[g_airborne]

I just replaced my MacBook Late 2013 after similar usage. No repairs, no hiccups or any component failure whatsoever except for a very badly degraded battery - it lasted about 1.5 hours on a full charge at the end. There’s a lot to be said about Apple but honestly I don’t see any other manufacturers that produce laptops that last so insanely long. Hopefully my new one will last as long as well :)

[zomglings]

Thinkpads last insanely long, too.

I have a Thinkpad that I purchased in early 2014 that is still going strong except for, as in your case, a degraded battery.

My grandparents used to play Freecell on a very early IBM Thinkpad (manufactured in 1993, I think) that I picked up for free in a garage sale in 2001. This machine lasted well into 2005, and probably still works today.

Highly recommend trying them out. These days you can get equivalent performance to Macbook Pros for maybe 60% of the cost.

[minerjoe]

This. My main development machine is a Thinkpad T60, manufactured in 2006. Still running strong. For me, it is still a supercomputer. 2x1.8GHz. 4G ram. 1400x1050. Everything I develop on it screams on anything modern. When it breaks I'm planning on moving backward in time to see if there is an older model that I can adapt to, probably without spending a single dollar, just acquiring a thrown away computer.

Limitatations can enable innovation.

[cannam]

The T60 with that wonderful 1400x1050 screen is fab, I agree. (I wrote a sibling comment about using a 2014 Thinkpad as my main box, but I also have some older ones.) The main problem with it from a modern perspective is that it's strictly 32-bit, so can't address more than 4G RAM or run many contemporary Linux distros.

I also have a T40p, from 2003-ish, with the same 1400x1050 display. This is an even nicer computer to use in many ways - the keyboard in particular is even better than that in my T60 - but the difference in performance between 2003 and 2006 is striking. It's almost as much as the difference between 2006 and now. The T6x used Intel Core CPUs, but the T4x was still Pentium M days - single core and quite substantially slower. The T4x still has a PATA drive, so it's harder to put in a modern SSD. It's limited to 2G RAM for reasons I can't remember. It's also much less robust - the T60 series has a completely rigid chassis (and my T60 still looks like new) but the earlier T40 would bend if picked up from the front, which would cause both the case and the tracks on the motherboard to crack (the USB sockets stop working first, then everything else).

The T40p is a lovely, lovely computer - in some ways the best one I own - but it's for occasional document-writing only, not really for development any more.

[minerjoe]

This T60 is 64 bit. Core 2 T5600. My cutoff for referbishing a computer for someone is that it must be 64 bit and it must have at least two cores. Seems like anything Core 2 duo and later is good enough for almost anything most people do (except games).

[cannam]

Oh! That's interesting, I'm not sure I knew they existed. Mine is dual core and quite fast (for the time) but definitely 32-bit only.

Maybe I should look for a fancier one, if only to pick up the motherboard and CPU from. I imagine they're quite similar in terms of performance, but the extra compatibility would be nice.

[TheSpiceIsLife]

My 2013 MBPr just gave up.

I have a T500 Core2Duo T5600 w 4GB RAM sitting in the cupboard. I pulled it out and put an SSD in it and installed Lubuntu, works fine but I have some software licenses I’ve paid for that are only available on MacOS & Windows.

Do you think it would run Windows 10 ok? I’d need to buy a license, but at this stage that might be cheaper than a new / secondhand laptop.

[eigenvector]

I run Windows 10 on a Dell Latitude E6400 from 2008 with a 1st gen Core 2 Duo & 4GB RAM and it runs fine.

Memory hungry apps like Chrome slow down pretty quick, but the OS itself is snappy.

[branko_d]

> Everything I develop on it screams on anything modern.

This is a very good point. I think the user experience, on average, would be quite a bit better if developers weren’t so prone to chasing glitzy new hardware that can “mask” performance problems.

On the other hand, developer’s productivity matters, so I’m not really sure what the right balance is here...

