Winders™ Notebooks

[DT]

RAM is fully socketed, so I can easily go to 32GB (with even higher performance RAM vs. OEM) for ~$150 at any time.

No time like the present - and technically there's only 15 in stock now

 

[DT]

The story so far ...

The new machine is incredibly fast, quiet, the display is terrific, gets into a ready to use state from deep sleep in < 10 seconds, and with my current heads down focus on my Windows dev work, it's a treat. The Parallels VM on a Mini was getting to be a little clunky, though I was a few versions behind.

The new 27" 4K displays are terrific, it makes the whole experience pretty stellar, I've got a ton of screen real estate, ultra crisp text, the notebook is running a VNC session to the Mini in full screen, very handy for messages, grabbing a file, accessing photos.

Windows 11 has some great features, like excellent window management, it definitely has a lot of MacOS vibe with how the taskbar is designed, some things I like better, but without getting into too much Windows 11 vs. MacOS, I'll say that the former has definitely improved.

Game performance is stellar, even though I haven't really played anything, but we have plans for this weekend The plan is to connect (via HDMI) to the main TV and use an XBOX controller (already connected and tested), and I imagine the Sonos audio system will really shine.

 

[DT]

No time like the present - and technically there's only 15 in stock now

Pretty easy install, booted right up with 32GB, got some headroom now. In addition to all the services like MS-SQL, IIS, I generally have VS, MSSM or Oracle SQL Manger, Postman, an email client, VNC, RD, Chrome with about 20+ tabs, text editor, you know, just a pretty regular dev tool set. Now I can fire up Word or Excel, or even something like Affinity Photo without stressing the RAM.

 

[DT]

I'm really digging on the "new" Windows machine. I'd been working on a VM (on my '18 i7 Mini) for so long, I forgot what it was like to run "native" on fully dedicated-to-Windows hardware. Especially with new 4K 27" displays (and using the 16" internal display as an excellent 3rd monitor). I did run Bootcamp on my MBP, but again, that wasn't nearly the performance and I didn't have as nice of a setup as I do now with the G series KB and mouse, that doesn't have to do double duty between two different OSs.

It's very quiet, I only experience an occasional fan surge, and not any more than it happened on the Mini. For this last push of Windows based development, I really should've done this sooner.

The extra bonus of this being a pretty stout gaming machine I haven't fully realized yet, but (per my comment in another thread), I'm still stockpiling games, and just a quick preview here and there, it's pretty impressive.

 

[DT]

@Renzatic

I almost bought Affinity Photo, I occasionally need a good photo editing app, and while I love Pixelmator, it's MacOS only. Affinity seemed to be a good replacement, but I didn't get to spend much time with it before my trial expired.

I originally started with GIMP, installed, fired it up, I saw the UI and started crying ... uninstalled it (installed the Affinity trial).

So I re-installed GIMP, tweaked the UI a bit, went into prefs, selected System for Theme, Color for Icon Theme, set the icon size for Custom >> Large. That made a big difference, but the UI still seems a bit crowded.

Affinity looks better, but before I commit to $50-something, I figured I'd ping you, get you're $0.02 on Windows photo editors (don't mind paying, but won't do a sub)

 

[Renzatic]

Affinity looks better, but before I commit to $50-something, I figured I'd ping you, get you're $0.02 on Windows photo editors (don't mind paying, but won't do a sub)

I swear by Affinity Photo. As hard as this is for me to say, considering how miserly I am, I honestly think they're not charging enough for the program, giving the impression that it's a sub-par alternative for cheap people. In reality, it can do 99.9% of everything PS can do, and can occasionally do it better.

The only reason why I'd suggest waiting is because Serif may be banging out the long awaited 2.0 release, which will likely be a paid upgrade. I dunno when it's coming out, and the price for the upgrade will likely be fairly cheap, so unless you're super miserly about your money, there's really no downside to getting it now.

...and don't use GIMP. Never use GIMP. If you absolutely must go with an open source photo editor, use Krita, even though it's more of a painting program with some photo editing capabilities.

 

[DT]

Excellent, thanks, that kind of seals-the-deal for me

I'll also keep an eye out for a Black Friday / Cyber Whatever sales, I see they did one last year for 50% all their products.

And once again, GIMP is returned to the ether ...

 

[DT]

@Renzatic

OK, got an announcement via email today - since I registered for the trial - about the 2.0 versions like you mentioned. The new version is $69, on sale for $40, and this is a pretty sweet deal:

So for $99 you get V2.0 of Designer, Photo and Publisher for Windows, MacOS __and__ iPadOS!

I like the idea of being able to bounce back to the Mac and/or iPad and use the same software (vs. Pixelmator). Probably wouldn't use Publisher, but Designer might be cool to have.

 

[Renzatic]

I like the idea of being able to bounce back to the Mac and/or iPad and use the same software (vs. Pixelmator). Probably wouldn't use Publisher, but Designer might be cool to have.

It's a damn steal at that price, even if you only intend to use 2 of the 3. I'd get it.

 

[DT]

Yeah, I guess using the current sale prices to compare:

Windows, $40 x 3 (for each app, Photo, Designer, Publisher - I think they're the same price), MacOS, $40 x 3, iPad $12 x 3, that's $276 vs. $99

(i.e., all 9 applications for the same price as JUST Photo on Mac/Win/iPadOS)