My college gives us a laptop included in our tuition. Give me some pros and cons on these boys. Which do I go with? I'm an EE major if that has any impact on what I should choose.
>gives us
Decline and ask for reimbursement.
Then buy your own. There's a 99.99% chance they will charge MSRP, which will be be anywhere from 20-50% more expensive than what you get similarly by yourself.
Is this why american higher education is so overpriced?
They are surely charging this at a huge markup and got it dirt cheap by buying in bulk
14" is a great union between comfortable screen size and portability/battery life. That's it.
>>54894176
>gives
you wish
>>54894213
>>54894223
The reason they do it is because they load it with any and all programs we would need so that nobody can complain with "hurr durr school is oppressive cause im poor and cant afford programs we needed". And im not sure if we can decline and ask for reimbursement but i'll look into it.
>>54894290
> Preloaded with software
You can bet your ass they're ass raping you with that thing, especially if it comes with any expensive software like Sold Works (or any other CAD program) and photoshop.
You seriously can't bring your own laptop with pirated software?
>>54894176
Which school do you go to?
get the T460p if you can't decline
>>54894176
MSI GE80
S
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8
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>>54894322
Not op but what do you prefer, x260 or T460?
>>54894322
Wentworth Institute of Tech
This is their program overview:
http://www.wit.edu/dts/laptop-services/index.html
And based on the FAQ it seems like they are gonna give me a hard time if I say I don't want one.
>>54894417
> You cannot use your personal laptop
>>54894417
i would cry
>>54894417
IT'S MY MONEY AND I NEED IT NOW
>>54894417
This thing is spywared up the ass and locked down as fuck.
If you are forced to use it literally just put finished work on it. Buy your own laptop or build your own PC.
>>54894417
Holy fuck, USA is confirmed to be fucking retarded
How much student loan debt are you getting into? 30k,60k, 90k?
>>54894586
Already have a PC and a hand-me-down macbook pro. I'm set to keep outta there NSA bullshit
>>54894417
>>54894476
To be fair, if I was them, I wouldn't want to individually install software on 200 different laptops and play tech support for dozens of illiterates. This way they can have 2 system images for those two thinkpads and just re-image as necessary.
>>54894681
Oh tru, never thought about it like that.
>>54894176
P50
just see this:
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-P50-Workstation-Review.158713.0.html
>>54894223
They still make us pay for the "required" 1700 dollar macbook or workstation with the tuition including sports and more sports also matlab/mathematic you are probably paying out the ass for.
>>54894681
I don't get it, his school probably has computer labs. My public university has computer labs with macs and PCs that are open till 11PM and a library that loans out laptops till 3AM. The laptops and desktops both have commercial software on it.
I guess it's true that "nothing is free".
>>54894681
They don't have to install shit. All they have to do is have a website where you log in with your student account and download the software that they have a site license for. If you can't install software on a laptop you shouldn't be pursuing an electrical engineering major.
>>54894666
>trying to keep out of NSA bullshit
>uses mac os x
>>54894731
Nobody is saying it doesn't have better specs compared to the T460p, it's just too fucking huge to lug around everywhere
>>54894417
I didn't read their page, but the caption you took is the only sane way of providing support to any number of students higher than 1. You either get "It's written on this webpage, go solve your problem, it works on my machine." or "You have to use a computer we support." There is no other way, it's not grabbing money, it's just the only logical way.
>>54894701
Also there's going to be financial savings from having less tech support guys and less disruptions due to somebody's laptop fucking up. How much does it cost for a company to employ an IT guy in Boston, probably like 100k a year? That's a significant number of thinkpads you can buy instead.
>>54894794
How do you think every other school handles this? Installing software on a laptop isn't rocket science
His school is just retarded
>>54894754
>If you can't install software on a laptop you shouldn't be pursuing an electrical engineering major.
