[HN Gopher] How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)
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How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops (2020)
Author : danradunchev
Score : 170 points
Date : 2023-07-08 17:47 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (solar.lowtechmagazine.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (solar.lowtechmagazine.com)
| kelsolaar wrote:
| > This is facilitated by the fact that laptops are now a mature
| technology and have more than sufficient computational power.
|
| Depends what you do with them, if you program, edit movies, do 3D
| rendering or play games, there will never be enough power.
| ido wrote:
| 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.
| [deleted]
| pessimizer wrote:
| 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.
| rpcope1 wrote:
| At that point, I guess I don't understand why you wouldn't just
| step up to a desktop workstation?
| ido wrote:
| Honestly, the new MacBooks are faster than any desktop I ever
| had - I don't feel a need to sacrifice mobility for more than
| that.
| nvrmnd wrote:
| A laptop can be easily transported for use in a variety of
| locations.
| arrowsmith wrote:
| You can even put them on top of your lap.
| Casteil wrote:
| Err, mobility? M1 / M2 Pro MBPs pack a serious punch... and
| they don't have to sacrifice battery life to do so - they
| smoke virtually all other laptops in terms of battery life.
| tmtvl wrote:
| Mobility is such an antifeature. Taking your work home with
| you is something you really shouldn't have to do. Worse
| even, taking your computer which potentially holds
| sensitive data with you could result in it getting stolen,
| at which point you've got a big problem on your hands.
|
| Laptops for work make no sense unless you're a field
| researcher.
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| Journalists and plenty of other fields benefit. Though I
| agree with the sentiment. A Mac mini is probably good
| enough for most folks who work in largely the same place.
| go_prodev wrote:
| Battery life gets mentioned quite often with laptops, but
| is it still really that important?
|
| I run my business from an X1 Carbon, but it's more about
| portability than battery life. Trains, planes, Starbucks
| all have power available so it's constantly plugged in and
| I can't remember the last time I used it on battery for
| more than an hour.
| flkiwi wrote:
| I've been using my X1C on battery for the last 4 hours on
| a transpacific flight (hello from the middle of nowhere)
| and am looking forward to about 4 more hours. The seat
| has a convenient power plug, but it's awfully nice to
| leave the charger tucked away in my bag to be one less
| thing to trip over when I have to wriggle free from my
| cattle class seat to run to the restroom.
|
| So, to address your question (which I would normally also
| ask), it _is_ that important though this is also a
| somewhat narrow use case.
| Casteil wrote:
| It's just one of many great aspects for such a capable
| device.
|
| They also run very cool and are effectively silent even
| when the fan DOES eventually turn on for a sustained max
| load. By comparison, every Windows/Intel laptop I've had
| over the last decade exhibited obvious fan noise every
| time there was some short-lived load on the CPU - that
| includes several nicer business/pro grade laptops
| including Dell XPS, Latitudes, and a Thinkpad.
|
| ...and NONE of those other laptops came remotely close to
| reliably lasting 10+ hours on battery like the MBPs
| can/do.
| Sakos wrote:
| It's pretty much impossible to find an outlet in Germany
| in public. Certain types of trains have them, but many
| don't. Like, the only guaranteed outlets I can rely on
| are at home or at work, and even at work, I'm constantly
| moving between meetings and simply don't want to futz
| around with cables all day. I never have to worry about
| charging my laptop between meetings. That kind of
| convenience is hard to beat.
|
| Battery life matters. Maybe not to you, but it matters.
| hoot wrote:
| I recently got my first macbook (coming from a thinkpad)
| and it's honestly more about not having to give a shit
| about a charger. It charges incredibly fast when I plug
| it into its monitor, but otherwise I just throw it in a
| bag without even thinking about what my battery
| percentage is. I'll leave the house with it and not even
| bring the charger.
| gtirloni wrote:
| I think this is the biggest selling point for me. Fewer
| cables around.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| lost_tourist wrote:
| I don't think that anyone is implying that a few people need
| the newest hardware they can get, however if you're working on
| webpages, cloud apps, project management, most phone apps, etc
| you don't need a brand new laptop to get that done. And that's
| just for developers, your typical student or home user
| certainly doesn't need the latest and greatest. I recently
| bought an M2 32GB machine but that was to replace my 2015
| macbook lol.
| meesles wrote:
| 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.
| ido wrote:
| I'm not trying to make a any gotchas. Yes, if all you need is
| MS Word and a web browser you can use a 10-15 years old
| laptop, I don't think this surprises anyone here (in fact its
| why most people these days use phones instead of PCs to do
| most of their internet browsing).
| jamespo wrote:
| I guess your superfast laptop wasn't very good at rendering
| the webpage of the article
| ido wrote:
| Are we not allowed to use the article as a springboard
| for conversation? Am I obligated to only restrict myself
| to what the author wanted to talk about without expanding
| the realm of discussion with the people on HN?
| dejobaan wrote:
| I feel that, for instance, game developers would fall
| into this category.
| ralfd wrote:
| My M1 Mac is the best laptop I ever owned.
|
| But it is also a big step up, I expect my machine to stay
| viable quite some time and recommend my noob friends to buy
| used M1/M2 Macbooks (if available).
| soulbadguy wrote:
| Is it also (inflation / time adjusted) the most expensive ?
| jrib wrote:
| Base m1 macbook air sells for 800 bucks routinely. It's a
| great value in my opinion. I agree it's the best machine I
| have ever owned.
| soulbadguy wrote:
| Doesn't answer my question. I wasn't trying to imply that
| M1 are a bad value...
| ido wrote:
| My old Dell XPS was actually slightly more expensive
| (even before adjusting to inflation - I was researching
| online and at the time it was the most recommended high-
| end pc laptop). And macs retain value a lot better than
| PCs - you can likely resell it for a significant fraction
| of its new price in a few years (unless you broke it).
| soulbadguy wrote:
| Still doesn't answer my question, not sure why people
| feel the need to jump into this... maybe something wrong
| the tone on my answer.
|
| But while i have you here... Which dell xps
| (year/model/spec) was it and which M1 mac
| (year/model/spec) was it.
| ido wrote:
| How does this not answer your question? If the XPS was
| more expensive even before adjusting to inflation, than
| the answer is no: the macbook was not the most expensive
| computer I ever bought (both adjusting _and_ not-
| adjusting to inflation).
|
| The Dell was XPS 13 (9350) bought Janaury 2016 for
| EUR2,105. The Macbook is M1 Macbook Air (the highest end
| model of which), bought June 2021 for EUR1,598. In both
| cases I wasn't trying to save money and was happily
| paying a premium for (within reason) the best laptop I
| could get, as far as I could tell from online reviews. I
| bought both of these directly from Dell's and directly
| from Apple's respective online shops.
|
| The latter is _radically_ higher performance while also
| being much better in many other ways (build quality,
| battery life, reliability, etc). I promise you I 'm not
| getting a commission from Apple, in fact there's a lot of
| stuff they do that I deeply dislike :)
| soulbadguy wrote:
| > How does this not answer your question?
|
| Because i was interested in OP point of view, not someone
| else...
|
| > The Dell was XPS 13 (9350) bought Janaury 2016 for
| EUR2,105. The Macbook is M1 Macbook Air (the highest end
| model of which), bought June 2021 for EUR1,598.
|
| You are comparing the experiences of two laptops 5 years
| apart ...
|
| > The latter is radically higher performance while also
| being much better in many other ways (build quality,
| battery life, reliability, etc). I promise you I'm not
| getting a commission from Apple, in fact there's a lot of
| stuff they do that I deeply dislike :)
|
| I agree, i have nothing apple hardware. I was just
| curious what kind of machine OP had before his mackbook
| air. I also recommend macbook air to anyone who can use
| macos
| pmontra wrote:
| HP ZBook 15 first gen here, 9.5 yo. I use it to develop with
| Django, Rails, Phoenix. Docker, psql, Mongo, mysql, whatever js
| frontend my customers choose. Debian 11. I upgraded it to a
| double SSD configuration, 32 GB RAM. I replaced worn out
| keyboards a few times, the battery once a few months ago. It
| works well and I hope that it keeps going for a while. It still
| sells second hand for about 600 Euros last time I checked, too
| much to buy two of them as mines of spare parts.
| user_7832 wrote:
| Somewhat meta, but having seen the _breath-takingly_ shitty
| hinges on many HP laptops including mine, followed by all the
| inevitable hardware issues with nearly every laptop at home
| (choose between buggy /unreliable/disabled x touchpad/left
| speaker/audio jack/webcam/Bluetooth/WiFi/screen/hinge/chassis
| shell/keys) made me realise that the only "true" solution is to
| spin your own laptop or similar.
|
| Frameworks may be good starting points for most, I prefer smaller
| devices and hope to build a cyberdeck with a 4"*4" SBC as soon as
| I have the necessary resources.
|
| I am done with troubleshooting glitchy hardware/software.
| (Modern) HP can go burn in an eternal hell. (Oh, and Lenovo and
| Asus are at the gates as well.)
| soulbadguy wrote:
| +1
|
| At the high-end windows laptop are usually a coin flip. If you
| want any guaranty you need to basically sign on for a PhD level
| of research and review watching to make sure you don't get a
| turd.
|
| At the low-end/middle end... God damn it's rough... The average
| quality from poor screen to poor keyboard, bad termal you name
| it ... just plain sucks.
| aj7 wrote:
| The same reasoning applies to cars even more.
| ac130kz wrote:
| I got tired of laptops being: non-upgradable, poorly designed,
| overheating, having cheap components, cheap materials, so I'm
| switching to a backpackable mini-ITX build. For a journalist,
| even a first gen iPad should do the trick, but for quick
| compilation and development in general with all those heavy apps
| and daemons even a relatively fresh laptop CPU just doesn't keep
| up. The only two downsides are: no battery, space.
| fbhabbed wrote:
| > the only two downsides are: no battery, space
|
| And not being able to use it on the couch, on the toilet,
| outdoors in your backyard, on a plane, on a train and so on.
| paulmd wrote:
| > on the toilet
|
| sure you can, there's even a little shelf to hold the
| keyboard while you poop
| LoganDark wrote:
| There are also dedicated backpack PCs that are designed to run
| in the backpack, usually for virtual reality. I think those are
| super expensive though... (search "VR backpack")
|
| Also they probably take up the whole backpack instead of being
| "backpackable". And they might be built like laptops
| (proprietary form factor, mobile/ultrabook CPU, etc.) depending
| on the model.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| I used a 12" Apple PowerBook G4 for years, long after Apple
| switched to Intel and came out with Macbook Air and Macbook Pro
| lines. I loved that laptop. Long after Apple stopped providing
| updates to the OS or browser I used TenFourFox to run a
| reasonably up-to-date FireFox on it. I finally gave it up, the
| battery life had degraded a lot and while that could have been
| replaced I was growing increasingly nervous about using such an
| out-of-date OS on an internet-connected laptop. I still miss it.
| [deleted]
| novaRom wrote:
| "Laptops don't change" - this is most important reason if we're
| talking about Apple laptops. My 10 years old MacBook Pro is
| almost absolutely the same as MacBook Air of 2023. Performance,
| screen, OS, weight, battery, keyboard. And old laptops look even
| better; look how ugly are new M1/M2 Air cases in comparison with
| first versions of Airs.
