

Don’t Waste Money on a New Computer for College - cwan
http://techcrunch.com/2010/09/11/don’t-waste-money-on-a-new-computer-for-college/

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phamilton
I've got a part time job on campus, and as such I've got an office with my
24-inch iMac in it (not to mention a 10,000 core supercomputer that I'm a
sysadmin to). We've got plenty of linux labs (I used to admin those as well).
I definitely could survive without my macbook pro. But at the same time,
there's something nice about having my own private dev machine. A cheap
machine on craigslist couldn't handle 5 hours of class without being plugged
in. I couldn't build iPhone Apps in Xcode instead of paying attention in my CS
classes. Also, I doubt a used laptop from craigslist could survive a trip
through my windshield (happened last thanksgiving when my car rolled 4 times.)
And an old machine is not going to have backlit keyboard, which is very useful
for 12-4am coding sessions. At the same time, I'm pretty sure my wife (History
Teaching major) would do fine on a used machine.

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fragmede
soooo you recommend a used macbook pro?

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FluidDjango
Actually, I've not bought a _new_ Apple laptop in years - but have bought
several _refurbs_ (~10% off). Never had one I had trouble with (or could tell
was not 100% new).

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rottencupcakes
Does this guy realize how much it sucks to go into a computer lab in the
middle of Boston winter to code up your assignments instead of sitting at
home?

Having your own reasonably performant dev enviornment at home is amazing. You
could always ssh into dialup machines, but generally the public ones aren't
the best for working.

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FluidDjango
>If you’re pursuing a liberal arts degree, you really don’t need a brand new
computer just to write all the papers you’ll write.

Well, if you're an undergrad and your school is inflicting Blackboard or
Desire2Learn software, you find the sluggishness on older machines to be
agony. In my humble experience.

Related FWIW: when I, as instructor, am perusing student records or developing
a course, I am grateful for a 27" iMac. Tiny screens add to the BB/D2L
sluggishness. [/rant]

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younata
suggest that the link is changed from the techcrunch article, to the one
techcrunch leads to, that is: [http://www.crunchgear.com/2010/09/11/dont-
waste-money-on-a-n...](http://www.crunchgear.com/2010/09/11/dont-waste-money-
on-a-new-computer-for-college/)

edit:

on the actual content of the article: I've found in my experience, that I
can't use any of the school's computers. This is out of self-choice, in that I
like unix (even in CS, we have a ton of windows boxes), and I use dvorak
(lugging my computer to all labs means I get to touch-type at 70-80 wpm as
opposed to hunting & pecking at 20-30 wpm).

~~~
pavel_lishin
> I use dvorak

You couldn't go into the control panel and change the keyboard layout?

~~~
younata
In my experience, windows doesn't apply dvorak universally when I try to set
it to. It's much more productive on my end to just bring my own computer.

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meric
Our university are fully equipped with windows machines. To a life long mac
user like me, this was unacceptable. Of course I didn't use any money on a new
computer... just brought my own mac.

I haven't owned a windows computer since I was 9 years old.

