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How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)

solar.lowtechmagazine.com

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Re: How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)

#111

Post by em-bee »

josephcsible wrote: post #107
em-bee wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. which devices are those? USB-C is a type of plug. it does not define the USB standard that runs on it. so if i understand that correctly, there can't be a USB-C only device. USB4 is defined to run only on USB-C, but it is also defined to be backwards compatible to at least USB3.x. the spec forbids certain legacy adapters, but only because it would allow for to many invalid and potentially unsafe cable connections.…

For point 1, consider a flash drive with only a USB-C connector on it. The kind of adapter that you'd need to plug that into a laptop with only USB-A ports is exactly the kind that the spec forbids.

you don't need any adapter. all my USB-C drives come with a cable that has C on one end and A on the other. again, those cables are allowed. only adapters that would allow you to use a C-C cable may not be. so connecting a USB-C drive to an old laptop that only has USB-A plugs is fine, and is supported.

Re: How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)

#112

Post by red-iron-pine »

devops99 wrote: post #34
SoftTalker wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> seven isolated chat/social profiles on seven separate VPN/Tor connections Bravo for you, but surely you realize that almost nobody does this? Hardly relevant to an article about getting some more useful life out of an old laptop.

You actually don't have to dig too hard to find places where hundreds if not thousands of people are doing exactly this.

download tor, run tor, go to darknet forums of any kind.

that's about the only use case I can think of for this approach, as well as where to find the few hundred people doing it.

that said, wearing walmart pants and hoodies, a face mask, and using a $200 laptop you got off of gumtree or kijiji or craigslist or FB marketplace at coffeeshop probably works just as well. bragging and laziness gets you busted, not a lack of local LLMs to check lexicon.

Re: How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)

#113

Post by josephcsible »

em-bee wrote: post #111
josephcsible wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For point 1, consider a flash drive with only a USB-C connector on it. The kind of adapter that you'd need to plug that into a laptop with only USB-A ports is exactly the kind that the spec forbids.

you don't need any adapter. all my USB-C drives come with a cable that has C on one end and A on the other. again, those cables are allowed. only adapters that would allow you to use a C-C cable may not be. so connecting a USB-C drive to an old laptop that only has USB-A plugs is fine, and is supported.

I mean flash drives that plug directly into the computer with no cable.

Re: How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)

#114

Post by em-bee »

josephcsible wrote: post #113
em-bee wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you don't need any adapter. all my USB-C drives come with a cable that has C on one end and A on the other. again, those cables are allowed. only adapters that would allow you to use a C-C cable may not be. so connecting a USB-C drive to an old laptop that only has USB-A plugs is fine, and is supported.

I mean flash drives that plug directly into the computer with no cable.

oh, ok, those seem to be rare though, and personally i find them impractical because the C connector makes them less stable. with an A connector the flash drive can be so small that it almost fits inside the connector entirely. in other words, buying a device that can't handle these flash drives would be a tradeoff that doesn't have much of a downside unless i already have such a drive that i really want to use.

but if i have a tendency to buy older devices, then i likely also have a tendency to avoid getting such modern drives. they will be coming though, thanks to USB4, and there will be a day where i can't avoid needing a laptop with at least two USB-C ports (because one of them will be used for charging), or get a USB4 rated USB-C only hub. and hopefully by then even older laptops will already have at least one USB-C port too (even if it doesn't support USB4 yet).

Re: How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)

#115

Post by latentpot »

jerome-jh wrote: post #42
jll29 wrote: post #33

Great article. I have had a similarly positive experience with older laptops, in particular ThinkPads (x230) and Latitudes (e7460). The older machines often also have much better keyboards than more recent laptops, IMHO. As the OP writes, swapping out HDD for SSD (1 usually prefer at least 1 TB) and maxing out RAM are affordable things that you won't regret.

On my side I prefer Dell Latitudes and Fujitsu Siemens, which only makes "professional" laptops. I agree with the keyboards, however really good keyboards have totally disappeared now. That said a used laptop is perfect for web browsing, office stuff, casual development and light gaming. When it dies you have no regrets. It is almost 20 years I have not bought a new laptop. Of course my kids have used laptops too. At…

Dell makes devices with mpp compatible touch screens. Cheap stylii, good pressure response

Re: How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)

#116

Post by idiotsecant »

mbreese wrote: post #46
mikepurvis wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if it is, most of the keys are interchangeable. Your fingers don’t care that the M key has an N on it.

With my mechanical keyboard, I have had a tendency to break a few (specific) keys. I got around it by 3D printing a few blank keys. So long as I know where the N and M keys are, that's all that matters :)

How are you people breaking so many keys?!

Re: How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)

#117

Post by pixelpoet »

jmclnx wrote: post #19

My newest laptop is a Thinkpad W541 with Linux purchased used a few of years ago. That is just as good as any new laptop made today. The Old T430 I got from a relative who went to a MAC is also quite adequate for daily use. I have NetBSD on it and just finished upgrading to 10.1, so this was typed on that T430. So unless you are a heavy duty gamer or work on complex 3d graphics professionally, any recently used lapto…

As someone who works on complex 3D graphics, I'm utterly bewildered by people who buy overpriced, overheating laptops for this purpose (more recently for AI stuff), leave them plugged in 24/7, and then complain about performance, heat, bad keyboard layouts, noisy fans and poor value for money.

Aaaaaanything but a nice efficient PC!

Re: How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)

#118

Post by herbst »

jll29 wrote: post #33

Great article. I have had a similarly positive experience with older laptops, in particular ThinkPads (x230) and Latitudes (e7460). The older machines often also have much better keyboards than more recent laptops, IMHO. As the OP writes, swapping out HDD for SSD (1 usually prefer at least 1 TB) and maxing out RAM are affordable things that you won't regret.

This. Used my T420 for years, got a T460 and was so disappointed about it's build quality that I now have a X1 of some generation which isn't much better but at least lighter for travel.

All bought used, never spent more than maybe $250 and $200 for max RAM and nice SSD.

Re: How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)

#119

Post by herbst »

josephcsible wrote: post #61

I'd have four concerns with such an old laptop: 1. Lack of USB-C ports means I wouldn't be able to safely use any USB-C only peripherals (since the USB spec explicitly bans adapters in that direction) 2. Lack of security updates for firmware, microcode, etc. 3. Hard to find replacement batteries from reputable sources 4. The CPU and memory requirements of software are steadily increasing

3. I am always doing a little research before I replace a battery but so far every replacement for a old ThinkPad had way better results as expected, very likely better than a good 'original' is at this point.

4. Not sure if I can agree. Most software I use just got more efficient over the years. Only exception being the IDE or code editor. #justlinuxthings

Re: How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)

#120

Post by herbst »

tgma wrote: post #93
unicornporn wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the author is quoting prices in Euros, which is pretty much synonymous with "extreme poverty" I mentioned before :) Care to elaborate? > Especially ironic this article is from 2020 when M1 was launched and now laptops, both Qualcomm and Apple ones, are leaps and bounds better than before. Something tells me you haven't quite grasped the blog post or what LOW←TECH MAGAZINE is about. https://permacomputing.net

> Care to elaborate? Europe is increasingly a basket case. > what LOW←TECH MAGAZINE is about Yea, I did sense some hints of political ideals, but did not know that it is explicitly part of some movement. Thanks for elaborating.

Have you been to Europe?
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