Starting at Google soon and have to pick my equipment. The on boarding guide strongly pushes me to pick the Google Pixelbook, but I’m hesitant to pick that one for a few reasons: 1. Everyone else on the team I’m joining uses Mac or Windows, and I know how sometimes it’s a pain to ramp people up who have a completely different OS than the rest of the team. 2. I think my productivity will suffer with Pixelbook because I’ve never used one before. On the other hand, I’ve spent years doing development on Mac, so I have a good Mac workflow already. 3. I don’t know what kind of support Pixelbook has for dev work. Like can it run IntelliJ, Sublime, and other dev related tools? I don’t want to use a cloud based IDE. Can it compile C++? I just don’t know if it’s a good dev box and not to mention if it can run other programs like Camtasia which I use a lot to make demo videos of new features that I create for sprint reviews. 4. I asked the team manager about it and they said Pixelbook would be fine and it’s really up to me, but I don’t want to go against the grain from the very beginning of my time at Google. Which would you pick and why? TC 210K
Laptop doesnt matter a lot. Take any laptop and Linux desktop. That's what most of the folks do. Laptops are just for meetings at least for more than 50% googlers. Having said that, u can pick Mac if u want
Do all Google software engineers have a desktop and a laptop? Up until now I’ve done all my work on a laptop only and don’t really see the need to have 2 separate computers
Google doesn't allow source code on any device that can easily walk out of the door. One of the few exceptions is for mobile development where you kinda need a Mac (probably a MacBook) because of the tooling.
I picked the mbp for myself. Most folks who interviewed me had pixel book or some other laptop I didn’t recognize.
Most people in my team use mac too. Pick Mac, since most of your team uses that. Don't worry it's not a big deal and you can change within 3 weeks, no questions asked.
I think the Dell 5520 is the best machine being offered right now. The MacBooks only have 16gb of RAM.
There are new MacBooks with 32GB now, though I have no idea if Google offers them or not.
No, they're not available yet. It'll be a couple months. Even then though, the 5520 is a better machine IMO. Especially with the thunderbolt dock they offer with it.
Wtf is spinDance? Lol
Came here to post the same :)
Ballet studio bro! It’s highly technical work
RAM matters. I was constantly paging disk when I had a MBP with only 16 GB of RAM because Chrome is a fucking hog.
I started last week. Picked pixelbook. Later, realized that: 1) 90% of engineers use MBP, 2) pixelbook is greatc, but really limits you. Already ordered an MBP as a replacement.
Perfect thanks for your perspective
I've used both a Chromebook Pixel and a MacBook Pro. Get the latter, in a 13" variant. You'll be using Chrome Remote Desktop for coding anyway, but the Mac is a nicer UX and you can have 3rd party apps installed (e.g. password managers, etc).
Just a curious question. Which password manager do u use. I remember someone telling in noogler orientation not to use password mgrs
Dashlane. It's for personal use. My work account password, I remember. For work passwords there is an internal password manager (Valentine).
I got the pixelbook and my teammates have started switching from macs to it too. It's super light and thin which is really nice carrying around and in your backpack. And as others have said, you barely use it as you do almost everything on your desktop.
Just get a MacBook Pro . I wish I had problems like you!!
I wish I could say it like you.