For anyone who wants the most powerful laptop from this generation, T530/W530 can be equipped with i7-3940XM and has a good wide gamut FHD display. igpu models are recommended for battery life and linux. They are also supported well by coreboot, and you'll be able to run just about any OS on them. A slightly newer T440p is also a decent choice.
I went back to using a ThinkPad from 2012
191–200 of 432 posts
Re: I went back to using a ThinkPad from 2012
#192Laptops in the early 2010s kind of reached a level of being adequate enough for most use-cases that it's hard to really justify an upgrade.
I feel, as I write this on my late 2013 MacBook Pro, that it's powerful enough for most normal activities, read, browse, video calls, work on not too large data sets, etc. Anything that needs to run longer than I keep the laptop open can run on a different device, many programs are now web apps. The screen has a high resolution and the keyboard is good, if only battery and RAM replacements were easier it would be as good as new.
This is different to for instance my older laptop from 2008 or that before from 2004 - horrible screens, battery life, no fast wifi or USB.
But also compared to newer laptops, mine seems to get exactly the right balance between being robust and lightweight.
Re: I went back to using a ThinkPad from 2012
#193Earlier quoted context omitted.
It may not be a kickstarter but it is definitely a startup in a tough space, being skeptical of its long term success is pretty reasonable.
Try one out before you start with that conclusion
What conclusion, I'm not asserting they are going to fail. Startup failure rates are close to 90%, being concerned that this startup might also fail isn't unreasonable.
Re: I went back to using a ThinkPad from 2012
#194Earlier quoted context omitted.
Car industry is going in the direction of manufacturer rebuild (remanufacture), so laptop industry should do the same. Instead of making unupgradeable garbage, manufacturers should offer upgrades.
I am not sure of what you're saying, perhaps partly because I don't own a car, and never have since I got my driver's licence at age 38 or so. I do recall a neighbour of mine saying "back when cars went rusty" to me a decade back, which surprised me. A lot. Apparently they don't now? But modern cars, and many modern motorbikes, are sealed units which are not maintainable by the end-user. I dislike electronics like th…
Toyota announced last week it's going to offer a full overhaul of its BEVs in the UK every few years. So you can drive it back to the manufacturer and they will make it new, much like a major revision of an aeroplane.
This is what should be happening with laptops as well. Sealed devices are a thing of the moment and will not last imho.
Re: I went back to using a ThinkPad from 2012
#195Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's a classic case of the Ship of Theseus. https://open.library.okstate.edu/introphilosophy/chapter/shi...
No, it isn't. The entire point of the "my grandfather's axe" or "my grandmother's broom" story -- of which Theseus' ship is the original -- is that there's nothing of the original left, but replacement was gradual so there's a feeling of continuity. Whereas this is the original laptop with some upgrades. Same chassis, same motherboard, same screen, same (IMHO, bad) keyboard, but more RAM, more & faster disks, and a n…
I did not know there was a name for this[1].
I am regularly using a T400 which started life as a Lenovo 3000 N100.[2]
Upgrades since then include a 2 TB SSD, 3.06 Ghz CPU, and WiFi.
I do enjoy tinkering, but I also like the keyboard :-)
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus
[2]: https://www.nu42.com/2016/12/another-one-bites-the-dust.html
Re: I went back to using a ThinkPad from 2012
#196I'm using X220 from 2011, it has i7, 8GB RAM and SSD, running Debian Linux. I don't even feel the need to upgrade. It's in ideal condition, I love the keyboard and form factor, and for my daily tasks mostly involving terminal, text editor and web browser if feels snappier than many modern machines I have worked with. I bought a new Dell laptop for my wife a year ago, and while the CPU and GPU are obviously way more c…
I'm also using an X220. I bought an X1 as a potential replacement but the trackpoint is unusable and the keyboard is a big step down. The X220 battery only lasts about 15 minutes though, so I need to keep it plugged in. I'd like to find a replacement battery but am not enthusiastic about prying the housing apart to install new cells or buying a knockoff from a faraway land which might start a fire.
Re: I went back to using a ThinkPad from 2012
#197The T430 was the machine that hooked me on to ThinkPads almost 20 years ago. Having tried many newer models since then, including the X1 Extreme I use for work nowadays, I agree that they just don't make them as they used to.
Ever since the Lenovo acquisition in particular, quality has gone down substantially, to the point where they don't feel special at all, and are on par with other Chinese mass produced brands. For the exorbitant prices it still retails for, you'd think that coil whine wouldn't be an issue, and that TrackPoint drift would be fixed after all these years.
Re: I went back to using a ThinkPad from 2012
#198Laptops in the early 2010s kind of reached a level of being adequate enough for most use-cases that it's hard to really justify an upgrade. I feel, as I write this on my late 2013 MacBook Pro, that it's powerful enough for most normal activities, read, browse, video calls, work on not too large data sets, etc. Anything that needs to run longer than I keep the laptop open can run on a different device, many programs a…
To me VDI is the way to go. I want my development machine to be in the cloud and always running.
I want a lightweight notebook that only takes into consideration screen, keyboard and battery that I can connect to my virtual desktop from anywhere.
I want a dedicated desk at home with a $40 PCoIP thin client purchased used on EBay hooked up to my multiple monitors that connects to the same virtual desktop.
With this you can truly work from anywhere even if your notebook is stolen or dies. With AWS Workspaces you can be as redundant as you want, you can create a daily snapshot of your Workspace if you want and launch it in any region if your primary region goes down.
Re: I went back to using a ThinkPad from 2012
#199Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Yes, definitely not true for all programmers. I guess with games, if you cannot get real time with instant compiles development experience with 120fps running 8k in debug mode, there is a room for improvement. Day to day that doesn't matter. I work on multiplayer games, and being able to run 8/12/16 clients on one machine at 10 fps at ultra low graphics is far more important than being able to run stupid resolution…
> the 3090 scores twice what the M1 GPU does It helps that you can buy a maxed out macbook pro for the price of a single 3090 though.
I can buy a high spec showhorse for $40k, or a new mid range sedan for $40k. That doesn't mean that the maxed out showhorse will work for commuting to work every day.
Re: I went back to using a ThinkPad from 2012
#200Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I am a programmer, so my needs are not that high This isn't true for all programmers. I'm a programmer, and until 3 years ago a good chunk of my day was spent waiting for compiles to finish. > Or perhaps it is that after 12 years, the laptops are now on bar with desktops. I think the biggest improvements for me in last 20 years have been the SSDs and then the NVMe. Not even remotely close. I have an AMD threadrippe…
3 times faster with 64 cores instead of 10, that slower single thread performance is having a big impact.
32 cores, not 64.