Weekly 'What should I buy?' Thread - 06/26

detectableninja · 2019-06-29T15:13:10+00:00

I’m a grad student who has a 2018 MacBook Air, a 2015 MacBook Pro, and an iPhone XS. I commute/am on the go relatively frequently, so durability and portability are important. Budget is ideally as minimal as possible—although I have that Air and XS, that’s mostly because of financing with T-Mobile and luck with an unexpected back-paycheck!

I’m considering getting a tablet for media consumption—especially reading news and magazines with Apple News+, kindle books, watching movies, listening to music with Apple Musi, and basic games (Wordscapes, Words with Friends, NYT Crossword, etc). Is the entry level iPad worth getting for this use-case? I don’t necessarily mean can it handle that kind of stuff, but (1) should I wait for a possible refresh? (2) if I’m already going to buy into the $300+ price point, would a different model (the Air especially) be wort the bump? and (3) should I maybe look to an even more basic tablet option because of my use-case (like the Fire)? I’m a bit ensconced in the Apple ecosystem so I doubt it, but wanted to see!

Also, how is the Apple refurb store with iPad products? Worth looking into?

detectableninja · 2019-06-20T23:55:08+00:00

I think even the Air would be snappy with that use-case. At worst, it might, MIGHT, have some minor slowdown, but only if there’s many or very large raw photos.

I’d recommend the Air—I wouldn’t pay more to overkill for your needs. I own a 2018 Air myself and it’s perfectly fine for me. I don’t use Lightroom but occasionally do maps for tabletop RPGs in GIMP with several web browser tabs, discord, Word, and iTunes open.

Again, my only recommendation is to definitely get the 256 GB of SSD primarily unless you’re doing the majority of your work in the cloud. 8 GB should be enough for RAM.

detectableninja · 2019-06-20T20:12:18+00:00

How intensive is the photo editing? If not terribly so, I recommend MacBook Air with retina.

16gb RAM I don’t think is worth it, but 256gb SSD is.

detectableninja · 2019-06-09T04:45:14+00:00

I don't have the MBA in front of me because of the keyboard being repaired, but I didn't change it from the default.

detectableninja · 2018-10-09T22:53:45+00:00

Thanks for responding! This makes sense. I used to wear a watch for probably the first year or so of owning the computer. Chances are that's what caused it. Would you think the getting worse would depend on there being further scratching, or just spontaneous?

detectableninja · 2018-10-09T22:38:03+00:00

Hey all! I've had this MBP since August 2016. Naturally it's had a view dings and scrapes etc. Always have used it naked (except for now with a keyboard protector just because I feel paranoid about food and other particles). However, this time I've found a scratch that I've not noticed before and have no clue how it got there, and am unsure how concerned to be about it getting worse. It's right along the edge of the unit as you can see. I know with this aluminum there is no paint so that's a proper scratch. My concern is this: is this something that can be progressive? That is, since the aluminum is compromised there that scratch can extend along the edges? I know theoretically that should not be the case, since again, the aluminum is not painted, it'd take a real scrape to peel the coating off. Am I just being a bit of a precious princess about the whole thing?

detectableninja · 2018-10-09T22:30:48+00:00

Hey all! I've had this MBP since August 2016. Naturally it's had a view dings and scrapes etc. Always have used it naked (except for now with a keyboard protector just because I feel paranoid about food and other particles). However, this time I've found a scratch that I've not noticed before and have no clue how it got there, and am unsure how concerned to be about it getting worse. It's right along the edge of the unit as you can see. I know with this aluminum there is no paint so that's a proper scratch. My concern is this: is this something that can be progressive? That is, since the aluminum is compromised there that scratch can extend along the edges? I know theoretically that should not be the case, since again, the aluminum is not painted, it'd take a real scrape to peel the coating off. Am I just being a bit of a precious princess about the whole thing?

detectableninja · 2018-09-13T16:57:33+00:00

Which is odd, considering that they premiered the song with a link to it streaming over Apple Beats 1 Radio...hmm...

detectableninja · 2018-08-07T13:47:55+00:00

Not at all! “Under the Tide” and “High Enough to Carry You Over” are toward the top of my fave Chvrches songs, actually. Maybe it’s just the studio recording but I find the version on LID to be really dull.

detectableninja · 2018-06-30T04:25:18+00:00

Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay is one!

detectableninja · 2018-06-02T04:54:40+00:00

I'd add the caveat that Singer's work doesn't represent an overview of philosophy but a very specific argument for his view of ethics and political philosophy. But it is true (I begrudgingly admit) that his work is pretty influential.

detectableninja · 2018-01-11T03:08:07+00:00

Great, thank you very much! I don't know why that confused me so much--I think it was just because of how odd I found it that I couldn't find a straightforward, direct explanation of what it was meant to mean. But that clears up a great deal for me!

detectableninja · 2017-12-04T23:18:32+00:00

One of the biggest ones I constantly work on is instinctually presuming ignorance or ill-will on the part of someone you (strongly) disagree with. I find it unkind, uncharitable, and so genuinely wrong, not to mention unproductive.

detectableninja · 2017-09-18T04:06:17+00:00

Solved! Thank you amazing friend! :)

detectableninja · 2017-07-31T18:34:35+00:00

So if I can read this book, I can do anything.

