Quality of everything is getting worse

FractalAudio

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Fractal Audio Systems
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My 2012 Macbook Pro is on it's last legs. So I'm looking for a new laptop. Should've never installed Mojave but it was constantly nagging me. Worked great before that. Now it's a dog and says the battery needs service but it only has 500 charge cycles. I'm convinced Apple slows down older products intentionally.

Dell: Gets really hot. Dell's response: "Dont' put it on your lap". Excuse me? Why tf do you call it a laptop then?

Apple: No USB ports. You need dongles for everything. Who was the rocket surgeon who came up with that idea? No mag-safe anymore. WTF? Trackpad the size of the USS Nimitz. Stupid strip thingy at the top. STILL no backspace key. Crappy keyboard where the keys stop working because they really needed to shave 0.1mm off the thickness.

Surface Book 2: Was tempted to get this until I read the reviews. 25% of the reviews are 1-star ratings. So, yeah, I'm guessing it's typical MS quality. Cut every corner possible and it breaks after a couple months.

Lenovo X1 Carbon. Overheats and CPU throttles. Gee what a surprise. You made the shell out of carbon fiber dumbasses. It's not a very good conductor of heat.

What's with the "it needs to be absolutely as thin as possible"? I'd rather have a laptop 1/2" thicker if it stayed cooler and got better battery life.



I relied on Intellicast for weather. They got bought by Weather Underground. "Dont' worry, it's gonna be great". Uh, no, WU sucks donkey tits. Everything TWC touches turns to poop.


My Porsche Cayenne got hit by a deer. Damage not too bad but was thinking about trading it in. The new ones are noticeable poorer quality. Floor mats look like they're made out of recycled burlap bags. Poor panel fit, lower quality materials everywhere. Disappointing.


Why do these tech companies have to keep moving the cheese. I swear they just change things for the sake of change.


Oh, and get off my lawn...
 
I too am disappointed in what Apple has done to their MacBook Pro...Not sure what the best alternative would be? Let us know if you come up with a better alternative.
 
Literally just went through this with computers about a month ago. I also have a 2012 MacBook Pro that was reaching the end of its life. I was really considering a Dell XPS 15 but I just couldn't get over the issues I kept reading about. I refuse to buy a new MacBook Pro, especially with the backlight and keyboard issues, not to mention the lack of ports and that stupid touch bar gimmick.

I ended up going with a used (good condition) 2015 retina MacBook Pro from OWC. I know it's not the latest and greatest but it works for what I need right now. It's hard to imagine that a company can brand a product as "Pro" when it is clearly geared towards the consumer market with useless features and cosmetics rather than a professional market. I'd take a much thicker macbook pro any day if it had all of the features that a professional market actually demands. Leave the gimmicks to the other product lines, and keep the "Pro" geared towards the people who actually use them professionally.

I remember a few years ago I was always so eager to move on to the new tech, whether it be computers, phones, audio interfaces, etc. Now I'm so nervous to upgrade anything as it seems to be a constant struggle. Glad I only have to worry about Fractal products, which just get better and better.
 
Yup. Nice car. It's a GTS. Pretty quick for a heavy SUV. Gotta a great deal on it because it was a "executive demo".
I have a serious bit of lust for a Macan.

Relatedly: don't buy a new MacBook Pro. The keyboards on them are abysmal. Typing on the one I have is like slapping a plastic lid with wet fish fingers.
 
I have the 13” MacBook Pro (with touchbar: I figured out a good setting for it).The 15” design is so stupid. The trackpad is soooo big and you can’t even write on it or anything extra for it’s dumb size. 13” CPU is fast enough for photo/video for me and the size of things works well.

Consumers and demand partly drive what products become over time. But I think companies should stop listening to dumb ideas from the masses. But that said, whatever company does the dumb ideas first will get the money, so it’s just a race to the ground as always.
 
