<story><title>Seven years later, I bought a new MacBook. For the first time, I don&apos;t love it</title><url>https://cfenollosa.com/blog/seven-years-later-i-bought-a-new-macbook-for-the-first-time-i-dont-love-it.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>blub</author><text>On paper Windows is good. In practice the telemetry and the story behind its introduction and how they handled communication means that I won&amp;#x27;t consider Windows as a primary OS candidate until there&amp;#x27;s a CEO change at least.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s disappointing to see so many being ignorant about this topic.</text></item><item><author>modernerd</author><text>The XPS 17 will be my next “MacBook”.&lt;p&gt;It should be out this month and it ticks all the boxes for me (great screen, supposedly good cooling, user-replaceable SSD&amp;#x2F;RAM, acceptable weight and size for a 17&amp;quot; laptop).&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.theverge.com&amp;#x2F;2020&amp;#x2F;5&amp;#x2F;13&amp;#x2F;21257006&amp;#x2F;dell-xps-17-15-redesign-specs-features-update-2020&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.theverge.com&amp;#x2F;2020&amp;#x2F;5&amp;#x2F;13&amp;#x2F;21257006&amp;#x2F;dell-xps-17-15-r...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=XyRUWM_LOPQ&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=XyRUWM_LOPQ&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;ve been trying Windows again after ~20 years on Macs (via a borrowed Lenovo Carbon X1 and then a second-hand XPS 15) and — unlike the author here — I&amp;#x27;m surprised how much better it has gotten.&lt;p&gt;Having fully expected to buy a Windows laptop and just run Linux on it, I&amp;#x27;m happy enough with the general Windows experience and the new WSL2&amp;#x2F;Windows Terminal&amp;#x2F;VS Code improvements that switching full-time makes sense for me.&lt;p&gt;The perks for me over macOS are the widely increased hardware choice, improved repairability&amp;#x2F;upgradeability, access to Windows-only software&amp;#x2F;games, better default desktop environment (window snapping&amp;#x2F;management, keyboard shortcuts for apps in the taskbar), and being able to boot real Linux images within ~1 second and work out of them comfortably.&lt;p&gt;The perks for me over Linux are the ability to run Adobe and other Windows apps, lower manual maintenance, fewer rabbit holes (I used Arch for about a year and found I was personally prone to exploring Arch instead of doing pet projects), better general integration with video cards, authentication hardware (fingerprint sensors&amp;#x2F;Windows Hello), projectors&amp;#x2F;external monitors, as well as a generally better experience with power management, wake-from-sleep, and connecting&amp;#x2F;reconnecting to Wi-Fi.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>modernerd</author><text>I understand abstaining from a platform on principle.&lt;p&gt;But it&amp;#x27;s pretty simple to opt-out of non-essential telemetry because so many people complained about it in Windows 10:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.windowscentral.com&amp;#x2F;how-view-and-manage-diagnostic-data-windows-10-april-2018-update&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.windowscentral.com&amp;#x2F;how-view-and-manage-diagnosti...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;I set telemetry to &amp;#x27;basic&amp;#x27; which means I&amp;#x27;m comfortable with essential system data being sent in return for my system gaining updates and security patches.&lt;p&gt;Microsoft does a better job than many about explaining what data it collects, why it collects it, and how to disable collection where possible across its products:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;privacy.microsoft.com&amp;#x2F;en-US&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;privacy.microsoft.com&amp;#x2F;en-US&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;Last year it started explaining which telemetry in Windows 10 is required (system data for updates&amp;#x2F;security) and which is optional (usage data to shape product direction) in a way that&amp;#x27;s largely free from legalese:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;support.microsoft.com&amp;#x2F;en-us&amp;#x2F;help&amp;#x2F;4468236&amp;#x2F;diagnostics-feedback-and-privacy-in-windows-10-microsoft-privacy&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;support.microsoft.com&amp;#x2F;en-us&amp;#x2F;help&amp;#x2F;4468236&amp;#x2F;diagnostics...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;There are definitely Windows users who are “being ignorant about this topic” but that&amp;#x27;s not true of everyone. For me it&amp;#x27;s a combination of understanding what is sent, why it&amp;#x27;s sent, and how to control what&amp;#x27;s sent. That info used to be a lot harder to find so I&amp;#x27;d say things are improving.&lt;p&gt;Reflecting on my own risk profile, seeing first-hand how much telemetry can benefit product teams, and learning about how the Windows update process works at a global scale (the “essential” telemetry class informs partial&amp;#x2F;phased roll-outs) also helped temper my initial reaction against telemetry being included at all.</text></comment>
<story><title>Seven years later, I bought a new MacBook. For the first time, I don&apos;t love it</title><url>https://cfenollosa.com/blog/seven-years-later-i-bought-a-new-macbook-for-the-first-time-i-dont-love-it.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>blub</author><text>On paper Windows is good. In practice the telemetry and the story behind its introduction and how they handled communication means that I won&amp;#x27;t consider Windows as a primary OS candidate until there&amp;#x27;s a CEO change at least.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s disappointing to see so many being ignorant about this topic.</text></item><item><author>modernerd</author><text>The XPS 17 will be my next “MacBook”.&lt;p&gt;It should be out this month and it ticks all the boxes for me (great screen, supposedly good cooling, user-replaceable SSD&amp;#x2F;RAM, acceptable weight and size for a 17&amp;quot; laptop).&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.theverge.com&amp;#x2F;2020&amp;#x2F;5&amp;#x2F;13&amp;#x2F;21257006&amp;#x2F;dell-xps-17-15-redesign-specs-features-update-2020&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.theverge.com&amp;#x2F;2020&amp;#x2F;5&amp;#x2F;13&amp;#x2F;21257006&amp;#x2F;dell-xps-17-15-r...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=XyRUWM_LOPQ&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=XyRUWM_LOPQ&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;ve been trying Windows again after ~20 years on Macs (via a borrowed Lenovo Carbon X1 and then a second-hand XPS 15) and — unlike the author here — I&amp;#x27;m surprised how much better it has gotten.&lt;p&gt;Having fully expected to buy a Windows laptop and just run Linux on it, I&amp;#x27;m happy enough with the general Windows experience and the new WSL2&amp;#x2F;Windows Terminal&amp;#x2F;VS Code improvements that switching full-time makes sense for me.&lt;p&gt;The perks for me over macOS are the widely increased hardware choice, improved repairability&amp;#x2F;upgradeability, access to Windows-only software&amp;#x2F;games, better default desktop environment (window snapping&amp;#x2F;management, keyboard shortcuts for apps in the taskbar), and being able to boot real Linux images within ~1 second and work out of them comfortably.&lt;p&gt;The perks for me over Linux are the ability to run Adobe and other Windows apps, lower manual maintenance, fewer rabbit holes (I used Arch for about a year and found I was personally prone to exploring Arch instead of doing pet projects), better general integration with video cards, authentication hardware (fingerprint sensors&amp;#x2F;Windows Hello), projectors&amp;#x2F;external monitors, as well as a generally better experience with power management, wake-from-sleep, and connecting&amp;#x2F;reconnecting to Wi-Fi.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>alpaca128</author><text>I completely agree. Also the automatic updates which potentially just close an open session including unsaved files is not something that helps trust. Windows has become less transparent and much more controlling, actively ignoring or overriding user preferences, and I don&amp;#x27;t know why I should use a software like that, not to mention pay for the &amp;quot;privilege&amp;quot; of being messed with.</text></comment>