| chaostheory wrote:
| This making sense depends on your career. It makes sense for
| writers, but not for everyone. Why? Because silicon is cheaper
| than carbon ie the hourly costs for most machines tends to be far
| cheaper than my salary. In my case it's more expensive to buy
| something cheap and slow, than it is to buy something that allows
| me to maximize my throughput per hour.
| teekert wrote:
| Nice read. I do the same, but with 3-6 year old laptops. I
| recently bought an HP ProBook 440 for 450EUR, you can still buy
| it new for 1050. The "used" one was brand new, there are people
| that buy such stock from companies and when they say "No signs of
| usage" they mean it, I so far got 2 spotless machines.
| rozenmd wrote:
| ThinkPads are absolutely magic. Here's one I built for
| travelling: https://maxrozen.com/replacing-my-macbook-m1-with-
| thinkpad-t...
| luciusdomitius wrote:
| They used to be. I am writing this from the above-mentioned
| T480. It is 3 years old, has both usb-c ports replaced, small
| crack on the backside of the screen and the keyboard zif is
| broken, so the tape cable is... well taped to the connector.
|
| On the other hand my X200, T420, T450 are still in mint
| condition. To be completely fair, modern macs are also way off
| from well-built. Shiny yes, but sturdy is the last thing I'd
| call them.
|
| BTW, in older ThinkPads, the drain-pipes under the keyboards
| actually worked - you could pour water on it just for kicks.
| Now it is there only for decoration.
| simfree wrote:
| It really is a shame that the USB C ports are not modular on
| newer ThinkPads, you basically have to send the laptop for
| board work to get them replaced once the USB C ports go.
| luciusdomitius wrote:
| Not really, I had mine replaced at revolt.bg for about 60
| EUR, both labour and spares. Miraculously, they had both of
| them on stock, so it was a Thurday to Wednesday job.
| Massive respect to those guys.
| cache_hit wrote:
| They really are. For example, I have a P53s (basically a
| renamed T590) that will randomly clock the i7 CPU it came with
| down to 400MHz under active use for extended periods of time,
| and I can't run anything that actually uses the cores on the i7
| for more than a minute without hitting the 95 degree PROCHOT.
| The dedicated GPU also will clock itself down to 100MHz and
| shift the termal throttling range from 75 degrees to 65 degrees
| randomly, on a system with a single fan cooling solution.
|
| Just magical, and I can't wait to see Lenovo's next trick.
| npteljes wrote:
| I unsubscribed from Lenovo at their Superfish debacle.
| Intercepting HTTPS communication with their own certificate?
| Now ain't that somethin'.
|
| And the next up was when they had a special place in the
| laptop for their bundled bullshit, so that they persist EVEN
| IF you reinstall Windows on the lappy.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenovo#Security_and_privacy_in.
| ..
| rozenmd wrote:
| Have you changed your thermal paste?
| cache_hit wrote:
| Yes, but it only helps so much when the actual cooling
| solution is as unsuitable as it is.
| tannhaeuser wrote:
| Anecdata, but before going all-in on ThinkPads I thought I
| share my experience.
|
| For the ThinkPad x13 2nd gen Ryzen I received for a customer
| project (with the customer not interested in getting it back
| after the project was completed) it's too early to say anything
| about reliability, but somehow the touchpad isn't centered
| properly and I always hit left click when I want right click -
| it's unbearable and surprisingly bad for a ThinkPad.
|
| Before, I had an ThinkPad E495 Ryzen that worked ok but after
| two years the touchpad got stuck - the pointless (for me!)
| construction with touch point and extra mechanical buttons
| (only acting as barrier) certainly didn't help.
|
| Before, I had my beloved Dell XPS 2016 which however had a
| swollen battery. Still, I consider it one of the best notebooks
| I had; gnome 2 and Unity also just got it right.
|
| In the last four years I got five (!) ThinkPad and Dell
| Precision notebooks for customer projects having battery or
| memory problems OOTB (the x13 I mentioned above was a notebook
| that finally worked).
|
| The notebook I used for the longest time (7 years) was a
| PowerBook G4 2003. I hope my current MacBook M1 will last me
| about as long, but at least 5 years. In terms of power
| management, display, and usability, a Mac notebook is in
| another league compared to Dells and ThinkPads with Linux, it's
| not even funny. Linux desktops have regressed to the point they
| have ceased to be usable for me. With the newer MacBooks, I
| think Apple listened to customers and nailed it; I'd just
| prefer lighter (non-alu) materials.
| pessimizer wrote:
| I'd like to defend the T430 from a T430. Yes, it was a bad
| purchase when I made it (and when the author made it), but you
| can buy them for $100 a piece now on Ebay. Keyboards you can
| probably buy 20 for $50. Since they are from the dawn of
| Thinkpad's bullshit, they hardcoded the hardware choices you
| could make for upgrades _into the firmware._ Awful. But 1vyrain
| (https://1vyra.in/) came along and fixed all that.
|
| A T430 doesn't even feel underpowered these days, and has a
| (horrible) webcam (that can be improved a bit by judicious
| software postprocessing.) With a dining room table, a router
| running OpenWRT, 4 T430s, and a 5-10 year-old gaming PC as a
| server to compile things on/serve things from/etc., you could
| start a little software company and your biggest expense would be
| the table.
| simfree wrote:
| The 35 watt processor in the T430 is just way too easy to get
| toasty.
|
| The T440 or above with a 1080p screen upgrade and trackpad
| replacement is so much nicer to use since it cooks your legs
| less, has a nicer screen, is lighter, thinner and still able to
| take hard falls without issue.
| pessimizer wrote:
| > The 35 watt processor in the T430 is just way too easy to
| get toasty.
|
| Definitely true, but I don't use laptops on my lap very
| often. I also have a fear that
|
| > lighter, thinner
|
| may mean harder to get into and repair/replace things.
|
| -----
|
| edit: let me let these people argue in favor of the T430...
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/thinkpad/comments/r88wag/my_almost_.
| ..
| InvaderFizz wrote:
| I really enjoyed my T460s from a job back in 2017. My main
| complaint was the rather anemic 2c/4t CPU.
|
| I have a LG Gram 15 that is pretty decent, but very
| wobbly/flexy. It's saving grace is the lightweight of it.
|
| My 16" MBP M1 Max is phenomenal, but very heavy, and I move
| it 5-10x daily.
|
| I plan on replacing it with the ~2025 MBA 15". My wife's 13"
| M1 MBA is great, but the 13" is not nearly as comfortable for
| a single display as the 16".
| YmiYugy wrote:
| I used to think that as long as all you needed to do was some web
| browsing that older or underspeced machines were fine. But in the
| last few years websites have become insanely resource intensive.
| Even using something as seemingly simple as Gmail is a
| frustrating experience on older laptops (speaking as someone who
| just upgraded from a 2017 dual core MacBook Pro). I also have a
| hard time believing that the same hardware could handle that task
| much better if it used some lightweight linux distro. The browser
| engines are the same after all. You could swap Gmail for a
| lightweight email client, but I find that this approach of
| choosing software compatible with a capabilities of these low
| powered machines runs into some limitations sooner or later, e.g.
| when someone decides to sends you a Microsoft Office file, asks
| you to collaborate on a Google doc, insists on doing a meeting
| via Google Meet or Zoom. I may also want some of the other
| amenities modern laptops have to offer, like bright screens, long
| lasting batteries, the possibility of using a modern IDE or IDE
| like editor instead of having to learn VIM.
| mahogany wrote:
| Huh, I have a Thinkpad t450s from 2015 which I'm sure has less
| power than a 2017 MBP, and I use it for email and streaming
| YouTube just fine. It runs Linux and I use an adblocker, so
| maybe that's a difference? Or maybe I don't mind the decreased
| performance as much.
|
| I don't do my programming on it, so I can't speak to that.
| [deleted]
| mumblemumble wrote:
| I'm more or less in that boat. I did by my laptop, a 2013 MacBook
| Pro, new, but 10 years later it's still fine for my purposes. For
| productivity purposes, the only real concessions to its age are
| that I did have to get the battery replaced about a year ago, and
| I do some light adblocking (no autoplaying videos or heavy
| scripting or anything like that, but I still let static ads
| through) to keep webpages usable.
|
| For light gaming I recently bought a refurbished 2019 desktop for
| $250. I mostly only play older games (because I'm cheap), so that
| was more about Apple dropping support for 32-bit apps than it is
| about the MacBook not being powerful enough, though I am
| admittedly happy about having a computer that can play KSP
| without everything turned down to the lowest quality level.
| Overall, happy there, too - it's hard for me to imagine that a
| new computer would provide enough utility to justify the added
| cost. The latest generation of this computer retails for four
| times as much money as I paid for the used one, but the specs are
| very, very similar.
| EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK wrote:
| Well, I'm retired, so I don't do much emails or zoom anymore. I
| do serious stuff now, like Cyberpunk, MFS and Hogwarts. So I need
| serious hardware, updated often. And I'm constantly on the move
| too, so serious hardware needs to fit into my backpack. Sorry,
| snowflake millennial applebooks not up for the task.
| albertopv wrote:
| I have a still working 2010 Acer 4810TG upgraded with a SSD and
| 8GB RAM, I use it to play very old games and a little of Internet
| browsing, for that it still works.
| RecycledEle wrote:
| The last 3 laptops I bought were a pair of Lenovo e570 machines
| and a Lenovo e580.
|
| Two went to college kids and I keep the third.
|
| When I configure a laptop, I use less RAM than I would otherwise
| want (16 GB lately) and make up for it with a fast NVME boot
| drive as swap space. Intel NVME drives are fast and power
| efficient. That gives me a better mix of performance and battery
| life than would a laptop with more RAM.
| isoos wrote:
| Wouldn't the increased swap load reduce the lifetime of the
| nvme drive?
| DeathArrow wrote:
| On my development machine I run at the same time: at least two
| instances of Visual Studio each containing a big microservice
| based app, an instance of Visual Studio Code containing a large
| front-end, Docker Desktop, Postgres, Redis, MongoDB, management
| apps for databases, at least three Windows Terminal tabs, dozens
| of tabs in browser, dozens of tabs in Notepad++, Teams, Outlook
| and some other random stuff.
|
| I need beefy laptops and I usually change them after two years.
| SimonPStevens wrote:
| I last bought a laptop (in fact any PC at all) in 2015.
|
| It was pretty beefy for the time. A desktop 4790K CPU, 32gb RAM
| and a GTX 980M. It was a long time ago, but I think I paid around
| PS1500 for it.
|
| Shout out to https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/ for a great long
| lasting machine that is very open for maintenance, long before
| Framework was around. I will absolutely buy from them again next
| time. Removable battery, replaceable hard drive, ram, cpu,
| graphics card. Easily open-able case (screws, but I've had it
| open). They sold me a replacement keyboard for something like
| PS30 when I smashed a few keys by dropping my camera on it.
|
| My inner tech geek is keen to buy something new, but this one is
| still going strong, and I can't justify spending money when this
| one works so well. It still plays all the latest games. It's only
| had two problems over the years. 1) Obviously, the original
| battery doesn't last very long now. 2) The CPU started
| overheating after about 5 years when pushed, so I popped the
| cover open, took the heatsink off and reapplied fresh thermal
| paste. Has worked perfectly since.
|
| I mean honestly, the single threaded CPU performance only seems
| to be about 50% behind modern chips. I don't really see many
| machines even today with 32gb ram.
