As Computer Vendors Focus On Making Their Laptops Thinner and Lighter, They Are Increasingly Neglecting Performance Needs of Their Customers (vice.com) 344
Owen Williams, writing for Motherboard: The pursuit of thinner, lighter laptops, a trend driven by Apple, coinciding with laptops replacing desktops as our primary devices means we have screwed ourselves out of performance -- and it's not going to get better anytime soon. Thermal throttling is not something that Apple alone suffers from: every laptop out there will face thermal constraints at some point, but whether or not that's perceivable depends on a number of different variables including form factor and cooling capacity. When you're shopping for a laptop, you'll notice that manufacturers like Apple use phrases like "Turbo Boost" and "Up to 4.8 GHz" without really explaining what that means. The 4.8 GHz processor clock speed, which Apple quotes for the 15-inch MacBook Pro, is a 'best case' processor speed that's only achieved in short bursts when your computer requests it, subject to a number of conditions.
If you're playing a game like Fortnite, for example, the game will request your processor provide faster performance, and the processor will attempt to increase its operating frequency gradually to deliver the maximum available performance within the thermal envelope of your machine. That maximum is restricted by both power and thermal limits, which is where we run into issues: laptops tend to get hot because they're thinner, with limited space to dissipate that heat through the use of fans and heatsinks.
If you're playing a game like Fortnite, for example, the game will request your processor provide faster performance, and the processor will attempt to increase its operating frequency gradually to deliver the maximum available performance within the thermal envelope of your machine. That maximum is restricted by both power and thermal limits, which is where we run into issues: laptops tend to get hot because they're thinner, with limited space to dissipate that heat through the use of fans and heatsinks.
Form Over Function (Score:5, Insightful)
What "power users" want is a portable desktop, not a sexy, sleek status machine.
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This is why I purchased a ThinkPad P for my latest laptop. These things are not small, they are not light, they do what I need.
https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/l... [lenovo.com]|se|google|365764632477|Lenovo_Thinkpad_P_Series|IIP_NX_Lenovo_ThinkPad_P_Series_SMB&CAWELAID=120030930000068286&CATRK=SPFID-1&CAAGID=42871565940&CATCI=kwd-365764632477&CAPCID=284151630458&CADevice=c&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI9su3s5C43AIVjMDACh1KNw1UEAAYASAAEgIQ3fD_BwE
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Absolutely.
I was able to get my company to upgrade my team to Thinkpad P51 laptops and all the developers who previously requested desktops switched over to laptops. You can get near-desktop performance from a laptop, but it will weigh over 5 pounds. I'll never use anything weaker than an HQ mobile processor (or its equivelant) again.
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Neither of which are significantly better than the budget laptop I bought years ago.
2 HDD slots, i7-3630QM, 8GB RAM, 17" screen, GTX650M, with more ports.
Obviously 8th gen is better than 3rd gen, 32>8, and an incrementally better graphics card but overall, given that in today's dollars I paid $250 less... and in Canadian dollars not USD. Things are really going backwards.
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Neither of which are significantly better than the budget laptop I bought years ago.
2 HDD slots, i7-3630QM, 8GB RAM, 17" screen, GTX650M, with more ports.
Obviously 8th gen is better than 3rd gen, 32>8, and an incrementally better graphics card but overall, given that in today's dollars I paid $250 less... and in Canadian dollars not USD. Things are really going backwards.
Part of why I went with a Xeon processor on a refurb Thinkpad P laptop. Haven't actually done any stress tests but the thing feels like a beast of a processor without paying an extreme amount.
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How many of these port do you use on a regular basis?
Besides computer prices decrease very fast.
If you are a value shopper for laptops then 2-3 year old systems are the best value.
However some people wanted the newest and most powerful, although not the best value, they often will get a longer usable life from it.
Re:Form Over Function (Score:5, Interesting)
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You'd be surprised at how well RDP works over high latency connections. I have to admin a set of windows servers at the far end of a satellite link, and once you get the hang of it it really isn't all that bad. Yes, you're clicking and typing a little ahead of what you see on screen, but all in all, it's tolerable.
