Looking for a New Laptop

[Simple Jack]

I'm looking at getting a new laptop to replace my fairly low end, couple of year old hp. Ideally I'm looking for something:
Light and compact, I'm thinking of going to a 13" screen (currently at 15).
Decent battery life
Reasonable performance, but really only for everyday tasks.
In the 1000-1500 range (very flexible either way though).
Unix-like OS.

I'm in no way a fan of Apple iProducts. But some people at my work have MBPs and they do seem very impressive, especially the OS, which has unixy goodness as well as seemingly being quite polished. I'm currently running Linux Mint on my laptop and whilst it's good it just lacks a little here and there and some things are much harder than they should be.

So my main questions are:
Would it be worth getting a MacBook? Is the price/qualty ratio worth it? I'm thinking of an Air, although the specs seem a touch on the low end considering I would likely need to run a Windows 7 VM occasionally and they are near on impossible to upgrade/fix.

Can anyone recommend another laptop and/or OS that would provide a similar quality of experience but perhaps for a lower price/more accessible hardware?

 

[Knightmare]

I'm looking at getting a new laptop to replace my fairly low end, couple of year old hp. Ideally I'm looking for something:
Light and compact, I'm thinking of going to a 13" screen (currently at 15).
Decent battery life
Reasonable performance, but really only for everyday tasks.
In the 1000-1500 range (very flexible either way though).
Unix-like OS.

I'm in no way a fan of Apple iProducts. But some people at my work have MBPs and they do seem very impressive, especially the OS, which has unixy goodness as well as seemingly being quite polished. I'm currently running Linux Mint on my laptop and whilst it's good it just lacks a little here and there and some things are much harder than they should be.

So my main questions are:
Would it be worth getting a MacBook? Is the price/qualty ratio worth it? I'm thinking of an Air, although the specs seem a touch on the low end considering I would likely need to run a Windows 7 VM occasionally and they are near on impossible to upgrade/fix.

Can anyone recommend another laptop and/or OS that would provide a similar quality of experience but perhaps for a lower price/more accessible hardware?

15.6' inch laptops are consistently the best priced for their size from a bang for buck perspective. But I'll talk exclusively about those that are less than 15' inches in size.

If you're looking for relatively the least bad value proposition via Apple is the base model MacBook Pro 13' coming in at $1,699 via their website. The specs are lousy with an i5, 4gb ram, 500gb hard drive, DVD drive. The basics are strong build quality, good battery, pretty good portability. Just you're paying a significant price premium for the brand.

Given you're looking at the light laptops the MacBook Air the 11' comes in at $1,399 and the 13' comes in at $1,549. Both come with a weak variant of the i5 cpu, 4gb ram, 128 PCIe SSD drives which are super quick which is great for quick boot times but less storage.

Having looked through the Apple pricing it's not worth customising any of the parts as you're significantly overpaying to do that, and that's just a general rule anyone should follow if considering Apple laptops or their all-in-one desktop pc.

Is it worth paying the price premium for Apple laptops? If it's the base, non modified variant of the base product. The price/quality ratio is acceptable. If you wanted to upgrade the cpu, ram, hard drive size etc then absolutely do not touch an apple laptop/pc of any kind. Just keep in mind with Apple laptops, imacs etc, their parts are decidedly last generation and not at all built for performance. But if all you're doing is word-processing, web browsing and emails then it will suffice if you're in no hurry and don't care about performance.

In your $1,000-$1,500 range for someone looking for a business laptop of rock solid build quality with and strong battery life. My personal preference is towards the Lenovo Thinkpads. Their 14' inch models relative are their better priced models but they also make 12.5' inch laptops.
For $1,199 on the Lenovo website they are offering an i7, your choice of windows 7/10, 8gb ram, 2gb dedicated graphics and 1tb hard drive. Overall the value proposition is much stronger than that offered by Apple with the build quality probably equal or better in the Lenovo with better overall specs across the board.
The advantage of the Apple Macbooks v the Lenovo is styling, lightness and a prettier screen. But unless those things are priorities to you the Lenovo is the better choice.

