What laptop should I go for? Framework Laptop 16 or M2 Pro MacBook Pro 16"?

[AviatorMaverick]

Hello! If all goes well, I’ll probably be in college in a few months and plan to buy a laptop for that by December. However, I’m kinda torn on which laptop to go for.

My rationale for an Apple Silicon Mac is that:

• The battery life is extremely great, which would probably be useful in college.
• I’m pursuing a major in CSE, so I assume the compile times would help too.
• It’d complete my OS trifecta (I already have a Windows laptop and run a Linux homeserver with a GUI, because it’s cool to be able to use it as a backup desktop alongside running everything in docker), which would keep me updated on all three OSes.
• I really like good GUIs.
• I’d get to play around with Linux on ARM, like Asahi.
• I’d effectively have a device to test ARM stuff on as well.

Cons for an AS Mac:

• It’s Apple. I don’t know if I want to support them.
• It’s near unrepairable.
• No upgradibility in terms of storage and memory. If that fails, the laptop is dead.
• Apple’s new sleep sensor (which is a calibrated Angle sensor now, instead of a hall sensor) can’t be replaced by (most) third party repair.

My rationale for a Framework Laptop 16 is that:

• It’s super repairable, and represents a lot of my beliefs towards the direction computer hardware should be heading.
• I’ll go full-x86 Linux on a mobile device for the first time. Probably Zorin or Arch.
• I can game on it.
• The modularity can be insanely nifty in multiple environments, where I can just print and modify ports to work with a lot of legacy hardware.
• Easily upgradeable to extend the lifetime of the device.

Cons for the FL16:

• Late release date.
• I’m not in an officially supported country, so getting parts might be tough even if I buy spare ports.
• Losing out on completing the OS trifecta.

I already have a Windows laptop, but it’s a gaming one which I don’t wanna daily in college simply because it will be cumbersome to use. I’m a bit conflicted because I’m very pro-OSS and repairability. That said, Framework is my only consideration in the non-Mac space. I have used MacOS in the past, right up to Catalina.

I’d be grateful for your advice!

[MetalizeYourBrain]

Those are two wildly different machines. What I’d say you could do is try to give all the pros and cons different values out of 5 or 10. Add them all up, subtract the cons from the pros and the device that come out on top based on your own scores is the machine that better fits your criteria.

@AviatorMaverick

I’d get to play around with Linux on ARM, like Asahi.

You’re buying on a promise that one day Asahi will work and be supported. That’s the only “moot point” I can find, but it’s my opinion.

@AviatorMaverick

No upgradibility in terms of storage and memory. If that fails, the laptop is dead.

I still have an HP laptop from 10 years ago and had to replace memory and the wireless card on it because both took a crap on me. I’d be kinda afraid to have a machine with soldered on everything if I knew I’d be pushing it day in and day out like I did with that poor laptop (smashing away at Dota matches for hours on end with the CPU pegged at 90+°C).

@AviatorMaverick

I’m not in an officially supported country, so getting parts might be tough even if I buy spare ports.

They’re adding more and more countries as time goes on. If you’re not in a hurry your country might be added by the end of the year.

[velvia]

As @MetalizeYourBrain mentioned, two diametrically opposed systems.

Lot of good advice in here, but what strikes me is:

@AviatorMaverick

Hello! If all goes well, I’ll probably be in college in a few months and plan to buy a laptop for that by December.

Even if you’re in a CS program the VAST MAJORITY of what you’re going to be doing is word processing, web browsing, and some light compiling in a few of your classes. You don’t need either of those laptops to get you through college.

Get yourself a 3-5 year old Thinkpad, Latitude, or other “business” notebook. With the inevitable battery replacement you’ll be in it for under $500, spend the other $1,500 or so you’d be burning on either of the above on books, board, beer, anything but a laptop.

In 2-4 years when you have an idea of where you’ll be focusing then look into what’s available, you’ll save more than what you put into the first laptop off the Apple by that point. If you do end up going new: Apple is notoriously good for financing for students, so I’d probably go that way, but I’d opt for a Macbook Air, not the pro. They’re absurdly capable even at the base configuration (but they sing with 16GB of RAM)

[AviatorMaverick]

That feels weirdly ChatGPT-esque.