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Latency of days until your cap refreshes (Score:2)
You'd be surprised at how well RDP works over high latency connections.
I imagine RDP doesn't work so well under the constraint of a packet latency of days or weeks. Say you send the last packet of the month over a satellite or cellular link, which causes you to exhaust the monthly data transfer quota that your satellite or cellular ISP imposes on you. It can be days or weeks until your satellite or cellular ISP allows your hotspot to start receiving packets again at the start of the next billing cycle.
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Agreed, several jobs ago, I had a coworker who lived a 2 hour drive east outside of Dallas Texas on a literal hayfarm two counties over. She had satellite internet connection down with dial-up modem up, and was able to RDP in and do upgrades of the custom software we had at the time, and make changes to our scheduling software, etc. She was not the most productive of our team members, but then again even in the office she wasn't terribly productive so I don't think the minimal lag really had much impact on
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+1
i am typing this from a less than great Dell laptop RDPed into a much more beefy desktop on which I do the bulk of my heavy lifting.
At previous jobs my laptops were used 90% of the time to RDP and work on a heavier weight desktop to run my VMs & development environment.
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Actually, all I want is an RDP session into my server or server cluster to get performance. I can travel with a light, low power laptop that just has to render the RDP session. This is not something I'd recommend for gaming, but it very useful for actual high performance computing applications.
Thin clients have been a thing for how many decades now?
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You can have that with nearly anything. A chrome book would probably work too.
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If you really wanted to work on performance in the server room, you'd be ssh'ing into Linux boxes
Though ASP.NET is ported to Linux [microsoft.com], as of July 2018, Microsoft SQL Server is still exclusive to the Windows® operating system [microsoft.com]. So if your existing application is designed for ASP.NET and Microsoft SQL Server, and you lack the time==money to migrate the application's database layer to PostgreSQL, you'd still be running Windows in a virtual machine on those Linux boxes. When you do use SSH, you'll probably end up tunneling RDP inside it.
What do they Need? (Score:2)
Seriously, it seems as if we are in an age of excess hardware capabilities.
Your "power user" isn't playing crazy hardware killing games on the laptop.
It's like when you demand high and higher horse power cars and eventually end up with a 750 HP Shelby GT 500 or an 800 HP Demon. So you can get from 0 to 45 MPH or even 65 really fast.
Sure, Win 10 will suck up CPUs for eye candy, but all that power has provided very little visible benefit to your average user.
Re: What do they Need? (Score:2)
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I have a Think Pad with a Chicklet keyboard, and it is hooked up to a Mechincal keyboard.
The difference for me is when I actually start typing. Getting a bit more resistance, then snapping down. Vs More resistance then a thump. However the key travel, and the conceived key caps are still there, and about the same. The real advantage of the mechanical key. Is the fact you don't need to do a full travel for it to register.
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If you aren't playing games on your laptop, then perhaps you are using a development IDE or even Excel. There are far more applications than just games which can take advantage of an Intel HQ line processor or a decent video card. I would almost venture to say that anyone who can get away with an under-powered power saving CPU could probably do their work on a cheaper tablet.
I used to think only software developers and graphics designers needed powerful workstations. Then I saw the Excel spreadsheets many b
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I would almost venture to say that anyone who can get away with an under-powered power saving CPU could probably do their work on a cheaper tablet.
Lightweight programming is practical on, say, the quad-core Pentium processor in a Dell Inspiron mini 11 3000 series laptop running Windows or Xubuntu. I doubt it's practical on the flat sheet of glass that is a tablet's default text input device. And by the time you've connected an external keyboard, you might as well use a laptop.
Re:What do they Need? (Score:4, Insightful)
The thing is, 99% of the CPU is idling even when running an IDE or Excel. So much so even a complex worksheet may take longer to open on a thin and light laptop, but in general, Excel or the IDE can crunch while I'm thinking about my next move.