|
| Things it struggles with these days that I suppose would require
| a new machine if it bothered you: - 4k gaming. - VR games are a
| bit too choppy unless you turn the settings right down. (HL:Alyx
| is playable at pretty much lowest settings) - Probably going to
| struggle with any generative AI stuff given the older GPU, but
| I've not tried it.
|
| I code on it, but I don't do high intensive stuff like video
| editing, 3d work, rendering, etc, so perhaps it would struggle
| with that kind of stuff.
| eimrine wrote:
| I use a Core2Duo laptop on a regular basis and all my tasks are
| met except of poor battery life. More cores does not give me such
| a boost as migration from a single-core Pentium 4. I still use
| Windows 7 on half of my machines as the best OS in my life ever
| but I am migrating on GNU/Systemd/Linux on all new laptops
| because Windows 7 is as much vendor's presence as I tolerate.
| hackan wrote:
| I have a Thinkpad T460p myself, and its battery lasts as long, or
| longer, than most new laptops I've seen! I was just searching for
| a new one for a friend, and noted that most new laptops are
| absolute garbage, total crap. Most have the same specs as mine,
| almost a decade later, WTF (yeah, "new gens", whatever) It's
| really sad, we are dropping all quality for mere quantity and
| consumerism...
| szundi wrote:
| My version: Intel did not do shit for 10 years. That's it.
| DeathArrow wrote:
| I can use old laptops because I can't run what I need, but at
| least I won't buying new cars as old cars seem to have a better
| bang for the buck.
|
| I like my actual car because is quite reliable and if something
| breaks, it's easy to fix. Also, being Diesel it's also cheap to
| run.
|
| My next car will also be an old Diesel. Probably I should buy
| more cars at some point because they'll forbid new cars with
| internal combustion engines and it's good to have backups.
| redroyal wrote:
| "Laptops don't change"
|
| Really? because a few years ago battery life was maybe 7 hours
| and now it's 18. And with faster processors, thunderbolt 4 and
| USB C charging, wifi 6, better screens and lighter.
|
| I keep hearing this argument for not buying a new laptop every
| year and it just doesn't hold water. I say buy the latest
| MacBook, expense it, factor it in as a monthly cost. These are
| expendable and essential tools. They pay for themselves
|
| And these framework laptops are pretty awful. They run hot and
| are poorly designed. The modular usb addons are a joke and
| exchangeable GPUs? heavy, power hungry, not for laptops. 3 hour
| battery life. The main product feature AFAICS is virtue
| signaling. These products are not open hardware either. Then,
| there's this modularity argument. Like this is the last laptop
| you'll ever own and forever will be replacing it piece by piece.
| Disassembling over and over. But that's not realistic. You'll
| have to upgrade to faster processors and the form factor of the
| mb will change regardless of what they say, and you're counting
| on the company being around in a few years which is a poor bet.
| They can't compete with Apple or even Lenovo
| 2h wrote:
| > I keep hearing this argument for not buying a new laptop
| every year and it just doesn't hold water. I say buy the latest
| MacBook, expense it, factor it in as a monthly cost.
|
| this is why Apple is a trillion dollar company. because people
| mindlessly buy any new thing they put out, regardless if it
| makes sense or not.
|
| https://youtube.com/watch?v=Ydje1ivynIM
| andrekandre wrote:
| > this is why Apple is a trillion dollar company. because
| people mindlessly buy any new thing they put out, regardless
| if it makes sense or not.
|
| not to defend apple or anything but whats the complaint
| here?... that apple is really good at capitalism?
| 2h wrote:
| > whats the complaint here
|
| Its dont mindlessly buy any new thing Apple puts out
| andrekandre wrote:
| why? whats wrong with people buying things that they
| like?
| 2h wrote:
| you seem to keep ignoring this key word:
|
| mindlessly
| andrekandre wrote:
| yes, because you haven't provided any evidence for these
| "mindless" consumers so i'm not going to try and debate
| that point (besides calling apple customers mindless and
| then saying thats why they have 3 trillion dollar market
| cap is nearing troll territory)
|
| _my point is:_
|
| if i (mindlessly perhaps?) concede the point that those
| consumers are mindlessly spending money on useless
| things... then so what? its their money, let them do what
| they want with it. why make value judgments?
| 2h wrote:
| because we aren't talking about candy here. we are
| talking about purchases that are hundreds or thousands of
| dollars. and people are normalizing making these
| purchases yearly. sure if you're dumb and rich go ahead
| buy what you want. but the culture pushes this mindset on
| people who cant afford it as well.
|
| unless you have the money to blow, then having critical
| thinking is an important skill. to ask yourself "is this
| a waste of money?", "should I really be buying one of
| these every year?"
| lannisterstark wrote:
| >we are talking about purchases that are hundreds or
| thousands of dollars
|
| ...with their own money. For items they see a use for.
| What they consider to be worth it.
|
| ----
|
| >to ask yourself "is this a waste of money?", "should I
| really be buying one of these every year?"
|
| "Hm, is this worth it to me? Yes." There you go.
|
| ---
|
| I agree every year is a bit much, but I'm not trying to
| stop people from spending their money in way they find
| useful. It's not my money. I'm ok with that.
| andrekandre wrote:
| > but the culture pushes this mindset on people who cant
| afford it as well.
|
| so the problem is with consumerism isn't it?
| 2h wrote:
| at the moment the problem is with you.
| lannisterstark wrote:
| there's no actual need to be an ass. If you're unable to
| have a discussion, don't comment.
| [deleted]
| marcel_hecko wrote:
| "ThinkPad(r) X260 will go as long as you do with over 21 hours
| of continuous battery life". Thats a quote from Lenovo website
| from 2018. I can confirm this was in practice the case with
| extended battery pack.
| lwkl wrote:
| Doing what kind of work? And with what kind of screen
| brightness?
|
| I like Lenovo laptops but I never got that kind of battery
| life on them I got maybe half or sometimes only a third of
| what they advertised.
| sfuller808 wrote:
| [dead]
| ripply wrote:
| The framework laptops definitely run hot, I gave up on mine
| because it would overheat several times a day throttling down
| to 200Mhz. It sits in a box unused now and I consider it
| ewaste, I don't have the time or patience to bother with it
| anymore. I reached out to support maybe 6+ months ago but I
| haven't finished following their instructions because the
| laptop was just so bad and I wasted so much time dealing with
| it that I don't care anymore.
| robocat wrote:
| > I consider it ewaste
|
| Leave it in a box in a cupboard and it is. Give it to
| somebody who will use it (at the next time you are hanging
| with geeks) and it isn't e-waste. Offer it for free pickup
| next Framework thread - somebody wants it enough to not cost
| you more time than a drive format.
| zmk5 wrote:
| Yeah I would suggest you do this instead of keeping it in
| the cupboard. Lots of people looking to pick one up for
| cheap.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| You sound like you've fallen for some marketing. They want you
| to think that your laptop is "old" and you must upgrade. They
| want you to chase specs regardless of the benefit to your
| workflow because specs will improve forever.
|
| I don't upgrade unless my computer can't do a thing that I need
| it to do.
| VoodooJuJu wrote:
| [flagged]
| DyslexicAtheist wrote:
| >> "Laptops don't change"
|
| > because a few years ago battery life was maybe 7 hours and
| now it's 18
|
| seconded for linux as well. a few years ago battery life was
| maybe 4 hours, and now it's 1.
| kibwen wrote:
| _> a few years ago battery life was maybe 7 hours and now it's
| 18_
|
| At what point do battery improvements become completely
| unnecessary? Who's out here using their laptops for 18 hours
| continuously? It's like an electric car that can go 2,000 miles
| on a single charge; YAGNI. The vast majority of people would be
| perfectly well-served by a smaller, lighter, less expensive
| laptop that cuts down the battery to just 10 hours.
| lannisterstark wrote:
| >Who's out here using their laptops for 18 hours
| continuously?
|
| "We should stop battery improvements because no one I know
| uses it" (to put it with a bit exaggeration) is certainly a
| novel take. Sometimes I put my laptop on the kitchen counter
| after doing stuff and not have to worry it'll be dead next
| afternoon when I need it for something.
|
| You're forgetting one important take. Batteries degrade. In 3
| years your "10 hour battery" will be more like 3 hours.
| cbzoiav wrote:
| Or even the older setups where you had a relatively small
| battery in the device and a bigger wedge shaped battery that
| could clip on the bottom.
|
| Or there were a couple of devices with dual battery slots so
| you could hot swap.
|
| Then on odd occasions when you need it just take the extra
| battery/ies.
| datavirtue wrote:
| You need an 18 hour battery to get a solid, reliable 10 hours
| of use.
| stetrain wrote:
| 18 hours advertised is usually running a locally stored video
| file on loop at medium to low screen brightness and some
| light web browsing.
|
| My 18-hour laptop is more like 8-10 hours of real work usage,
| which is still fantastic compared to the 2-3 hours I would
| get at similar tasks 6-7 years ago.
|
| Another big change is improvements to sleep and standby time.
| I can use half the battery, close the lid, and be reasonably
| confident that the other half will be ready and waiting the
| next time I need it.
|
| EVs may actually be an apt comparison, where an EPA rating of
| 300 miles is more likely to give you 240 miles at highway
| speeds, or 150-200mi between charging stops since the optimal
| charge speeds fall off above a 70% charge.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| > My 18-hour laptop is more like 8-10 hours of real work
| usage,
|
| Ans in which context do you find yourself needing to be
| even 8 hours in a row on your computer without being close
| to a power plug? You can even charge your computer in
| planes now!
| maleldil wrote:
| > which context do you find yourself needing to be even 8
| hours in a row on your computer without being close to a
| power plug?
|
| It's summer. I was writing a paper in an outdoor pub. No
| plug available, unless I wanted to go indoors (I didn't).
| I used the entire battery. Granted, it was mostly VS Code
| being a power hog.
|
| > You can even charge your computer in planes now!
|
| Not if you're flying economy on British Airways.
| jwells89 wrote:
| Part of the appeal is the convenience. Not having to pull
| out the brick and charging cable, sit next to an outlet,
| and then pack it all back up is nice.
|
| Longer battery life also means that for trips, you don't
| necessarily need to bring a full size laptop brick at all
| and instead can charge overnight off of a tiny phone
| charger.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| > Not having to pull out the brick and charging cable,
| sit next to an outlet, and then pack it all back up is
| nice.
|
| But then even 18h isn't enough, and at some point you end
| up running to the plug in the middle of a meeting,
| because of course in the end you need to charge it (this
| is happening to a different co-worker almost every week
| in remotr, and I dont even spend that much time in
| meetings).
|
| > Longer battery life also means that for trips, you
| don't necessarily need to bring a full size laptop brick
| at all and instead can charge overnight off of a tiny
| phone charger.
|
| Given that a small charger is already enough to give you
| 30W, I'm not sure it's going to make too much of a
| difference: if you keep tour computer plugged while
| working, the battery will slowly discharge, but under
| most load I suspect it will still survive the day without
| issues.
| mitchell209 wrote:
| I want my EV to last a month on a single charge and yet
| some people are arguing against battery improvements.
| Crazy.
