Starting Computer Science Degree

[Silentstorm74]

Hi, 

I’m going to be starting a computer science bachelors program, and was looking for recommendations for laptops, I do not need something gaming oriented as I have a desktop for those needs. I would however like something reliable and light for traveling and commuting. Thanks in advance!

[Slottr]

MacBook Air ez 

[Lightwreather]

I second the M1 macbook air.

[Silentstorm74]

12 minutes ago, Slottr said:

MacBook Air ez 

Appreciate the rec, would the 8gb of ram be alright? or is opting for the 16gb model worth it?

[Slottr]

Just now, Silentstorm74 said:

Appreciate the rec, would the 8gb of ram be alright? or is opting for the 16gb model worth it?

Easily.

Anything that requires more memory can be handled on a department lab computer or your home desktop - this wouldnt be until later year courses anyway. (if at all)

 

Or you have a memory leak in your code somewhere lol

[jj9987]

Mac is a good choice, but speaking from my own experience...

Depending on the university and the courses, you may struggle with running certain applications or achieve certain goals. Most courses had the materials and guides for Windows-only. Or the application that was required to use, was only available for Windows. If you used any other platform, you were on your own - run a virtual machine or what not. If you have courses with hardware, that require certain drivers, that's a whole new struggle.

 

So my main recommendation would be that try to get familiar with the university's courses and what's used in them. If you are familiar with MacOS and/or willing to learn the command line and all it's tweaks and are willing to spend extra time to get stuff running, go Mac - great battery life, great performance, great build quality, great keyboard (assuming you avoid the disaster from 2016-2020) and great display. If you are rather new to computers, programming, hardware, drivers etc, Windows might be somewhat safer solution. In that case, a Thinkpad would be my first recommendation, followed by Dell XPS.

[Slottr]

6 minutes ago, jj9987 said:

 

 

Any Computer Science program shouldn't be promoting Windows as a development platform as is. Looking at pretty much any program in NA, and I'm sure all other areas, you'll be required to use some sort of UNIX based OS to some degree.

 

Most tools used for CS will be native to UNIX and it's environment, trying to stick to Windows systems within a program like this will be crippling

 

That being said, you could always throw a linux distro on an XPS/other

[RONOTHAN##]

6 minutes ago, Slottr said:

 

Any Computer Science program shouldn't be promoting Windows as a development platform as is. Looking at pretty much any program in NA, and I'm sure all other areas, you'll be required to use some sort of UNIX based OS to some degree.

 

Most tools used for CS will be native to UNIX and it's environment, trying to stick to Windows systems within a program like this will be crippling

 

That being said, you could always throw a linux distro on an XPS/other

Speaking as someone currently taking a comp sci degree in the US, so far half my classes have required me to have a Windows computer to at least some degree, with the other half being platform agnostic (though in these cases having something *nix based makes things a lot easier). 

 

My standard recommendation for a comp sci major is a used business laptop like a Lenovo Thinkpad. They're cheap, fast enough for basically anything you'll do in class, and built pretty well while also being pretty easy to fix (for the most part). Try to get something 8th gen or newer with an i5 or better, and amongst Thinkpads (what I know the best personally) their T- series is usually the best value machines you can find. Plus, when you eventually need to have something *nix based, Linux driver support is usually very solid. 

 

That said, if you're willing to wait for Windows on ARM to officially release, an M1 Macbook would be a fantastic bet once you can run Windows on it in case you need it. 

[Slottr]

4 minutes ago, RONOTHAN## said:

Speaking as someone currently taking a comp sci degree in the US, so far half my classes have required me to have a Windows computer to at least some degree, with the other half being platform agnostic (though in these cases having something *nix based makes things a lot easier). 

 

My standard recommendation for a comp sci major is a used business laptop like a Lenovo Thinkpad. They're cheap, fast enough for basically anything you'll do in class, and built pretty well while also being pretty easy to fix (for the most part). Try to get something 8th gen or newer with an i5 or better, and amongst Thinkpads (what I know the best personally) their T- series is usually the best value machines you can find. Plus, when you eventually need to have something *nix based, Linux driver support is usually very solid. 

 

That said, if you're willing to wait for Windows on ARM to officially release, an M1 Macbook would be a fantastic bet once you can run Windows on it in case you need it. 

Thats interesting to hear. Where have you explicitly needed to use Windows?

[RONOTHAN##]

5 minutes ago, Slottr said:

Thats interesting to hear. Where have you explicitly needed to use Windows?

Most recently, I had to take an assembly class, and the assembler the teacher wanted us to use was MASM, the Microsoft assembler, and he specifically wanted use Visual Studio Express 2017. I did try to get around that by using Wine and other tools, but gave up and just ran a VM every time I needed a Windows tool.

[jj9987]

1 hour ago, Slottr said:

 

Any Computer Science program shouldn't be promoting Windows as a development platform as is. Looking at pretty much any program in NA, and I'm sure all other areas, you'll be required to use some sort of UNIX based OS to some degree.

 

Most tools used for CS will be native to UNIX and it's environment, trying to stick to Windows systems within a program like this will be crippling

 

That being said, you could always throw a linux distro on an XPS/other

"shouldn't" is a good term. They're not promoting Windows, they just make sure everything works on Windows and don't spend any extra time to see if it is possible on other operating systems. I remember from my 1st year in CS BSc, where we had to use some Sybase application for the databases course, which was only available for Windows at the time. Anything else wasn't permitted, because all their automated tests were built on that and if you used MySQL/MariaDB or PostgreSQL, it wouldn't work as SQL was slightly different.

 

I agree with you, they shouldn't. Most courses could be done on any platform without too much hassle, but there were a few problematic ones. Also, since the instructors/lecturers aren't familiar with all the operating systems, don't expect very much support if you happen to get problems with one they aren't familiar with - this happened to a few co-students.

 

[BuckGup]

2 hours ago, Slottr said:

 

Any Computer Science program shouldn't be promoting Windows as a development platform as is. Looking at pretty much any program in NA, and I'm sure all other areas, you'll be required to use some sort of UNIX based OS to some degree.

 

Most tools used for CS will be native to UNIX and it's environment, trying to stick to Windows systems within a program like this will be crippling

 

That being said, you could always throw a linux distro on an XPS/other

I agree but like others have said it's not like this at all. Windows dependent programs are used a lot. Also macs being UNIX based doesn't mean plug and play either. Low level programming will behave differently, test cases written in an IDE on windows won't always work on the same IDE on macOS, and the list goes on with super specific errors students won't have a clue how to fix. Most CS students don't even know how to navigate directories on windows or how to install a program. When I was in class peers would ask me questions about computers I learned when I was in elementary school and I was dumbfounded but the course curriculum didn't cover any of it.