[JohnBooty]

    For the same reason professional mechanics in F1 
    don't use shitty tools to work on their cars.

They also probably don't buy new wrenches every time new wrenches are released, if their current wrenches are completely sufficient and not holding them back in any way.

[latchkey]

> if their current wrenches are completely sufficient

That's a fantastically entirely subjective opinion.

[rewmie]

> That's a fantastically entirely subjective opinion.

That's the point: objectively, there is absolutely no concrete reason that justifies replacing a MacBook bought in the past 3 or 4 years with the M3 ones. None at all.

In fact, it boggles the mind how anyone could justify replacing any MacBook pro with a M3 one by claiming "pros don't use shitty tools", as if MacBook Pros packing an Intel core 7/M1/M2 suddenly became shitty laptops just because Apple released a new one.

[georgespencer]

> That's the point: objectively, there is absolutely no concrete reason that justifies replacing a MacBook bought in the past 3 or 4 years with the M3 ones. None at all.

Again, what you mean to say is that _you_ cannot think of a reason that would make _you_ upgrade from a 4 year old MacBook to a new M3 one.

> objectively

Do you understand that what you say is literally, definitionally, subjective? It's one thing to make primitive and clumsy generalisations, but quite another to be confusing subjectivity and objectivity.

> it boggles the mind

Starting to believe there isn't a lot of mind to boggle here…

> how anyone could justify replacing any MacBook pro with a M3 one by claiming "pros don't use shitty tools"

I haven't noticed anyone making this argument, but I know many people who upgrade their tools -- whether computers or otherwise -- to the latest and greatest whenever they can, because working faster and more efficiently is a concrete benefit, and it really would take an inestimable moron to, say, argue that late Intel-era MacBooks can do the same things that M-series MacBooks can.

[JohnBooty]

    I haven't noticed anyone making this argument

Yeah, you haven't read this thread.

Not that you missed anything of value. A previous poster, latchkey, quite literally made that argument:

    "the upgrade/switch from intel to m*, is night and day 
    better ergonomics as a developer. It isn't just some 
    shiny new toy or a waste in cash. For the same reason 
    professional mechanics in F1 don't use shitty tools 
    to work on their cars. Or tour de france racers aren't 
    using 30lbs Huffy bikes"

As to this assertion:

    it really would take an inestimable moron to, say, 
    argue that late Intel-era MacBooks can do the same
    things that M-series MacBooks can. 

In terms of raw performance and power efficiency, obviously the Apple Silicon laptops trounce the Intel-based Mac laptops.

But if you spend some time learning about our industry you'll realize that not all development workflows are identical, and not all have the same bottlenecks, and for many tasks an Intel-powered Mac is not a bottleneck. Surely you can understand that, or aspire to understand that.

I would certainly agree with a more generalized and reality-based version of what you and the other poster seem to be attempting to say: If your current hardware is bottlenecking you in any way, you should most definitely address that if at all possible. A hardware upgrade that unbottlenecks you and improves your developer ergonomics will almost certainly pay for itself in the long run. That is sane and profitable advice and something I've always done.

[georgespencer]

Thanks, I had missed that. It contains the phrase "don't use shitty tools", but I'll leave it to you to decide whether OP honestly recapitulated the same argument in their passing reference. The two seem somewhat different to me.

> As to this laughable claim […]

This is a response to a specific point which rewmie has made several times. They seem to genuinely believe there is literally no difference between M-series and Intel chips:

> There is absolutely nothing I can do with my M2 laptop that I cannot do well with my cheap old Intel laptop. Nothing.

> there is absolutely no concrete reason that justifies replacing a MacBook bought in the past 3 or 4 years with the M3 ones. None at all.

> it boggles the mind how anyone could justify replacing any MacBook pro with a M3 one by claiming "pros don't use shitty tools", as if MacBook Pros packing an Intel core 7/M1/M2 suddenly became shitty laptops just because Apple released a new one

I likely disagree with your position, and believe you have made some bad faith arguments, but you're at least compos mentis.

> But if you spend some time learning about our industry

Whoops.

> you'll realize that not all development workflows are identical, and not all have the same bottlenecks, and for many tasks an Intel-powered Mac is not a bottleneck. Surely you can understand that, or aspire to understand that.

Would you mind restating what you believe my argument to be? Because this reads as a patronising non-sequitur to me, and I'm sure you're not intending for it to land that way.

