Laptop or Tablet (MacBook or iPad)

Geneeus said:

When it's time to do my annual taxes, I go to a Fedex location where you can rent time on their computer. I use Intuit and they have my previous couple of years of tax returns to make things quicker. No laptop required, even though I have several, as well as a Mac Mini

Click to expand...

I do my taxes using H&R Block on my iPad. Works wonderfully, and my taxes can be a bit complex….

dustytrailhead said:

That’s good to know, but I imagine it requires an appointment.
I finished updating my 2015 MacBook Pro. It took about 6 hours over two days at Starbucks. I wonder if Monterey will be my last macOS. It is almost 7 years old.

I’m still chewing on the laptop vs tablet conundrum. Spilled coffee on my iPad this morning. I’m surprised I haven’t done that before. Things started out a little uneven today, which is a continuation of yesterday. I sent a pan of oatmeal skittering off the counter when I hit its handle with my elbow. Miraculously, it landed upright. Wow! Anyway, these kind of stupid human tricks make me reluctant to buy an $1800 iPad Pro and keyboard case.

Click to expand...

You don't necessarily need the iPad to be a Pro (or the 13"). The latest generation iPad Air will outperform the 2015 Macbook Pro, has the ability to use the magic keyboard (with trackpad) and has USB -C.....those are the things that really make it more of a replacement for a laptop. The ability to have a trackpad, and the ability to store files on an external drive. Yes, they are expensive, and the latest generation Air (256g) will run you $1200 with the magic keyboard, but as someone who has spilled coffee on their iPad on several occasions, I do highly recommend Apple Care. Pain to get to a city and bring it in, but saved my butt on more than one occasion, and will save your investment.

Kinda nice to know that I'm not the only one who sends food flying. LOL

Think I paid about $900 for my macbook air 2015.

I updated my 5 year old imac to Monterrey and it rendered it almost unusable, everything is slow as molassas. Slower actually. What used to take 10 minutes now takes 2 hours. It seems to be incompatible with the older machine.

I am on my second IPad Mini 4, and I love it.

And with a 5GB plan for my phone, Verizon gives me unlimited data on the IPad for $20 a month, which when traveling is worth its weight in gold.
.

GoingMobile said:

I updated my 5 year old imac to Monterrey and it rendered it almost unusable, everything is slow as molassas. Slower actually. What used to take 10 minutes now takes 2 hours. It seems to be incompatible with the older machine.

Click to expand...

How infuriating.
And will no doubt take hours to troubleshoot, which is also infuriating.
But ... don't give up yet?

I recently upgraded an even older MacBook, and it went surprisingly smoothly. (FWIW, I went straight from Catalina to Monterrey.)
If the following seems more frustrating than useful, just ignore it -- this sort of kibbitzing can be a pita, I know -- but here are a few random ideas in case they help.

(1)
Are you sure it's really done installing? I seem to recall that I kept thinking it was done, but then it would do more upgrade-related stuff. The process messages (especially "time: about 1 minute" HAHAHA) often don't seem accurate. My upgrade may have gone smoothly, but it did not go quickly.
(2)
Could there be a specific program that's hanging it up? Have you tried looking at the Activity Monitor (under Go > Utilities) to see if something weird is going on?
(3)
I don't know whether you use Adobe products, but FWIW I finally did a clean-out of alll my Creative Suite program files (which have been unusable since Catalina anyway). I suppose there's a .00000001% chance that some obsolete program could cause a hang.
(4)
Have you tried rebooting in Safe Mode?
(5)
If worse comes to worst, there are ways to revert back to an older OS.

I do think it's worth venturing into Google/Forum Time-Suck Hell to see if you can find a solution, or at least see what other people have been experiencing who have a system similar to yours. Because my machine is so much (two years) older than yours, and because if it's truly incompatible Monterrey "should" just tell you so and refuse to download, I am guessing there's going to be some kind of a solution.

Meanwhile, try not to grind your teeth. Good luck!

GoingMobile said:

I updated my 5 year old imac to Monterrey and it rendered it almost unusable, everything is slow as molassas. Slower actually. What used to take 10 minutes now takes 2 hours. It seems to be incompatible with the older machine.

Click to expand...

You didn’t say what version of macOS. I installed v12.2 on a Spring 2015 MacBook Pro. I saw no performance degradation. v12.3 has Universal Control. That seems like a big “incremental” update to me. I haven’t updated to that version, yet, and don’t know if I will. I should probably sell it. I used my iPad to do my 2021 taxes. It was difficult at the start, but I got better figuring out the cursor and focus as I went on. But, if you need a Mac, an iPad won’t cut it. I doubt Apple will ever make the iPad a Mac replacement.

In my limited experience Apple products take progressively longer to update as they age. My 2012 MacBook Pro took almost 10 hours to update the last time I updated it... and it stuck at the "One Minute Remaining" for about 3 or 4 hours. Similar but not as severe with my really old iPad (the 2nd iPad - the original iPad 2, and several iPhones).

I imagine that the transition from Intel to the new proprietary Apple chips are making backwards compatibility even more of an issue... although from what I've heard the new chips are simply phenomenal in how they perform (if they only weren't so damn pricey!).