How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020) • Hacker News Board

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

#141

Post by grecy » Fri, Jan 03, 2025, 7:35 AM UTC

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…

> That is just as good as any new laptop made today.

How’s the battery life? Going days without thinking about where my charger is can be really nice.

What resolution does the screen run?

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

#142

Post by yellowapple » Fri, Jan 03, 2025, 8:33 AM UTC

scarface_74 wrote: post #43

cconcannon wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you considered a Framework laptop? They have 13-inch and 16-inch models and are designed to be upgraded. https://frame.work/

Do they have 15 hour battery life, run cool and silent like my MacBook Air? The Framework laptop has way too many compromises https://www.theverge.com/24185827/framework-laptop-16-six-mo...

There are always going to be tradeoffs. For me, on both my 13 (11th Gen Intel) and 16 (AMD), the battery lasts long enough ("a few hours", depending on workload), and they run cool and quiet enough (again, depending on workload). Still performant, still portable, more flexible than any other laptop I've ever owned.

Assuming Framework remains solvent and doesn't change the physical layout of their motherboards, I don't anticipate ever needing to buy another laptop.

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

#143

Post by jmclnx » Fri, Jan 03, 2025, 4:23 PM UTC

grecy wrote: post #141

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…

> That is just as good as any new laptop made today. How’s the battery life? Going days without thinking about where my charger is can be really nice. What resolution does the screen run?

I accidentally tested the battery today, I forgot to plug it in :)

So, just shy of 2 hours the level was at 5%, I usually run at Frequency 2200, the range is 1200 -- 2601. The lower the frequency, the longer the battery life. You can set on NetBSD freq. using:

sudo /sbin/sysctl -w machdep.cpu.frequency.target=2200

I set it via an entry in root's cron on reboot.

For resolution via the laptop screen is 1366x768, that is the highest on the Laptop monitor. As you can see it is a bit odd for some reason. On my external monitor I can go to 1920x1080 at about 60Hz. I think there were various models of the T430 and some had higher resolutions.

Note: The battery is original and is the larger Thinkpad battery. You can find new batteries on the WEB. I always use the T430 plugged in.

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

#144

Post by grecy » Sat, Jan 04, 2025, 12:04 PM UTC

jmclnx wrote: post #143

grecy wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That is just as good as any new laptop made today. How’s the battery life? Going days without thinking about where my charger is can be really nice. What resolution does the screen run?

I accidentally tested the battery today, I forgot to plug it in :) So, just shy of 2 hours the level was at 5%, I usually run at Frequency 2200, the range is 1200 -- 2601. The lower the frequency, the longer the battery life. You can set on NetBSD freq. using: sudo /sbin/sysctl -w machdep.cpu.frequency.target=2200 I set it via an entry in root's cron on reboot. For resolution via the laptop screen is 1366x768, that i…

Thanks for the info.

> just shy of 2 hours the level was at 5%

Ouch. That is unworkable for me, and would be very hard to deal with.

> For resolution via the laptop screen is 1366x768

Oh wow, that is a very low resolution, and wouldn't be good enough for editing photos and video.

> I always use the T430 plugged in.

I'm always shocked to see this. What is the point of a laptop you just use plugged in? Lower quality (and res) screen, bad thermals, lack of cheap expansion, and you're just tied to a desk anyway. It seems a basic desktop would run rings around it.

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

#145

Post by cleverpatrick » Sun, Jan 05, 2025, 10:09 AM UTC

Maybe it's just me, but I find that older hardware will sometimes get "sticky" after just sitting around for awhile. I've had it happen to mice, and to the palm rests on my old Dell laptop.

The best explanation I've had for this is that the rubber components degrade over time. But it makes me leery of buying older hardware because of that.

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

#146

Post by IYasha » Tue, Jan 07, 2025, 11:20 AM UTC

> New laptops may be more energy-efficient per computational power, but these gains are offset by more computational power.

Should I rephrase: computers are getting ridiculously powerful, but JavaScript cancels out everything? Or just low-quality software in general.

PS: I'm using 2014 laptop and only wish WWW wasn't such heavy garbage.

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

#147

Post by IYasha » Tue, Jan 07, 2025, 11:25 AM UTC

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

Lol! Finding a bunch of good 18650s is WAY easier than a freaking proprietary black bar. Replacing them requires some skill, though, but most repair shops can or know who can do it properly.

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

#148

Post by tgma » Thu, Jan 09, 2025, 12:15 AM UTC

herbst wrote: post #120

tgma wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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?

Yes, I have [but I've not been to the border :-)].

Lack of air conditioning and low respect for tech employee (feudal style treatment of owner/worker) compared to Silicon Valley was obvious (although they are propagandized to think they have "better working conditions" due to more mandated vacation days and not being easily fired, but the order of magnitude lower salary is almost never brought up and if you bring up 500k salaries being a routine thing for upper-middle-range of a run-of-the-mill Senior SWE, they think you are exaggerating; to cope, immediately the subject of socialized health care comes up!) But good historic landmarks, for sure.

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

#149

Post by herbst » Sat, Jan 11, 2025, 9:27 AM UTC

tgma wrote: post #148

herbst wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you been to Europe?

Yes, I have [but I've not been to the border :-)]. Lack of air conditioning and low respect for tech employee (feudal style treatment of owner/worker) compared to Silicon Valley was obvious (although they are propagandized to think they have "better working conditions" due to more mandated vacation days and not being easily fired, but the order of magnitude lower salary is almost never brought up and if you bring up…

I honestly don't even know what to answer. You just generalized some places you think you saw as Europe.

I live in Switzerland, you can earn 500k if you want to. But you can also have a relaxed live. All your neighbours aren't poor so you barely have to be afraid of anything. Junkies get their heroin from the state, even them are nice people on the streets. Vacations is part of our lifestyle and even the poor have that. Tax burden is way less, startups are common and usually don't require a lot of investor money...

Also I have no idea why people always bring up silicon valley. That's not even 1% of the US, the rest of the country still is an obvious shit hole, in every single metric. And silicon valley is just barely better with super high wages.

You can build your walled mansion, but you can also enjoy being part of a healthy society.