I had a look at the new Windows 8 system and some new flashy notebooks yesterday while I was back in Singapore, at Funan IT mall.
I found W8 the same thing, except for a new wrapper. There is absolutely no meaningful reason to upgrade from W7, let alone XP, other than the touch based system, which is quite cool and works without the mouse. However, most people like myself use Windows for doing real work, not playing touch or accerlerator based games. Touch is pointless for Word, Excel and Powerpoint (in increasing horror - try using the pointless Keynote on the iPad for starters). In a nutshell, W8 is as meaningless an upgrade as W7 was from XP. So overall, I'm not sold and have no preference. W8 will need me to understand further how the OS works and a waste of time.
On the hardware side, I had been eyeing the Thinkpad X1 Carbon for sometime now, however, my trusty x60s will NOT fail, and is still working perfectly, and running software at ease. Anyway the notebook I am looking for needs to have a large screen (as I'm getting long sighted) and a small screen (so the asshole who reclines back in front of me when I am travelling economy doesn't crack my screen). It should probably be a i7 ivybridge and be exceedingly light, preferably 1.2kg max. It should also be reasonably cheap. It must have an awesome keyboard, not those iMac Air type which I can't do any real work on. I also hate iMac Air type trackpads, no matter how large they are, they force your wrist is a unhealthy position.
The candidates are: X1 Carbon, X230, Samsung Series 9, X60s. In order of merit:
Screen large - X1 Carbon
No man's land - SS9
Screen small - x230, x60s
CPU - SS9, X1Carbon, x230, x60s
Weight - SS9, X1Carbon, x60s, x230
Keyboard - x60s, x230, X1Carbon, SS9
Trackpad - x60s, x230, X1Carbon, SS9
As seen above, my current trusty s60s is beating notebooks GENERATIONS ahead in user interface. I would like to have the 1.15kg weight of the SS9, coupled with a 14" screen of the X1Carbon, but I also want the magnificent keyboard of a Thinkpad, and its perfect red knob.
Something's got to give!
In the meantime, I guess I will just wait for my x60s to stop working - after 6 years, it is unfortunately still running perfectly!
I found W8 the same thing, except for a new wrapper. There is absolutely no meaningful reason to upgrade from W7, let alone XP, other than the touch based system, which is quite cool and works without the mouse. However, most people like myself use Windows for doing real work, not playing touch or accerlerator based games. Touch is pointless for Word, Excel and Powerpoint (in increasing horror - try using the pointless Keynote on the iPad for starters). In a nutshell, W8 is as meaningless an upgrade as W7 was from XP. So overall, I'm not sold and have no preference. W8 will need me to understand further how the OS works and a waste of time.
On the hardware side, I had been eyeing the Thinkpad X1 Carbon for sometime now, however, my trusty x60s will NOT fail, and is still working perfectly, and running software at ease. Anyway the notebook I am looking for needs to have a large screen (as I'm getting long sighted) and a small screen (so the asshole who reclines back in front of me when I am travelling economy doesn't crack my screen). It should probably be a i7 ivybridge and be exceedingly light, preferably 1.2kg max. It should also be reasonably cheap. It must have an awesome keyboard, not those iMac Air type which I can't do any real work on. I also hate iMac Air type trackpads, no matter how large they are, they force your wrist is a unhealthy position.
The candidates are: X1 Carbon, X230, Samsung Series 9, X60s. In order of merit:
Screen large - X1 Carbon
No man's land - SS9
Screen small - x230, x60s
CPU - SS9, X1Carbon, x230, x60s
Weight - SS9, X1Carbon, x60s, x230
Keyboard - x60s, x230, X1Carbon, SS9
Trackpad - x60s, x230, X1Carbon, SS9
As seen above, my current trusty s60s is beating notebooks GENERATIONS ahead in user interface. I would like to have the 1.15kg weight of the SS9, coupled with a 14" screen of the X1Carbon, but I also want the magnificent keyboard of a Thinkpad, and its perfect red knob.
Something's got to give!
In the meantime, I guess I will just wait for my x60s to stop working - after 6 years, it is unfortunately still running perfectly!