[AviatorMaverick]

@velvia

Even if you’re in a CS program the VAST MAJORITY of what you’re going to be doing is word processing, web browsing, and some light compiling in a few of your classes. You don’t need either of those laptops to get you through college.

Yeah, but I plan to do a lot more stuff, including but not limited to video editing, graphic design, VMs and other passion projects. I don’t doubt my ability to max out the performance for stuff I’ll use it for since I tinker a lot and have already played around with my friends’ Macs.

That said, I’ll definitely consider it! Thanks!

@MetalizeYourBrain

I still have an HP laptop from 10 years ago and had to replace memory and the wireless card on it because both took a crap on me. I’d be kinda afraid to have a machine with soldered on everything if I knew I’d be pushing it day in and day out like I did with that poor laptop (smashing away at Dota matches for hours on end with the CPU pegged at 90+°C).

Yup, that’s what I’m afraid of. I dailied a 2008 MacBook Pro (hand-me-down from my parents) for a while and extended its lifetime with an SSD, RAM, and a new battery. If something like this is affected, it’s effectively a dud.

@MetalizeYourBrain

They’re adding more and more countries as time goes on. If you’re not in a hurry your country might be added by the end of the year.

Hopefully!

@MetalizeYourBrain

You’re buying on a promise that one day Asahi will work and be supported. That’s the only “moot point” I can find, but it’s my opinion.

It works right now. I’ve used it. And that’s not a needed feature since I already have a Linux desktop. It’s just a nice-to-have.

[MazeFrame]

@AviatorMaverick

I’ll probably be in college in a few months and plan to buy a laptop for that by December. However, I’m kinda torn on which laptop to go for.

I went through university on some random AMD A6-series, I think. 2 Cores, sluggish on a good day and the battery lasted exactly the advertised 6 hours. I upgraded RAM from the shipped 4Gig to 16 and replaced the craptastic Realtek Wifi with an Intel AC9260.
Overall cost was 450€
Running VMs was no fun, office and code-writing/compiling was perfectly fine.

Touch-Screens are maybe nice for taking notes (if that is your style, I prefer paper).

@AviatorMaverick

I already have a Windows laptop, but it’s a gaming one which I don’t wanna daily in college simply because it will be cumbersome to use.

Yeah, don’t do that.

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If you have the racecar sitting at home though, what you realistically are going to use is a typewriter with memory, then sync your notes to “the good one” and work on that. Maybe a tablet with keyboard cover is enough to get you by.

[MetalizeYourBrain]

@AviatorMaverick

Yup, that’s what I’m afraid of

Things have gotten better though and I think the termals on those new MacBooks are good enough so much so that it won’t kill anything. But something defective might still fail and would require you to take the device to Apple to fix.

@AviatorMaverick

It works right now.

I’ve been following the progress and there’s still no fully accelerated video encoding and decoding, most of the silicon is not getting used (media engines). It’s not finished, that’s what I meant to say. Though your judgment on the matter is more than good enough to make a good choice for your needs.

Have you considered the lighter 13" Framework laptop? I think it’s much better if you’re gonna carry the thing around all day, battery is gonna be way better and CPU performance for

@AviatorMaverick

video editing, graphic design, VMs and other passion projects

is gonna be more than enough. I’ve edited a not so simple Inventor project on the previously mentioned old laptop (i7 3630QM, 16GB RAM, Nvidia GT635M) and it worked like a charm. Though I didn’t render the thing since I only needed it for a simulation.

Video editing is the thing that might make you want to consider the Mac really. What video resolution and bitrate are you going to edit?

[AbstractConcept]

I already reported it before scrolling down to your comment; want to place bets on when it will start spewing advertisements?

[AviatorMaverick]

@MetalizeYourBrain

Have you considered the lighter 13" Framework laptop? I think it’s much better if you’re gonna carry the thing around all day, battery is gonna be way better and CPU performance for

I really just don’t like 13" devices, personally. Bit too small for me, IMO. 15 or 16" devices are much more preferable.