[minerjoe]

Depends on how you develop. There are many ways to improve productivity that do not require faster machines. I'm a lisper for most work so I rarely have to wait for any compilation. Every interaction developing with this computer is basically instantaneous.

Also, I find that new developers think they would benefit greatly using the fastest machines to learn to program, but then never develop a good sense of algorithmic complexity as everything just screams. On slower machines you can have the opportunity to feel the difference between O(1), O(log n), O(n), O(n^2), etc.

[WizardAustralis]

Mine is a little later than yours, a 2009 T400 (2x2.4ghz Core 2, 4GB RAM) - having a light weight distro (Trisquel) plus an SSD has meant that this thing still feels incredibly snappy on most things. Only 1080p video is a real stretch and even then it will just barely plow through it.

[cannam]

> I have a Thinkpad that I purchased in early 2014 that is still going strong

Indeed an early 2014 Thinkpad is my main work development box. It's a T540p with the excellent 3K matte screen. Admittedly I use it like a desktop computer, plugging in a keyboard and mouse (and, now, camera), so there's very little wear and tear, but in my mind it's basically still a new computer.

[barrkel]

I'm stuck with a T540p and it's no good thermally IMO. It was slower than the desktop it replaced and throttles when asked to work, which is pretty frequently with a few browser instances, a few ides and few databases all running with a build.

Add a concurrent video conference - all too frequent these days - and it practically freezes every so often. Only 16G really doesn't help.

Am looking forward to something bigger, soon...

[cannam]

Does yours have the discrete GPU option? Mine doesn't, and I imagine that could make a big difference thermally.

[ryukafalz]

>I have a Thinkpad that I purchased in early 2014 that is still going strong except for, as in your case, a degraded battery.

Fortunately most ThinkPads of this era had removable batteries, so this isn't as big of a deal as it would be for most laptops today. I'm currently using an X230 that I bought off eBay as my main personal laptop; it needed a new battery when I got it, but otherwise works great.

[soperj]

I'm using a x230 as well, where'd you purchase your battery? mine's nearly done I feel.

[bestnameever]

I find it pretty difficult to buy a reliable laptop battery unless I can get it from the mfg.

[ryukafalz]

eBay, honestly. Got an unopened Lenovo-branded one.

[encom]

Thinkpad brigade checking in. Still using my X220 running Gentoo. The last ThinkPad with the good keyboard.

From my cold dead hands.

[dmd]

I have a mid-90s Compaq laptop that still works.

[timbit42]

But do you use it daily as your primary system?

[ajtjp]

Dell, HP, and IBM produce(d) some really good models, too. Precisions, EliteBooks, ThinkPads. Even some of the mid-tier ones will last quite awhile, and if not quite 7 years, a lot of them are more repairable than an Apple.

I still semi-frequently use a 2007 consumer-grade Dell that served as my only machine for 4.5 years, and as my primary laptop for another 5. It took six years for it to need a repair other than replacing a battery, and even today I get two hours of life from its latest replacement battery, and can swap in the next-oldest for 75-90 minutes more away from a power outlet.

Apple laptops do tend to last a long time, but if my goal were to buy a laptop I could use forever, I'd buy something else that was more repair-friendly instead.

[thedjinn]

I'm on a 2012 MBP with similar experiences. Every year I think about finally replacing it, but hold off on it because everything still works fine apart from some increased fan noise and reduced battery capacity (which doesn't concern me too much). If you treat your laptop with care it really does last a long time.

At some point I expect I will stop getting MacOS updates which will force me to upgrade to a newer model.

[jkestner]

I’m still running my 2010 MBP (it was worth maxing out the config, and I've replaced the optical drive with an SSD), though recently I bought a 2009 Mac Pro for my main machine. The MBP has fallen several feet into a concrete shop floor with only a squished corner in that milled aluminum case, and is on its third or fourth battery (I should stop cheaping out). I did splurge a few years ago on a replacement keyboard when the original's PCB traces started corroding. That's one of the first parts they integrated to the detriment of its repairability.