2 months ago, I had just installed an app (for AWS development) on my home PC (win10x64 Apr 18 Creators update).
Almost immediately, it started blue screening. I removed the app. OK.
Still blue screening..
Ran multiple boot-time mem tests.. ALL passed without issue.
Continued getting weird, random, non-memory related BSOD's, and digging for solutions.
After much research (and a YUGE amount of cursing) I came to the conclusion - as did many other web sites - that a clean install was needed. I did this after backing up as much as I could, including the registry, etc.
Fixed??
Ummm no-o-o-o-o-o :mad: Same issues. RANDOM BSOD's.. more mem tests.. all clean!
Pulling my hair out now..
I came across a post about 17 levels deep on an MS tech site.. said to use Memtest86 as MS memtest is no good.
Oh wow.. memtest86 is still around for wintel boxes? I remember using it on old 8086 ans 8088 boxes!
OK. at this point.. what the hey!
Created a boot USB drive with it. Ran a couple of iterations.

57,647 Errors, all located on the 3rd stick of RAM.
Pulled the RAM, replaced 3rd stick with 4th, bought a new stick and all's well.
I won't be trusting MS's memory test EVER again!
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I’ve been very happy with HP laptops lately. I went to the Microsoft store a couple years ago to buy a Surface Book and walked out with an HP Spectre x360 instead. Since then I’ve bought two more for my mom and son and they’ve all been great.
 
@FractalAudio everything except Fractal right? :) I agree with everything you said in the main post. Apple is doing what killed IBM in the 90s. I actually looked at getting a Cayenne as well as the older "good ones" are not considerably much more money than a BMW, Audi or Skoda of the same size. The new Cayenne is built really cheap, felt like driving a plastic car.
 
been going on since years. doesn't matter what sort of product (unless maybe some boutique stuff). lifespans are getting noticeably shorter...
 
Yeah, quality of everything has gone to absolute shit in recent years. Fractal is waving the quality flag pretty damn high, and in this climate that's rare.

I'd check ASUS for bang for the buck, their stuff is usually pretty good considering the competition.
As for keyboards, I hate all laptop keyboards!!!
I plug in various das keyboards wherever I use them and I'm happy :

Everything these days is based on the consumerism 'OMG I need this flashy thing NOW!!'

So companies make things not designed to last - designed to look flashy and sleek and with the cheapest components and labor to make the highest profits with the highest production.

So they aren't focusing on people who need to use the product for actual tasks- they're focused on pumping out something flashy and cheap cuz that's what sells like crazy! They know they will make more money focusing on the next cheap flashy product than trying to support the current one.

If you wanna buy a new Porsche Cliff, just make an Axe 4 in white with a glossy HD touch screen, red knobs and the cheapest components, you'll be SWIMMING in money - people don't want quality anymore, they want the latest greatest flashy thing
 
Hear you loud and clear on the MB Pro. I have a late 2013 model. Battery replacement last year since the cells were starting to swell and the trackpad was mushy. Apple replaced for, I think $199? Which essentially included a new motherboard, I believe. I don't know what I'm going to do when it dies - I bought the Mac because all the Win laptops we were passing out as standard looked and felt like crap to me.

And on the Cayenne - yeah, have an '85 911. As my mechanic said "I can fix anything on your car. The new ones are just a PITA."
 
I remember when 3 yrs was the max life cycle on a PC build or laptop. I'd go through a new build about every three years due to a video game requiring newer graphics card which required new motherboard. I have a Sony VAIO laptop I bought in 2010 that still works and just got into the Mac world when I purchased my AX8 in 2017, so it's the 2016 version. I love the Mac. I'm a PC user all my life and am really efficient using PC's. I feel I need to learn the Mac's 'tricks' or best workflows, hotkey's etc. That being said I'd be happy if my Mac lasts 6 years. A 2013 model should be approaching the end of its life, huh?

You guys got me thinking about spending the rest of the day backing up....AX8, Mac...everything. I'd be kicking myself if it died tomorrow and I posted this today.
 
Wife needs a new MacBook and I think I'm going to get her the really old sliver bezel Air. She needs a typewriter/internet machine and that new keyboard is so hideous I can't inflict that kind of suffering on her.
 
You guys got me thinking about spending the rest of the day backing up....AX8, Mac...everything. I'd be kicking myself if it died tomorrow and I posted this today.

At least the nice thing about the Mac is Time Machine. Slap an inexpensive spinning drive on there - or a NAS - and you're set in minutes. Restoring something is trivial. Windows backup - no thanks.
 
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