@MetalizeYourBrain

Video editing is the thing that might make you want to consider the Mac really. What video resolution and bitrate are you going to edit?

4K60 (8000 kbps) or higher, but also want to play with multiple layers, effects etc.

[AviatorMaverick]

Already does, but for now, it’s detectable at least.

[AbstractConcept]

Are you sure the 13 inch Framework would have better battery life? That was the main complaint I found the last time I was looking at 13 inch Framework reviews. Larger laptop would mean more room for a larger batterty, no?

@MazeFrame

then sync your notes to “the good one”

Especially if you avoid cloud syncing, do check how easily notes can be transferred from the programs you are using. iOS Notes for example can only export one at a time and loses formatting unless you first copy to Pages and export as non-.txt.

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Something else to consider though, if it gets severely damaged, on the Framework you can remove the M.2 and view your files on a different device.

[AviatorMaverick]

@AbstractConcept

Especially if you avoid cloud syncing, do check how easily notes can be transferred from the programs you are using.

Syncthing is pretty nifty for that. I use Obsidian, so it’s all .md files. Super convenient.

I’m fairly good with backups, so will have Nextcloud in the background backing up important folders on the fly.

[MetalizeYourBrain]

@AviatorMaverick

I really just don’t like 13" devices, personally. Bit too small for me, IMO. 15 or 16" devices are much more preferable.

Fair enough. Having carried a 4lbs laptop around for years I don’t think I’m ever gonna get something that heavy.

@AviatorMaverick

4K60 (8000 kbps) or higher

I don’t think you’re ever gonna be limited by a modern laptop even if you add layers and effects. Considering that an high performance laptop has almost the same power as my desktop (3700x + 2070 Super) I can tell you that you can easly edit 4K30 200Mbit on it (mine’s from a Fujifilm X-S10).

[AviatorMaverick]

I just kinda wanna have some performance headroom, so that I don’t limit any new use cases. I really like to tinker with a lot of stuff and might even try to get into things like Blender. Just wanted to keep all avenues open.

[PaintChips]

Even though during my undergrad time period I didn’t major in CS, the amount of spreadsheet data crunching for a science track had me cringing with a lowly 12" PowerBook G4 of that time period… the only upside was Apple had the best battery life back then at ~5 hrs when PCs barely lasted 3 hrs with a four cell battery. I found myself moving to a Thinkpad with an extended battery and Microsoft Office worked much better, Office on the Mac is still a mess if you rely upon Excel.

With any Mac expect it’ll likely last 6yrs when you treat it very well but with the soldered down nature of most laptops its meaningless as reliability is better vs soldered RAM back in the 2000s. The only downside I see using a Mac for education is Microsoft Word/Excel has a ton of bugs, for example if you embed a photo/graphics into a Word for Mac document it might not properly render on Office for Windows–this bug also happens with PowerPoint too. During my undergrad time period I knew many who used VirtualPC then later Parallels to run Windows+MS Office to avoid some of the funky issues of the Mac version of Office. As much as Microsoft claims Office for Mac has been rewritten from the ground up, much of bugs are related to backwards version support–for example a Word/Excel document from 2007 will render differently compared to a 2010 vs 2016 document. (Office format breakage rarely happened between Office 95 to 2003)

@AbstractConcept

Are you sure the 13 inch Framework would have better battery life? That was the main complaint I found the last time I was looking at 13 inch Framework reviews. Larger laptop would mean more room for a larger batterty, no?

A larger laptop doesn’t always mean longer run time as some companies can adjust the TDP lower based on the cooling they’re able to fit in the laptop design, doesn’t matter if its a 13" Framework vs 16" Framework or a Thinkpad T14 vs T16 you can typically expect the larger laptop will have a much more larger cooling system(two fans or a larger heatsink) so an i7 or Ryzen 7 can turbo boost longer.

@AviatorMaverick

I just kinda wanna have some performance headroom, so that I don’t limit any new use cases.