As a further and equally deserving choice is the Asus Zenbook/UX models which you'd be best to buy from Centrecom. I like the $1,399 model which is 13'3 inch, with an i5, 8gb ram, 256SSD Drive. It's a sleak, light weight laptop with strong battery life and like with the Lenovo is suitable for an office situation and again has stronger specs than what you'll get in similarly price Apple laptops. The build quality isn't as extremely robust as the Lenovo, but still of strong overall build quality as I'd say of the various Apple Macbooks. And like the Lenovo Thinkpad I also favour the Asus based on the better value proposition given the better specs you are getting for what you are paying. You may also be able to get the same model Asus elsewhere more cheaply with the same specs, so with this model shop around and you may be able to get a get $ off somewhere else.

Here are the appropriate links:
Macbook pro 13': http://www.apple.com/au/shop/buy-mac/macbook-pro?product=MD101X/A&step=config#
Macbook air 11': http://www.apple.com/au/shop/buy-mac/macbook-air?product=MJVM2X/A&step=config#
Lenovo Thinkpad E460 14': http://www3.lenovo.com/au/en/deals/current-offers/deals-of-the-week/E460-AU-C4/p/20ETCTO1WWENAU3
Asus Zenbook UX303 13.3': http://www.centrecom.com.au/asus-ux303la-r40079g-133-full-hd-core-i5-ultra-portable-laptop

Look up some reviews online if you're keen on more information on these models. There are plenty of comprehensive reviews of each model to give you the best feel for what they offer.

Otherwise feel free to hit me up for more info/opinion/recommendations.

But if you're looking to run windows on it, my personally view anyway is you're wasting your money if you get the Apple. You get an Apple because you like the operating system. Not as a machine to run windows on.

 

[Knightmare]

15.6' inch laptops are consistently the best priced for their size from a bang for buck perspective. But I'll talk exclusively about those that are less than 15' inches in size.

If you're looking for relatively the least bad value proposition via Apple is the base model MacBook Pro 13' coming in at $1,699 via their website. The specs are lousy with an i5, 4gb ram, 500gb hard drive, DVD drive. The basics are strong build quality, good battery, pretty good portability. Just you're paying a significant price premium for the brand.

Given you're looking at the light laptops the MacBook Air the 11' comes in at $1,399 and the 13' comes in at $1,549. Both come with a weak variant of the i5 cpu, 4gb ram, 128 PCIe SSD drives which are super quick which is great for quick boot times but less storage.

Having looked through the Apple pricing it's not worth customising any of the parts as you're significantly overpaying to do that, and that's just a general rule anyone should follow if considering Apple laptops or their all-in-one desktop pc.

Is it worth paying the price premium for Apple laptops? If it's the base, non modified variant of the base product. The price/quality ratio is acceptable. If you wanted to upgrade the cpu, ram, hard drive size etc then absolutely do not touch an apple laptop/pc of any kind. Just keep in mind with Apple laptops, imacs etc, their parts are decidedly last generation and not at all built for performance. But if all you're doing is word-processing, web browsing and emails then it will suffice if you're in no hurry and don't care about performance.

In your $1,000-$1,500 range for someone looking for a business laptop of rock solid build quality with and strong battery life. My personal preference is towards the Lenovo Thinkpads. Their 14' inch models relative are their better priced models but they also make 12.5' inch laptops.
For $1,199 on the Lenovo website they are offering an i7, your choice of windows 7/10, 8gb ram, 2gb dedicated graphics and 1tb hard drive. Overall the value proposition is much stronger than that offered by Apple with the build quality probably equal or better in the Lenovo with better overall specs across the board.
The advantage of the Apple Macbooks v the Lenovo is styling, lightness and a prettier screen. But unless those things are priorities to you the Lenovo is the better choice.

As a further and equally deserving choice is the Asus Zenbook/UX models which you'd be best to buy from Centrecom. I like the $1,399 model which is 13'3 inch, with an i5, 8gb ram, 256SSD Drive. It's a sleak, light weight laptop with strong battery life and like with the Lenovo is suitable for an office situation and again has stronger specs than what you'll get in similarly price Apple laptops. The build quality isn't as extremely robust as the Lenovo, but still of strong overall build quality as I'd say of the various Apple Macbooks. And like the Lenovo Thinkpad I also favour the Asus based on the better value proposition given the better specs you are getting for what you are paying. You may also be able to get the same model Asus elsewhere more cheaply with the same specs, so with this model shop around and you may be able to get a get $ off somewhere else.