This is the part you are wrong in modern education system. Higher education today is a way to get higher paying jobs, that's why they're paying huge tuition, and if you are paying tuition you are a customer not a volunteer who seeks to learn more from masters. If you sue the school for not teaching you well enough you'd win (as people won lawsuits against online schools that don't do anything but give you a piece of paper with your name on it.) Teaching you well enough includes a year wasted on installing stupid software. It's not an efficient system, but it's the system we have.
>>54894223
they include crap most student's don't use and can't opt out of
sporting events, social events, gym use, fees to vendors to stay on campus.
>>54894808
Every other school probably handles it like "Yeah, there is a website and these are the only methods we support, submit a ticket please" and when you do submit a ticket it would probably take them a year or so to solve your actual problem.
And please don't claim that you've never run into a problem that could've been solved instantly by a properly set up software instead of you looping around bunch of forums. Latter makes you more knowledgeable but there's no point if in your professional life someone else is always going to set things up for you, which is the current view on higher education, learn a single thing. It's sad but true.
>>54894754
Yeah, but such a website costs money to create and maintain, and you also risk getting your licenses revoked if your IT guy fucks up the access rights.
> If you can't install software on a laptop you shouldn't be pursuing an electrical engineering major.
Sure, but if you expel retards who can't install shit, or insist on having Solidworks on their mom's '06 Macbook, they will sue you. Really, it's cheaper to buy them thinkpads.
>>54894176
P50 all the way. Much better model than the T460p.
We used to deploy T440Ps at the MSP I work at and they were cancer
>>54894223
Where do you think the universities get money to pay their presidents $5M/yr salary?
>>54894597
I have never seen a US university except for OPs do that. OP just goes to a "special" school.
Can't you request a MacBook OP?
>>54895293
xx40 series Thinkpads were the worst ones. xx60 aren't nearly as bad.
OP this is a huge red flag desu, especially if you're in CS or CE. A CS program should never restrict a student on their choice of Operating System.
>>54894597
>>54895341
It is the only logical way though, your schools must be way more special than OP's.
>>54895484
It's not logical at all. It's restrictive and sketchy. And for any major in technology a hindrance to learning.
>>54894731
>pay for the "required" 1700 dollar macbook or workstation with the tuition
This is less than my total career expenses in 5 years. American education must suck.
>>54895512
Yes American college is expensive, but you don't seem to understand the fact that OPs college is part of a very small minority that require students to buy a "required" laptop.
>>54895503
Have you ever worked at a company for a day in your life? It's the only way to support multiple computers. Unless you are okay with stupid students running around claiming school didn't provide them with tools to complete their assignments.
i love how this thread is barely helping OP at all
>>54894176
Get the P50 bro
>>54895553
Computer Labs
Licensed Software that is free for students
Face it, your school is fucking shit. Name me a top 100 school that does this.
>>54895562
Why would anyone help OP? He asked for reviews which are kind of out of topic as stated in the sticky and the difference would probably be barely noticeable for anything done for school. It's more fun to discuss things that are wrong with higher education today.
>>54894176
T460p
has great battery life plus the screen size will make it easier to bring around to classes
>>54895562
kek
>>54895592
Berkeley and Stanford has servers running Scientific Linux just not to help people with using software on their own computers. A lot of others are using Citrix and such to not let students install stuff on their own computers.
It's not that my school or any other prohibits installing said software and checking the license, it's just deprecated. And when you have the smallest issue, they're only going to say that they don't support the way you are doing or the OS you are using.
>>54894342
Are you a strong, masculine man, or a sissy who can't stand carrying a heavy bag?
>>54895664
>Berkeley and Stanford has servers running Scientific Linux
That's a lot fucking different than forcing students to buy a $2000 macbook, you fucking moron. They don't force people to solely use Scientific Linux, do they?
Name me one relevant University that uses Citrix.
>>54895664
This.
My school has a room full of thin clients connected to server clusters running virtual desktops just so that they don't have to pay ridiculous amount of money purchasing floating node licenses for MATLAB.
>>54895710
>That's a lot fucking different than forcing students to buy a $2000 macbook, you fucking moron.