I might be in the minority of saying this, check your campus IT dept as some universities have student deals with Lenovo & Dell. At my former uni you could order a Thinkpad T-series or a Dell Latitude a bit cheaper than CTOing, repairing a business grade model is just as easy as a Framework. If battery life is a decision factor, stick with an i5 or Ryzen 5 as it’ll power sip quite nicely. When CPU power means more than wanting a dGPU, there are some laptop makers who use Intel and AMD H-series CPUs with the IGP and the battery difference tends to be 5% less than a U-series.

[thro]

as someone who runs linux macos and windows…

you can run all three on a macbook. you can’t run all three legally on anything else.

the mac hardware is nice too.

i own an m1 pro 14 for the above reasons. the XDR retina display will ruin you for other laptop displays. or most desktop displays and tv screens for that matter.

[gc71]

shopping for a laptop?

the answer is pretty much always Mac

however, I strongly suggest considering the smaller 14" versions, 16" is pretty damned big and heavy, you are gonna regret it when you try to haul this thing around campus all day every day every week all year

whatever the latest model of the MacBook Air or MacBook Pro will likely be plenty for you. Personally I actually prefer the Air models. Just make sure you get one with MagSafe charging.

the build quality is unmatched, Air models are fanless, macOS is a great desktop OS, its a great ecosystem for programming work, really the list of things it doesnt do well is extremely short and not terribly relevant.

my suggestion is 14" / 16GB memory / 1TB storage, minimum.

keep in mind that you can get them discounted on both Apple’s own “Refurbished” store or their Education store, but you can also find sales on Amazon etc., keep an eye on SlickDeals too

for context, I also use all three OS’s regularly, I work in Linux server on a daily basis ssh’d in from my MacBook to do programming stuff. For a daily driver general use system there is really nothing close to Mac and macOS.

[gc71]

@AviatorMaverick

Cons for an AS Mac:

• It’s Apple. I don’t know if I want to support them.
• It’s near unrepairable.
• No upgradibility in terms of storage and memory. If that fails, the laptop is dead.
• Apple’s new sleep sensor (which is a calibrated Angle sensor now, instead of a hall sensor) can’t be replaced by (most) third party repair.

None of these things matter. There is nothing to repair; if you are worried then get Apple Care and keep good data backups (such as Time Machine on an external drive). There is nothing to upgrade, get 16GB RAM and at least 1TB storage and you should be fine for the life of the system.

In all my years of owning more than a dozen different laptops, including some that lived in my college backpack for years, never have I ever had one break or need repairs. Its simply not an issue if you are cognizant of taking care of them.

Another thing worth mentioning, one of the only real limitations of the M1/M2 platform in my experience is the lack of virtualization for x86, which I think you brought up. This, however, is also largely irrelevant. If you have a credit card, you can just rent a tiny Linux server on something like Digital Ocean for light dev work. Its also extremely likely that your college has its own computer lab and servers you can use. And finally, you can just have a secondary system, literally any spare laptop or old desktop you can find, and slap Linux on it for the few times you need something besides ARM M1/M2 macOS.

my experiences with all my devices suggests that “modularity” is a dead gimmick. You might as well just get a system that is adequately powerful enough up-front, rather than getting something gimped and underpowered and then spending more time and effort later to bring it up to speed as if having a half-baked system for a period of time is a “feature” of some kind.

[risk]

If you haven’t used Mac OS before, you’re in for a treat and a bit of a culture shock. The OS GUI feels a lot more pedestrian with a lot less customizability and a lot of polish. E.g. if you’re comparing Windows and KDE, it’s on the opposite end of the spectrum. If you’re into GUIs you’ll find it super interesting.

Also, xcode and swift… if you want to learn and use those, you kind of need a Mac.

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Hardware wise Apple Silicon is awesome, but I don’t know how much money really means to you.

The configuration I’d get if I wanted it as a portable workhorse for VMs would be expensive.

screenshot stupid Mac 16 workdonkey

… and as amazing as that machine is (hook it up use as a desktop replacement to run small clusters in VMs), it’d be wasted most of the time, it’s hard to justify as a VM machine. For that money I’d like a proper server please.

