The Apple M-series macbooks are fantastic for battery life and perhaps the best laptop for school or business use you can get. In my office, some rough benchmarks put the Macbook Pro M1 (which is still a couple years old) >4x faster than the 2019 Intel Macbook Pro on running our test suite, and it gets all day battery life, whereas the Intel Macbook Pro dies in like 2 hours. It’s absolutely amazing what Apple has done.
That said, I’ll never buy one. I hate their keyboards and I really want the mouse buttons and TrackPoint on my ThinkPad. I run Linux exclusively (openSUSE Tumbleweed on laptop and desktop), and I really like my workflow on my machines more than my work computer. However, since Apple is UNIX, I can get pretty close (VIM + tmux + some random CLI tools). I’d really like a Framework laptop because Lenovo keeps making their laptops worse (I loved my T440, then upgraded to an E495 because the T495 had soldered RAM, and the new Thinkpads don’t excite me), but I’m not sure I’m ready to give up my middle mouse button and TrackPoint. If Framework could give me the three mouse buttons above the trackpad, I could probably give up the TrackPoint, but I really like those buttons and use them a ton.
I have long hated the “Apple hardware is amazing” nonsense people spouted, but it’s actually true with the M-series macbooks. If you want fantastic battery life, top performance (and are okay with losing game compat), and like or don’t mind the Apple-style keyboards, then I highly recommend them. But if you’re expecting Linux compat or want to play games, look elsewhere.
It’s fine, but it doesn’t solve my main problem with trackpads: I have to move my hand from the keyboard to use it. After using my work mac for almost 4 years now, I still don’t use the trackpad gestures very much, I just find keyboard shortcuts to be better, and I prefer the crappier trackpad on my ThinkPad that has mouse buttons and a TrackPoint.
I’ll help out then.
The Apple M-series macbooks are fantastic for battery life and perhaps the best laptop for school or business use you can get. In my office, some rough benchmarks put the Macbook Pro M1 (which is still a couple years old) >4x faster than the 2019 Intel Macbook Pro on running our test suite, and it gets all day battery life, whereas the Intel Macbook Pro dies in like 2 hours. It’s absolutely amazing what Apple has done.
That said, I’ll never buy one. I hate their keyboards and I really want the mouse buttons and TrackPoint on my ThinkPad. I run Linux exclusively (openSUSE Tumbleweed on laptop and desktop), and I really like my workflow on my machines more than my work computer. However, since Apple is UNIX, I can get pretty close (VIM + tmux + some random CLI tools). I’d really like a Framework laptop because Lenovo keeps making their laptops worse (I loved my T440, then upgraded to an E495 because the T495 had soldered RAM, and the new Thinkpads don’t excite me), but I’m not sure I’m ready to give up my middle mouse button and TrackPoint. If Framework could give me the three mouse buttons above the trackpad, I could probably give up the TrackPoint, but I really like those buttons and use them a ton.
I have long hated the “Apple hardware is amazing” nonsense people spouted, but it’s actually true with the M-series macbooks. If you want fantastic battery life, top performance (and are okay with losing game compat), and like or don’t mind the Apple-style keyboards, then I highly recommend them. But if you’re expecting Linux compat or want to play games, look elsewhere.
Mousepad on the macbook is so much better than anything else, I personally don’t need the buttons
It’s fine, but it doesn’t solve my main problem with trackpads: I have to move my hand from the keyboard to use it. After using my work mac for almost 4 years now, I still don’t use the trackpad gestures very much, I just find keyboard shortcuts to be better, and I prefer the crappier trackpad on my ThinkPad that has mouse buttons and a TrackPoint.