| kibwen wrote:
| This is a straw man. The argument is not against
| improving batteries. It's about engineering products for
| what people actually _need_ , and not over-engineering
| them for the fantasies that we construct regarding what
| their needs are. To continue the EV example, the majority
| of trips by car in the US are less than 3 miles. You
| could comfortably reduce an EV's range from 300 miles to
| 30 and sell a car that still suffices for the majority of
| people, and what you _gain_ from that is decreased costs
| and increased efficiency, which disproportionately
| benefits both overall power consumption and charge time
| (remember the tyranny of the rocket fuel equation). Most
| people don 't _need_ a car that charges once a month,
| they need a car that lasts just long enough for the time
| between when it 's convenient to charge.
|
| The truth is that almost nobody actually _needs_ a
| computer that can last more than a single eight-hour
| workday on a single charge. In fact, most people need
| even less than that; if you 're working somewhere with
| wifi, you're working somewhere with electricity. It's
| rare that I need my laptop to last more than two hours,
| let alone eight.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| I'm pretty sure you're not ready to pay a premium for
| that.
| MAGZine wrote:
| 10 years ago I could write software and take notes and
| browse the Internet for 8h a day on a MacBook air.
| lvspiff wrote:
| I recall the same - the first and second gen airs were to
| me the epitome of what a laptop should be. Solid feature
| delivery in a portable light package that was still
| humming after a flight from LA to DFW.
| user_7832 wrote:
| > My 18-hour laptop is more like 8-10 hours of real work
| usage, which is still fantastic compared to the 2-3 hours I
| would get at similar tasks 6-7 years ago.
|
| I'm not sure if you're using an M1/2 MacBook but if you're
| using windows laptops - 2 to 3 hours is pretty poor even
| for an old laptop (assuming it didn't have an H series
| processor which is a whole another story).
|
| My (dad's) HP Probook with its 6th gen i5 processor could
| get between 6-10 hours of battery life when I got it around
| 2020, after some years of use. Sure, old batteries degrade,
| but 2-3 hours for a laptop less than 3-4 years old (or
| older, but with a new battery) is kinda poor to start with.
| starttoaster wrote:
| I have a fairly recent Dell XPS, maybe 2 years old. i9
| and mobile RTX 3070. Realistically I get about 3-4 hours
| on it before it's dead. Pretty similar battery life if
| I'm on my linux partition too.
| datavirtue wrote:
| Never had a windows laptop that would last more than
| three hours...brand new or remanufactured. And I have
| used a LOT of windows laptops in my time, both used and
| new.
|
| Except for the Lenovo Thinkpad X, or whatever they called
| it. I think I got ~8 solid hours of use out of them.
|
| My 2022 MacBook Pro easily goes all day and into the
| evening under heavy use.
| andrekandre wrote:
| > 2 to 3 hours is pretty poor even for an old laptop
|
| i get this on my macbook pro m1, but it happens when i
| have some webpages that suck battery life (google docs,
| jira etc) and/or xcode/android studio open (just sitting
| there) oh and corporate mandated ant-virus...
|
| i think it might be highly dependent on work
| patters/environments
| rospaya wrote:
| > At what point do battery improvements become completely
| unnecessary?
|
| A week of heavy CPU/GPU use, on full brightness. We should
| strive for better. I want to go on a trip without carrying my
| charger.
| kibwen wrote:
| This is asking for a battery with hundreds of times more
| capacity, which, regardless of any future advancements in
| battery tech, would result in laptops with batteries which
| are hundreds of times heavier, hundreds of times more
| expensive, and using hundreds of times more materials than
| they could otherwise be (to say nothing of being hundreds
| of times more dangerous in the event of a battery failure).
| agentultra wrote:
| I had young kids. I took my laptop to conferences and events.
| Performances.
|
| Things happen in these circumstances. Drinks spill. Laptops
| fall from heights. Cords get pulled.
|
| You know what happens when a MBP encounters a liquid? It
| depends. But one thing almost every device will have in common
| in such an encounter: they cannot be repaired.
|
| You have to replace the entire mainboard. And the cost is
| enough that you may as well buy a new one. The rest ends up in
| an unlicensed dump somewhere in the global south where a kid is
| going to get exposed to cancer causing chemicals when they drag
| it out and bring it to some back alley disassembly shop.
|
| The cost for a laptop is pretty high. Building them to be bench
| repairable and upgradeable help extend their useful life. As
| the article points out the best we can do is use them for as
| long as possible.
| kevinh456 wrote:
| This is part of why Apple is pushing trade in when you buy a
| new device. They recycle it.
| agentultra wrote:
| They claim to. I would love to read an independent audit of
| their recycling process. I suspect the vast majority of
| devices they extract the battery, the screen if it's
| viable, and the rest ends up in a dump. "Recycled," in a
| sense but not really.
| chasil wrote:
| It is well-known that planar transistors are more reliable than
| FINFET.
|
| It is usually agreed that the end of planar transistors was the
| last process node of 28 nanometers. Everything below this (14,
| 10, 7, 5, 3, and 2 nanometers so far) is less reliable.
|
| The fastest, lowest power, and most reliable CPU in a laptop
| will be on a 28nm process node. Everything beyond this
| sacrifices reliability for speed and lower power.
|
| (And if you really care about lower power, then you are on
| ARM.)
| tengbretson wrote:
| The failure rate of CPUs could go up 10x and it would still
| be a rounding error when quantifying what causes laptops to
| be decommissioned.
| chasil wrote:
| A quick check of Google shows that TSMC does have a 16nm
| finfet process that is tested and approved for use in
| automobiles, which is a much more punishing environment
| than laptops or phones.
|
| As a measure of redundancy, multiple finfet transistors can
| be wired together to act as one. It would not surprise me
| if this was heavily exploited in automobile applications.
|
| https://electronics360.globalspec.com/article/16795/2-autom
| o...
| alxmdev wrote:
| > _I say buy the latest MacBook, expense it, factor it in as a
| monthly cost. These are expendable and essential tools. They
| pay for themselves_
|
| Yay, another top comment that steamrolls the posted article. I
| say _don 't_ buy the latest Macbook: instead repair, refurbish,
| and get true lifetime use out of these expensive devices.
| They're expensive to manufacture, expensive to buy, and
| expensive for our planet and people to just throw them away
| every year.
|
| They're not expendable at all, here is just one example of the
| human sacrifice involved in their manufacturing:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protests_against_Samsung
| smoldesu wrote:
| > 3 hour battery life.
|
| Maybe if "laptops don't change", sure:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuw-YpbFkkM
| redroyal wrote:
| Using the modular GPU
| [deleted]
| oliwarner wrote:
| They change, but my 2015 ThinkPad 13 still delivers on
| performance, battery, screen, etc.
|
| I'm a grown up now. I've got better uses for PS2k right now.
| I'll get a new laptop when I need one.
| crawsome wrote:
| That sounds like batteries change
| benj111 wrote:
| So you buy a new laptop every year?
|
| What do you do with your old one? Throw it away? Or sell it? If
| you're selling it who do you think is buying it?
|
| You do realise most people don't need the fastest processor, an
| 18 hour battery life, thunderbolt 4 or WiFi 6
|
| And better screens and lighter weight are relative. If I
| upgrade my 10 year old laptop to a 5 year old laptop I'm still
| realising those gains. Next year a better screen will be out.
| Presumably we can agree that today's best screen is adequate,
| despite the knowledge that in the future it won't be the best
| screen, so if it's adequate today, why would it cease to be
| adequate in 1/3/5 years?
| redroyal wrote:
| Well in 5 years I expect most dev work will be done in VR
| collaboratively with remote teams, w multiple virtual screens
| and AI assistance. Another world. Laptops and cell phones
| will be gathering dust with the desktops. Things change fast.
| Remember the world without the iPhone? That was 16 years ago.
| So when you talk about using a 5 year old laptop to save a
| few dollars it just doesn't make sense. You can listen to
| music on a CD player, sounds great, doesn't make sense. Using
| a heavy hot i7 MBP w 6 hours battery life from 2017 also
| doesn't make sense, to save what $1200 rather than buying a
| 15 inch MBA. Not today - this machine is your everything.
| Spend some money already
| tmtvl wrote:
| How about we save that $1,200 and donate it to something
| like Rainforest Alliance instead?
| anthk wrote:
| VR sucks for work. And multiple virtual screens... FVWM did
| virtual desktops since... 1994?
| HWR_14 wrote:
| > buy the newest MacBook, expense it
|
| Obviously if the cost (to you, because your company will pay
| for it) drops to zero, you should consume a new laptop every
| year. It costs nothing and if nothing else the battery is
| newer!
|
| Of course, that logic applies to almost anything (take free
| stuff) even if it is objectively stupid. Your company will pay
| for your laptop but not part of your electric bill for your
| home office, just buy a new MacBook every two days with a fully
| charged battery!
| gremlinunderway wrote:
| If you read the rest of the site, you would see that the
| argument against not buying a new laptop every year is to find
| ways to lower the insane amount of electronics waste we're
| generating any single year.
|
| It's not just about lack of features, it's also just
| ridiculously wasteful even for an industry already known for
| it. At least my PC, I'm just swapping out parts for upgrades.
| I'm not dumping my entire PC tower in the garbage every few
| years.
|
| We're so goddamn lucky that PCs haven't become these disposable
| machines like every other piece of tech out there. Video game
| consoles, phones and laptops are just the worst for this and
| while it's cheaper in the short term, the costs are there we
| just don't see them.
| happymellon wrote:
| And this is another reason I avoid Nvidia whenever possible.
|
| At least with laptops, I have perfectly serviceable Intel and
| AMD systems, but I have old laptops with Nvidia that are no
| longer supported and basically can't be used anymore for
| productive purposes.
| Atotalnoob wrote:
| So if framework can let you reuse the "shell" for 2-3 upgrade
| cycles until they have to change the motherboard, that's a lot
| better than having to buy an entire new laptop.
|
| It's not about keeping the same form factor forever, that's
| unrealistic. It's about reducing the amount of stuff you have
| to buy for each upgrade.
|
| Opening and closing stuff is realistic, if it's easy.
|
| I've opened and upgraded various components of my steam deck
| half a dozen times in the last 6 months.
|
| It's reduce, reuse, recycle.
|
| I don't own a framework.
| coldtea wrote:
| > _It 's not about keeping the same form factor forever,
| that's unrealistic._
|
| It's not that unrealistic, if we constraint forever to like
| 10-15 years.
|
| In a lot of laptops I'd rather they keep most of the ports
| (and just e.g. update USB2 to USB3, and add a few new ones)
| but keep the form factor the shape.
|
| Often new keyboards (Apple is notorious, but holds for
| others) are worse than in the previous form factor.
|
| And when they go and "make it thinner", beyond some point,
| I'd often rather they added more battery, or added a space
| for an extra use installable SSD, or put bigger speaker
| cones, or just leave the space inside for better thermal
| dissipation...
| pnpnp wrote:
| I love that they're doing this. However, in my use-case I
| keep a laptop 5+ years now. At that point, it's pretty worn
| out and usually warrants a total replacement.
|
| All the individual components keep me happy for so darn long
| now. After 5+ years, there have usually been pretty big
| improvements in every area.
| neuralRiot wrote:
| 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.
| KronisLV wrote:
| > 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 more RAM slots for main PC). I
| occasionally swap out drives and now my homelab servers
| also have SSDs like my desktop. Once I bought faster RAM
| for my desktop, I moved some of the old sticks to the
| servers.
