Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I am seriously considering going back to desktop computers

misc-stuff.terraaeon.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 693 posts

Re: I am seriously considering going back to desktop computers

#131

Post by WalterBright »

bleepblorp wrote: post #105
WalterBright wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's hard to find a full size bluetooth keyboard. I think I went through every keyboard on Amazon and found only one. If you use a USB wireless keyboard, well, there goes one of the two USB slots on the laptop. It's not just the monitor being big, I want lots and lots of pixels. I'm currently running 3840*2160, and have a second monitor attached set up in portrait mode (so I can display a manual page while I work on…

I don't see a lack of USB ports as a complete dealbreaker for using a laptop. USB hubs work fine to attach large numbers of lower-speed USB devices to a laptop.

Not any one thing is a dealbreaker. It's the combination.

Once the laptop is festooned with hubs, external drives, cables everywhere, might as well just buy a desktop.

Re: I am seriously considering going back to desktop computers

#132

Post by coddle-hark »

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #78
coddle-hark wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most people are not content creators, they are consumers. I don’t think this is true at all, everybody that has a Twitter / Facebook / Instagram / YouTube / TikTok account is a content creator. There’s a reason the term “browsing the web” has died out, it’s not about passive consumption anymore. Writing code is just about the only thing you can’t do on an iPad. And while I think we can all agree on HN that having a…

> everybody that has a Twitter / Facebook / Instagram / YouTube / TikTok account is a content creator. All the fora you mention are characterized by lack of longform text. What people are creating today tends to be image-heavy and eschew any long argumentation or prose storytelling. Having just a smartphone obviously represents a limitation. For example, I am a member of some niche travel communities. A decade ago, w…

Yes, long-form text is down and photo/video based content has exploded — things are different but I’d hesitate to say that they’re worse overall. I used to share a computer with 5 other family members growing up in the 90’s, nowadays every kid has a content creation device on them 24/7. That seems like a good thing to me.

Re: I am seriously considering going back to desktop computers

#133

Post by ACow_Adonis »

agloeregrets wrote: post #24
polskibus wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

12. High end desktop CPUs are noticeably faster than mobile counterparts (higher freq, more cache)

Is that actually true anymore? I mean, hardware wise they are not much faster, but cooling is a different story.

not only is it still true, there's never been evidence it's not been true or that it's going away.

Time after time, as someone who's been working on his 10 year old desktop (with a replacement ssd + graphics card when the old one died), I meet devs and analysts using laptops who reason more or less: "well it says i7 and it says x GHz and it says ddr3/4 and it's got a gpu with the same marketing number, so laptops perform the same as desktops cause they have the same hardware in them don't they".

Clearly, what they really mean is "I've never worked with and compared with a desktop". I suppose one of the problems is that SOME of them that have 'used desktops' were actually using neutered VMs in a shared corporate environment that run really poorly and are pretty underspec'd in a shared environment.

But every time, it's actually been the case that not only is the desktop faster and cheaper, but things usually remained faster on an X year old desktop hardware vs more modern laptops for any serious workload.

Edit: and in case it needs to be said, I have both desktops and multiple portable devices in my household because the downside of desktops is clearly portability.

Re: I am seriously considering going back to desktop computers

#134

Post by eptcyka »

ed25519FUUU wrote: post #15

My main concern with desktops is that they’re much less power efficient than laptops, and therefore create a lot more heat in my office. Something like a Mac cheese grater is probably more power efficient than my custom built PC, but you lose a lot of the value going with a prebuilt system.

Why do you think a well built desktop PC would be less power efficient? It's probably more power hungry, but I don't think desktop PCs use inherently more power per instruction executed or whatever arcane metric we'd be measuring. Modern desktops can clock up and down just as quick as their more mobile counterparts, and due to proper cooling, the same chip you have in a laptop would be more efficient in a desktop enclosure - the cooler a chip is, the more efficient it can be - higher temperatures necessitate more power to move a charge across a conduit.

