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

I stopped buying new laptops (2020)

solar.lowtechmagazine.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

371–380 of 551 posts

Re: I stopped buying new laptops (2020)

#371

Post by paulmd »

pessimizer wrote: post #36
ido wrote: post #5

Nice. Now try to do the same as (some types of) programmer or 3d modeller or video editor. The newest MacBook with an M2 chip compiles and runs my projects drastically faster than the 2015 Dell XPS Skylake-i7 laptop I used to have and the GPU on the M2 is so ridiculously more powerful it's like going from 3dfx voodoo to a modern GPU.

It would be silly if this article were trying to recommend a 15 year old computer for intense numerical processing, which is why nobody, including the author, made the attempt.

yeah, but "author realizes they have no substantial computing needs because they only word-process" isn't a particularly interesting article. like boss you can hook a bluetooth keyboard up to your phone and go to town at that point, if you want, there's really no need for a laptop at all.

and since it's not applicable to the userbase here you're gonna get discussion on why it's not applicable.

Re: I stopped buying new laptops (2020)

#372

Post by ant6n »

Dalewyn wrote: post #357
LeFantome wrote: post #341

For a lot if what I do, the CPU on an older laptop is just fine. So, I too use really old laptops. That said, I am upgrading laptops that sold with 2 - 4 GB of RAM to 16 GB, or at least 8 GB. Often I am replacing on old HDD ( maybe as slow as 5400 RPM ) with a faster SSD. That SSD also juices the battery life. So, what I am using is a lot nicer than what the original owner had to deal with. Many laptops today will no…

>Linux is fantastic on older hardware I've been having a hard time getting Linux to work on older hardware ever since the majority of distros dropped 32-bit builds. Then again, "older" for me means stuff from the Pentium through the Pentium 4 era. Seeing as "older" today means Sandy Bridge and the like, the moral of this little tale is I am a fucking old man angry at the kids on my lawn.

But there must be some with 32bit support?

Re: I stopped buying new laptops (2020)

#373

Post by RomanPushkin »

I bought Lenovo 11e chromebook for $24 with free delivery on ebay. Disassembled the unit and unscrewed write protection screw, installed new BIOS and GalliumOS. Works pretty OK'ish. I use it to watch videos: youtube and video services I need (movies online) work well. Battery is pretty good as well.

There is no magic though. You get what you pay for - I can't do modern JavaScript development on it.

Re: I stopped buying new laptops (2020)

#374

Post by kwhitefoot »

ant6n wrote: post #372
Dalewyn wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Linux is fantastic on older hardware I've been having a hard time getting Linux to work on older hardware ever since the majority of distros dropped 32-bit builds. Then again, "older" for me means stuff from the Pentium through the Pentium 4 era. Seeing as "older" today means Sandy Bridge and the like, the moral of this little tale is I am a fucking old man angry at the kids on my lawn.

But there must be some with 32bit support?

Debian still supports 32 bit for the latest version and there are several small distros that are explicitly aimed at 32 bit.

Re: I stopped buying new laptops (2020)

#376

Post by SCdF »

barbariangrunge wrote: post #316
BowBun wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you read the article? The author is, well, an author. They don't program or 3d model. Computation sped wasn't even mentioned in the point they were making. I guess I don't see the reason to read an article about a specific use-case/point of view, only to follow up and say, "yeah well it wouldn't work for this completely different thing you weren't talking about". It's not the 'gotcha' you think it is.

I’m an author, sometimes. My 2015 MacBook Air has slowed down so much, due to software bloat, it’s painful to use. You need to constantly buy new hardware to run peoples literally exponentially less efficient software

Yes! It's frustrating. I have a perfectly good 2015 MBP 13" that runs as fast as the day I bought it but is now unusable for much of the web, especially video or high Javascript situations. To use YouTube without it being a jetengine you need to force YouTube to return you mp4s instead of vp8 or whatever they use now. Twitch is just unusable is chat moves slightly faster than not at all. Everything in general is a frustrating sluggish mess. My phone is going the same way as well, becoming less and less usable.

But it's not the laptop or phone that's changed, it's the rising tide of tech enthusiasts constantly buying new computers, having their performance QC be "feels OK to me", and that raising everyone's minimum spec.