|
| You can easily replace homelab servers with a family PC or
| another machine that you have (or just spare parts in case
| something fails) in the example and it will still make
| sense.
|
| Actually a lot of that hardware is also second hand - since
| it was easier to just get affordable first gen Ryzens for
| my desktop, instead of saving up money for a while. Those
| homelab servers both also use 200GEs because of the low
| TDP, which others might consider obsolete, but which have a
| second life here.
| musicale wrote:
| 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 you plan to connect to the
| internet.
| yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
| > just like PCs you configure it once and it will be that
| HW until it is obsolete for your purpose.
|
| Nearly every PC I own has had its disk replaced at least
| once, and many have more RAM than they started with; both
| of these massively extend their useful lifespan.
| musicale wrote:
| RAM, storage, and GPU upgrades are great.
|
| Unfortunately CPU upgrades often require a new
| socket/motherboard.
| zacmps wrote:
| Terrible example, a large proportion of gamers (including
| myself and almost everyone I know with a PC) builds their
| own.
|
| Upgrades are piecemeal and old components are variously
| sold, given to friends, or re-used in home servers.
| CraigJPerry wrote:
| >> So if framework can let you reuse the "shell" for 2-3
| upgrade cycles
|
| I badly want the framework laptop idea to succeed - the idea
| of re-using your old laptop battery as a battery bank when
| you upgrade, that's just brilliant. The idea of taking your
| old motherboard and sticking it in a slim case that bolts to
| the vesa mount on the back of your monitor, beautiful.
|
| However, it's far more expensive that just buying a MacBook.
| I bought the base model M1 Air for PS999 at launch. I just
| sold it, what's this, 3 years later, with 90% battery life
| remaining for PS600 plus shipping, after eBay & paypal's cut
| I'm PS537. That's PS462 for 3 years of having faster single
| core / interactive responsiveness than anything else at
| comparable price on the market.
|
| How much more would I have had to pay over a similar time
| frame for a slower heavier framework with much much less
| battery life.
|
| I considered the framework for this laptop cycle but instead
| I just traded up to a second hand 16" M1 Pro/16Gb/1Tb with 16
| cycles count on the battery - i.e. brand new. Sure it's 25%
| slower than the equiv PS2800 M2 Pro version but this cost me
| just PS1500 delivered in pristine condition. I'm feeling very
| confident I'm going to come out ahead again in total cost of
| ownership.
| aCoreyJ wrote:
| Those comparisons work against any Windows business laptop
| though, which Framework competes well with on price and
| features.
|
| No doubt Apple Silicon has really exposed AMD/Intel and
| x86/64 in general
| finitestateuni wrote:
| My framework (latest revision i5 DIY edition) is lighter
| than my wife's maxed out M1 MBA. She has 16gb of RAM and
| 2tb of storage, and it cost $2500 with taxes and shipping.
| I have the latest i5 DIY edition and I forwent everything
| (charger, RAM, storage). I got the fastest 2tb m2 drive
| supported and the fastest 64gb of RAM supported on Amazon.
| Total cost with taxes and shipping for everything was
| $1250.
|
| My framework compiles the linux kernel faster than her MBA
| and lasts all day on a single charge. I did spend an
| enjoyable afternoon dialing things in, although I know not
| everyone would enjoy that. I wouldn't recommend a linux
| laptop to anyone who doesn't understand init systems and
| how to manage config files.
|
| They're both great laptops, but with different target
| markets. Let people enjoy things!
| the-grump wrote:
| Too bad Apple's hardware doesn't play nice with Linux.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| I'm a huge Framework fan but I worry that the upgradeability
| produces _more_ e-waste rather than less. I already see
| Framework laptop owners tossing mainboards every generation.
| I think the e-waste angle is the weakest- I like the
| upgradeability because it saves me money. As a cheap bastard
| I almost see it as a challenge to use my devices for as long
| as possible.
| conceptme wrote:
| Just being able to replace the battery is a huge win.
| sheepscreek wrote:
| For OPs use-case which is mainly writing articles, reading and
| such - an older laptop will work fine. Especially when powered
| from A/C.
|
| My MacBook Pro 2014 base model can still hold a candle to
| MacBook Air M1 for general use (even dev work to an extent),
| and that's saying something. It's slower, but doesn't feel
| 9-years-old slow - if you know what I mean. It doesn't drive me
| nuts to use it and I can be productive on it (my daily driver
| is a MacBook Pro M1 with 64GB RAM and I own a MacBook Air M1,
| so I speak from experience).
|
| Also, we already do this for cars (used cars market is huge),
| so why not laptops. In fact, with cars - there are arguably
| stronger reasons to go with newer tech (safety, automatic
| cruise control) than with a newer laptop.
| doubled112 wrote:
| Always assumed it was because laptops start at $300 and cars
| start at $30,000.
|
| Don't call me out on the actual numbers, I am only really
| paying attention to the zeros.
| tyg13 wrote:
| > The main product AFAICS is virtue signaling.
|
| Friendly reminder that people do care about things you don't
| care about. Claims of virtue signaling say more about you than
| them, quite frankly. And really, you should care about the
| massive amount of e-waste generated every year.
| quadrifoliate wrote:
| This.
|
| I lose any hope for us as a species being able to reverse
| climate change if the top comment about an article that goes
| quite deep into meaningful ways to "reduce, reuse, recycle"
| is that this is virtue signaling, and that we should buy
| Macbooks every year instead because they are "expendable
| tools".
|
| Guess what, their impact on the environment is very much
| noticeable. There is no way we are going to reverse or even
| meaningfully delay climate change with this kind of
| collective attitude.
| Shekelphile wrote:
| Owning a macbook vs owning a framework laptop isn't going
| to effect climate change in any way. In fact, Apple's track
| record is that their products generally outlast the
| competition, even when they do otherwise stupid things like
| software DRMed screen and battery replacements and soldered
| SSDs.
|
| It is purely virtue signaling. If you want to do good by
| the climate and still want a powerful tool there is no
| better option than a used macbook.
| redroyal wrote:
| That issue can't be solved by reusing laptops or sorting
| cans from cardboard. The argument that every little helps
| is totally flawed. Fantasy, make believe. The other 8
| billion people simply don't care and why would they? 50
| years from now they'll all be dead. Since when did people
| care about future generations and the good of humanity?
| It's a very recent western fashion. The only thing that
| truly motivated the vast majority of people is sex and
| money or objectives closely descended from that tree. To
| modify mass human behavior you have to incentivize based on
| that leverage. But - even modification of the behavior of
| the crowd won't be sufficient. The only way to fix this is
| w new technology
| liamN wrote:
| You're falling prey to the fallacy that just because 1
| person's actions can't make a world of difference on
| their own, those actions aren't worth taking. By your
| logic, you may as well not vote either, because everyone
| else is voting. Every little bit DOES count, because the
| more people believe they can make a difference, the more
| of a difference they will make collectively. You have to
| lead by example. Rolling over and dying because you dont
| think you can make a difference makes you part of the
| problem.
|
| New tech certainly would help, and it isnt/shouldnt be on
| the shoulders of just individuals to make all the change.
| But Im not going to use that as an excuse not to change
| my own behavior for the better.
| redroyal wrote:
| I mean you've got to appreciate the scale of the problem
| here and be pragmatic. The danger of recycling is it
| gives the illusion of progress, but I'm not against it
| otherwise. Philosophically you might be correct but
| voting blue in a non swing red state is completely
| meaningless
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| We need not be locked in a two party system forever. If
| enough of us demand same day primaries and ranked choice
| then other parties have a chance.
|
| Only voting in blue strongholds certainly isn't going to
| break the duopoly.
| vel0city wrote:
| There's 8 billion people so my actions don't matter. I
| guess I'll pour all my old paint and paint thinner down
| the storm drains. Maybe my motor oil and used coolants as
| well. After all I'm just one person out of 8 billion, my
| actions don't matter.
|
| I'll just litter all my stuff as well. Single use
| plastics? Sign me up, I'll just throw it out in the
| street. I'm only one of a few million in my city, my
| actions don't really matter.
|
| Or maybe my actions really do matter.
| piaste wrote:
| Your actions do not, indeed, matter. Neither does your
| vote, or your boycotting of $global_evil_corp, precisely
| because there's millions or billions of people involved.
| (To be pedantic: while not literally zero, your actions
| matter several order of magnitude less than would be
| necessary to be able to perceive their effects.)
|
| But that's a really hard pill to swallow. Your post is a
| beautiful example of that difficulty: you spell out
| examples of how your actions don't matter [as much as you
| would like], and then wildly swing into open denial with
| "Or maybe my actions do really matter".
|
| My advice - if you focus on the consequences of your
| actions that you can actually perceive, instead of the
| ones you only wish you could, you'll be less frustrated.
| For example, helping your local community will typically
| give you far better returns than trying to improve any
| global issue.
| flangola7 wrote:
| This is lazy defeatism and an immediate disqualifier I
| use in the selection of both friends and employees.
| gotoeleven wrote:
| How much climate change do you think has been allayed by
| sorting garbage into 3 kinds of trash cans and drinking
| from paper straws?
| bloomingeek wrote:
| I agree, all branches of science should invent ways to
| recycle almost anything. We know we have a waste problem,
| yet society doesn't demand enough to have ways created to
| deal with recycling. Forget Mars and looking at the
| Titanic till we find ways to deal with real world
| problems.
|
| Burying our heads in the sand will hurt future
| generations!
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| The evidence indicates that recycling is burying our
| heads in the sand.
|
| It is reduce>>>>reuse>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>recycle.
|
| As far as I can tell, very little recycling actually ever
| happened or does happen. It was always just poorer
| countries willing to look the other way and trash it and
| claim it was recycled.
| edflsafoiewq wrote:
| That is not what he means by "Laptops don't change". He means
|
| > A 2015 research paper discovered that the embodied energy of
| laptops is static over time.
|
| > Improvements in functionality balance the efficiency gains
| obtained in the manufacturing process. Battery mass, memory,
| and hard disk drive mass decreased per unit of functionality
| but showed roughly constant totals per year.
|
| > New laptops may be more energy-efficient per computational
| power, but these gains are offset by more computational power.
| Jevon's paradox is nowhere as evident as it is in computing.
| dehrmann wrote:
| I didn't find that point all that interesting. Once laptops
| got as small as is practical (full-size keyboard, just thick
| enough for a USB port), we continued cramming in as much tech
| and battery as it would fit and not get too hot. This
| shouldn't be a surprised.
| Miraste wrote:
| 2015 was the nadir of processor improvements. At that point,
| Intel had effectively used the same processor in every laptop
| since 2008. I would like to see this analysis post-Ryzen and
| Apple Silicon.
| jwells89 wrote:
| Yes, I previously owned a pre-touchbar 15" MacBook Pro (the
| last "good" Intel model) and though it was a great laptop,
| my M1 Max MBP is dramatically better across the board. Way
| more power, far better battery life, much less heat and fan
| noise, and a significantly better screen and speakers.
|
| Granted, leaps like that aren't a given but they can and do
| happen sometimes.
| DeathArrow wrote:
| Well, go to Geekbench and compare CPUs from 2015 with CPUs
| of today.
| photonerd wrote:
| So... you can do more, faster, for longer, then?
|
| Sounds like a good argument for upgrading
| dijit wrote:
| Until software causes performance improvements not to be
| worthwhile.