It's important for the app to open fast and display what it knows. Recalculate in the background because by the time I navigate around to find what I want, the CPU is probably done with the calculating and macros and all that.
I love myself a beefy laptop, but while it's nice and powerful and runs everything I threw at it, it wasn't the best. Carrying it around was such a pain it was easier to just leave it at my desk. Traveling with it mean having to plan beforehand how I was going to carry it - its heft and weight made for real issues. And forget about using it enroute.
Today's modern processors mean it's Good Enough. It may not crank out the FPS as much, but eGPUs help, and it means when move about, I can carry my thin and light laptop with me - it slips in my bag and it's not that much heavier with the heft of other stuff. I can take it out and use it when I need to - granted, it's not got the graphical power so I can't play heavy games, but I can do plenty of other stuff with it. I can even code using an IDE with it. Getting decent battery life (something my laptop battlestation never had - the battery was more of a UPS than anything) is a bonus.
Granted, it's not for everybody - there are people who need to run 3D applications, Photoshop and other things that need raw power on the go and would need a huge heavy laptop. I just found while it was great, it was also more limiting. Turned out for me, I needed less a luggable, and more a portable.
Re:What do they Need? (Score:5, Interesting)
Power users utilize all sorts of applications that are extremely CPU / GPU intensive that aren't necessarily games.
The list of applications that I use daily where horsepower is vastly preferable over slim & sexy:
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Premiere Pro
Adobe After Effects
Adobe Lightroom
Blender
Capture One Pro
Rhino
Zbrush
Keyshot
I'm typically using a desktop to run the aforementioned applications when I'm at home. When on the road, however, I carry a beefy laptop that is neither thin nor light. It weighs in at nearly thirteen pounds and has dimensions of 17"w x 12.7"d x 2"h. Most current configurations of the laptop fits an Intel i9-8950HK, 32GB Ram and an Nvidia 1080 GPU.
Not light, not thin, not even quiet. Definitely not cheap.
( as a bonus, if you wish it to, it will run the hell out of just about any game you throw at it )
But horsepower it has, which is what I want, so I'm willing to sacrifice light and thin to get it.
Re:What do they Need? (Score:5, Insightful)
The average user does NOT play games. The average user surfs the Net and does a little word processing and that's about it. This quest for "more power" is irrelevant to most users. The user who actually plays games pays attention to the specs and doesn't try to run them on a wimpy thin laptop.
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They play games too.
Most of the games are not that resource intensive such a FPS but they play games.
Because playing games is fun snd people like to have fun.
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Gaming isn't the only reason you'd want a 'beefier' laptop though. I ended up needing to buy a laptop to get some 3d work/editing done on the go - it came down to an expensive under-spec'd ultra thin, a chunkier gaming laptop with 'passable' specs, or an insanely expensive "workstation" with a mobile quadro in it.
I ended up getting a g
Re:Form Over Function (Score:5, Interesting)
Minor change:
What "power users" want is a transportable desktop [...]
I have an old 17" MacBook Pro. I'm not going to whip it out on a flight--at least not in coach--or at a trendy café. It goes from office to work-site and back.
Yes, I care about how light it is. But the trade-off is a bit different--I'm fine with the extra pound or so if it makes it faster or user-upgradable.
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"transportable" is a relative term. I once flew for business with a Shuttle desktop and monitor. That was no fun to transport.
Granted, things are better now than in the bad old days 10+ years ago. A fast desktop processor can fit in a mini-STX case now. A processor with graphics card can fit in a short mini-ITX case. Keyboards can be smaller now too, though not good ones. But flat monitors are still as luggable as ever. I suppose a projector might be an alternative, but I haven't seen a good one.
Re:Form Over Function (Score:5, Insightful)
What "power users" want is a portable desktop, not a sexy, sleek status machine.
What laptop vendors want is sell as much as possible, and power users << regular users.
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What "power users" want is a portable desktop, not a sexy, sleek status machine.