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I think a better spend of money on Apple Silicon would be to get it as a typewriter/browser type/“headfull” machine that you take on the go, but dock to nice 4k screens and mechanical keyboards at home/office/workplace.

It’s still expensive, but omg that display - so nice for couch and coffee shop coding.

… and then just use the rest of the money on headless x86 boxes or various kinds to do Linux stuff.

If you decide to not need the 2 external displays, … or that you suddenly like money for some reason, then maybe a MacBook Air would be an ok bring along computer that you could “dock” at your “workplace”, but it’s limited to 1 external display and just not as fast.

air with some ram and storage

There’s rumors of an upcoming Air 15, I don’t know if framework 16 is out where you live.

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But then if you want a semi-capable “bring-along” and not a workhorse, this middle of the road thing is amazing because of the screen and dock-ability:

MacBook pro 14 option

Still expensive, but the 1300+ money difference to first workhorse machine, is an interesting start for some basic home network gear and a couple of HDDs that would be a good foundation for some cheap Proxmox/Ceph HA playground that you could grow over time.

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Framework gets you more compute for the buck, waaay cheaper, especially with added ram and storage, might replace your desktop “work-study-station” for the next 2-3 years, definitely a better dockable than the MacBook air in a similar price category.
But IS IT the better experience you want on the go than any of the macs, e.g. spending 2h in between at a random not-starbucks coffee place, when you’re browsing, or light coding or reading up in stuff making your world domination plans.
I don’t know, i don’t think it’s as comfortable as the MacBook Pro, but I don’t know compared to the Air, especially how will framework 16 compare to air 15. I like the 3:2 screen

framework 13 screenshot

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Ideally, I’d like a 14" 3:2 very hi-dpi OLED screen framework, running Linux in HDR (ahahaha) with a capable 8+ core CPU and a 80wh+ battery that lasts 15+ hours of screen on time looping 4k videos or 10+ hours doing basic golang or python coding with LSP style compiling, with a 50+ GitHub and 20 Gmail tabs open

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In summary, screen or money?
… and will you be remoting into codeserver?

Personally, if I had more time to work on personal stuff, I’d go for the 3k 14" AND a framework 13 for the curiosity/novelty/quirk/pain of Wayland/KDE and multi-display. (if I had more time I probably wouldn’t be able to afford both, but I could still dream)

[AviatorMaverick]

@gc71

get 16GB RAM and at least 1TB storage and you should be fine for the life of the system.

Planning to get 32GB RAM + 1TB Storage, yup.

@gc71

“modularity” is a dead gimmick. You might as well just get a system that is adequately powerful enough up-front, rather than getting something gimped and underpowered and then spending more time and effort later to bring it up to speed as if having a half-baked system for a period of time is a “feature” of some kind.

Disagree. Don’t plan to go for a half-baked device. I do want to get a good device upfront. But that doesn’t mean I’d not like to just replace a dead part later. Or get a better one if there’s a great improvement of some sort.

@gc71

tiny Linux server on something like Digital Ocean for light dev work

Already have my own homeserver for that!

@risk

If you haven’t used Mac OS before, you’re in for a treat and a bit of a culture shock. The OS GUI feels a lot more pedestrian with a lot less customizability and a lot of polish. E.g. if you’re comparing Windows and KDE, it’s on the opposite end of the spectrum.

Have used all three! They’re great in their own ways IMO.

@risk

Air 15

I don’t really like the feel of the new Airs + kinda want that Pro display.

@risk

reading up in stuff making your world domination plans.

You don’t have to expose me like that.

@risk

screen

Yeah, I forgot to mention this, but I really like the display of the new Pros. It’s insanely good for stuff I wanna do, especially color-wise. And the speakers are insane. Great for a lot of creative work.

@risk

screenshot stupid Mac 16 workdonkey

This is the config I’m looking at. (Will get an educational discount later, ofc).

@risk

… and will you be remoting into codeserver?

Already use Codeserver. So yeah, probably will for some stuff.