|
| Though nobody can argue that battery lives haven't
| improved.
| littlestymaar wrote:
| > more, faster
|
| Not in the world de live in: https://jmmv.dev/2023/06/fast-
| machines-slow-machines.html
| croes wrote:
| The article author is a journalist, I bet his speed depends
| on his speed of typing and not the speed of his laptop.
|
| He could to more, faster and longer but if he doesn't the
| extra costs are useless.
| VBprogrammer wrote:
| I suspect the next big laptop update I have will be
| whatever lets me run GPT-4 size models natively.
| marcus0x62 wrote:
| The author is choosing to optimize for environmental impact
| over raw performance.
| yieldcrv wrote:
| Every year is a lot
|
| But I think the article is more about impulse control taken to
| an extreme because they lacked it in the past
| ImPleadThe5th wrote:
| Do you actually buy a new laptop every year? I feel that's a
| bit delusional. Year to year most upgrades are pretty minor.
|
| An argument can be made maybe every 3 years if you're doing
| some incredibly resource intense stuff.
| gghffguhvc wrote:
| I do a lot of Android and iOS app compilation (Lots of
| flavors/schemes of apps). So lately the upgrades in cores has
| meant a faster upgrade cycle for my work dev machine than for
| the intel based MacBook Pro era. I'm sure Apple can't keep up
| this pace of the last few years though.
|
| Back in early 2000s we used distcc for distributed
| compilation of QT apps and reused old workstations in a
| server room. But with XCode and Android studio it isn't
| pragmatic.
| pshirshov wrote:
| Why don't you buy an EPYC/Threadripper workstation then?
| Even best M2 laptops still can't compete with hackintosh on
| dated 3970x
| kiratp wrote:
| Because it's not faster. Well at least the 3990x wasn't.
|
| Compilation rapidly drops from parallel to single thread
| bound for most workloads.
|
| https://twitter.com/kiratpandya/status/145743872568048025
| 7
| pshirshov wrote:
| Depends on your workload. For me 3970x is faster in all
| my workflows.
| ido wrote:
| I think you severely underestimate how fast the M2 series
| is.
| pshirshov wrote:
| I compared. They are better on bang per watt but I'm
| still getting significantly shorter compilation times on
| 3970x.
| gghffguhvc wrote:
| I also have a maxed out Mac Studio when I need the extra
| cores and don't need the portability. But I haven't
| looked into hackintosh options for a long time. Perhaps
| I'll check it out again some time. Thanks for the tip.
| simplify wrote:
| > When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of
| calling names. "That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be
| shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3."
|
| > Be kind. Don't be snarky. Edit out swipes.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| elliotec wrote:
| Yikes. Don't be like that.
| kristopolous wrote:
| > Year to year most upgrades are pretty minor.
|
| Really this depends on the year. We're in a more chunked
| paradigm now when significant progress is happening more
| intermittently.
|
| That doesn't mean buy new. Wait it out a year or two and buy
| used.
|
| Some years matter. Most don't. You can exploit this.
| ImPleadThe5th wrote:
| Fair, and I agree. Especially if you're out of sync with
| the CPU/GPU upgrade cycle.
|
| But even then the odds it will have a major impact on most
| workloads is very unlikely.
|
| I think as tech people we tend to try to maximize when
| there is no need.
| cj wrote:
| What's delusional is highly paid engineers not investing
| money in essential tools to get their work done. A new laptop
| is 1-2% of the annual salary of many people here.
| ImPleadThe5th wrote:
| I think there is nothing wrong with investing in equipment.
| I think there is something wasteful with replacing a laptop
| every year.
|
| Unless its some crazy jump in hardware between cpu/gpu
| generations that you weren't in sync for.
| Crywastaken wrote:
| You can sell your mac every year then upgrade don't cost
| full price
| Crywastaken wrote:
| [flagged]
| HWR_14 wrote:
| If everyone insists on new hardware, then there is no one
| to sell your used Mac to.
| MAGZine wrote:
| If productivity is so important, why are people using
| laptops at all? Desktop processors are faster.
| [deleted]
| cj wrote:
| And cheaper! I personally run on a M1 Mac Mini (and iMac
| before that)
|
| I paid less than $700 for the Mac Mini right when the M1
| chip came out. It's hands down the fastest computer I've
| ever owned.
| andrekandre wrote:
| > I paid less than $700 for the Mac Mini right when the
| M1 chip came out. It's hands down the fastest computer
| I've ever owned.
|
| same, though i did kind of regret getting only 8GB ram
| (for what i am doing).
| yardstick wrote:
| If you just work in one location only, sure. I work from
| home, the office, coffee shop. When Im at home I often
| like to code from the couch rather than the home office.
| Laptops add flexibility. I like their middle ground of
| flexibility and performance.
|
| I'm also one of those "weird" people that don't use an
| external monitor. And yet I'm still just as productive,
| probably more so, than most of my coworkers.
| musicale wrote:
| I like having two large monitors and a desktop-style
| "mechanical" keyboard, but there's absolutely a benefit
| to having a full productive work environment with you,
| with your data and work in progress, anywhere you might
| want to work - even if you're not online. And when you're
| in an office (or home office) environment, you just plug
| in and continue from where you left off.
|
| A high-end MacBook Pro may not be cheap, but it packs
| some serious mobile compute power along with good battery
| life.
| leetcrew wrote:
| is BYOC that common at software companies these days? even
| if I wanted to "invest money in essential tools", I
| wouldn't be allowed to connect them to any company
| networks.
|
| in any case, the most resource-intensive thing my work
| laptop does is have outlook and firefox open at the same
| time. the "heavy lifting" is done on a cloud instance that
| can be easily scaled up or down depending on what I'm
| currently working on.
| tebruno99 wrote:
| I like my framework and the 2 mini pc made from upgrading the
| internals. The slots are pass through thunderbolt 4 just like
| laptops with only USB's ports. Not sure why they offended you.
| Get 4 usbc inserts and pretend they aren't changeable if
| that'll calm you down. Battery life does suck though I'll give
| you that. It's good overall at the cost though
| a-dub wrote:
| it would be pretty cool if someone released a 10 or 15 year
| chromebook.
| [deleted]
| me551ah wrote:
| Rather than buying an old laptop which was high end at its time,
| it's better to buy a cheap laptop which is new. The processor
| will be more efficient and powerful, it's going to have multiple
| newer ports and you don't need to run an obscure version of Linux
| which won't run tools that people in your industry use. Running
| Linux as your daily driver is hard as it is, running an obscure
| version of Linux on an old laptop as your primary machine will
| drive you crazy. You would end up losing productivity fixing all
| the bugs and random issues.
| activiation wrote:
| I always buy my phones used, from swappa.com... saved hundreds of
| $ for phones that are in mint condition
| rpcope1 wrote:
| > 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 of effort. For both my Dell and Supermicro workstations, they
| basically last 10+ years, and I've got a lot of options to keep
| them going; I wish I could say the same about laptops. I really
| wish I could get a new 2k screen for the old Dell Latitude E6530
| I have -- it's built a lot more robustly than my newer latitude.
| I really would like to see our government mandate user
| serviceable parts (kind of like how the EU apparently mandated
| replaceable batteries, which is a huge win), as there's so many
| older designs that would continue to chug along with a few fixes,
| like IBM era Thinkpads or some the more robustly designed
| Latitudes. Lenovo has been going the wrong direction lately...I
| have sworn them off after having a two P1s and a P53, which were
| gently used and taken care of, die in under 2 years.
| fuzztester wrote:
| >For both my Dell and Supermicro workstations, they basically
| last 10+ years, and I've got a lot of options to keep them
| going; I wish I could say the same about laptops. I really wish
| I could get a new 2k screen for the old Dell Latitude E6530 I
| have -- it's built a lot more robustly than my newer latitude.
|
| Agreed. When I was checking out new laptops to buy one, in
| shops, about a year ago, I was shocked to see the lower quality
| and sturdiness of the cases and keyboards. For no apparent gain
| except possible lightness.
|
| I think laptop makers have started doing an auto industry in
| terms of built in or planned obsolescence.
|
| Edit: just like mobile phone makers.
| gtirloni wrote:
| It's been like this for at least 2 decades now.
| jwcooper wrote:
| 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 are a very young company, but their promise has held up
| thus far).
|
| Hopefully more folks that are interested in upgradability and
| repairability are purchasing frameworks to show other companies
| that it's worth it to do (I'm unaffiliated with Framework, just
| a customer).
| a1o wrote:
| I wish something like Framework could be more popular so it
| could be easily available on other countries. As is, the
| impact something like it is small. Hopefully this changes at
| some point.
| akmittal wrote:
| I just upgraded RAM(4 -> 12 GB) and HDD to SSD of a 8 years
| old laptop and it became a lot more responsive. Laptops now a
| days are not upgradable and companies claim they are doing so
| to build lighter laptops but framework is proving all of them
| wrong
| shortrounddev2 wrote:
| My T420 is still running strong 12 years later. I don't use it
| for much since I'm not on Linux anymore, but I occasionally
| open it up and play with it. I'm using a Dell Inspiron now and
| I'm hoping it lasts a while.
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| Yup. I have two working t420s (t420s is thinner than t420 and
| I think puts it in the realm of "acceptable" in modern
| standards. T420 I find is mostly a stationary laptop). They
| run upgraded ssd drives and ram.
|
| I also recently stocked up on 3 used t480 as it's the last
| generation with easily removable battery as well as drive and
| memory. Those should last me a while! My primary daily driver
| is the 6 year old t25 - basically t470 but with good
| keyboard.
|
| But I think... That's kinda the point. These laptops were
| upgradeable but modern ones are not. T490 and onward don't
| have external replaceable battery. A lot of modern thinkpads
| have soldered ram. And none of them have the elegance of
| ultrabay of yore.
| oneplane wrote:
| Some of the laptop issues are a chain of dependencies that en
| up with mechanical and power envelope. That doesn't mean it's
| impossible, but say you want to go from 720p to 2k, that also
| requires more power, a bit for the panel and a bit for the
| backlight. The mainboard might not have a TCON and eDP or LVDS
| transceiver to drive such a panel, and the GPU might not be
| able to handle it either. So now that new panel needs three
| more things: - Power supply - Display
| transmission - GPU
|
| And those things in turn need more (or well, 'different')
| space, which in turn might not fit in the existing chassis. And
| if it does, you might still have the thermal envelope issue
| where the chassis can't support the right airflow in the right
| places, or the cooling solution might not.
|
| None of those are impossible to solve, but they also aren't as
| simple as "just give me a different panel", because it's not
| really just about the single component, it almost never is.
|
| We have had a lot of luck in the past with a single 'family' of
| computers (usually largely designed by compal, Foxconn etc.)
| having interchangeable parts, and the base models essentially
| being downgraded versions of the top-tier model, which means
| that as long as you stay within that family, you get to upgrade
| parts along the way.
|
| Framework does an excellent job of keeping everything that
| still fits within the same envelope going. But if at any point
| the current eDP interface needs to be replaced to support
| higher bandwidth, that means that the possible combinations
| between panels, cables and mainboards is now a whole lot more
| complicated. Some panels might only work with some mainboards,
| which might mean you have to replace both at the same time,
| greatly reducing the usefulness of what remains. Currently we
| don't have a huge gap between previous generations and current
| generations, but I'm very curious what's going to happen when
| we do make another significant jump. Only time will tell.
