patrick.net

Blue says

Do not buy too cheap with less number of CPUs if he wants to do some serious stuff, very likely it will pay him back in no time.

I understand. I have no intention of going cheap. I am budgeted to spend upto $1500 to $2000. I just want him to have an excellent laptop that will get him through 4 years of undergraduate school. However, I do not want to overbuy and over complicate it. I just want something that will HIM and his needs.

I will buy him an another one after he gets his degree.

gabbar says

I understand. I have no intention of going cheap. I am budgeted to spend upto $1500 to $2000. I just want him to have an excellent laptop that will get him through 4 years of undergraduate school. However, I do not want to overbuy and over complicate it. I just want something that will HIM and his needs.

I'd say, get him a basic used laptop, don't spend over $700.

If he wants to play Call of Duty 3000:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysKhbaLyIFw&source=patrick.net

No reason a healthy 18-21 year old can't work a few hours a week for beer & GPU money while going to school full time. Shit, he'll be partying like crazy until 4AM many nights whether or not he works 10-15 hours a week somewhere. Work is good for them.

See also half the Millennials as to how "Dont work, just study" worked out, they're 30 and still expecting parents to set up doc appointments and/or laundry service. I've seen this IRL, huge difference between my 2010 "Only here for resume padding, so I'll call in 'sick' again" milly interns vs. my 2019 "Can I get more hours? Money is Good" Zoomer interns.

Blue says

Like other said, try
1. Mac that is close to Linux
2. If college requires windooooz (I see $800-$1500 6-8 CPUs, 16-32GB RAM at Costco) buy and install Virtual machine (like http://openbox.org) and install Linux on it.
3. Like others said above buy a (not too) cheap new/old laptop and install any Linux flavor (I like Ubuntu) with dual boot to keep windows and Linux.
Linux is very flexible to be able to install quite a number open source software and experiment while leaning, its a lot of fun :)
Do not buy too cheap with less number of CPUs if he wants to do some serious stuff, very likely it will pay him back in no time.

I talked to somebody Wednesday - if I'm correct, MAC has moved to ARM as it's main processor and will soon drop x86 support entirely.

As a result of this, running a VM of Windows on a MAC or a VM of MAC under Windows (or Linux) may not be practical. Simulating an entire processor in software is not efficient and people that have used Qemu know this. It's in THEORY possible, but it's painful. It's SOOOOO SLOW.

Windows supports ARM, so does Linux, but I'm not certain about the quality of the distributions. I run a raspberry pi which is ARM - it's a capable computer, HOWEVER, it is nothing compared to my 7 year old i7 8 core 32 GB machine. It's like working on a computer from 2000. It works, but it's a little painful.

pudil says

Has anyone here tried wsl (windows subsystem for Linux) yet?

I'm about to test it out at work because Mac no longer uses intel chips but instead the M1 - which won't let us compile many bioinformatics packages in docker anymore.

richwicks says

It's like working on a computer from 2000. It works, but it's a little painful.

Yes, ideally its better to have either 1. Mac (costco: $1,449.99 MacBook Pro 13.3",M1 Chip 8-core CPU, 8-core GPU, 8GB, 512GB SSD) or 2. buy Windows box that supports dual boot and install Linux to be able to run Linux natively (I like this option).
The next alternative is get Linux laptop like Dell XPS 13 Laptop.

pudil says

Has anyone here tried wsl (windows subsystem for Linux) yet?

I know somebody that tried to use it years ago.

It sucks. Files written would be lost, it was a disaster. I don't know how it is now.

I use Linux as my base operating system. Samba is trivial to setup now though and if you want help with this - ask Patrick to give you my email address. Basically, it just means modifying your /etc/samba/smb.conf and adding the above to your smb.conf at the end of the file:

[SHARE_NAME]
    comment = SOME_SHARE_NAME-THIS_ISN'T_TOO_USEFUL
    path = /home/UNIX_USERNAME
    read only = no
    browsable = yes

Anything in caps, you need to replace. You will have to lookup smbpasswd to set a password for it.