Here are the appropriate links:
Macbook pro 13': http://www.apple.com/au/shop/buy-mac/macbook-pro?product=MD101X/A&step=config#
Macbook air 11': http://www.apple.com/au/shop/buy-mac/macbook-air?product=MJVM2X/A&step=config#
Lenovo Thinkpad E460 14': http://www3.lenovo.com/au/en/deals/current-offers/deals-of-the-week/E460-AU-C4/p/20ETCTO1WWENAU3
Asus Zenbook UX303 13.3': http://www.centrecom.com.au/asus-ux303la-r40079g-133-full-hd-core-i5-ultra-portable-laptop

Look up some reviews online if you're keen on more information on these models. There are plenty of comprehensive reviews of each model to give you the best feel for what they offer.

Otherwise feel free to hit me up for more info/opinion/recommendations.

But if you're looking to run windows on it, my personally view anyway is you're wasting your money if you get the Apple. You get an Apple because you like the operating system. Not as a machine to run windows on.

And for those looking for a sub 15' inch gaming laptop in around the same price range. Worth checking out is the MSI GE40. Computer Alliance were selling it for $1,199 during the Boxing Day sales, it's now up to $1,395 which happens after new year, but the deal is still relatively ok give you get a highish end i7, 8gb ram, 1tb HDD, 128gb SSD and an acceptable for gaming Nvidia GTX 950m graphics card which makes it in my view the value choice of the more potable laptops.

 

[Simple Jack]

15.6' inch laptops are consistently the best priced for their size from a bang for buck perspective. But I'll talk exclusively about those that are less than 15' inches in size.
..............
But if you're looking to run windows on it, my personally view anyway is you're wasting your money if you get the Apple. You get an Apple because you like the operating system. Not as a machine to run windows on.

Thanks for the suggestions, I'll look into them.

I'm actually looking for a machine to fundamentally not run Windows on. I only meant the VM for the occasional times you need to use Windows only software. If it wasn't for the OS I wouldn't even be considering a mac. It's just because it seems to be a very polished, Unix-like OS which is what I am looking for. Getting a non mac, wiping/partitioning the HDD and then installing a Linux distro seems like it just won't give me the same high quality experience.

There are too many little things that work against Linux for personal computing. Hardware integration chief amongst them. I put up with that for now because otherwise the experience is considerably better than Windows having that complete integrated experience where everything just works well together is what I want. I just don't know if the mac trade off of high price/unfixable/unupgradeable hardware is worth getting the integration and OS.

 

[Knightmare]

Thanks for the suggestions, I'll look into them.

I'm actually looking for a machine to fundamentally not run Windows on. I only meant the VM for the occasional times you need to use Windows only software. If it wasn't for the OS I wouldn't even be considering a mac. It's just because it seems to be a very polished, Unix-like OS which is what I am looking for. Getting a non mac, wiping/partitioning the HDD and then installing a Linux distro seems like it just won't give me the same high quality experience.

There are too many little things that work against Linux for personal computing. Hardware integration chief amongst them. I put up with that for now because otherwise the experience is considerably better than Windows having that complete integrated experience where everything just works well together is what I want. I just don't know if the mac trade off of high price/unfixable/unupgradeable hardware is worth getting the integration and OS.

Both operating systems have their flaws and drawbacks.

Apple tend to do things in a prettier style but it depends on preferences and what you're used to. Both have their highly unintuitive elements and their good bits. I don't like their file navigation at all, but their bar down the bottom with all the icons/shortcuts I quite like. And you'll find your own likes/dislikes.

With macs there often are compatibility issues with windows specific software which is worth watching for, ask around at work for those programs whether they have had any issues with those programs you will need to use.

If you're that heavily anti-windows as an operating system, and all can be emulated fine onto a Mac then I'd probably be inclined to go the Mac air/pro - as cheap as you can go with the base 11 and 13 inch models respectively. But the disclaimer is if you think you'll want to upgrade it or modify it later, you're buying the wrong laptop and better off with the Asus/Lenovo and just putting up with Windows or installing Linux on it or whatever you would want to do with it.

 

[Magnum]

Just bought an HP Spectre x360 2in1 (i5, 4GB RAM, 128SSD) and its an excellent piece of kit for most tasks. I got it for $1176 at the Good Guys

Screen is great, tablet works very well, excellent battery life and - run windows 10. Very light and compact. Build quality is excellent.