I got rid of my 2006 MacBook pro Core 2 Duo in late 2012 because Apple was dropping support for it in future MacOS versions. I kept my replacement longer with much less issues.
Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)
271–280 of 295 posts
Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)
#272funny thing. i downgraded to an iphone se this past weekend to remedy the fatigue of carrying the large-in-comparison iPhone XS. It is not only perfectly functional for my daily needs, but it is also easier to use thanks to TouchID!
Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)
#2732011 Lenovo Thinkpad X220 daily user here. Really nice machine really for my needs, running the latest Debian smoothly. I do have a spare ready to take over if needed. Old hardware could always die very suddenly. It's a frugal solution, both cheaper and more ecological than buying new.
Same here, 2010 x220. I've been wanting to upgrade really bad, but all the equivalent still can only take 16 GB, so I'd gain some battery life and some CPU oompf which has never been an issue, but would still have the same memory limit.
Sure the x220 has a good keyboard compared to its replacements but the other thing it has is superior mechanical design: you NEVER have to prye apart plastic pieces. Want to change me more? It's one screw away. HD? One screw. Keyboard? 3 screws. Battery? Push 2 tabs, pull the battery pack.
Sure it's a bit thicker, but I don't understand when that's an issue ever, at least I can use it on trains, cars and even airplanes as long as they don't have those space-invader-reclining-seats.
Every new laptop I look at is just worse design, less upgradable (note: I only look at laptops with track points, the other ones are useless to me). What happened? Why have laptops gotten worse?
Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)
#2742011 Lenovo Thinkpad X220 daily user here. Really nice machine really for my needs, running the latest Debian smoothly. I do have a spare ready to take over if needed. Old hardware could always die very suddenly. It's a frugal solution, both cheaper and more ecological than buying new.
T420 here for the nostalgia. Apart from the ssd and ram upgrades, the FHD IPS upgrade made it an excellent cheaper alternative to the thinkpad 25th anniversary edition. My only problem with it is the battery, I bought a new one but it only lasts for about 2-3 hours. If anyone here is planning to do the FHD upgrade, be very careful with power, you need to remove the battery/power cable and press the power button a cou…
I managed to do this on a 2016 HP laptop, replacing the screen assembly. The laptop base worked great, plugged into a TV via HDMI, but a few days later, after the replacement top half had arrived, plugging it in and there was a pop sound... and a dead laptop.
Battery had been disconnected, also the CMOS battery. I usually remember to hold down the power button for a few seconds. Dang.
Didn't chase this further, as I am clumsy with board-level repairs, and my friend didn't want to throw more money at the project.
Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)
#275Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)
#276Earlier 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.)
The OLPC gizmo from the mid 2000s was pretty close. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OLPC_XO A kind neighbor gave one to my kids. It had no games, so they were not really interested. I thought it was great! Super long battery life, great wifi reception with the external antennae, very ruggedized. It had some fork of Fedora iirc. I kept it in the van. There was a lot of free wifi in those days. Plenty good to ssh to a sc…
We had one for each of our two kids at the ranch for a while. The Wifi range in those things was insane.
Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)
#277Most 8-10 year old laptops are perfectly fine if you put an SSD in them. I just upgraded a 2011 mbp from 4GB and spinning disk to 8GB and SSD. The difference is remarkable. It wasn’t usable at all (as in trivial things like logging in could take minutes) and now it’s snappy. Old laptops without such upgrades aren’t really viable these days unless you work all day in a terminal.
SSD is the most wonderful thing happened to me in years. Instantly change how I use computer. Now I cannot use any other than SSD.
Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)
#278Earlier quoted context omitted.
T420 here for the nostalgia. Apart from the ssd and ram upgrades, the FHD IPS upgrade made it an excellent cheaper alternative to the thinkpad 25th anniversary edition. My only problem with it is the battery, I bought a new one but it only lasts for about 2-3 hours. If anyone here is planning to do the FHD upgrade, be very careful with power, you need to remove the battery/power cable and press the power button a cou…
I managed to do this on a 2016 HP laptop, replacing the screen assembly. The laptop base worked great, plugged into a TV via HDMI, but a few days later, after the replacement top half had arrived, plugging it in and there was a pop sound... and a dead laptop. Battery had been disconnected, also the CMOS battery. I usually remember to hold down the power button for a few seconds. Dang. Didn't chase this further, as I…
Bridging the solder points of the blown micro fuse is a very easy job even if you're clumsy with such jobs (trust me, I'm pretty much a klutz).
It'll be a shame if you just leave the otherwise working laptop dead.
Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)
#279> 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. And then Electron came out and... well, there went that dream.
Luckily the amount of Electron apps on most people's life is pretty thin.
Re: Oldest Viable Laptop (2017)
#2802011 Lenovo Thinkpad X220 daily user here. Really nice machine really for my needs, running the latest Debian smoothly. I do have a spare ready to take over if needed. Old hardware could always die very suddenly. It's a frugal solution, both cheaper and more ecological than buying new.
How is your battery life?
I've got x220 as well - not my daily driver. More like a toy.