[quote=“Mike_Earley, post:8, topic:73409, full:true”]It was poorly written, and honestly comes across as a bit ‘insane’ and/or ‘melodramatic’.
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Wow. I couldn’t disagree more. I thought it was amusing and well-written. Just goes to show you that at least half the work of interpreting text is performed by the reader.
You’re making an apples to oranges comparison. Smartphones are improving at the rate desktop computers did in the '90s. Android phones from six years ago are just as useless as that iPhone 4, and Macs from six years ago are still extremely well supported by software updates. Apple’s current OS X release supports Macs from as far back as 2007.
You want a Thinkpad from the X or T family.
Here is what happens when you spill water on a recent model Thinkpad:
And to be really smart about it, remember about once a month or so to back up a second external hard drive as well, and keep that one somewhere fire/waterproof, preferably far away from the computer.
you’re right, my commodore 64 should still be supported, damn it. or my TRS-80. or my minvac 601. damn these unreasonably tech companies and their non-support of vintage equipment.
You can also buy used Thinkpads like the X220 or T220 on eBay for $200-$300. These run Linux great; and are still very capable machines. It’s hard to tell the difference (in CPU processing etc.) between my X220 and my 6 month old desktop (with Intel Haswell). Get one with an IPS screen and an SSD (or else install these afterwards - ThinkPads are very easily user-serviceable - it’s not hard to swap out the drive or add memory).
I’ll give you a like for your use of hyperbole.
Should I point out that no one uses floppies anymore? And that’s when people should upgrade, when there are significant innovations. However, both you and I know people who have just to have a new iPhone or Samsung because they’re suckered into it. I think five years support (or one year per $100) isn’t too much to ask for.
#dontbehatintheplanet 
The newest ones are a little harder (for example, you need to crack the case to change the HD on an X250, maybe even on the older X230, and keyboard replacement is a bear). However, at least Lenovo publishes free hardware maintenance manuals so you can do all your own field work on the machines after the warranty expires.
The iPhone 4S, which was released in late 2011, has the latest version of iOS. Some animations get a little choppy but it’s still perfectly usable. It will probably be dropped this fall, but that’s at least 5 years of support. The iPhone 4 received software updates for about 4 years after its initial release. Aside from a few outliers (iPad 1, iPhone 3G), Apple supports older phones and tablets far longer than any other manufacturer.
I hate to say THIS! but… this. My iPhone 4s was still working great. I chose to upgrade and my old phone is still doing just fine as a hand me down. I guarantee you won’t see longetivity like that with Android.
FYI - you can roll back, if you reinstall with the original CD/DVD media you got with the machine. I had long ago abandoned the slow physical disks for images, and I have no idea if more recent macs allow this, but I just finished doing a bare metal install to fix an older protools machine. That was the only way to go back from El Capitan.
That said, Apple has a long history of introducing an app or feature, then taking it away. Look at menu labels, iPhoto dragging, Final Cut X, iMovie, replaceable ram and storage. They also have a long history of making iTunes worse, and not giving a crap about somewhat older hardware. (macintoshes getting more of the short end than iPhones)
Your suggestion is not really needed. Or did you not notice the article’s title? And you seem to have a really, really, really low bar for what qualifies as a “rant”. It appears to be any opinion that you don’t happen to agree with.
I moved to the Bay Area in '86 and used PCs and Macs (literally one on the left hand one on the right) in the graphic design and communications field. Things constantly evolve.
But I can sympathize with the author in some ways: my trusty top-o-the-line 2011 i7 maxed out imac slagged right after Thxgv and I limped along for w few weeks on a machine 4 years older until I faced the music and got a middle-top-o-the-line i5 Skylake Retina machine. Nice screen, but DAHUM! Apple, the lack of resolution independence or even just pixel doubling for system elements is terrible. I’m in my 50s now and trying to read FCP X’s tiny grey on grey interface is awful. Don’t even try to go full retina. The hardware under the hood has mostly stagnated and the move to a more iOS OS X is less thrilling to me. Where is the delight? The clever stuff? Replacing the old system has been fraught with problems, mostly fonts, software too old, new software moves the cheese and doesn’t add much. Now I rent software (MS office and Adobe CC, grrrrr). Learning an entirely new tool chain seems to be a non-starter for me. And don’t get me started on the JIvy ‘customers want it thinner still!’ nonsense. I don’t want a ‘wafer thin’ mac, I want something that kicks ass and is reliable and upgradeable to some extent (yes yes thunderbolt). Apple is now a phone mfgr, they get 10% of their biz from macs and another 10% or so from iPads… message, get used to it. Or switch. Wish they realized they are leaving market on the table. They could dominate desktop and mobile computing (non-pocket edition), but the margins are better selling candy to babies.
tl:dr they moved my cheese!
Your suggestion that my suggestion is not really needed is not really needed.
Well my instant qualifier for “rant” is when something gets called ‘fascist’ in an absurd way in a sentence accompanied by bad grammar.
I have a iMac 5K. It’s a luxurious machine. In my experience resolution independence only rears it’s ugly head when I boot into Windows 10.
Stopped reading when author used the word “fascist”
I’m still rocking a 164GB Video I got in April of '08 myself. I’m about to buy another off Ebay to back it up just in case, but it’s still awesome. I don’t know what I’d do if there wasn’t a wheel of some sort associated with my music anymore.