That's pretty much the same. You are only thinking about computer science/engineering. A lot of CAD tools are deprecated to be run on people's own computers, because setting them up is nightmarish and no sane IT department wants to mess with it. So they're forcing the scientific linux for these programs, your answer is yes* with * explained as before.
And here one relevant university from Citrix' own page:
https://www.citrix.com/customers/georgia-institute-of-technology-en.html
>>54894290
Are you getting a discount on them? If so, reinstall windows and sell it.
>>54895710
>>54895788
Also one more thing, it may sound like I like this system, I don't. I like admin/user kind of people, but it is the way everyone is going and it is logical if you want students to focus on a single thing and provide IT support.
>>54894757
>a macbook only runs OS X
Kek
>>54894744
I'm in the UK and our university has multiple computer labs but they're often fully booked and some lectures don't like you being in there while they teach
The library also has a load of desktops, but they are painfully slow at even opening the file explorer. I'm not on a CAD using course, but a friend is and he says he hasn't bothered using them for CAD
>>54895659
>T460p
>has great battery life
No it doesn't.
Not even with the sticking out battery.
It is my single big issue with it.
Although you can always bring a 2nd battery of course.
>>54894176
Lenovo includes great spyware on all their laptops.
>>54894808
see
>>54894681
why do you think schools, offices and universities only use a handful of desktop and laptop models
it's because they don't want to have to deal with all the niggles with having to keep 30 different models of computer updated
>>54895892
That's subjective. What did you expect and what did you get?
Also I'm not the person you were discussing. I'm the one who is messing around defending school's policies.
>>54895925
>That's subjective.
No it isn't.
It's a high-performance laptop with just 50% more battery than its ultra portable low-power baby brother (X260).
And that's when comparing bulging vs. flat. - the X260 can actually hold 33% MORE battery with the bulge because it has an extra internal battery.
>>54896187
So higher power version has shorter battery life than lower power version? That's a surprise.
It is subjective in terms of the performance you expect from it.
>>54896325
Expectations have nothing to do with it.
I knew battery life was shit before I bought it.
Turned out it was indeed shit.
Doesn't magically make it better just becasue it fits my low expectations.
>>54895788
>Having computer labs running a specific distro is the same as literally saying you can't use your own computer
My college has labs running openSuse, my laptop runs Fedora. No one complains. You can use your own computer.
>But I can't install this .rpm in Windows
Then use the openSuse computers.
>>54894905
>Professional life
Op is going to college. In college you learn. Learning involves making mistakes.
I'm a sys admin and I'd never hire someone who had never installed an OS, which is what OP's school is advocating. There's just a knowledge gap that will take a long time to breach.
>>54894808
I agree his school is handicap. I go to Indiana University, we have access to creative cloud and like every generation of word since 2003, among any other software one may need.
If you are a complete babby and don't understand how to install these softwares, they have an ENTIRELY DIFFERENT SITE that just has the same things but hosts it on a virtual machine through citrix and you just use your school credentials to log in.
>>54896499
Using your own computer for remote connection is not using your own computer for school. They could've easily given access for students to download pretty much (not all, please don't give specific examples to disprove) any software running on servers and make them run it on their own computers. But they don't because they just don't want to deal with thousands of people asking same questions without reading a single page of instructions. Your vision might be better for learning more about computers but it's not the way sane schools are doing. It's sad but true.
>>54896577
You'd never hire a system admin who had never installed an OS. You may hire an electronics engineer or a computer engineer who had never installed an OS. I don't follow your point.
>>54896406
No it doesn't. But you wouldn't have complained about it online if you had expected 2 minutes of battery life from it.
The discussion was pointless to begin with but it's friday night, I'm bored.
>>54894290
>>54894417
Its because they don't want to put their LUM licenses for expensive softwares (which they have group licenses for) on personal machines.
Its a liability thing so that they can control how many seats are on their licenses
>>54894176
>paying that much for a dinosaur laptop
>>54897135
>Thinking that if it is thinkpad it's old.
>>54895698
I'm guessing the x260 is heavy?
Sounds like the laptop for me!