Re: I stopped buying new laptops (2020)

#377

Post by beebeepka »

colechristensen wrote: post #370
Dalewyn wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Linux is fantastic on older hardware I've been having a hard time getting Linux to work on older hardware ever since the majority of distros dropped 32-bit builds. Then again, "older" for me means stuff from the Pentium through the Pentium 4 era. Seeing as "older" today means Sandy Bridge and the like, the moral of this little tale is I am a fucking old man angry at the kids on my lawn.

I think you have graduated to retro computing enthusiast.

No kidding. Not to mention that Pentium 4 was just about to worst line of intel CPUs, culminating with junk like pentium d 820 and its siblings.

People ought to be paid to use this crap

Re: I stopped buying new laptops (2020)

#378

Post by KronisLV »

musicale wrote: post #257
KronisLV wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Upgradeable hardware sounds great in theory but doesn’t work in real life, just like PCs you configure it once and it will be that HW until it is obsolete for your purpose. This isn't really the case for many folks out there. If I get a better CPU, the previous one might go to one of my homelab servers (consumer hardware). The same goes for motherboards, that's how I got a second homelab server (bought a mobo with…

I think you can often make a similar hand-me-down argument for non-upgradable (or minimally upgradable) hardware as well. For example, obsolete thin client PCs can be repurposed as home servers or control systems. With a USB GPIO interface they can even do Raspberry Pi-like things. Apple makes it harder since you may fall out of the 7-ish year macOS security patch window, but you can often install Linux or NetBSD if…

> I think you can often make a similar hand-me-down argument for non-upgradable (or minimally upgradable) hardware as well.

That's fair and I'd probably also make that argument as well: as long as the hardware/software isn't locked down and utterly unsupported, then even older pieces of kit can be utilized well, instead of being thrown in a landfill somewhere.

I do have a netbook with a N4000 CPU and 4 GB of RAM that is still good enough for web browsing, note taking, some light development and even using as a stream dashboard when I'm streaming on the main PC. As far as I'm concerned, that is only possible due to good drivers and support for Linux distros that are lightweight.

But at the same time, if it had more RAM slots, it'd last me years longer than a soldered offering - it's easy to imagine an old netbook being repurposed as a homelab node, for an internal Wiki, maybe some project management software, internal file repository, or some other simple goal like that.

That's also why I'm upset at some Android phones: that go out of support in a few years, with no way to easily install an up to date release, weird driver situation and locked down bootloaders and sometimes even batteries that cannot be replaced! It's like they're the ultimate form of planned obsolescence, even though the same hardware could last me close to a decade.

Re: I stopped buying new laptops (2020)

#379

Post by grudg3 »

jwcooper wrote: post #42
rpcope1 wrote: post #12

> Most of the 160-200 million laptops sold each year are replacement purchases. The average laptop is replaced every 3 years (in business) to five years (elsewhere). 3 My 5.7 years per laptop experience is not exceptional. This is one of the many aspects I don't like about how laptops are designed today. Even with OEM desktops like my Dell Precision T1700, it's still serviceable and fixable today without a whole lot…

This is what Framework set out to do (and is pulling it off so far...I'm typing this out on my 12th gen framework). They have an entire marketplace of replacement parts you can buy, including screens. They've even got battery upgrades (increased capacity), better speakers, new screen type (matte) that you can retrofit into your existing Framework. They support upgrading from their first gen laptop (admittedly they ar…

Yes, Frameworks are amazing on paper, and yet I still can't purchase one in New Zealand but I can easily purchase Apple hardware.

Re: I stopped buying new laptops (2020)

#380

Post by beebeepka »

lathiat wrote: post #340
Reason077 wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have an M1 MacBook Air and use an app called CoconutBattery to monitor power usage. What I’ve noticed is that while the laptop is usually super efficient (say, 2.5-4W while web browsing giving 8+ hours battery life), occasionally the power draw climbs up to 6, 7, 8W or more with no obvious explanation, draining the battery in 3 or 4 hours. Activity Monitor will show no apps using unusual energy yet the power is goi…

Watch your backlight level, which auto adjusts to the room light level. "When comparing battery life, remember that screen brightness makes a huge difference! On an M1 MacBook Air sitting idle on the KDE desktop, you will get around 7 hours of runtime at 100% brightness, and 23 hours of runtime at the minimum (not zero) brightness. Even keyboard brightness matters! Those numbers are with the keyboard backlight turned…

You are correct. Even plugging in my gaming mechanical keyboard makes a noticeable difference.
Post reply on HN