastic bevels with washed out screens and covered in stickers. (i'm sure there are exceptions, but thats still the prevading aesthetic, or lack thereof).

i was trying to help my parents find a laptop a year or so back, and while their computer needs are pretty modest, the laptops just looked so gross i honestly couldn't find anything that looked decent. i ended up giving them my old macbook pro, and my mom became so enamoured, they went out and bought an imac to supplement it (although oddly, the older macbook pro still seems to be the main thing they use).

so yeah, i guess if macs didn't exist, i'm not sure what i'd do. i probably wouldn't be so spoiled by build quality and aestethics and would have found something to make due. razor makes something that looks almost identical to a macbook pro in black, but i have one of their mice, and its been nothing but trouble on the driver front.
 
If you need a powerful workstation PC, then my alternate was a Dell Precision. I bought one in 2009 and loved it - wasn't pretty but it was a great Windows machine. Was going to get another, but landed on my first Mac.

Dell and HP get flak for their POS consumer machines, but their higher end workstation laptops are great.
 
ThinkPad T61p. Best screen and keyboard of any laptop ever made. The TrackPoint is the second-best pointing device I've used; second only to the MacBook trackpad, and has the added advantage of letting you move the mouse without moving your hands at all. I'd throw out Windows, put Linux on that thing and call it a day.

Seriously. 1920x1200 on a 15" screen and a 7-row keyboard is nothing to balk at. This was all in 2007! IBM was so far ahead of its time, it's ridiculous.
 
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2IS said:
I'm not sure how close to 0 you can get without actually hitting 0, but I'd estimate that's the chance that what you're saying is true.
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Not sure what is been implied however, there are many people who don't use a computer and I would be one if I had not been introduced to Macs.
 
Without sounding like I'm going to be hit...
Possibly a Samsung laptop.

Seems to be the only things my windows friends buy because they last long.
Bad experiences with Dell, Lenovo, HP and Acer.
 
I would have ordered an Asus G75VX 17" laptop. Traded the better specs for a MUCH better form factor with my 17" Macbook Pro.

Today, I would have a Razer Blade Pro.
 
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As a gamer Razer Blade 14 inch would be my next computer but the 14 inch display sucks. Prolly will end up waiting for another refresh and hopefully the display is better otherwise ill get another macbook and bootcamp.
 
Custom-built desktop PC + iPad 5.

I think desktop PCs are better than laptop PCs relatively to Macs. In large part because you don't have to deal with ****** trackpads. You also have to make less compromises when building yourself, while with laptops it's hard to find a single laptop that is powerful, has a high-end screen, nice form factor and long battery life at the same time. No bloatware is also a plus.

If however I was only restricted to a laptop I'd probably get an Asus Zenbook U500VZ.
Aluminum body, 1080p IPS 15" display, quad-core, GT 650M, 2x 2.5" storage slots, relatively thin and pretty good battery life. It's pretty hard to find and is expensive though. If only they could update it to Haswell and a 2560x1440 screen like the Zenbook Infinity, it'd be pretty awesome.

EDIT: Wow, did it really censor such an inoffensive word?
 
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I'd have a nice equally priced Lenovo W/T series or a Latitude. Was considering the Surface Pro 2 but I use some pretty keyboard/mouse intensive software on my MBP (photoshop/premiere/after effects) as well as software development and music production which really need a good amount of screen space, so I'll stick with normal laptops.

I have to say I prefer the Mac experience on a laptop over Windows, but Windows over Mac on a desktop.
 
WillFisher said:
Without sounding like I'm going to be hit...
Possibly a Samsung laptop.

Seems to be the only things my windows friends buy because they last long.
Bad experiences with Dell, Lenovo, HP and Acer.
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I've heard great things about Samsung and their laptops, much better than their phones.
 
pgiguere1 said:
Custom-built desktop PC + iPad 5.

I think desktop PCs are better than laptop PCs relatively to Macs. In large part because you don't have to deal with ****** trackpads. You also have to make less compromises when building yourself, while with laptops it's hard to find a single laptop that is powerful, has a high-end screen, nice form factor and long battery life at the same time. No bloatware is also a plus.

If however I was only restricted to a laptop I'd probably get an Asus Zenbook U500VZ.
Aluminum body, 1080p IPS 15" display, quad-core, GT 650M, 2x 2.5" storage slots, relatively thin and pretty good battery life. It's pretty hard to find and is expensive though. If only they could update it to Haswell and a 2560x1440 screen like the Zenbook Infinity, it'd be pretty awesome.

EDIT: Wow, did it really censor such an inoffensive word?
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Have you used the Mac's trackpad? I keep forgetting to use the mouse plugged into my Air because the trackpad is just so good.
 
@OP Sony used to be amazing. A lot of inventions and styles were phenomenal. They were one of the first to adopt the "chiclet" keyboard style. They were pretty much macbooks but PCs. I went Sony until Macs were better spec'd. The Vaio Z is nice, but doesn't offer a 15" screen option.
They have intel light peak = thunderbolt and included an external graphics card/blu-ray drive. They have all the great ideas, but poor marketing.

The PC brand I trust the most is Asus. Their warranty is great, they manufacturer motherboards and various other parts unlike Dell and HP.

@agentxavier That is like a black macbook. Beautiful.
 
As I posted in another thread, I did get tired of waiting for the refresh.

I just got an Alienware 17. It's not svelte, but it has very good build quality and it is insanely fast.

It's my 1st non-Apple laptop, ever.

I'm going to spend Monday getting Mountain Lion loaded on it. There are some great guides out there.

65fps in Skyrim with Ultra settings AND OS X? 😀
 
Matthew9559 said:
Prolly a Dell ultrabook. I almost got one instead of the MBA a couple years ago.
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That was my initial thought earlier this year, but I needed something more powerful and still lightweight. Someone suggested a mac and that was that - 8 months later, still waiting.
 
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Surface Pro 2, without a doubt. Hell, I'd almost take Surface Pro 2 over my Retina Macbook.

Second choice: Any professional Lenovo laptop.
 
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