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I maintain a 17 year old ThinkPad

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Re: I maintain a 17 year old ThinkPad

#291

Post by kjs3 »

yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #78
interroboink wrote: post #41

Having run some hardware for about 20 years (recently deceased), the problem that eventually happens is that newer OSes drop support for old hardware. If you hit some weird bug on your setup on a new OS release, there won't be anyone to help you fix it[1]. So then you're stuck on an old OS. In time, that means you can't run the latest userland software either, which relies on more modern OS features (eg: your Firefox…

> In my case, the boot loader stopped working for my hardware on FreeBSD 11.4 That's interesting/strange. Did you report it? I'd expect them to care about that serious of a breakage in a point release.

Considering I've booted FreeBSD 11 on a Pentium Pro, I very much doubt "old hardware not supported" is really the GPs issue.

Re: I maintain a 17 year old ThinkPad

#292

Post by notpushkin »

dahauns wrote: post #174
hkt wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure what GP means but I gather the x230 era (2012?) has a cult following. I picked one up a few years ago when a laptop died and I didn't have the cash for something new: it is still my daily driver and I'm not replacing it til it dies. By contrast, I know someone who got a T480 second hand and it lasted six months. My guess is the 2012 era was when the change happened

It's been a gradual shift, with a few obvious changes along the way. Among a few: The keyboard switch from the old 7-row (whose pinnacle was at the x220/T420 era with double-height esc and del) to the new 6-row (with later ever decreasing key travel) to the current x9 (which is basically just a yoga keyboard with no trackpoint, no key grouping, and the loss of pgup/pgdn). Things like the modular battery options vanis…

> The keyboard switch from the old 7-row (whose pinnacle was at the x220/T420 era with double-height esc and del)

I think xx30-series has such a good reputation because you could use a T420 keyboard (with a tiny modification to better fit the chassis and not short out the backlight pin).

Re: I maintain a 17 year old ThinkPad

#293

Post by masswerk »

quailfarmer wrote: post #79

The tightness of hardware integration isn't a bug, it's genuinely a feature; In fact, it's the defining feature that makes Apple hardware great. Socketed RAM, CPU, and Storage just weren't worth the tradeoffs, namely size, weight, cost, and performance. Including those modular interfaces just wasn't worth it when the internal interfaces would be obsolete within 5 years, and the average user was replacing sub-componen…

That said, I've a MacPro 3.1 in production (also 17 years now – always up), which is from Apple's era of easily (or even hot) swappable parts. Apart from failing 3rd party RAM, no issues ever. – And I'm probably going to upgrade the drives to SSD (still HDD) this year, since you can still get new upgrade parts for its ancient busses.

(And for the failing RAM: open the hood, a LED tells you which strip is failing, swap it, close, go on… The build quality is quite amazing, BTW.)

Re: I maintain a 17 year old ThinkPad

#294

Post by ethbr1 »

Malcolmlisk wrote: post #118
umbra07 wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone on the subreddit was talking about how they plan to make a high-end carbon fiber chassis for the 13. That was a few weeks ago - I don't believe they've posted anything since their initial post.

As a 13 owner (only thinkpad 13, nobody talks about it but I think is one of the best pieces of hardware I have ever owned) this would be fantastic. I would love to have my 13 for life. I don't know if my 13 is able to be upgraded like a desktop PC like other thinkpads, but adding a carbon fiber chassis would be like fresh air.

Thermal conductivity?

Re: I maintain a 17 year old ThinkPad

#295

Post by ninalanyon »

ivraatiems wrote: post #103
trompetenaccoun wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The older they are, the better they are Everyone agrees the build quality used to be better (my grandpa already said this about appliances from his youth). But one thing I almost never see discussed is the power consumption of these old devices. Older CPUs often double as room heaters. Modern ones, especially the Apple M-series, have become a lot more efficient. So while I agree that modern laptops suck in many ways…

It just isn't really a measurable impact against an overall picture. At maximum, a T580 can draw 44 watts. 8 hours per day, 365 days a year, at 50 cents a kWh (quite expensive for the US), that's $65 a year. That's a several-year-old computer already. The W520 can draw a much higher (but still low relative to a desktop) 150 watts. The cost per year to run it would then be around $220/year - but again, that's assuming…

My refrigerator doesn't use anything like 300 W average. An IKEA 310 l fridge is rated at less than 100 kWh per year.

Even if you add a 210 l upright freezer to it is is still less than 300 kWh per year. That's 300 kWh / (365 * 24 h) = 34 W

Re: I maintain a 17 year old ThinkPad

#296

Post by animal531 »

apples_oranges wrote: post #247
animal531 wrote: post #216

I have a 2nd generation iPad and its amazing how well it still runs. Of course I can't do anything with it because you can't update the OS and without having a new OS you can't actually download or run anything from the shop.

Same for my third gen. Well, at least I updated the root certificate on it and it's good as a PDF reader, book reader and music player still.

I should probably do the same since my Kindle has packed up and will no longer start, so I could at least use the pad for that.

Re: I maintain a 17 year old ThinkPad

#297

Post by sevensor »

I love old Thinkpads for single purpose computers. Install Debian, boot it once a day, or once a week, or once a month. One for all the flacs I had the energy to rip in my 20s, one for wine and dosbox, one for messing around with programming languages, one for household stuff. It prevents distractions.

Re: I maintain a 17 year old ThinkPad

#298

Post by JansjoFromIkea »

Bought an X220 years back and it unintentionally became my main laptop for a few years. Sold it on in much worse condition (I kept the keyboard) at a profit and got an i7 X230T instead, which has also somehow gone up in price since.

the X230 didn't last as long, the efficiencies of the M1 macbooks were too good to ignore. Gave it to my mother since because she wanted "an old laptop that just works"

Re: I maintain a 17 year old ThinkPad

#299

Post by inatreecrown2 »

inatreecrown2 wrote: post #95

I bought a x220 about 10 years ago, and then a x230 a couple years ago. I also have a M1 Pro 16 inch but sometimes I enjoy working with the Thinkpads more than that. I really wish we could get a modern system that was build like the old Thinkpads. Especially regarding overall Size, repairability, connectivity and Keyboard.

Oh I forgot to add: they both work perfectly fine still!
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