I remember back around 2000, Dell used to offer certain Inspiron laptops which contained desktop processors. They weighed a ton, and that was even before you considered their power brick (which was quite literally as large and as heavy as a standard stone brick). They ran ridiculously hot, as well - no way you could use those laptops on your actual lap.
If you carted one of those around, you were probably carrying 15 pounds just with the computer and the brick.
I don't think that's actually what people want,
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Except often it isn't up to the user, but their management.
A previous company I worked for was a Mac shop, despite the fact the bulk of the development was on Windows... so of course they would hand each of the developers a 'top of the line' Macbook which stugleed regardless of if you were running Parallels or Bootcamp to run what we were building.
Whenever I'd point out how the PoS HW (which was always running at 100% fan given the load), I'd be told that every job has 'suck', and that I just need to put up
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Re:Form Over Function (Score:4, Insightful)
But ... but ... it's thinner and lighter. The focus groups all told us that thinner and lighter were far more important than function, and focus groups are never wrong.
Sadly, I fear most product development these days is so heavily driven by marketing and other idiots, that they'll stay this course and make crappier products by chasing design goals which aren't all that important.
Honestly, it's like in the 90s when the first black hardware became available instead of beige. Suddenly black was the new black, and people wanted that. If it was beige, it was old hat and nobody wanted it.
To me, there comes a point where thinner and lighter becomes just stupid .. and for me that's the point where they start removing cable jacks and obsessing over that last 0.5mm. Dammit, I'm going to slap a heavy duty OtterBox on the damned thing, and I still want a fucking headphone jack ... I don't give a fuck if it's slightly thinner than last year's model, because it's less useful than last year's model.
I want a faster CPU with more RAM and disk-space. I don't really give a damn if you've made it slightly lighter than the previous model if you're charging me more for essentially the same machine.
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Bring back the "lunchbox" computers. My old Compaq was awesome. Could even add a few ISA cards for added funtionality.
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They are out there.
I see some new systems that are nearly 2 inches thick. And are mobile workstations.
However they are not so popular, because "power users" want a sexy status machine too.
For most "Power Users", The laptop computer isn't a source of Powerful Usage, a Workstation or a Server will be their real powerhouse. When they want a Laptop they want something easy to carry and bring around, with enough performance for some offline work. Crunch a few million records in a few minutes. Being able to do
Re: Form Over Function (Score:3)
Most people want something stylish
Form can be pleasing but function is all that truly matters; those who prefer the former over the latter are braindead zombies and should be regarded accordingly.
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Form can be pleasing but function is all that truly matters; those who prefer the former over the latter are braindead zombies and should be regarded accordingly.
Unfortunately, people with money to invest in your proposal aren't in the habit of regarding them accordingly.
Re: Form Over Function (Score:2)
Here you go... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik... [wikipedia.org]
Drivel (Score:3, Insightful)
Worth noting this guy doesn't compare the performance of the different generations of laptops. He's just assuming any form of throttling must be a step backwards. You couldn't possibly have a company like Intel trying to over-spec the parts they sell.
Also missing, a discussion of how large a battery you need in your laptop to run at 60 Watts for however long the guy wants his battery to last for. Not to mention, compensating for heat dissipation and the size of the heat sinks you need.
If you need performance, you need a desktop. It's simple physics.
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Horse puckey.
The point is that performance would be EVEN better without the throttling. He's not comparing generations, but actual vs potential performance for a given generation.
The laptop might just be 0.5cm thicker with the proper heat sink and/or fan, but it will be properly cooled. As far as the battery, make it removable. Or just plug the laptop in while gaming.
Re:Drivel (Score:5, Insightful)
The performance would be EVEN better if you did a lot of things. Building a laptop is all about compromise. The author has no clue about what that takes and just assumes everything can always be "better".
Perhaps laptop vendors think it's a better idea to put in a throttled fast processor than a full-speed slower processor.
Throwing a hissy-fit over a single datapoint without any realistic discussion of what the options are is, as I said, drivel.
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Laptops (and later phones and tablets) have always throttled. At least as far back as (IIRC) about Pentium 90s, when the technology was first deployed.
