Apple users: do you desktop or laptop?

I used to have an iMac on my desk as a secondary computer, but since getting a M3 Macbook Air I’ve totally switched over to the “buy a decent monitor and plug whatever laptop you want in” model. Work Windows POS during the day and Macbook Air when I want an actual pleasurable experience. Save the money you’d spend on the iMac for upgrading everything else. I went with;

Monitor – 4k 27″ USB-C Dell – I don’t like ultra wide jobs and this was best no-silly-money USB-C 4K 27″ I could find.

Keyboard and mouse – Logitech Master MX – lovely kit that is labelled for both Windows and Mac. For Windows I have the Logitech dongle plugged into a USB port on the monitor so PC sees them when I plug it into the USB-C. Mac is handled direct by bluetooth. Silly money for a keyboard and mouse, but are a pleasure to use and you’ve just not bought an iMac!

Right, I have cancelled!

Think the set up @timmy’s has suggested will work – and still allows both of us to plug our work Windows machines in if we really need too. The keyboard makes a lot of sense to me! And about 73% cheaper then a iMac, without the risk of the screen dying in 2 years time!

And now I have the money to do the garden, which makes me feel a lot less stressed!

Maybe some shiny speakers and an iMac mini can follow in due course, when I have some spare pennies.

Maybe some shiny speakers 

I have one of these sat behind the monitor (you can just about see it on my picture on the previous page)

Available from Cex for a bargain £10 – it’s just connected to our home wifi network via Airplay. The sound quality is very good (and the iPod port closes neatly away).

My M1 macbook pro spends most of it’s life on mains power, and is now 3 years old with a battery capacity of 91%, so is looking on average 3% per-year. I’ve previously had Dell’s and thinkpads, all of which had replacement batteries by this age, so this is something apple seem to have got right.

I think that leaving it off mains power when not in use may actually be worse, since it doesn’t truly go to sleep when idle even with the lid shut, and still does background things. Leave it unplugged for a weekend and I see the charge can have dropped by a fair bit, so would probably cause more battery wear through additional charging.

I was a big fan of the 27″ iMac (had 4 for work, just retired the penultimate one this week – replaced with a Mini & 30″ LG monitor from CostCo which was very cheap!!) as it was cracking VFM – you basically got a massive, awesome display for free. The new iMacs don’t make sense for me, smaller monitor, poor VFM vs a Mini or woeful performance vs Studio. Plus decent monitors from Dell, Samsung, LG have got a lot cheaper over the last few years.