Valve and devices like the Steam Deck and soon the Steam Machine are also grabbing the gaming segment away from Windows. Distros like Bazzite also are enticing to those technically inclined enough to boot from a USB drive and run the simple installer.
There are an awful lot of groups installing Linux on Win 10 cast offs around the world.
My uncle runs one in Bradford on Avon and they are slapping on an OS for you whilst you supp tea and chat. Often, the user-agent is set to something Microsoftie in the browser. If necessary Edge is installed but that is frowned on 8)
I have not heard of this MacBook Neo thing ... Why would ? I only own a little IT company and hang around on HN.
1. The usage statistics don't reflect your anecdotal Linux usage; Linux desktop/laptop usage share has not grown that significantly in 20 years and Windows remains quite dominant.
2. MacBook Neo was widely discussed on HN not very long ago, and I'd think if anything an owner of an IT company would be more aware of it than an average HN user. It's definitely going to shake up the market for lower-end laptops.
1. The devil is in the details: How are those stats gathered? Many, if not most Linux users hide their OS affiliation via USER-AGENT
2. Missed it or perhaps blanked it. It really will not shake up the lower end because anyone wanting a lower end laptop (whatever that is) will insist on it running Windows and not Apples.
There is a really good reason why car manufacturers run multiple marques - the budget, standard and premium ones. Attempting to put the Apple "premium shine" on a budget effort may backfire spectacularly (and devalue the entire brand) or maybe they will somehow manage to re-invent marketing.
I’m not sure what market you are in, but this thing will absolutely upend the low end market in North America. This is a MacBook which handily competes with used/refurbished M1 airs for performance, but sells for less. Hell, it sells for less than an iPhone.
They have managed to keep the build quality without really sacrificing anything you would expect on an entry level computer.
My experience with the low end of laptops is that people can’t even tell you what OS they have (chrome or windows). People are going to see this and think that apple makes good phones, good tablets, and now good computers for affordable prices. The existence of the c model iPhones never “cheapened” the high end models. The existence of the iPad does not cheapen the iPad Pro. All the reviews and media basically are people wondering how they managed to create such a high quality product at this price point.
It’s a general purpose computer that runs MacOS, just like every other Mac from the past few decades.
If you want an ad to tell you what that means, well...
There is great value to be had in reusing old hardware selling for a fraction of new pricing. There is great value to be had in an affordable machine with great battery life, light weight durable design, and a user friendly interface that will work and be supported for the better part of a decade. Knowing that some customers will be better served by the former or the latter is pretty valuable.
As an aside, if you are concerned about e waste, take a look at the teardown videos of this machine. This is being touted by many as the most repairable Mac in decades (admittedly, a low bar). Just about every component can be replaced in a few minutes with nothing more than a screwdriver
Never quite that cheap, but budget is relative, and the Neo is certainly a new degree of meeting that category, but I think in those relative terms the polycarbonate macbook would have been quite a good value for money at the time, even at around ~$1000. You could get cheaper laptops, and you still can, but what you'd get for that money would truly be terrible for the amount you'd save, unless you literally just played solitaire on them.
Even after years of operation, they'd be a decent buy on the used market compared to comparably priced windows laptops that would literally fall apart at the hinges and overheat.
I don't think anyone cares. I remember the switch from a MacBook with a (no-adjective) trackpad to a MacBook with a haptic trackpad. There was absolutely nothing earth-shattering about that switch, it was a great trackpad before and a great trackpad after.
True, I don’t think people care since Apple’s non-haptic trackpad is still far (and I mean FAR) better than anything else in the market. People who eventually move on to a higher priced Mac with a haptic trackpad will probably feel a difference and think of it as a nice bonus that came with their upgrade (and probably would not like to downgrade, if possible), but I dont think any newcomers would frown at its absence first-hand.
I’d say 100% with a fair share of confidence since Apple’s magic lies both in hardware AND software (as usual). The hardware is already phenomenal (and far above anything else in the market) but the Mac makes fantastic use of it in such a way that neither Windows nor Linux have managed to even start replicate.
Tried one of those MacBooks Neos in a store a few days ago because I got curious.
As a Linux/windows user I was completely baffled that you actually have to click (at least in the default setting) to make a mouse click instead of just giving it a tap. Does anyone prefer that?
> Why would ? I only own a little IT company and hang around on HN.
Something’s not quite right here.
If you hang around HN you have absolutely heard of the Neo. And I’d be downright frightful to have anything to do with your little IT company (whatever service it provides) if you haven’t at the very least /heard/ of the Neo at this point.
I suspect this is a little white lie just to drive a point home but I fail to see the benefit of such an act when all it does is make you look like you’re lying.
I blank threads I'm not interested in. To be honest I certainly did not notice it here and now I have engaged, I've only now noticed the adverts on TV here.
Now I know what I'm looking at, the Neo ads here are so up their own arse that it is unlikely that anyone has noticed what is on offer. Its an Apple {something, in pastel shades} is my only takeaway.
That might be what they think. I just installed windows and it had countless dialogs. Most have a reason to exist but it's a lot of work. The Ubuntu live usb on the other hand just boots into the desktop environment. It just works? There is nothing to do?
I hadn’t tried Fedora until late last year, and was very impressed. Came across as highly polished and complete.
Hadn’t tried Pupply Linux until a couple months ago, and it’s now my new favourite. I’m now running it on a small form factor desktop HP with no internal drive.