| mattlondon wrote:
| I recently did the same - needed a laptop, but balked at the
| costs for an "occasional use" device. Even a non-shite Chromebook
| (so decent ram and non-awful CPU) was PS500+.
|
| I got a used ThinkPad X1 from 2017 for PS200 from ebay and it has
| been superb so far. It is modern enough for me - USB-c charging,
| Wifi-5, win11, 3ghz quad-core i5 etc.
|
| I feel like it is very much luck of the draw for what the
| condition is like when you buy used, but for the ThinkPad X1 I
| got it appears to have held up very well.
|
| Highly recommended. Will do the same again when I need another.
| Avshalom wrote:
| >>Even a non-shite Chromebook
|
| I don't have a shit chromebook exactly but I have a shit big-
| box retail HP laptop that was ~$200 new that I bought on
| clearance in 2016 (so in the box but not recent), wiped the
| windows install and put CentOS7 on it.
|
| It got me through most of a CS minor and a geology (focus
| geophysics) major.
|
| It still works pretty well for an "occasional use" device,
| didn't handle Office365 very well but I think that was as much
| firefox as it was the hardware.
| JEDI-HACKER wrote:
| [dead]
| danradunchev wrote:
| Although capitalism could provide us with used laptops for
| decades to come, the strategy outlined above should be considered
| a hack, not an economical model. It's a way to deal with or
| escape from an economic system that tries to force you and me to
| consume as much as possible. It's an attempt to break that
| system, but it's not a solution in itself. We need another
| economical model, in which we build all laptops like pre-2011
| Thinkpads. As a consequence, laptop sales would go down, but
| that's precisely what we need. Furthermore, with today's
| computing efficiency, we could significantly reduce the
| operational and embodied energy use of a laptop if we reversed
| the trend towards ever higher functionality.
| ip26 wrote:
| _laptop sales would go down, but that's precisely what we need.
| Furthermore, with today's computing efficiency..._
|
| Somehow these conversations never seem to talk about how we
| would not _have_ current levels of compute if everybody kept
| their computers for one or two decades before buying another.
| Good or bad, right or wrong, the present state of affairs only
| happened with the present replacement cycle.
|
| I'm not arguing we have to keep the present replacement cycle,
| but I think it needs addressing.
| soulbadguy wrote:
| > Good or bad, right or wrong, the present state of affairs
| only happened with the present replacement cycle.
|
| Hmmmm... I am not sure that those two things are as
| correlated (much less causally linked) as it might first
| appear.
|
| We could have the same "average" pace of innovation, just
| delivered between longer intervals.
| ip26 wrote:
| Ok, you're probably right as long as your total spend in
| dollars is the same. If everyone buys laptops half as often
| but pay twice as much. It's the spend that funds the
| advancements.
| cyrillite wrote:
| Content aside for a second:
|
| I have been trying to find your magazine again for so long.
| This scratches an itch. Thank goodness.
| wyldfire wrote:
| I often buy a ~one generation old phone for this same reason.
| It's just so much better value to buy someone else's phone. The
| folks who keep buying the newest generation tech often seem to
| take really good care of their gear - perhaps because they plan
| to resell it later.
|
| I haven't done this as much with laptops because I do tend to
| keep those for such a long time that I can reasonably amortize a
| bigger investment over ~5+ years.
|
| Curated marketplaces like "swappa" are a good way to purchase
| used gear. But anywhere you've got an escrow/guarantee should
| suffice.
| AussieWog93 wrote:
| Went to comment this. A mid-range or high end product from a
| gen or two ago is often the same price as this year's budget
| option, and way, way better in every sense.
| gtirloni wrote:
| I often replace phones because the battery starts holding less
| charge and I find it annoying to charge all the time.
|
| I tried a battery replacement service once and didn't like the
| result on my sealed and hard to open by design phone.
| zokier wrote:
| But the biggest reason (for me) to replace phone is to get
| security updates; buying used is counter-productive to that end
| yardstick wrote:
| I think that is more of an issue with the manufacturer.
|
| Apple supports their phones for a very long time. They
| updated iOS 12 this year with security fixes, so that covers
| iPhone 6 and up.
|
| https://www.macworld.com/article/675021/how-long-does-
| apple-...
| mattl wrote:
| Because the time to get updates is less on an older phone or
| that a used phone is less secure because someone could
| install malware on it?
| Shekelphile wrote:
| If you buy a two year old phone then there's plenty of
| support left for apple and samsung devices in that time. At
| least 3-4 years for apple, 2 for samsung.
| wyldfire wrote:
| Just replace it with another one generation old used phone
| when it stops getting updates. Still better value.
| lost_tourist wrote:
| what are you talking about? I have an iphone 10 that that is
| several generations old at this point and it's still getting
| security updates and will for a couple more years.
| dehrmann wrote:
| Then buy Apple. The 6s is up to 8 years of updates.
| kunalgupta wrote:
| I never buy new computers more than once every 5 years because it
| takes like 3 days to get local versions of openssl and node or
| whatever to run correctly enough to run an app and it's the hours
| of my life I most abhor. It's just lost time on earth.
|
| That being said it obviously pays off in productivity at least
| every 5 years. Maybe 3 is net positive? At this point i think we
| are climate doomed without acceleration so productivity is
| environmentalism
| Crywastaken wrote:
| Apple is a business first and formost. Software closing to
| replace the same part with different id is trash. more money to
| them
|
| looking back what mac have is it closer to Linux than win (I know
| subsystem Linux exist) - Linux is but Programs is key for market
| You can't import ios apps to win It's monolith
|
| Unix system and then modules for desktop etc (hmm it wouldn't
| work how I imagine) /
|
| Animation is a problem Graphics 4k Before you click then need to
| be spectrum of color time to react to do a function it's weird
| you didn't speed this too much features bare bones isn't great
| either Hmm
| bitwize wrote:
| I knew a guy who would buy a laptop, use it for like 3 months,
| then flip it on eBay and buy another. He said this is how you get
| good value for money -- flip it before it loses much of its
| resale value and buy new with the proceeds.
|
| I'm not sure why people would do this. I use computer equipment
| to the point of exhaustion. I still have laptops from the _90s_
| that work fine; while they will never be a main they are fun to
| play with. My main laptop currently is a ThinkPad from 2014 -- it
| does just about all that I need it to do without a hitch or
| stutter.
|
| My main PC is a Ryzen desktop I bought in 2018. It's probably due
| for some upgrades, but I cannot afford them currently.
| pg5 wrote:
| I buy back my decomissioned work laptop for $50, which means I
| get a fairly new ThinkPad that works pretty perfectly with Linux.
| rollcat wrote:
| I agree with TFA. Probably the best value for the buck is a 3
| year old high-end Thinkpad (T or X series); you can often find
| one for EUR250-350, as many businesses will be replacing whatever
| is at the end of their 3 year cycle.
|
| I've been getting a new one roughly every 3-5 years and they
| definitely stay good enough for another 5. My latest score is a
| T495 (replacing an 11 (!) year old X230); it has 4 cores (8
| threads), 24GB of memory, two NVMe drives, 4-5 hours of battery
| (~270 cycles), full HD 400 nits screen, and a GPU that actually
| handles some games. It's definitely less powerful than my M1 Mac
| mini, but it's good enough to the point that I'm not missing the
| extra horsepower all that much, even when doing "Actual Work" (it
| can get tad hot tho).
|
| Also, developing software on less powerful hardware has another,
| indirect benefit: your software tends to suck less, because you
| have less cycles to waste.
| downrightmike wrote:
| One really good reason to buy new gear: Discovery of new UEFI
| rootkit exposes an ugly truth: The attacks are invisible to us
| Turns out they're not all that rare. We just don't know how to
| find them. https://arstechnica.com/information-
| technology/2022/07/resea...
| easeout wrote:
| > Furthermore, Linux operating systems do not steal your personal
| data and do not try to lock you in, like the newest operating
| systems from both Microsoft and Apple do.
|
| Is recent macOS accused of stealing or shown to steal personal
| data? Platform lock-in is not news, but that would be. This is an
| earnest question; maybe I'm in a bubble and missed a big story.
| sounds wrote:
| Note that the only data tracking Apple was caught doing was in
| iOS, not macOS, but there are many signs that Apple collects
| aggregated usage data in macOS (which probably cannot be later
| reduced to expose the behavior of any single customer).
|
| 2021 Jun 7: > "Anyone opting out of tracking
| right now is basically having the > same level of data
| collected as they were before. Apple hasn't > actually
| deterred the behavior that they have called out as being
| > so reprehensible, so they are kind of complicit in it
| happening," > Seufert explained.
|
| * https://www.macrumors.com/2021/06/07/apps-continuing-to-
| trac...
|
| Apple did finally close this loophole in iOS 14.5, causing
| Facebook to lose what some analysts think was ~$10 Billion.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identifier_for_Advertisers -
| however, by March 18, 2021, Mark Zuckerberg stated that it
| could actually encourage advertisers to use the explicit
| targetting and tracking happening on facebook, and he made it
| sound like a win-win.
|
| 2022 Nov 8: > The recent changes that Apple
| has made to App Store ads should > raise many #privacy
| concerns. It seems that the #AppStore app > on iOS 14.6
| sends every tap you make in the app to Apple. This >
| data is sent in one request: (data usage & personalized ads are
| off)
|
| * https://gizmodo.com/apple-iphone-analytics-tracking-even-
| whe...
|
| * https://techcrunch.com/2022/11/14/apple-faces-new-lawsuit-
| ov...
| easeout wrote:
| Thanks for all the details. The App Store app bit is a very
| bad look. The rest seems on the up and up, or at least isn't
| the OS phoning home your personal data.
|
| I'm inclined to think the quote only meant to claim that
| Windows and macOS try to lock you in, and that Linux doesn't
| steal your personal data. The sentence structure is
| ambiguous.
| gregw2 wrote:
| The original article makes a good point but neither it nor the
| comments here mention my main concern with used computers-- They
| don't have the same clean/new-system "security" properties as a
| new computer.
|
| Who knows what malware/security rootkit was installed on some
| consumer machine that persisted in some corner of it and didn't
| get detected/wiped? It's kinda a crapshoot in my view.
| tristor wrote:
| I average 8 years and two batteries for a laptop since I switched
| to Macbooks, prior it was about 5 years and one battery.
|
| MacBooks have a much better lifecycle.
| madduci wrote:
| Aren't new models with soldered batteries as well? The
| lifecycle is a disaster, especially if you would like to change
| the drive or upgrade the ram, you simply can't
| jlokier wrote:
| In some countries Apple provides a battery replacement
| service for the Macbooks at a fixed price, but you have to
| leave it with them for a little while like any other service.
|
| I think the price is reasonable for the quality of the
| batteries. The Apple price was much lower than a local Apple
| reseller store quoted for battery replacement - they
| pretended not to know about Apple's own service, and when I
| showed them they said they couldn't match Apple's price as it
| was too low.
|
| The inability to upgrade storage space is a big problem
| though. Apple storage is prohibitively expensive up front yet
| you know you might run out of space during the long life of
| the device. External drives work and are fast so that's the
| practical solution but it's not as convenient.
| nperez wrote:
| I feel like 2010-2020 was a stagnant time for hardware, which was
| most visible in the lack of huge leaps in gaming console quality.