The 'proper' heat sink is the one in your server. The fact you're dealing with a portable device means there will be compromises.
You can undervolt and underclock your laptop and get what you describe. But you lose the momentary high performance 'feature', which actually is a feature for most uses.
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>The 'proper' heat sink is the one in your server.
Server heatsinks are nasty. Small, with a tiny and very fast fan pushing air through it and making a horrific whining noise (like some /. posters). This is fine because they get the job done and they live in a server rack (unlike some /. posters).
Today's closed loop CPU water coolers and big low speed air cooled coolers are pretty well engineered things.
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But are they engineered to handle all CPUs running, balls out, full time? Most desktop heat sinks, aren't. Most games still being largely single threaded and GPU bound.
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They got "fast enough" (Score:5, Insightful)
The entire industry has been suffering form this for several years. For most applications, the current computers are fast enough and have been so for several years.
Yes, there are enthusiasts and there are a few high power commercial applications; however, most users are running an office suite and a browser. For those uses, the computers got fast enough several years ago.
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Maybe Apple doesn't care about them and sees more profit by catering only to the web surfing masses.
Funny thing is that market's already cornered by Chromebooks, for 1/10th the price and 5x the battery life. And it's surprising what is available for them, including ssh, RDP, VMWare and Citrix clients, media players, etc. The only awkward part is that it's easy to forget everything you're doing is in (essentially) a Chrome browser window, so pressing ctrl+w while in a remote session will close it out.
Chromebook on transit is awkward (Score:2)
The only awkward part is that it's easy to forget everything you're doing is in (essentially) a Chrome browser window, so pressing ctrl+w while in a remote session will close it out.
The other awkward part is what happens when you close your Chromebook, board the bus, and try to get back to what you were doing. Unless you're using Crostini (a GNU/X11 environment that is currently exclusive to more recent, high-end Chromebooks), you're relying on an Internet connection to get things done, and buses in many cities (such as my own) don't provide a hotspot even for fare-paying riders.
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I am such a pro user. I'm typing this on a top of the line 2017 MBP.
The lack of ports is irritating - I need two separate dongles to connect the peripherals I need on a daily basis. The performance is OK, although not spectacular and poor value for money. It's reasonably quick on mains power but lackluster on battery, which lasts for about three hours of moderate use.
There are several show-stopping bugs that Apple apparently have no interest in responding to. kernel_task using 1000% of the CPU, dodgy keyboa
Re:They got "fast enough" (Score:5, Insightful)
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IIRC your describing Gate's law. Every year software gets 40% slower.
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>there are a few high power commercial applications
For whatever hardware I have today, there is a class of algorithm I can run, limited by the runtime. As computers get faster, I've been able to do more and better data crunching, but always limited by the CPU and memory.
At work I use a server farm. This is fine.
However travelling, free from interruption and co-workers in the same time zone, is prime programming and testing time. Turnaround time matters. So while I'd love a lightweight laptop for its ligh
Thin laptops are a plague on perfomance (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Thin laptops are a plague on perfomance (Score:4, Insightful)
Could we do a poll on that? Because I do think that if you offer performance/battery life/screen size vs. fashion statement and design, I kinda have a hunch which side will be the "outlier" one...
Re: Thin laptops are a plague on perfomance (Score:2)
Design all the way baby!!!
laptops over desktops? (Score:2)
"coinciding with laptops replacing desktops as our primary devices"
Here let me fix that for you... coinciding with smartphones and tablets replacing laptops and desktops as our primary devices
Re:laptops over desktops? (Score:5, Insightful)
Smartphones and pills (I mean tablets) are nice toys, but suck for even basic web surfing and emailing. Writing an email on a touch screen vs a real keyboard makes me want to toss the device out of a window.
Tablet + keyboard? Sure. But at that point it's a laptop by another name.
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Yup, if I could attach a keyboard to a smartphone so I can type ... and a 17" screen so I can see something ... we'd have the perfect laptop replacement.