(If you are pushed for time, I'll do it: nearly everyone spending thousands of dollars to upgrade their computer has what they consider to be a good reason for doing so, whether that reason be boosting their self-esteem by having the latest toy, or a mild performance boost in their day-to-day work. You may not find their interpretation of "a good reason" to be persuasive, but there are likely to be many areas of your personal spending which they would see as imprudent or rooted in tenuous reasons. This thread is full of people incapable of understanding the reasons others have for upgrading and making emphatic sweeping statements. Everyone is different. News at 11.)

[JohnBooty]

Replying to this one since I think we reached max nesting. Regarding as to why somebody might not be in a hurry to upgrade a 2015 Mac to an M2:

https://www.cpu-monkey.com/en/compare_cpu-apple_m2_8_gpu-vs-...

To put it in fully objective terms, a lot of development tasks (for many people) are still dominated by single-core performance.

The M2 has roughly 2x single-core performance, which is going to be absolutely awesome if you're spending a lot of time waiting for the CPU. But if that's not really a bottleneck, and the things you do are already completing at a speed that doesn't disrupt your flow state or otherwise consume significant amounts of your day.

I'm working (on my 2018 MBP) on some Python software that does science stuff. The single core perf delta between my CPU and the M2 is even smaller for a lot of tasks, more like 50% instead of 100%. And I'm not doing anything that would really benefit from more than 6 cores.

I'm currently planning an upgrade, but it's just not a pressing need as $2K-$3K is a significant investment for me at the moment.

    I can't imagine an F1 mechanic not taking an interest 
    in the latest marginally improved wrench

F1 teams have mandated cost caps. I'm not entirely sure if that includes tooling, but even if not, budgets are not infinite and there is a time cost required to research and acquire new tools. Time and money spend getting wrenches are time and money not spent elsewhere. So I would think there is a constant pressure (like in any business) to identify real bottlenecks, not just spend unlimited amounts of money on increased capabilities that may or may not have any bearing on actual performance. Presumably this is why a developer might choose a regular M2 or M3, but not necessarily the maxxed-out M3 MAX with 192GB of RAM and 8TB SSD for $10,000 or whatever (I know I'm exaggerating). Yes it's more performance, no it won't matter for many workloads.

[JohnBooty]

     "There is absolutely nothing I can do with my M2 
     laptop that I cannot do well with my cheap old Intel laptop"

Well, I took that one in good faith and interpreted it to mean that the old Intel laptop was perfectly adequate for their personal needs.

The alternative interpretation, that they believed there was no objective difference in capability between Intel and Apple Silicon laptops, was so absurd I couldn't imagine anybody expressing it or believing it. I think I made the correct interpretation but it was definitely an extrapolation on my part and definitely fits the HN guideline of "assume best intentions."

To be clear, the Apple Silicon laptops certainly trounce the Intel MBPs and I think most developers will find them well worth the upgrade for most things -- I just didn't like the assertion that anybody still using an Intel Mac was equivalent to somebody riding the Tour de France in a Huffy.

[georgespencer]

Sorry you're being downvoted for pointing out specious arguments.

[JohnBooty]

You... don't think that mechanics on a racing team are qualified to know if their current wrenches are sufficient?

[georgespencer]

I suspect that OP thinks, as I did, that you've constructed an inane straw man.

[JohnBooty]

User latchkey, the one you're agreeing with, is the one who very literally claimed that a developer using an Intel laptop is quite equivalent to an F1 mechanic using "shitty tools" or racing the Tour de France in a 30lb Huffy.

[georgespencer]

I'm not agreeing with latchkey's statement about developers and "shitty tools". I'm agreeing with them that when you say this…

> if their current wrenches are completely sufficient

… you are not making an honest argument, because it is entirely subjective as to whether their current wrenches are "completely sufficient".

The dog I have in this fight is not upgrade cycles or Intel vs. M1, it's "argue the fucking point without descending into high school rhetoric and logical fallacies".

[JohnBooty]

A wrench has a finite set of objective qualities. Grip, length, strength, weight and maybe some special-case properties like being non-magnetic or spark resistant.

It's surprising to me that you think that cutting-edge racing mechanics don't have objective criteria for these things and that it's all some sort of subjective dark art. But it's a bad analogy to begin with and it's not my analogy.