With a tweak I was able to get Mojave on it, and another tweak to get Xcode to compile for iOS 13 on it. That should do me for a while, until either the video cable exposed through a hinge breaks, or they can’t get the latest iOS to compile on it. But I’m loathe to get a machine that won’t let me keep it alive the next 10 years.

Intel CPUs haven’t advanced that much since this machine's 2.66x4 i7. The video probably hurts more. It points to a future where we can just expect to put some money into maintaining our computing machinery instead of consuming it like it's a service. But given that John Deere has moved this way, I’m not hopeful that computers will go back that way. Support right-to-repair bills!

[acjohnson55]

> I’m still running my 2010 MBP (it was worth maxing out the config, and I've replaced the optical drive with an SSD), though recently I bought a 2009 Mac Pro for my main machine. The MBP has fallen several feet into a concrete shop floor with only a squished corner in that milled aluminum case, and is on its third or fourth battery (I should stop cheaping out). I did splurge a few years ago on a replacement keyboard when the original's PCB traces started corroding. That's one of the first parts they integrated to the detriment of its repairability.

Exact same story here. I finally bought a Lenovo last fall after giving up hope that Apple would make a machine I could also get 3TB into. I still use the old MBP for photo management.

[scraft]

I have an Early 2011 MBP which I stopped using precisely because it couldn't get Mojave and therefore couldn't run the latest Xcode and therefore couldn't build for iOS 13. When I searched it sounded like any hacked upgrades would leave the graphics in a pretty poor state and it sounded like it just wouldn't be worth it. So I am curious on your results?

[galuano1]

Another happy mid 2012 MBP owner here. I am happy that I could upgrade the RAM as soon as I bought it to 16GB, and replaced the HDD with SSD after 5 years, and have replaced batteries twice. Running 10.15 without any problems. The screen hinge has loosened, but nothing a screw driver and ifixit couldn't fix.

[myth_drannon]

Dell's business line models are very good. I still use my Latitude from 2010, 10 years of heavy usage. It cost 2000$ but well worth it.

[bitwize]

Back in 2006, all my coworkers bought brand new MacBooks. Within a month, all those MacBooks were in the shop for repairs/parts replacement. I bought a $900 Compaq. Aside from the occasional cleaning, that thing worked for ten years plus.

2006 had a bad run of MacBooks, so this is not an indictment of Apple equipment in general. But Apple equipment is not universally particularly durable, nor is Apple the only vendor to make durable laptops. They've taken a lot of shortcuts recently, and currently they've set the expected service lifetime of a new MB at around four years.

[Hamuko]

I just replaced the battery on my early 2011 13-inch MacBook Pro. The original battery gave out ages ago and so did the Chinese aftermarket battery. Other than replacing the battery and replacing the old 320 GB 5400 RPM HDD with a Samsung SSD, there's not really been any issues with it.

I was actually surprised how usable the computer still was after all this time, although the thermals suck quite hard. I imagine the 2011 thermal paste is nigh on useless at this point. Granted, I don't use the laptop much these days, but it'd still serve for basic browsing when needed.

[spookybones]

I'm reading this on a late 2012 Macbook.

[pseudoramble]

Same here! My main change was getting an SSD. If you're in this boat, I highly recommend it. If I wanted to really push it, upgrading to 8GB of RAM would probably make it work extremely well.

It's nice to have things that run well with relatively small changes.

[neurostimulant]

Upgraded mine to 16gb ram and ssd years ago. I also replaced the battery last year. My only wish is to have more cores, but otherwise it's working fine.

I wonder if the current MBP lineups can last 8 years of constant software development use like this 2012 model.

[dylan604]

don't buy a 2016-2018 MBP. these have to be the worst built laptops from apple.