My local Best Buy has a “open box - satisfactory” baseline M1 MacBook Pro 14” for $1,285.99. And a baseline “open box - excellent” M2 MacBook Air $987.99. While I love the way the Air looks, getting the M1 MBP for that price seems like a really good deal.
But, I’ve never bought an open box satisfactory item from Best Buy before. I know it of course varies, but does anyone have experience with them? Should I expect a giant scratch somewhere on the unit? If I order online, is it rude to ask to look at it before leaving the store?
My workflow would be fine with the M2 MBA - which I’m also considering because I also think it’s a pretty good deal, but think this will make my iPad Pro feel even more redundant. Love the iPad, but getting something very similar to it and sandwiching it in between the MacBook and iPhone, I probably just wouldn’t use it much anymore. I may just end up selling the iPad Pro to help pay for the MacBook anyway.
I currently switch between my fiancé’s M1 MBA and my 12.9” iPad Pro (with Shadow PC) for my 2D game development, however figured I should consider a machine for myself - and not rely on their’s or the Shadow PC service. Both of these laptops I’ve been eying on Best Buy’s open box pages for months now. I’d like to get one either tonight or this weekend, though I think waiting until after Monday’s keynote would be better as a new MacBook Air may drop this one’s price. It’s unlikely they’d be sold before then.
Was also considering a brand new Surface Pro 9 with a free keyboard for $999. This makes since to me since my game dev tools are mostly Windows based (I run them through Crossover on the Mac, which seems to break a lot with macOS updates), but other hobby tools like Pixelmator just aren’t available on Windows. I’ve had multiple Surface devices in the past, I always thought they were reliable. But had a pretty bad experience with the Surface Laptop Studio and just kind of put me off the brand. The SLS was very slow, it had stuttering problems while playing movies, the thing overheated and battery life was poor. Maybe it was a dud?
I’m not really interested in an M1 MBA, Mac mini (or other desktop), or any other Windows brand. Narrowed it down to those three choices. Or just keeping my current workflow (fiancé’s M1 MBA and Shadow PC), which works mostly fine, and I’m only paying $30/month for Shadow. I don’t really play any games, other than what’s on my Nintendo Switch, so Shadow is only used for development. Unfortunately Shadow PC has these random small issues that make using it kind of annoying sometimes. The iPad’s trackpad is too fast for scrolling, and sometimes the app swaps horizontal/vertical scrolling. Waiting for Windows to boot from being completely off every time I want to use it. It doesn’t reliably work with iCloud Drive, files don’t really like to sync, and since my Shadow PC is hosted in another state, Apple will sign me out all the time. Needing a good internet connection (not getting any work done with Shadow at the local cafe, admittedly haven’t tried it connected to my phone’s unlimited hotspot though, which is capped at 5Mbps (edit: Just tried it with my 1 bar signal strength, and lowest resolution. It’s not completely unusable, but I’m not going to get much work done with it, maybe it would be better with a stronger signal).
I’ll wait until after Monday’s keynote before actually buying anything or deciding to keep my current set up. We might get some extremely unlikely and random surprise that the iPad will be able to run Mac apps or something.
But, I’ve never bought an open box satisfactory item from Best Buy before. I know it of course varies, but does anyone have experience with them? Should I expect a giant scratch somewhere on the unit? If I order online, is it rude to ask to look at it before leaving the store?
My workflow would be fine with the M2 MBA - which I’m also considering because I also think it’s a pretty good deal, but think this will make my iPad Pro feel even more redundant. Love the iPad, but getting something very similar to it and sandwiching it in between the MacBook and iPhone, I probably just wouldn’t use it much anymore. I may just end up selling the iPad Pro to help pay for the MacBook anyway.
I currently switch between my fiancé’s M1 MBA and my 12.9” iPad Pro (with Shadow PC) for my 2D game development, however figured I should consider a machine for myself - and not rely on their’s or the Shadow PC service. Both of these laptops I’ve been eying on Best Buy’s open box pages for months now. I’d like to get one either tonight or this weekend, though I think waiting until after Monday’s keynote would be better as a new MacBook Air may drop this one’s price. It’s unlikely they’d be sold before then.
Was also considering a brand new Surface Pro 9 with a free keyboard for $999. This makes since to me since my game dev tools are mostly Windows based (I run them through Crossover on the Mac, which seems to break a lot with macOS updates), but other hobby tools like Pixelmator just aren’t available on Windows. I’ve had multiple Surface devices in the past, I always thought they were reliable. But had a pretty bad experience with the Surface Laptop Studio and just kind of put me off the brand. The SLS was very slow, it had stuttering problems while playing movies, the thing overheated and battery life was poor. Maybe it was a dud?
I’m not really interested in an M1 MBA, Mac mini (or other desktop), or any other Windows brand. Narrowed it down to those three choices. Or just keeping my current workflow (fiancé’s M1 MBA and Shadow PC), which works mostly fine, and I’m only paying $30/month for Shadow. I don’t really play any games, other than what’s on my Nintendo Switch, so Shadow is only used for development. Unfortunately Shadow PC has these random small issues that make using it kind of annoying sometimes. The iPad’s trackpad is too fast for scrolling, and sometimes the app swaps horizontal/vertical scrolling. Waiting for Windows to boot from being completely off every time I want to use it. It doesn’t reliably work with iCloud Drive, files don’t really like to sync, and since my Shadow PC is hosted in another state, Apple will sign me out all the time. Needing a good internet connection (not getting any work done with Shadow at the local cafe, admittedly haven’t tried it connected to my phone’s unlimited hotspot though, which is capped at 5Mbps (edit: Just tried it with my 1 bar signal strength, and lowest resolution. It’s not completely unusable, but I’m not going to get much work done with it, maybe it would be better with a stronger signal).
I’ll wait until after Monday’s keynote before actually buying anything or deciding to keep my current set up. We might get some extremely unlikely and random surprise that the iPad will be able to run Mac apps or something.
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