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Windows PC Industry Reacts to Apple's Most Affordable MacBook Ever
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zarmanto
macrumors 65816
This did indeed used to be a huge problem; now, most things generally work -- but not always perfectly nor as quickly, depending on whether it has been optimized for Arm. Obviously GPU heavy games are an exception; if a game isn't optimized, it's more likely to fail entirely.
That said: The press release states that this run of Acer laptops uses Intel, not Arm.
I was referring to Mac OS X aka macOS not the Classic Mac OS. I came to Mac with Mac OS X 10.1 so it doesn't even occur to me to think about Apple's pre-UNIX period at this point.
PBG4 Dude
macrumors 603
Video decoding is silicon based so it doesn’t even use a CPU core. It uses the media engine.
The cool thing about the media engines is the codecs are implemented in silicon so the chip doesn’t have to do any “thinking” to decode supported codecs. You feed the file in one end and send the resulting video output to the display. It’s probably one of the most energy efficient processes that can be performed on the chip.
PBG4 Dude
macrumors 603
Lucky you. I bought my first Mac in Feb 2001 so had to suffer (almost returned my PBG4 because of it) with OS 9 for a month until the 3/24/2001 release of OS X.
Having to load programs in a certain order or rebooting to defrag RAM are things I’m happy not to think about.
Siriosys
Contributor
firewire9000
macrumors 6502a
The worst part of those PC aren’t the wobbly plastic or the crappy construction, is the abysmal quality of the displays. Once you see a MacBook Neo you can go to those 1080p crappy displays.
groove-agent
macrumors 68020
PC manufacturers can try to create comparable laptops all they want, but they'll still be running Windblows 11.
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zarmanto
macrumors 65816
1BadManVan
macrumors 68040
opeter
macrumors 68030
jml12286
macrumors 6502
Can in a pdf 🥳 https://doompdf.pages.dev/doom.pdf
The competition is OLED,Faster M.2,Faster Ram,and all the ports you can cram in the machine.
Must be spies watching each other for competitions. Oh they built this so we must build that?
You think that's the way it works? You get what they build and if is selling then great ,if not try again. Not competing with anything or anyone. It`s all how much $$$ can we make on the built products. Right now its a race to the bottom in price but soon they will have all these high end models not selling then what happens?
Apple can hold on to pricing for how long is the game right now. All mfg`s are hurting badly. Too many sitting on the shelves not sold.
Must be spies watching each other for competitions. Oh they built this so we must build that?
You think that's the way it works? You get what they build and if is selling then great ,if not try again. Not competing with anything or anyone. It`s all how much $$$ can we make on the built products. Right now its a race to the bottom in price but soon they will have all these high end models not selling then what happens?
Apple can hold on to pricing for how long is the game right now. All mfg`s are hurting badly. Too many sitting on the shelves not sold.
Timpetus
macrumors 6502a
I use both every day, which is why I cannot understand how that experience is possible. After Outlook, File Explorer is the worst program I have to deal with.
FWIW fractional scaling on Windows and modern Linux desktop environments is waaay better than Apple’s fractional scaling. Apple optimizes for integer scaling, which sure, is always going to be slightly better than fractional scaling, but really screws a bit everyone who doesnt have ideal displays for integer scaling. Fractional scaling looks fine on my macbook pro docked to my 32” 4k screen at “looks like” 2560x1440, but I will admit the same scaling looks better when I toggle to my gaming machine on the same display
For dell it’s very much dependent on if it’s their cheaper consumer lines or their professional/enterprise ones.
The latter are rock solid machines, and have solid builds. The former… ugh
Yeah I actually didn't go Mac until Mac OS X just because of things like that (the details of which I didn't know). Once Apple released a desktop-focused UNIX that could run commercial applications, I was all-in. Well waited just until Mac OS X went ~ production (10.0.0 wasn't...) and then I also got my PBG4.
If it makes you feel any better, for the few years before that I suffered through Windows 98 and maybe even a few days of Windows ME before Windows 2K Pro came to town. I much prefer Mac OS X but W2K was also quite a step up from the previous desktop OS choices.
TVreporter
macrumors 68030
Just tell her to use the old standby: save it to the desktop!
bollman
macrumors 6502a
The real problem with windows pc:s are the absolut crap displays. We use Dell at work and you have to really fork out money to get anything decent. Otherwise you're stuck with 1920x1200 regardless of size (16" 1920x1200 is a joke, the pixels are pinhead-sized). And if you're lucky, you get 400Nits. And this is on enterprise-grade Dell laptops costing substantially more than a MacBook Air.
Funniest thing I heard today at work was that this does not matter. Most PC-users only use their laptops once in a while, otherwise they stay docked to a monitor (which, btw, usually is a 24" 1920x1200 300Nits Dell) so they don't care about the screen quality.
I just kept my mouth shut, but thought to myself: yeah, or they stay docked since they have zero battery life and the screen hurts to look at so nobody wants to use them as laptops unless forced to.
Funniest thing I heard today at work was that this does not matter. Most PC-users only use their laptops once in a while, otherwise they stay docked to a monitor (which, btw, usually is a 24" 1920x1200 300Nits Dell) so they don't care about the screen quality.
I just kept my mouth shut, but thought to myself: yeah, or they stay docked since they have zero battery life and the screen hurts to look at so nobody wants to use them as laptops unless forced to.
PC guys didnt have to wait for Apple, they could do it long time ago. The problem Windows guys thought and were trying to resolve was to provide a lower cost of Windows Chromebook but the real problem is on the ecosystem and seamless integration in among of different Apple products. You can't do airdrop on Windows system.
If Acer could do 200 - 300 dollars of Chromebook, why couldnt they do Windows Neo until Apple proved their success.
If Acer could do 200 - 300 dollars of Chromebook, why couldnt they do Windows Neo until Apple proved their success.
jml12286
macrumors 6502
Yea, to me its all about display resolution and brightness. Its always been difficult to find something in the Windows world that matched the screen specs of a Macbook Air at the same pricepoint.
Same point about many business and Schools which are still stuck using 20 year old 17-24" monitors with only HD resolution. I work at one such place, and people are having to use new Chromebooks with 20 year old monitors docked to the desk. I have been lucky enough to find a discarded 2015 27" 5k iMac that I am able to use in my office at school where Macs no longer exist.... Sad indeed.
brewcitywi
macrumors 6502
So, you've been all selling plastic crap for years, and that was fine. Now that Apple creates an affordable product still made from premium materials, and you suddenly copy it? Even if they match materials and price, you'll be getting an Apple product instead of crap from these bottom-feeder brands. Those brands should have to recall the last 12 months of shipments and replace them.