Choice of computer : i need more peace of mind

Any insight of this https://www.scan.co.uk/ ?

as much as it pains me to say so, Apple laptops are actually good at this (peace of mind regarding drivers, overall hardware quality and stability during performance...) - at least several years ago, the one i use daily dates form 2011, BUT they are much more expensive - i'm not sure if you can have something good for your price range - and nowadays they are sad to deal with because no usb and no CD drive, and it's apple :s I use OSX since 9 years and 2 laptops, and am eventually considering buying a windows next time because it's expensive & reasons & i've heard windows has gotten better, but the stability of the system is something real afaict.

Everyone can relate to this problem. Computers are just not made the way they used to be.

If you want to go retro, there's no need to buy Apple. I have a Lenovo ThinkPad X220 with Core i5 at 2.6GHz. Boots Win10 instantly off an SSD. It's got every kind of legacy port. Triple USB, ExpressCard slot (for which I have a FireWire adapter), VGA plus DisplayPort, etc. Runs my live gigs just fine. Plenty of memory. Cost me 200 quid.

People will look at this processor and compare with something more modern. Truth is that in 7 years you might get something "sort of" twice as fast, at most. You can spend two grand for an incremental upgrade.

I compared the performance of this laptop against my older desktop, running an i7 920. For synthesis they were identical! Programmes like Reaktor and Max aren't using the multicores. So there it is.

Take care with companies like Dell. My friends used to work on their line, in support etc., back when their European facility was in my home town. These machines are built using the cheapest components to maximise profits. This means that person A can have a certain specific model working just fine, but person B will have problems. The components could change week to week. This is what "innovators in Just-In-Time manufacturing" really means! What's good for business is antigood for consumers.

This is particularly the case for the Inspirons, Dell's consumer line. Never buy them. Stick with Latitudes. Some of them are pretty sweet. There's one in the house I should really try with an audio setup.

Avoid laptops altogether as your first computer. A desktop provides so much more for the price, especially if you build it yourself from parts. (I use Scan in the UK as noted above.)

I have a desktop computer. That one I speak which runs a win8.1. Of course, it's absolute pure joy to use it. Built 6 years ago, indestructible and CPU no bullet but rocket proof. I built another one for my sister recently, performances are barely better for the same price range than mine 6 years ago.
But what the point using it, 90% cases it'll end up in the laptop for the sake of mobility, so I don't see any relevance composing on a rock solid desktop just to migrate at the end. I want to do all of it from the start in the final streamer. So I gave it to my father who has no words to thanks me enough for that sacrifice.

Btw, my computer is an inspiron.. Yeah you're right, what a crap.. Graphics components are a unique custom limited version that no other series have in the world.. Have to stick to 3 years old factory drivers, or it does insane shit. USB are crap. Realtek audio drivers often goes mad and begins to eat 40% CPU whenever I take the manufacturer ones or the dells one. And the touchable screen (totally useless but I didn't buyed it for that feature) have false contact that mess up things. Jeeez

My first dell, I was always a Asus fanboy, no problems till the last one that gave me headaches also. So i'm a bit tired with mainstream market computers...

Well, think pads are already on my lists, I'll add your testimony on the plus list ;) apple are too. I wish I could get more user feedbacks on recent ones. What about Scan? So you're satisfied? Pretty bangs for buck IMO

As a prior Apple engineer, I would say an Apple laptop is a VERY stupid choice for Max. They use shared memory for video, so your screen control and jitter performance will be terrible.

I have a custom built i7 on Windows and a Mac Mini, and for the price difference, you can get both rather than a top-end Mac, but if you can afford it all at once, a top-end Mac with windows installed too is the best choice.

@Ernest : "They use shared memory for video" what does it mean ? and how do other OS differ on that point ?

Yeah, computers... it's a pain. I need graphics performance and went for a pretty high-end gaming laptop: MSI GS63VR 6RF. Just over a year old now.

Comes with a ton of crapware pre-installed so the first thing to do is reinstall Win10 clean, not the manufacturer's recovery image. Win has that function built in now. Very handy. Then install drivers and all yourself.

I tweaked the CPU core voltages down a bit so it gets less hot and tuned the cooling fans so it's perfectly silent when not doing anything heavy. I also found that turning up the GPU fans more than needed helps keeping the CPU cooler as well, which results in a bit better cooling performance overall.

Connectivity is good with USB3, USB-C / TB3, ethernet, HDMI and mDP. Just missing FW but that's nowhere to be found anymore, sadly.

I searched long to find a model that has more or less decent cooling for the heavy CPU and GPU in it (no unicorns here, all gaming models get hot and loud, but one more than the other) and with a good range of connection options. Bad cooling results in the CPU and GPU throttling down when they get too hot. I also wanted it to be reasonably portable so no 4kg desktop replacements.

I'm happy with the performance and stability of it. I've run some seriously heavy audiovisual Max and Ableton stuff on it fine. I mean "4 projectors + DMX control + multichannel audio + sensor interfaces" heavy.

After 6 months it started having occasional BSOD crashes after which the OS drive wouldn't be found for a while. I sent it in and they replaced some mainboard components and the OS SSD drive and now everything is fine.

It's expensive but I recommend it for people needing serious performance.

(It's great for my occasional gaming too. The built-in speakers are total crap though. )

Alix, your experience mirrors mine. I too would recommend ASUS at one point in time, but they have released so many different lines of rubbish laptops there's no telling what you get any more.

Just to be clear, the Thinkpad I referred to also uses shared memory for the graphics. The alternative is a huge expensive laptop with dedicated memory card, as documented in the post above. This makes no sense for me, since the laptop is my second computer and I want it to be portable I do not use Max for Jitter. So, 4GB of RAM shared between OS and GPU is just fine, even if running an external monitor.

For those who don't know, Windows 10 is a free operating system. You can download an image and run it forever, legally. Inconveniences include a watermark and the inability to customise your wallpaper etc. This is perfect, however, for cleaning up a crapware bloated machine.