My nephew just graduated high school, and wants a laptop. When he decides what computer to buy, price (or more precisely, value) is the most important attribute.
Apple's MacBook Neo upended the 'value laptop' equation—Apple's not supposed to be both the cheapest option and the best value... but it seems like that's squarely where the Neo landed for the good-but-cheap laptop category.
My nephew is also my godson, and to kick off his computing journey, I thought I'd let him choose from a Framework 12 I bought to test, or the MacBook Neo I bought a couple months ago to use around the studio.
Buying a Framework laptop always felt ideological, not value-based. Like a statement that you want to support Linux-first hardware. Hard to compete without economy of scale, of course, but that wasn’t their main goal.
Every time I price one out, this is the friction I face.
I have a 9 year old Yoga 720 that was my daily driver and have been wanting to upgrade for at least 4 years. I love what the Framework 13 Pro is, and that it finally has a touchscreen but priced out it is over $3,000 CAD.
I finally upgraded, but picked up a refurbished Asus Pro Art 13 for $1,100 CAD instead, which also fit in to my waste-less ideology.
Sorry, no fake internet points for “I almost did it” 😉 Good on ya for buying refurbished though, it’s a real gamble sometimes, unfortunately.