If I run Windows now I do it as a VM and I setup the OS and use a Samba drive for storage on my main system. Setting up MacOS under this system isn't exactly trivial, although I've done it once, I can't seem to repeat it. If I can successfully setup a MacOS system again, I will document it. I just end up with a fucking blank screen. You need an INTEL processor for this, not AMD.

Does anyone have any thoughts about how Dell Precision vs Lenovo Thinkpad laptops compare?

Any comments about this laptop for freshman in college of engineering?

gabbar says

Does anyone have any thoughts about how Dell Precision vs Lenovo Thinkpad laptops compare?

Dell has a smother touchpad, Lenovo has hard right and left mouse click buttons, and a joystick. The Joystick takes some getting used to, to master it smoothly, and the touchpad isn't as responsive as the Dell. The Lenovo is built like a tank, the Dell has two year, obsolescence and self destruct built into it. At least that's been the experience with the 7 or 9 I bought over the years. Lenovo feels like a cheap shitty laptop, so they don't get stolen from companies. But the truth is you can't kill them and they are built like a tank. Where as the pretty thin, sleek Dells, that deploy the latest much have features, grow legs and walk away.

I think Lenovo gives you more for what you pay in the midrange laptops, that are priced in the $700 to $1500, you have to get a Dell refurbish to get as much specs for the money in that class, or buy a consumer class Laptop like an Inspiron(if they even still make them). I eventually dumped Dell and went Samsung. Samsung were thinner, nicer laptops for the money, but they too only lasted about 2 years. I wasn't happy with what I got for what I paid with my last Samsung laptop. But going on 4 years, it's still going strong. For the most part I credit. The fact that it sits above my desk on a monitor stand, connected to a Monitor hanging on the wall, and I use external mouse and keyboards for it. I doubt it would have lasted a year, if it were a rig I carried around in a Backpack everyday, and plugged and unplugged it in at two different locations.

In summary they are all shit, and have all had their golden years, when one over the other reigned supreme.
I would go with the Lenovo, that's what I would get if I were to buy a new Laptop. I know that the other brands had their day, but that day is in the past.

gabbar says

Any comments about this laptop for freshman in college of engineering?

It's 2012 specs with an updated UHD display.
Get a Solid State drive, SSHD is a hybrid, still has a spindle.

gabbar says

Any comments about this laptop for freshman in college of engineering?

16 GB is plenty, I'm on a computer that has 32 GB, is a desktop, and I commonly run 3 virtual machines on top of it - meaning I run 4 operating systems at the same time.

I also have an i7, it's now ANCIENT, but it's "good enough".

I'm an engineer, this is plenty for me. It was overkill when I bought it, and it cost me about $1,000 to build.

The most important thing is how much MEMORY it has, you want a minimum of 8GB. Disk storage, whatever, but 1TB is plenty. It's a fine computer, although personally I wouldn't want Windows on it, but I'm a freak engineer. That laptop should be able to comfortably run VirtualBox is they want to run Linux.

It's a fine machine based on the specs, if you're satisfied with the price I'd say go for it.

Tenpoundbass says

t's 2012 specs with an updated UHD display.
Get a Solid State drive, SSHD is a hybrid, still has a spindle.

So its a 10 year build? How did you identify its age? And no, I don't want a hybrid drive.

Tenpoundbass says

In summary they are all shit, and have all had their golden years, when one over the other reigned supreme.
I would go with the Lenovo, that's what I would get if I were to buy a new Laptop. I know that the other brands had their day, but that day is in the past.

Lenovo gets the most votes on this post. Thank you.

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/05/lenovo-tumbles-after-report-about-alleged-chinese-spy-chips.html

Lenovo shares tumble following report about alleged Chinese spy chips

Ultra_FJB says

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/05/lenovo-tumbles-after-report-about-alleged-chinese-spy-chips.html

Lenovo shares tumble following report about alleged Chinese spy chips

This is always a possibility when you outsource to a different country with its own self interest. Maybe it is even legit in the business world.