Urbin Technology

Haven’t posted in a while, so going to touch a few different topics.

First off, an Apple Watch update. I ran my series 1 for four years. Upgraded to a Series 5 mainly for battery life. I was going on vacation, and didn’t want to worry about it running out of power while I was out and about for the day. I was happy with the 5. That was the last one that didn’t support blood oxygen monitoring. Didn’t worry too much about that since I already a fingertip blood oxygen and pulse reader. I ran that for four years also. I did not get the Series 9. Went for the Ultra 2. The Ultra 2 is a beast. It’s big but I really do appreciate the larger battery. I can run it all day, collect sleep data, and then just pop it on a charger for 10-15 minutes in the morning to get back to an 80% charge. I also like the larger display, especially with simple analog watch faces. Fully expect to run this for at least four years.

I got a M1 MacBook. My last one was coming up on a decade of use. It still runs, and is a viable laptop. I still use it, but the M1 is a whole new experience. I got it with extra RAM and large SSD, since I plan on using that as long as I ran the Intel based one. One of the reasons I like the MacBooks is that they are bloody tanks. The hardware is rock solid, and the OS is stable. The M1 runs Baldur’s Gate 3 just as well as my Windows 10 tower with an i9 CPU. There are times I’m tempted to make the M1 MacBook my primary system instead of my Windows tower system.

I’ve got a pair of 27″ 4K monitors, which the MacBook drives nicely. One is a direct USB C connection (which also supplies power), and the other is connected to a USB C dongle via HDMI. The dongle also where the Ethernet cable is connected. Also picked up a Mac centric keyboard and mouse. Both are Logi products. The keyboard is a MX Mechanical, with the number pad and the extra loud clicky goodness. The mouse is the MX Master S3 for the Mac. Really please with both. The mouse tracks reliably on the black surface of my desk more reliably than the Apple Magic Mouse. YMMV, but it works for me.

Yes, I’m still running Windows 10. Thankfully the system I built a few years ago doesn’t have a TPM. So I rarely get the annoying ‘you need to upgrade your hardware to install the OS I don’t want’ messages from Microsoft. I had to use a Windows 11 system for a few weeks and I did not enjoy the experience. I’ve collected a lot of data over the years, and it’s stored on my homebuilt tower system. When I do a search, that is where I want to focus, not the Interwebs. I certainly don’t want search results for products someone is paying Microsoft put at the top of the list. I figured out quickly how to remove the new search button that is located where the Start button used to be. That improved my experience right away. Another ‘feature’ I didn’t like was that I couldn’t remote desktop to the Windows 11 system using the Microsoft remote desktop app on my Mac. I had to remote desktop to my Windows 10 system, and then remote desktop from there to the Windows 11 system. Probably some sort of ‘security’ setting that Microsoft has buried somewhere. I didn’t take the time to figure it out. Just stopped using the Windows 11 system. The only actually useful feature I found was tabs in File Explorer. Something MacOS has for years.

My opinion on Windows 11 is that Microsoft is trying to take us back to the days of the Mainframe and terminals. They want all your data in their cloud, where they can generate a continuing revenue stream. Personally, I’m not fond of this concept. There are multiple good reasons for the distributed data and processor concept, not all of which are technical. I’m old enough to remember when desktop personal computers on a LAN killed the microcomputer industry, and why.

Filed under: Apple, Gadget, Microsoft, Operating Systems, Windows 10 | Tagged: Apple, Apple Watch, Gadget, MacOS, Microsoft, Operating System, Windows 11 |