Re: I am seriously considering going back to desktop computers

#135

Post by jay_kyburz »

rbecker wrote: post #54
jay_kyburz wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think "the masses" were ever interested in general-purpose computing. For them it never started. For people who actually care, I think the concerns are overblown and we'll always have access to a machine that can run open software. And yes sure, we might not be able to pay consumer prices for them, but they are not going anywhere. And sure, we might elect a fascist government which will simply ban the technol…

No self-respecting author would write "We'll always have access to typewriters without built-in censorship. Sure, we might not be able to pay consumer prices for them, but they are not going anywhere." What makes you so sure the restrictions will stop somewhere you're comfortable with? What happens when unlocked machines are only available to "enterprise" (not unlike a certain Windows version), and you have to agree…

I guess I'm confident that an open market will always provide for us. I don't know why you think it would not.

Right now, today, it has never been easier to just go down to the local mall and buy a general purpose computer, and sure, there are lots of phones, tablets, and consoles on display as well, but there is no less computers as a result.

Re: I am seriously considering going back to desktop computers

#136

Post by WalterBright »

rabidrat wrote: post #61
WalterBright wrote: post #16

I prefer a desktop because: 1. I like big, big monitors. 2. I prefer a full size keyboard. 3. I prefer a separate mouse. 4. I prefer big freaking disk drives installed. 5. I put the desktop under my desk, and with a wireless keyboard and wireless mouse, there is much less of a snarl on my desk. 6. The desktop has an optical drive I still use. 7. The desktop has lots of USB ports and they're all in use. 8. I can repla…

I love desktops, but I have to admit that it's pretty great having a built-in UPS. To get the equivalent for my desktop is an extra $200+ and a big honking box that apparently will only last for 30 minutes when the power goes out.

The power goes out for a day, sometimes days, every year in my neighborhood when the wind blows. Finally fed up, I recently had a generator installed that attaches to the natural gas line.

I know that purchase was effective, because a week after it was installed there was a big storm and power went out everywhere except my neighborhood. Just having a generator successfully wards off power failure, you never have to actually turn it on.

I submit this is objective proof that I am living in a simulation and none of you exist, you're just artifacts of the simulation.

Re: I am seriously considering going back to desktop computers

#137

Post by TheGrim-888 »

smabie wrote: post #12

I much prefer desktops and don't even own a laptop at the moment, but what's with the fixation on UEFI? I'm not well versed in the technical differences between BIOS and UEFI, but I don't think it really matters? All these people like Richard Stallman and this guy make their lives harder as a method of virtue signaling. I'm convinced they get off on the masochism of making their life hard for the sake of "freedom." M…

I find it really gross this trend nowadays to look down upon or make fun of people that are interested in preserving their freedom. If I assume you're from the US, what's supposed to be the "land of the free, home of the brave", and yet you're mocking somebody for wanting to be free in this particular aspect of their life.

Re: I am seriously considering going back to desktop computers

#138

Post by bartread »

japhyr wrote: post #45

Does anyone have any recommendations if I want to keep using macOS, but I'm not tied to a MacBook? I realized I hadn't taken my main MacBook off the dock in 9 months. When I go out, I have an older one that I'm happy to use away from my desk. Since it's acting like a desktop now, I though maybe I'd replace it with a higher-spec mac desktop. But a high end mac mini isn't much different than a high-end MacBook. It seem…

The high end iMacs are quite nice, as long as you don't mind their all-in-one nature (including the monitor obviously). Back in the day I might have suggested Hackintosh, although that's always seemed like quite a hassle to me, and certainly less appealing now Apple are moving over to ARM.

If I buy another Apple laptop it'll probably be a 16" Macbook Pro. In fairness to Apple I usually get at least 5 years out of one of their laptops so can generally live with the premium.

Re: I am seriously considering going back to desktop computers

#140

Post by cesarb »

avalys wrote: post #21

I have been reading this same article for the past thirty years. Yet, I can still install and run whatever operating system and software I want on my laptop _and_ desktop, and I don't see any sign that that freedom will go away anytime soon. It is true that the billion-dollar media companies have decided a subscription model is more lucrative than a one-time-purchase model for the mass-market content they produce (mo…

> Yet, I can still install and run whatever operating system and software I want on my laptop _and_ desktop, and I don't see any sign that that freedom will go away anytime soon.

We got awfully close though. Had Linux not been popular enough back when UEFI SecureBoot started being adopted, Microsoft would require x86 UEFI motherboards to not allow the user to install their own keys, like they did with ARM UEFI (https://www.softwarefreedom.org/blog/2012/jan/12/microsoft-c...).

Post reply on HN