| I have been using 12" MacBooks since they came out because I live out of a backpack and travel a lot. I cannot find anything comparable in terms of size/weight/battery and build quality. Especially the trackpad, nothing is remotely close. Otherwise I'd get that and put Arch on it. People complain Apple is expensive, not so sure. The TCO may actually be less because of the high resale value. It is also more convenient. More than once when faced with crossing an annoying border (TSA, sigh) I'd sell the Macbook at my origin and simply pickup a new one at the destination. Thirty minutes in-and-out of the Apple store, they all seem to have exceptionally fast wifi, and setup handled via a curl-to-bash of mine gets me exactly back to where I started, down to the sessions.. Since my points of origin usually have higher Apple prices due to currency/taxes, I end up accidentally eking out a profit after months of use per machine. If you can't be arsed with the above consider this: Their retail global presence is getting to be quite complete, even coming to Samsung land (Seoul, behold: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xt4ldH5vQCQ) and Tel Aviv finally along with some others. Most big airport hub cities will have an Apple store close by. Stuff gets broken or stolen and yet with this setup I'm generally never 24 hours away from my exact laptop setup... There is no alternative. I feel trapped. |
This is ironic, considering that you live out of a backpack! Honestly though, there are alternatives, but that's the problem with luxuries: once we have been spoiled, human pyschology makes it difficult to accept "less." We tend to describe things we want as things we "need." It seems that many Apple power users, myself included, tend to be perfectionists when it comes to computers. Unlike the rest of the population — the majority of whom don't live out of a backpack and can not justify the cost of Apple products (with the possible exception of an iPhone) — "good enough" just doesn't cut it.
Depending upon what you're using your computer for, you could have a "good enough" setup with just about anything, though it would probably be less comfortable to you than what you have now. For light use, a Chromebook can be instantly set up, and they can be found all over the world. For heavier use, any Windows 10 laptop can sync settings to the cloud and, coupled with Chocolatey and WSL, it's possible to emulate your current workflow. MacBooks are fantastic machines and I believe they offer immense value but, if you feel trapped, it's because the adventurous spirit that has carried you across the world has yet to extend itself to your computing environment!