Until then, keep your toy with the stamp-sized screen.
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Yup, if I could attach a keyboard to a smartphone so I can type ... and a 17" screen so I can see something ... we'd have the perfect laptop replacement.
Until then, keep your toy with the stamp-sized screen.
And get off my lawn ya darn kids!
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HP already did that... (Score:3)
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Smartphones and pills (I mean tablets) are nice toys, but suck for even basic web surfing and emailing. Writing an email on a touch screen vs a real keyboard makes me want to toss the device out of a window.
Tablet + keyboard? Sure. But at that point it's a laptop by another name.
Completely agree... and I would add it is not ergonomic so oversized phones can cause hand strain through prolonged use... however, just look at the numbers. The great great majority of people are using phones and tablets for basic computing needs.
I wish people who try to explain technical... (Score:2)
...details knew what they were talking about half the time.
The application (in this case, the game Fortnite) doesn't "request your processor provide faster performance."
The operating system, noticing an application is making certain API calls consistent with a program that needs high performance, will ramp up the clock rate of the processor.
I have a suggestion.... (Score:4, Insightful)
How about we stop this bloating of software?
And I see this across everything - updates that just add more and more to the size of the applications and slow the machine down. Why does a performance enhancement increase the size of the application and use up more storage and RAM?
I find it asinine that today's OSes need 16 gigabytes just to function reasonably.
My 8GB phone can't update because Google's shit needs 32GB now in order to work properly.
Ok? 8GBs is NOT enough?!? For a goddamn phone OS?!? I have NO pcitures, videos, music or any other of that horseshit. I reset the phone and deleted EVERYTHING and it's still not good enough.
Seriously, the only problem is today's developers. It's not the hardware.
Duh (Score:2)
They can care less about the people who want or need it. Not as much money in it.
I am handicapped for this group, by having a life! (Score:4, Interesting)
Hey, I'm really interested in new laptops, especially powerful, light ones with great battery duration. But I don't really fit in this crowd. I won't ever run "Fortnite" or indeed any video game on it. I will develop software for space satellites, I will write and deliver speeches, maybe I'll produce some videos.
Right now I own a whole fleet of Panasonic Toughbooks of different vintages, up to the Core i7 tablet with removable keyboard, because I can drop them and have them keep working, and it is actually specified to stand being hosed off from any angle. All were purchased used.
I don't want an ultra light thin phone. I just put them in a Unicorn Beetle case as soon as I get them, and they aren't thin after that. I want one with a battery door. This is difficult to get in a good phone these days. Similarly, I want to be able to replace the laptop battery and disk.
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Laptop makers are meeting needs of most consumers (Score:5, Insightful)
If laptop makers were making things people didn't want, no-one would buy them.
Laptop makers going thinner and lighter didn't come out of the blue. It came about in large part because of hugs sales successes from things like the original MacBook Air. Common sense will tell you that 99% of laptop buyers by laptops because they carry them around, and why would those people not prioritize light and thin above performance?
It's not like there are no high-performance laptops, take Alienware. But who do you think sells more laptops, Alienware's relative huge bulky gaming laptops with power to spare, or Dell/Apple...
Re:Laptop makers are meeting needs of most consume (Score:5, Insightful)
But there has to be lower limits to both weight and especially thinness. When you need to design new keyboard keys that are worst than the previous generation to save half a millimetre on the thickness of the laptop, you're actually going backwards.
Just got a new laptop at work (Score:2)
Water Docking! (Score:3)
Docking stations need to come with a water loop coupling.
Plug in the laptop and cold water is fed through pipes in laptop's body.
There is plenty of space for the coupling points now that all the useful interfaces have been removed from laptops.
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Sarcasm?
Because if you are serious, you need to think about the coupling that you are going to create between the laptop dock and the laptop and how you are going to secure those connections.
Connecting and disconnecting creates wear. When you have a docking station, or even a USB plug or a ethernet jack, they can take wear and tear and become loose and sloppy after a certain number of connects and disconnects. Not to big a deal as you need a small metal to metal connection to allow electricity to flow. I
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By the time you're done for the day you'll have enough hot water to take a bath.
