2018 15” MBP or Asus Zenbook?

Can pick up the 2018 15” MBP with 16gb/i7/256gn/Radeon GPU with some extras for about $1600

Or...
A new Asus Zenbook in 13 or 15”, 4K, i7/16gb/512/nvidea GPU for about 1500

I plan on doing most editing from an iPad Pro but like having the laptop around as well. I prefer Apple....honestly. But...didn’t know if anyone had experience one or the other

Thanks! Plan on doing one or the other tomorrow

I like Apple products but would steer clear of their newer (2018 and later) MBPs due to keyboard issues. If you don’t really need the portability of a laptop, I suggest going the desktop route.

I do need a laptop unfortunately. Can’t really use a desktop because no space for it and I’m pretty much 100% mobile

Or just go the iPad Pro route I was considering originally and keeping my monster gaming laptop as the “home” machine

I cant imagine every paying for a windows pc that expensive...... ever again.

I've owned 3 in that price league, 2 have had hardware and a million software issues, one has been fairly solid. On the used market, they are worth nothing. My macbook runs parallels, so I can use the occasional windows program, rock solid for video editing, and the virtual machine is super convenient, wipe to previous setting takes only a minute. It's probably not as fast as my latest PC laptop, but it sure as hell retains better value, more superior build quality and finish. It's also more stable, hardly ever needs to reboot, it's not perfect, it does get stuck from time to time, I'm running windows virtual AND a heavy load on the MacOS, so yeah, it's taking a lot of usage. Still better reliability than my windows machine. Battery life stays true to the spec, where the windows machine seems over estimated. For reference, I've used high end dells, Hp's, and toshibas.

The keyboard problem is blown way out of proportion. If you eat over your kepbard, you might have a problem, don't use it as a food tray and you won't have any issues. I've been using mine in the field for almost a year and haven't had any problems. I have another 2018 that I use at a desk, also no problems.

I would highly recommend any of the new MacBook Pros!

PacAce wrote in post #18906280
I like Apple products but would steer clear of their newer (2018 and later) MBPs due to keyboard issues. If you don’t really need the portability of a laptop, I suggest going the desktop route.

I ended up with a 2018 15” MBP, and new 12.9 iPad Pro figured j would just bite the bullet and do what I was leaning towards in the first place, and have the best of both worlds!

Derek1387 wrote in post #18911411
I ended up with a 2018 15” MBP, and new 12.9 iPad Pro figured j would just bite the bullet and do what I was leaning towards in the first place, and have the best of both worlds!

Hopefully, Apple has resolved the keyboard issue on the MBPs by now. Keeping fingers crossed!

Seems fine to me!

Derek1387 wrote in post #18911811
Seems fine to me!

It took several months before my daughter started having issues with the keyboard on her 2018 MBP. Fortunately, it was more of an annoyance than something major. She kept getting multiple spaces and periods inserted when typing even though she only typed one space. The genius bar folks weren’t able to resolve her keyboard issue so she needs to have it sent in for a keyboard replacement.

I think it really boils down if you are OK with Windows OS or prefer Mac OS X. Mac OS is more trouble free and you are hardware-wise pretty much covered under warranty. But the moment the warranty is over, if your Mac gets a hardware problem, you will most likely have to throw it away as Apple wants to charge a fortune to repair it. Of course, your Mac may continue to work problem free for many years unless you run out of luck.
If a PC laptop on the other hand breaks, it will be much easier to find third party repair shops that will fix it for you for a far more reasonable price. Most PC laptops can also be upgraded by the user (ram, storage) for far less than what Apple charges for upgrading the components. Batteries in a PC laptop can also normally be replaced by the user (check the model you want to buy in this regards). So overall cost-wise, PC will be less expensive than Apple in the long run even if the initial price seems on par.
On the other hand, Windows OS is sometimes a pain to use and has numerous flaws in its design and frequently requires some effort to maintain its normal healthy operation. What can one expect when Microsoft spams their own operating system? On the positive side, hardware freedom will be lost in the Apple ecosystem which is an important concern for me. So I am a PC user.