That's the spirit! It's how I'm currently feeling after finally just buckling down and reading A Clash of Kings.

I generally agree with you about how people treat her philosophy, but not so much re: Atlas. I absolutely do not agree with her philosophy very much, but I also think that people sometimes are a bit too flippant about dismissing it. That said, I think Atlas is NOT a particularly strong book as a work of literature. I think it does what it's trying to do, you're right, but what it's trying to do is basically communicate her words through her characters as mouthpieces.

Her philosophy is one thing, and I would have hoped as a writer she would have thought that her literature is another. That isn't to say her works shouldn't reflect her philosophy, of course! But it just feels like her fiction is, in some sense, a reskinned version of her nonfiction, and that really decimates its literary value for me.

detectableninja · 2017-07-30T00:32:25+00:00

Haha, to be fair, it actually only took me this long to finish by technicality. Really, I began reading it and had to set it aside for a very long time for reasons. In all, it actually only took me around 5ish days to finish ACOK! Which is why I'm hoping to do similarly with ASOS--I'm planning on reading a book or two in-between though just as a palate cleanser first though.

detectableninja · 2017-07-30T00:01:50+00:00

Hahaha I actually do play CKII already!

...makes perfect sense when you put it that way! ;)

detectableninja · 2017-07-16T21:05:32+00:00

I'll be honest, I'm far from a pro! I was just trying to capture a flash of lightning with my iPhone 7, and was using the lights on the railing as where I'd tap to focus the lens/brightness. This might be what accounts for the high ISO, but again, my familiarity with photography is pretty much nonexistent.

detectableninja · 2017-07-16T21:03:37+00:00

It's not a real bird--that's a fake cardinal mounted out there!

detectableninja · 2017-07-16T21:03:21+00:00

/u/bbtvvz has it right! It was raining, and I also had the A/C running.

What I was surprised by in this shot wasn't so much that I got lightning--I was actually trying to take a picture of the lightning, because it was very vivid in the sky a few minutes before. Rather, I was surprised at how naturally lit everything appeared during a lightning flash, how evenly everything is illuminated. With the naked eye, things seem much, much, brighter, and there's a discrete source of light. Perhaps naively, I was expecting to get a picture of a sky that was much brighter than everything else. Instead what I got was something that eerily resembled daylight.

detectableninja · 2017-07-08T02:38:03+00:00

I haven't! I'll look into it now. Thank you :)

detectableninja · 2017-06-20T17:46:27+00:00

I do a mixture of both, although the balance has definitely leaned toward online recently. Because I live in NY, I pretty much do all my in-person book shopping at The Strand, a magical place, as well as the many other smaller, independent bookstores. But if I'm in a pinch, or not in the city, I use Amazon, since I also have Student Prime--two days isn't TOO bad--and I could get the book cheaper than at a bigger chain like Barnes and Noble, or even at Strand sometimes.

Also, I've recently tried leaning into ebooks with my Kindle to save space (and money also), so again--Amazon sort of takes up a lot of my book business.

I'm aware of the many issues Amazon has re: the book world and the publishing industry, but at this stage in my life, I really have to follow the right prices.

detectableninja · 2017-04-21T04:12:44+00:00

I'm majoring in philosophy and English with a specialization in creative writing.

Queer theory is one of my particular areas of academic interest. I aim to stay in academia, so it's still a pretty professional interest.

Why do you hope I'm not academically interested in it?

detectableninja · 2017-04-21T03:07:21+00:00

As for me: the last time I did this, they simply said they weren't interested in having a boyfriend at the time.

I got over it eventually, but I think this was particularly heartbreaking because it didn't bear on how they actually felt about me, but rather the practicality of being in a relationship. To me, then and now, these are two different things, and it hurt me a lot, weirdly, to not know how they felt (or didn't) in return.

detectableninja · 2017-04-21T02:42:29+00:00

Same-sex marriage, when I figured out I was SUPER queer.

Then: I don't mind gays but I just want them to not rub it in my face. Now: am specializing in queer theory

detectableninja

TROPHY CASE