You do know that the intersection of gamers and daily bathers is pretty much the null set?
Depends strongly on the use case (Score:3)
Indeed, this is quite accurate. For use cases that only peg the CPU for a minute at a time (for instance, incremental compilation of a large software project), this is great -- in fact the turbo is significantly higher than the nominal clock speed of the CPU, essentially allowing it to 'save/borrow' TDP from the past and future in order to deliver snappier instantaneous performance.
On the other hand, for use cases that peg the CPU for minutes at a time (for instance, encoding a long video, clean build of a huge project), turbo gets you no benefit and you are limited by the steady-state TDP.
So which is more important? Honestly, I think everyone will have to look at their own use-case and decide. For a lot of folks, they don't often exercise the latter use case and might be fine with lower steady-state performance. Others might not.
If you work at a desk get a desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
Something I've been puzzled by is why people often use laptops even when a desktop would be a better choice. If you really are moving around a lot and need a portable device then I get it. Laptops are super useful for people on the go. But a lot of people work at a desk all day long on a laptop which makes very little sense in a lot of cases. I use a desktop PC with some fast hardware and 3 large 28" 4K monitors. FAR more productive than any laptop. When I need a laptop I have one of those too but its often frustrating to use unless I'm single tasking or doing something simple. I'm usually juggling multiple applications and documents and doing that on a single small screen is annoying to put it mildly. Even a "big" laptop doesn't hold a candle to a well configured desktop for performance and desktop real estate.
I could see a laptop with an external GPU being a useful thing if you need occasional portability but mostly work at a desk. But if you work at a desk then it's kind of silly to use a laptop. Use the right tool for the job. We mostly use desktops and have a few laptops in the company for people to share when they need something portable.
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Might as well buy a Porche and tell them you only want 2 wheels.
FTFY (Score:2)
As Customers Continue to Buy Computers Whose Vendors Focus On Making Their Laptops Thinner and Lighter, They Are Increasingly Neglecting Their Own Performance Needs
Got a demanding workflow? (Score:2)
Find a real laptop thats not a fashion accessory that has thermal limits.
Catering to the "devices as jewelry" crowd (Score:2)
Competition satisfies demand (Score:2, Insightful)
No, we have not. Electronics in general — and laptops in particular — is a very competitive field. That "invisible hand of the markets", which Illiberals love to mock so much, is at work. The mainstream laptop offerings are exactly, what most of us want. And there also remain offerings for the various minorities
Year of the Desktop!!! (Score:4, Insightful)
If you need so much computing power that it's melting the laptop case, you probably need to get a desktop. If you're using a laptop there's always going to be an area of compromise: portability (weight, size), battery life, performance, cost, and upgradability. It's like complaining that the ROG or Predator laptops are heavy and gets less than 7 hour battery life. There's not going to be a laptop that's perfect in every way. Recently a friend asked for a recommendation of thin, powerful laptop with 10+ hour....for under $600. SMH.
The users are shorting themselves (Score:2)
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Just wait for that next-get iMac... (Score:2)
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You're not gonna like what HP has been up to either. :-)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
to
https://ssl-product-images.www... [www8-hp.com]
Apple isn't the only source! (Score:2)
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Just buy the 2015 MBP on EBay or Craigslist. Speed isn't actually all that different, since the new "thin" Macbooks/MBPs are throttled to hell and back due to thermal restrictions.
And yes, Apple's desktop/laptop products went to hell after Steve Jobs died.
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It's called a 'clitmouse'.
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Slashdotters can't find it.
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The move to widescreen allows for a numpad on the built in keyboard (if the screen is sufficiently large), which makes up for it slightly.
16:10 was the perfect all-purpose aspect ratio, however it was doomed as it confused non-pc hardware manufacturers (plugging tv-oriented things into the HDMI port of a 16:10 monitor resulted in vertically stretched images, and customer complaints).