Not true at all, when my 2013 MBP had a problem, I had to have the logic board replaced, cost me $271. Apple has 3rd party sources for older repairs, I took it to the Apple store, they sent it out, and it returned to them. We have two Apple Certified repair centers in Indy. I think the misconception is that when Windows based laptops break, people toss them because they are so cheap. If you compare high end windows repairs to Mac, they aren't that far off.

raminolta wrote in post #18920716
I think it really boils down if you are OK with Windows OS or prefer Mac OS X. Mac OS is more trouble free and you are hardware-wise pretty much covered under warranty. But the moment the warranty is over, if your Mac gets a hardware problem, you will most likely have to throw it away as Apple wants to charge a fortune to repair it. Of course, your Mac may continue to work problem free for many years unless you run out of luck.
If a PC laptop on the other hand breaks, it will be much easier to find third party repair shops that will fix it for you for a far more reasonable price. Most PC laptops can also be upgraded by the user (ram, storage) for far less than what Apple charges for upgrading the components. Batteries in a PC laptop can also normally be replaced by the user (check the model you want to buy in this regards). So overall cost-wise, PC will be less expensive than Apple in the long run even if the initial price seems on par.
On the other hand, Windows OS is sometimes a pain to use and has numerous flaws in its design and frequently requires some effort to maintain its normal healthy operation. What can one expect when Microsoft spams their own operating system? On the positive side, hardware freedom will be lost in the Apple ecosystem which is an important concern for me. So I am a PC user.

I have a kirabook by toshiba, costs $2K, never again will I spend that much on a windows laptop...... it's only a little older than my macbook, and worth less than 300 on ebay. I know my macbook can pull in probably 1000+ for a MBP with 16GB ram....

The MBP has been more reliable than all my windows laptops, faster for in most, if not all scenarios despite lower specs, and just more pleasurable to use. It runs windows as well, and in a protected partition, I can simply wipe and refresh in seconds. Dont worry about viruses, and dont have microsoft constantly spam me about news events I never signed up for.

ShotByTom wrote in post #18921270
Not true at all, when my 2013 MBP had a problem, I had to have the logic board replaced, cost me $271. Apple has 3rd party sources for older repairs, I took it to the Apple store, they sent it out, and it returned to them. We have two Apple Certified repair centers in Indy. I think the misconception is that when Windows based laptops break, people toss them because they are so cheap. If you compare high end windows repairs to Mac, they aren't that far off.

I have a few high end windows machines, and they depreciated so badly, I might as well buy a used one...... my keyboard no longer lights up on my kirabook, not about to get that fixed, when a used one will likely cost as much as the repair.....

Charlie, you're so full of contradictions. If you're a Mac fan, that's fine....but there are many more options for PC configurations vs Mac. Take for example Mac Book Pro...a touch bar, but still no touch screen. My day to day light laptop is a Lenovo Yoga 4K touch screen: have a Wacom stylus and can go into tablet mode to paint masks and other "paint" tasks. It serves me well, and notice new configs are about the same as what I paid. I also have a Dell mobile workstation for my 3D animation tasks (which need a Nvidia Quadro card to render correctly). I've had it for a number of years, and still running strong. I would say that even though I don't like how Windows updates are going, they do make it very stable for the lay public. For an advanced user like me, I have to get into the classic control panel and have to do more registry edits. I'm not even getting into desktop workstations: in which the PC architecture has way more CPU and video card options.

davesrose wrote in post #18921395
Charlie, you're so full of contradictions. If you're a Mac fan, that's fine....but there are many more options for PC configurations vs Mac. Take for example Mac Book Pro...a touch bar, but still no touch screen. My day to day light laptop is a Lenovo Yoga 4K touch screen: have a Wacom stylus and can go into tablet mode to paint masks and other "paint" tasks. It serves me well, and notice new configs are about the same as what I paid. I also have a Dell mobile workstation for my 3D animation tasks (which need a Nvidia Quadro card to render correctly). I've had it for a number of years, and still running strong. I would say that even though I don't like how Windows updates are going, they do make it very stable for the lay public. For an advanced user like me, I have to get into the classic control panel and have to do more registry edits. I'm not even getting into desktop workstations: in which the PC architecture has way more CPU and video card options.

How is my personal experience a contradiction?

I work on Windows machines(3 of them) and it's my opinion that they suck compared to my MBP despite much beefier specs. I run Windows(7 + 10x2) in a VM on my Mac, don't really need a Windows machine... And to keep on topic, this thread is regarding laptops, which generally have low customization abilities. I don't really measurebate my machines, I just need to work quick and reliably. Deep integration with my iDevices is a huge deal, the are ways to do this with Android, but it's a gigantic workaround, you just end up fighting with your poorly communicating devices. When you buy a Mac, you're also buying into an ecosystem that works well, I don't get that with a Windows PC laptop.