| AI is changing that. Having tons of RAM and VRAM really does open
| up options that would simply be impossible before.
|
| Running large AI models locally is a bit niche right now but I'm
| doubtful it will stay that way, so I say it's a good time to
| value bleeding edge machines
| zokier wrote:
| 2010-2020 includes the launches of Intels Sandy Bridge (and to
| lesser degree Haswell) and AMD Zen (and with it Threadripper),
| many great products from nvidia (980, 1080, RTX, Titan). 2010s
| were also the decade of Apple Silicon, mostly on mobile though
| but culminating on M1 launch in 2020. In 2010 SSDs were just
| becoming a thing, but were still pretty anemic small sata ones
| with notoriously buggy firmwares, no comparison to modern-day
| nvme drives. And finally, after decades of stagnation, in 2010s
| we saw great improvements in displays, both getting hidpi, hdr,
| and larger gamuts.
|
| Sure, it might pale in comparison to the absolute wild ride
| that were the 90s, but I would not call 2010s stagnant as a
| whole.
| jcpst wrote:
| I have not directly bought a computer in 13 years. I've been a
| programmer for 10.
|
| My daughter uses the one I was issued at coding bootcamp in 2013.
| My home recording studio uses a 2010 mac mini. My wife uses an
| out-of-warranty one from my work, as do I for my home dev
| machine. My son uses a really old cheap laptop that was laying
| around.
|
| I installed SSDs and maxed out the RAM on all of them.
|
| Maybe people are attracted to the latest shiny thing, or give up
| early on a computer that would go to scrap without a little TLC.
| YZF wrote:
| Typing this from my `MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Late 2013)`
| ... Also have two working ThinkPads in use in my household that
| are older where I've had to replace the CPU fans, at some point
| they just crumble, but otherwise work OK-ish (but maybe getting
| to a point where I should really retire them).
| mholm wrote:
| The Pre-touchbar Retina Macbook Pros were the perfect laptop
| for the era. They could run a bit hot (but what didn't, back
| then?). Excellent hardware quality, and can generally still run
| well today if you don't do anything demanding. I've got a 2013
| 13" that doesn't have a single issue other than age.
| jimworm wrote:
| The touchbar feels to me like a time bomb that explodes when
| Apple thinks it's time for you to give another stack of cash
| to them.
| InvaderFizz wrote:
| The heat and constant fan noise was a real problem.
|
| That's the entire reason we upgraded my wife from a 2015 15"
| MBP i7 to a 2020 MBA M1. The extra hours of battery was a
| nice bonus, the main gain was the lack of noise.
| pengaru wrote:
| Oh how I miss the form-factor+keyboard of my X40/X60. Seeing that
| tent of an X60s has me feeling very nostalgic. One of the few
| devices capable of doing that for me.
|
| It's too bad they had so many flimsy plastic parts until the X220
| era, which still tends to crack palmrests and bezels with use.
|
| If someone packaged a modern SoC beneath an X40/X60 keyboard in a
| rugged light chassis with all the modern display/battery junk I'd
| be all over it.
| mpenet wrote:
| Same. It really was the best screen size/ratio for me. I was
| basically carrying it everywhere.
| pengaru wrote:
| IBM used to make some genuinely great end-user stuff.
| Tade0 wrote:
| > According to the most recent life cycle analysis, it takes
| 3,010 to 4,340 megajoules of primary energy to make a laptop
|
| 4340 MJ is around 135 litres of gasoline in terms of primary
| energy, or a little less than 36 US gallons.
|
| Commuters blow through this much in 1-2 months, depending on
| distance.
|
| My point is that if you're concerned about embedded energy,
| there's a lot of other, lower hanging fruit to pick.
| mahogany wrote:
| Energy usage isn't the only thing to be concerned about. There
| are resources that have to be extracted, and non-recyclable
| waste piling up in huge quantities.
|
| Seems like a fine fruit to pick if you consider broader
| environmental impact.
|
| (Also, we can do multiple things at once. Burning an extra 36
| gallons of oil if you don't have to is still bad.)
| Tade0 wrote:
| I want to agree, but fossil fuels are generally non-
| recyclable and extracted on a much larger scale.
|
| I mean, global production of cobalt - a highly controversial
| material - is around 200k tonnes.
|
| By weight this is approximately 1.6% that of _daily_ oil
| production - 90mln barrels a day.
| mgraczyk wrote:
| I just bought a new Macbook Pro and have been using it for ~1
| week.
|
| Even compared to my previous 2019 Macbook Pro, it's a huge step
| up in build quality and speed.
|
| If you spend any time waiting for code to compile, web pages to
| load, or dependencies install, I'd say buy the fastest laptop you
| can find. I'd guess this new machine has already saved me around
| 20 minutes of waiting. At that rate it will pay for itself in
| around 6 months. If you're just using the laptop to write and
| browse the web, maybe it's ok to try to save some money.
|
| Even ignoring economics, I spend like 12 hours a day staring at
| this thing. It's really important to me psychologically that the
| screen be high quality so I don't loose my mind.
| soulbadguy wrote:
| +1 on the importance a high-quality screen. I never quite
| understand why PC manufacturer skimp on what is agruabably the
| most important interface with the device. And when they do,
| they of course jump into spec chasing with resolution and frame
| rate taking the focus instead of contrast, color reproduction
| and PWM (for people sensitive to it ).
|
| What's the delta in BOM cost for a high quality display ? Maybe
| someone with industry knowledge can comment.
| hoherd wrote:
| The high quality screen is so important. Every time I go
| looking for cheap laptops, it's the screen that steers me
| towards higher prices.
| cempaka wrote:
| I'm still getting great mileage out of a T430 I bought in 2017,
| and I'm not particularly nice to my laptops. The one frustration
| I've had recently is that it can't drive my nice 38-inch monitor
| at its full resolution, so I've started eyeing a T470.
| btgeekboy wrote:
| The T430 is a rugged laptop, but it's getting pretty far up
| there in age. For example, I use mine in the shop to read PDFs,
| update the project's Trello board, fetch software updates and
| drop them on SD cards, etc.
|
| I used to think Trello kinda lagged. Great tool, but man it's
| kinda slow. Then I opened it on a modern computer - it's just
| the old hardware holding it back. Same with PDFs - these are
| graphical 11x17 pages, and it really does get bogged down easy.
| You're gonna be amazed how much faster everything feels when
| you get to the newer machine.
| [deleted]
| lwdf wrote:
| Go for the T480, it has 4 cores and 8 threads compared to the
| T470 2 cores 4 threads. Big jump if you do anything like
| compiling.
| zimspy wrote:
| I'm a software developer and an older laptop is not great for
| productivity. I have an old Dell Latitude from 2017 and I pumped
| as much life into it as I could. Bought more RAM, an SSD but
| despite all that, it's a pain to run the IDEs I need to use for
| work. I keep it as a backup and work on an M2 Max now.
|
| Same goes with my S.O. who is a Chemist. Older computers are just
| not ideal for new software.
| zokier wrote:
| Age is not really the only aspect here; almost certainly top
| tier 2017 Latitude is more powerful machine than bottom tier
| brand-new Latitude today.
| zabzonk wrote:
| my brother is fanatically opposed to buying anything new. when i
| wrecked my last new laptop, by spilling a gin & tonic into it, he
| got me a S/H HP Z15 workstation on ebay, and i must admit i have
| been pretty happy with it. i will think again before buying new.
| bodge5000 wrote:
| I can't say I stick to this 100%, but I actually like using
| underpowered laptops. Optimisation is an important step in the
| development process but its often rushed through even by those
| who consider it most important (myself included). However, if you
| NEED to optimise your code just to get the thing to work on your
| computer, a lot more attention is put into it. If I'm optimising
| for a lower spec machine than my users are likely to have, that
| gives me plenty of leg room.
|
| For the record, I'm mostly talking about personal projects, which
| are game dev, where performance is more of a factor than
| something like a web app.
| OldManRyan wrote:
| Quick aside: This should have a (2020) tag.
|
| The keyboard and mousepad on my Thinkpad have died twice. I've
| replaced it twice for 30 dollars each time. I would have had to
| buy a new laptop if I had something else. The conclusion about
| this being a hack and not a new economic model is why I'm hoping
| Framework seems success. Unfortunately I think my Thinkpad is on
| the way out for good and I plan to replace it with the Framework
| 16 when it is available, which I hope will last me just as long
| as my Thinkpad
| [deleted]
| draw_down wrote:
| [dead]
| dbg31415 wrote:
| I mean... you can save a few bucks on a laptop. Sure.
|
| But the real cost is the downtime.
|
| If I have an employee that I value at $100,000 a year, working
| 1800 hours, that's $55 / hour.
|
| Assuming their work doesn't impact anyone else, it would be silly
| for me to take that employee out of commission for any expense
| that costs less than $440 / day.
|
| Way smarter for me to buy a new laptop, which is less likely to
| have any issues, and then sell the old ones to offset the costs.
|
| And I'd also point out that most people in tech make more than
| $100,000.
|
| Also I'd point out... the new Apple Silicon is really nice.
| Battery life is a lot longer. Heat is a lot less. Screens are
| fantastic. No stupid touch-screen function bar. Great keyboards.
| MagSafe power... like, honest to god if you haven't got one of
| the new Apple Silicon laptops you're really doing yourself a
| disservice. You should get one! (=
|
| (Also... my opinion... every other laptop maker should just quit.
| Just close shop. They can't touch the new Apple machines. That's
| how much better the Apple Silicon laptops are. Everything else
| that's being made is just e-waste by comparison. Even the Intel
| MacBooks from 3-4 years ago are just dogwater in comparison.)
| Karsteski wrote:
| Most people in tech definitely do not make over $100k US, what
| an American centric POV.
| eatsyourtacos wrote:
| It's crazy that you think that actually makes sense in
| practice. Yeah you can put the numbers out there and it may
| "seem" correct but in reality that is ridiculous logic.
| zokier wrote:
| And that is just one factor in having pre-emptive laptop
| renewal cycle.
|
| In general it makes IT happier to have more homogenous fleet,
| makes managing things easier, possible to have spare parts at
| hand etc etc.
|
| It also removes the need of negotiations if someone
| "deserves"/needs new laptop or not, which might otherwise be
| discussion wasting the workers, IT depts, and possibly
| managers time.
| pessimizer wrote:
| > Way smarter for me to buy a new laptop, which is less likely
| to have any issues
|
| I don't think that's a safe assumption.
| [deleted]
| botulidze wrote:
| I rely on laptops provided by corporations I work at, so here's
| the breakdown of the remaining electronics:
|
| 1) samsung s10 (2014) -> iphone 8 (2018) -> iphone 13 mini (2022)
| -> no replacement planned since Apple dropped mini lineup.
|
| 2) gaming pc: amd fx-8350 (2012) -> i7-6700k (2016) -> 7800x3d
| (2023) -> hopefully no replacement till 2027
|
| 3) tablet: nexus 7 (2012) -> galaxy tab s3 (2018) -> ipad pro
| 2021 (2022) -> unless battery completely dies earlier than in 4
| years like it happened with nexus 7 (making it stationary
| device).
|
| So overall, my update cycle is every 4 years on avg, with PC
| upgrades having longer cycles thanks to exceptional performance
| of the chosen platform at the time
|
| I.e. I still have i7-6700k working at another location and
| delivering strong both for productivity and gaming use cases.
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