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About LinkBacksRead more.The trade-in program is the company's latest strategy to promote the Surface.
Read more.The trade-in program is the company's latest strategy to promote the Surface.
Well if I had one nocking about I'd definately take the trade in.
For me the iFixit scores are rather meaningless. For instance the iPad Air is 2 out of 10, vs 1 out of 10.
The point is it's not going to be opened up by me and my trusty swiss army knife, compared to say my Series 9 ultrabook which sadly I'll be taking apart tonight to replace a worn out SSD.
If you have a screen with very little gap between digitiser, you will loose repairability. I want that, so I make that choice.
The downside is this is a shift to a computer that's ~£1k which is completely disposable. You have to really want the portability.
throw new ArgumentException (String, String, Exception)
Shame this isn't an option in the UKI'd be quite willing to take them up on this with my Air!
At the launch Microsoft appeared to target the MacBook Air. It looks like they really meant it.
For me it will be replacing an early 2012 samsung series 9. Lighter n smaller.Originally Posted by Brian224
If I'm doing a long stint, I'll bring a full size keyboard anyway, or buy one if away from home, just the cheapo kind that cost £10 mind.
I'm not sold yet, I'll only buy one if I'm in Singapore or the USA soon, because the version I'd be after is £1.3k in the UK or just under £1K in Singapore, so it's not just VAT.
If it was £999 for the model I'd want, including the keyboard, I'd push the button and buy now, but as is, it's just a shade to expensive.
throw new ArgumentException (String, String, Exception)
I would NEVER EVER trade in my Macbook Air for one of those things. Jesus Christ this is the most retarded thing I've ever heard...
"The knack of flying is learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss."
- Douglas Adams.
Well, seeing as I don't have a Macbook, air or not, and emphatically don't want a Surface Pro 3, this one rather passes me by.
This is the most retarded thing I've ever read. ;-)
Is it just me then that thinks this is Microsoft saying the Surface Pro 3 only matches a MacBook Air once it's discounted by $650 ?
Fraz (24-06-2014),smithy1158 (24-06-2014)
So I guess Microsoft will be handing MacBook Air's as Christmas bonuses this year.
I would agree that the latest Macbook Air's (2014) are underpowered compared to what they can be. This is so people buy the retina Macbook Pro's. When the retina's first came out, the Air's were just as powerful and a lot better designed than the retina's (thanks to many improvements over the years). This is pretty bad on Apple's part.
I have a 1.8GHz i5 Macbook Air and I have been using it as a development machine through my final year as a Comp Sci undergrad. My dissertation used CPU and memory intensive AI and natural language processing techniques, which the air handled fine.
The Air's build quality is astounding and is quite possibly the best in any laptop ever produced. The unibody shell is strong, resilient and the whole thing acts like heatsink. It's light and definitely as portable as the surface. Battery life is just as good as the surface.
The surface however doesn't even come with a keyboard. And with the (crappy) novelty keyboard factored in it is as expensive as a Macbook Air.
Macbook's are favoured as development machines all over the world for they're UNIX compatibility. Mac OS X is BSD UNIX and even the Apple extension of it (Darwin) is completely open source.
You can also install and run Windows natively and virtualise it running it side by side with OS X. It just supports everything and thats what you need in a development machine.
"The knack of flying is learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss."
- Douglas Adams.
Airs do have a few shortcomings though, the main one that I've seen is the screen. 1440x900 maximum in 2014 is just crazy, that's not enough screen real estate for putting multiple windows on screen at once. It makes me think that maybe the retina macbook pros are made for working professionals and the airs are built for, well, anyone else. A surface pro 3, or heck even a pro 2 beats the airs for screen resolution and quality. If it matters number 3 also beats an air for weight (800g vs 1.08kg or 1.35kg).
Personally, I wouldn't really buy an air, if I'm buying a macbook it has to be something top notch like a pro retina 15. A surface pro 3 kinda slips through the net because of the different form factor, so if it came down to it I probably would buy one... I'd just buy one with a warranty extended until the death of the sun because there is no way I could ever replace that battery.
LOL
(Not sure if you believe that, or if your view of the world is just from univeristy)
throw new ArgumentException (String, String, Exception)
Seem like two reasonable statements to me. For the last ~10 years, literally every programmer I know has chosen a Mac, largely for its Unix compatibility and corresponding ease of developing that kind of software. I guess it depends on the industry you work in, but Windows really is an abysmal platform to work on if you spend all day working with and developing software for Linux machines. Sure, you can buy a PC laptop running Linux, but the polish and usability just isn't there.
Or desperation on Microsoft's part.
Of course, it might prompt Apple to offer a trade in to a Retina Macbook Pro- now that would be worth having!
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For most dev's I know, it's only been in the last ~4 years that they've been able to stand using a laptop spec hardware.
When it comes to platforms again it really depends where you are working, the issue is having a central policy of any kind on a mac is an exercise in frustration. Not to mention the complete lack of any security options, at all.
This is why most places use those big cheap lenovos, TPMs and SmartCard / BioMetrics as standard, along with a slab of bendy plastic.
Now when it comes to designer devs, people doing say HTML/CSS/JS then yeah, most of them do use OSX but almost all of those I know (only 1 doesn't) use MBP because the air is so poo.
In fact last November I found myself nursing the sorrow of the loss of my mobile phone in a bar in Siagon, another guy who was a dev was doing the working from the back packer trail. The fact is he was envious of my 2012 samsung series 9, as it was smaller, lighter and better screened than the air. The difference in CPU of newer generation was minimal, it was mostly in battery life which the air had an extra 2 hours off, oh and a better track pad if you never right click. But overall it just didn't cut the mustard, he was quite frustrated and ended up buying a new Laptop in Da Nang (that is a fun experience if you only know very basic Vietnamese!).
So in the context of Airs I don't know anyone who uses them.
If you get rid of the one man shop type places, no one really uses them, they aren't value for money, they have security problems.
Now this is why it's interesting to see MS go after the Air in such a way. Myself I think it's because MS suffer from brand association with your workplace. The crippled desktop, decades out of date, with horrific propriety software, people expect that to be the Windows experience. I think what MS are doing here is creating a halo product, that is gunning for the not too technical persons halo apple products. The fun thing is it's not really the Air, it's the iPad and the Air.
The Air is a bit of a gimped product, it's screen is really rather bad, it reminds me of a canon/nikon crop body camera, it could easily be more, but they don't want to hurt the sales of the higher ticket item by letting it have the features it should.
In that context, going after the Air is really quite srewed, it has a user that needs something more than an iPad, but yet didn't need much more, it's a selecting market of users who are not technically too demanding, but valuing portability, yet not enough to compromise for an iPad.
throw new ArgumentException (String, String, Exception)
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