But this also mean you are not consulted on some critical configuration choice and that you are left alone wondering what to do next.
Earliest Macintoshs in the 1990 launched a tutorial on first boot until you explicitly finished or skipped it.
This was a wonderful experience as a kid and still warm my heart today thinking back of it.
Today's Mac only display "tips", "what's new" after first boot or major update because people are generally more computer literate. But (unless Liquid Glass changed that too) they never gave on this mantra that the OS should guide newcomers.
So yeah I think Linux distro have room to do better.
Normal people can definitely install an OS. Last weekend I set aside time help a friend install CachyOS. They'd never used a terminal before and wanted some help.
When I called them, they had already set it up and was playing Risk of Rain 2. They started streaming for me on the Discord Flatpak they installed from the app store.
Define normal. I would argue at least 75% of the US population has zero interest in learning how to install a new OS, let alone actually do so themselves.
I say this as a decades-long Linux user (who has tried to evangelize it many times).
Gamers are one of the few demographics still buying new Windows PCs. There are now so many discord servers and subreddits filled with people discussing which Linux distro to use.
Honestly for your average home consumer, there isn't much need for a Windows PC now days.
Well I can agree with that, but that's not the same thing as being incapable of doing it. Both of my parents could easily install Linux, it's infantilizing to argue that they can't fill out a user wizard and select a drive to wipe.
You don't have to know. The Calamares installer annotates your partitions and explains what will happen in natural language. If you can order a pizza online, you can install Linux.
Yeah. If ordering a pizza also regularly involves entering BIOS setup to change boot device ordering, change SATA mode from RAID to AHCI and disable secure boot, depending on your distro.
This is funny. I have an HP PC that has an option in the BIOS to "prepare for RAID" or some such. I wondered what that was, so I turned it on. I had Linux on it at the time, and nothing happened. I shrugged and just forgot about it.
Fast forward a few months later, when I gave this PC to my dad. He installed Windows on it, then started thinking the PC was somehow borked: "the installer sees the drive, installs, reboots, then it fails to boot". I was shocked, that PC worked perfectly.
Then I remembered about that setting, told him to untick the box in the BIOS, and he was off to the races.
I don’t disagree that installing windows/macos and certain Linux distros can be stupid easy but to a layman it’s daunting.
In my experience most people who use a computing device may be able to tell me “this is window” or “this is Mac” by virtue of the branding being all over the stuff but for all intents and purposes these things are appliances.
In the same way most people except ambitious DIYers don’t rip apart their 500-1000 dollar washing machine to replace a worn belt the call a repair guy. Or in your case, have a buddy who knows how to do it.
I bought two Linux pre-installed PC's last October. They were €350 cheaper apiece than the same Windows PC (presumably because the Windows machines came with a lot of additional software installed idk).
Correct. And they usually don’t install windows on their computer either. The 8 year old laptop they got at Best Buy had it pre installed. So if Linux is going to go mainstream it’ll be because stores start offering PCs with Linux that are at a $140 discount.
I think GP's point is that a chromebook is a perfectly cromulent apternative to windows, running normal ChromeOS, for users looking for a simple web/docs/email machine.
Of course they can. They might be too lazy or ignorant to do so, but it's not really any harder to learn to install Linux than it is to learn to make mashed potatoes once you're motivated to bother -- and billions of people have managed to do the latter just fine.
Normal people are absolutely capable of following basic directions like: "download this file", "insert a USB stick", "run this program", "reboot your computer", "double click the install icon", "click the 'Continue' button (or similar) following the on-screen prompts".
That all sounds really difficult compared to going to the Apple store , and buying a Neo.
Not to mention Linux is great, things start going wrong. Cool, you found a DE you like, it's on X11. Another application you want to use only works on Wayland.
Ohh, you want to use a Bluetooth headset, your DE might randomly crash upon connect.
The best thing about Linux is you can customize it. The worst thing about Linux is you can customize it. We have no single answer as to what distro a new user should try.
Ubuntu might not support your wifi card. Ok, so you try Arch. A bad update bricks your system.
I love Linux, but I've spent countless hours to understand and use it. Some people might prefer to buy a Neo and then go play with their cat, etc.
This is why Linux doesn't exist on more PCs - this is a problem.
Imagine a plumber talking about how much better his toilet is than everyone else's - bc everyone believes only a plumber can install it (which was truth for most of Linux history and general PC users).
Nobody took it seriously bc they took it as mostly an odd humblebrag for niche Windows haters.
What can possibly be wrong with giving people a different option to try Linux? If it’s not right for you, who cares because you have other options? The constant negativity is so boring.
These days it's as easy as running a powershell script. There is 0 functional barrier to installing Linux from any windows machine. Soon the same will be true for the Neo.
Normal people will be expected to upgrade to Windows 12 next year after seeing "your hardware isn't supported" Windows Update messages, without any idea of what an NPU is or why it's a system requirement to receive a system upgrade.
I think this is in response to slightly abnormal people trying Steam OS and other user-friendly Linux distros as they grow increasingly annoyed with Windows 11 antics.
You hope it offers a way to revert or accept your computer no longer works. I bumped into someone at the local bar, I think Windows is just corrupted, but she had no interest in fixing it.
Framework, System76, and a few others do offer it now but yeah only as a niche dev thing.
I think there is a real chance that there will be an EU push for that to be made available as a way of gradually decoupling national security interests from the US, for obvious reasons.
This is about the MacBook Neo coming for the budget laptop market. At 500$ it's an easy choice.