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Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)

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Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)

#161

Post by 0815test »

danans wrote: post #111

A related question that is also interesting: What is the oldest laptop that can run an up-to-date, internet connected OS (i.e a museum device with the same OS from 1991 doesn't count). It doesn't have to have a fancy desktop, but it does have to support connectivity to the internet, and run all the latest security patches and updates. This is different than the article because optimizing productivity isn't an objecti…

Debian is wonderful for their old hardware support - they even patch Firefox so it will run on old 32-bit CPU's. You do need a PAE-capable (if 32-bit) CPU, and at least 512MB RAM for a tolerable experience. (You can even surf the web on 512MB, but then the machine will start to swap and feel quite sluggish. For a good web-surfing experience, you'll need 1GB.) For machines that are even older and less capable, you could try getting them to work with TinyCore, but I've not actually tried doing that recently.

For really, really old hardware, I suppose FreeDOS is always an option-- they're currently working on version 1.3, so it would theoretically count as something that's "up to date" - although I wouldn't actually trust FreeDOS software to be secure on today's internet. It does have an auto-updater of sorts, though, FDIMPLES.

Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)

#163

Post by cimmanom »

JonathonW wrote: post #100
wwweston wrote: post #88

My daily driver is mid-2012 pre-retina MBP. It's entirely adequate. I fear the day it dies because there are no more non-glossy MBPs, and I'm either going to have to make the choice to give up a matte display or give up macOS. It did recently go down and I pulled out a 2008 MBP. Mostly adequate, lag does start to show, though. My guess is that it's an issue of constrained memory (max 4GB?) as much as processor. Tops…

Recent-ish (10.7 and later) versions of macOS tend to fall apart under memory pressure with traditional hard disks-- more so than previous versions did or than Windows does on similar hardware. My hunch is that they changed something in their virtual memory subsystem to takes advantage of characteristics of SSDs that isn't quite so friendly when your drive has significant seek times. A consequence of this is that an…

Yes. During that period when you could get 64GB in a Windows desktop replacement laptop but only 16 in a top-of-the-line MBP, they reworked their memory systems to (IIRC) do some sort of predictive paging to improve responsiveness under memory pressure.

It's surprisingly effective with an SSD and even just 8GB RAM, though 16GB is still more comfortable. It seems to work better when the memory demand is coming from multiple apps rather than from a single app with lots of windows/tabs/etc.

Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)

#164

Post by bgorman »

rotrux wrote: post #138

I don't really understand how we've all been shocked by this. From https://www.maketecheasier.com/why-cpu-clock-speed-isnt-incr... : > "Thanks to the limitations of physics and the current transistor material designs, increasing clock speed is not currently the best way to increase computational power." In around 2006, the CPU industry became a commodity industry & innovation has since come in the form of Instruction…

Forms of ILP have been around much longer than 2006 e.g. branch prediction. The main industry "event" that concluded the "frequency wars" was the commercial flop of the Pentium 4. Modern high-performance CPUs are not a commodity industry - due to the requirements for a high IPC, only Intel, Apple, and AMD can really claim to have "industry leading" products.

Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)

#165

Post by avhon1 »

danans wrote: post #111

A related question that is also interesting: What is the oldest laptop that can run an up-to-date, internet connected OS (i.e a museum device with the same OS from 1991 doesn't count). It doesn't have to have a fancy desktop, but it does have to support connectivity to the internet, and run all the latest security patches and updates. This is different than the article because optimizing productivity isn't an objecti…

Contiki, an actively-developed IOT OS, supports 6502-based hardware, including the Apple ][e, Atari XLs, and the Commodore 64. Among other useful applications, it has an http server, email client, an irc client, a web browser, a desktop GUI, and a VNC.

The Apple //c is already pretty close to a laptop, and can be turned into a laptop with Apple's the flat panel display and third-party batteries.

If laptop-ifying a desktop is okay, there are people who have turned Atari XLs and Commodore 64s into laptops.

For all of these ancient computers, you can easily buy or build ethernet (or, more recently, esp8266-based wifi!) adapters.

The biggest catch that I know of is that you would need a newer computer to periodically build and flash updates. Contiki is not self-hosting.

Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)

#166

Post by stcredzero »

wlesieutre wrote: post #158
stcredzero wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone needs to make a modern day equivalent of a Model 100. By that, I mean a highly portable instant-on computer one can do remote terminal work on with seemingly endless battery life. The first programming job I was ever paid for, I did a large part of dialed in through a modem over landlines. Emacs was fantastic for that! (Because it's an OS masquerading as an editor.)

iPad Pro with a Brydge keyboard? https://sixcolors.com/post/2018/12/brydge-pro-keyboard/ The OS has a lot of limitations on doing local development work, but if you're connecting to a remote server you get a great quality screen and remarkably long battery life. Apple lists "Up to 10 hours of surfing the web on Wi-Fi, watching video, or listening to music." Keyboard has its own battery (default connection is bluetoot…

I have an iPad mini with a Microsoft folding keyboard that I rather like. I guess I could buy a really stout Otter case with my iPad mini and refresh the battery (getting old) and it would serve fairly well in that role.

The thing about the Model 100, was it was pretty robust. Not mil-spec, but pretty darn good for a consumer device. I've read about it being used by researchers someplace like Antarctica. iPads are pretty good that way, but they do feel like a luxury device.

I'd like to see more "consumer-level stout" devices. Give me plastic: much more robustness without added weight, and let me just not worry about knocking the thing around.

Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)

#167

Post by freedomben »

keithpeter wrote: post #117
nwallin wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The standard CPU in the x61 is a T7300, which is a 64 bit CPU. I really don't understand the need for 16.04 at all.

Yup, I have an X61s running Xubuntu 18.04 quite nicely. 2Gb and a cheap 64Gb SSD.

oh haha, I stand corrected, thanks.

Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)

#168

Post by slezyr »

> Ubuntu 16.04 doesn’t have a built-in dictionary or thesaurus

What OS has build-in dictionary? There is no need to preinstall all the programs. Even if it had one it would be just one more thing to remove and install another dict (everyone has different needs).

Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)

#169

Post by hyperpape »

TheWiseOne wrote: post #51
Anarch157a wrote: post #16

> Either laptop improvements are well into diminishing returns, or progress in hardware has stagnated, or both. Sort of. The part about diminishing returns is arguably true, but hardware didn't stagnated. What happened is that _software_ stopped bloating and inflating like a balloon, as was the norm through the '80s, '90s and early '00s. When a Microsoft OS requires _less_ resources than it's predecessors (like early…

> What happened is that _software_ stopped bloating and inflating like a balloon, as was the norm through the '80s, '90s and early '00s. Is that true though? Windows might have gotten more efficient but I think overall most software has gotten worse from a performance perspective. With the prevalence of Electron everywhere, performance doesn't even seem to be a priority anymore. And "native" apps using WPF, etc. aren…

It doesn’t strike me as true either. I was just thinking about how my Intel MacBook came with 1GB in fall 2006 (stock was 512 MB, iirc).

Granted, that wasn’t a professional machine, but I’d say expected memory for a machine has grown 4x in a dozen years.

Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)

#170

Post by marmaduke »

slezyr wrote: post #168

> Ubuntu 16.04 doesn’t have a built-in dictionary or thesaurus What OS has build-in dictionary? There is no need to preinstall all the programs. Even if it had one it would be just one more thing to remove and install another dict (everyone has different needs).

Macos has a nice built dictionary and thesaurus, and it’s something I miss on the other platforms.

Not everyone has time to play around with a thousand software packages.

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