I want to take a moment for an aside on tech. I am currently living with a gaming laptop and a 3 year old kindle fire which is rapidly showing it's age. In the past 3 months I have been trying to figure out how to update my tech to suit my usage style. The problem is that my usage style is not represented by the tech specs and tech sales strategy of the companies I can buy tech from.
I just came back from best buy, who did horribly. Yet they did the best at actually trying. I found a decent 2 in 1 laptop for $750. That is quite a bit of change to drop for a tablet alternative. I will not be able to shift my gaming to that machine, it is strictly an option for taking stress off the gaming machine. Then I looked for about two hours on Newegg and Amazon, after which I found roughly the same specs best buy offered for $500-$600. I could not find a single tablet with specs that motivates me to part with over one hundred dollars.
An updated version of my gaming laptop is available for $500. So the lowest end 2 in 1 I could live with costs MORE than a top end gaming laptop. What kind of fucking economy is this? Do they understand older consumers? I have no interest in being hip, or replacing a smart phone. I have no interest in anything being compared to Apple products. I made my decision about how I felt about Apple between 1995 and 2005. They had their chance to not be smug elitist assholes, they did not do it in that decade, they cost more for the SAME hardware. Further I have to point out that their operating system isn't even independently developed. It now runs on the same kernel as linux. Which means that if I want the performance of a mac I can just go to linux, which I have experience and somewhat warm feelings with.
As far as I can tell modern tablets are either middling high performance machines that cost more, or advanced smart phones. I could get a 2 in 1 capable of replacing all my other tech for a few thousand dollars. Or for less than half that I could buy a new kindle (89 dollars), and a newish gaming laptop for between 500 and 1100 dollars. I really don't know what is going on in the economy these days, since the focus is not on customer service, nor good hardware.
Tech has become a tax on the consumer by the tech industry. To stay with the times we must part with hundreds if not thousands of dollars a year on tech which they seem to think we don't understand. The tablet is the best example I can find of a profit loop. They cannot be repaired, fiddled with, or in any way taken care of to extend the life of. Two or three years is the best we can hope for from a tablet. Same with cell phones. Sometimes a laptop can make it 3-4 years, which I'm hoping for my current one. The reason for the difference is that I can fix my laptop, it doesn't have a touch screen and I don't care about the battery life. It is a light weight work station. I might be able to do better, but it is against the will of the retailers and manufacturers.
I just came back from best buy, who did horribly. Yet they did the best at actually trying. I found a decent 2 in 1 laptop for $750. That is quite a bit of change to drop for a tablet alternative. I will not be able to shift my gaming to that machine, it is strictly an option for taking stress off the gaming machine. Then I looked for about two hours on Newegg and Amazon, after which I found roughly the same specs best buy offered for $500-$600. I could not find a single tablet with specs that motivates me to part with over one hundred dollars.
An updated version of my gaming laptop is available for $500. So the lowest end 2 in 1 I could live with costs MORE than a top end gaming laptop. What kind of fucking economy is this? Do they understand older consumers? I have no interest in being hip, or replacing a smart phone. I have no interest in anything being compared to Apple products. I made my decision about how I felt about Apple between 1995 and 2005. They had their chance to not be smug elitist assholes, they did not do it in that decade, they cost more for the SAME hardware. Further I have to point out that their operating system isn't even independently developed. It now runs on the same kernel as linux. Which means that if I want the performance of a mac I can just go to linux, which I have experience and somewhat warm feelings with.
As far as I can tell modern tablets are either middling high performance machines that cost more, or advanced smart phones. I could get a 2 in 1 capable of replacing all my other tech for a few thousand dollars. Or for less than half that I could buy a new kindle (89 dollars), and a newish gaming laptop for between 500 and 1100 dollars. I really don't know what is going on in the economy these days, since the focus is not on customer service, nor good hardware.
Tech has become a tax on the consumer by the tech industry. To stay with the times we must part with hundreds if not thousands of dollars a year on tech which they seem to think we don't understand. The tablet is the best example I can find of a profit loop. They cannot be repaired, fiddled with, or in any way taken care of to extend the life of. Two or three years is the best we can hope for from a tablet. Same with cell phones. Sometimes a laptop can make it 3-4 years, which I'm hoping for my current one. The reason for the difference is that I can fix my laptop, it doesn't have a touch screen and I don't care about the battery life. It is a light weight work station. I might be able to do better, but it is against the will of the retailers and manufacturers.
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