Computers mostly do last for decades. I'm typing this on an eight-year-old Thinkpad, and most of the other hardware in my house is from 2010 or earlier.
The problem is that software stops supporting it, or new software has vastly steeper requirements. Think about laptops from the early 90's - black and white screens, floppy drives, network connections were built-in phone modems if you were lucky. Most of them still run! There's just nothing to do on them anymore unless you're a retrocomputing geek or want to use them for a tiny number of very specific use cases, like running some very old word processor or something.
I'll knock both of them when sane alternatives like LibreOffice exist.
That said, productivity software sucks. It hasn't meaningfully advanced in UI since the 90's, and hasn't advanced in features since online collaboration appeared in the late 00's. Development on FOSS alternatives is wasted spent chasing compatibility with Microsoft's broken formats. It performs poorly, uses absurd amounts of processing power and RAM for relatively straightforward tasks, and the plethora of supported document formats are dreadful from a portability, programmability, interoperability, or user friendliness perspective.
The issue, then, is two-fold: productivity software is trapped in a document format hell, and the lack of code re-use across development houses prevents the software ecosystem as a whole from advancing. If it were possible to have a standardized core - a rendering engine, a math backend for spreadsheets/etc., a database format, a standard set of document formats that are extremely easily edited by humans and machines, scripting and markup languages - and re-use that core across industries, with different frontends for different purposes, the software would stop sucking. Improvements to the core would benefit everyone, and UI developments could be shared in a collaborative effort instead of a competitive environment where copying is forbidden.
tl;dr: do a free software socialism to productivity software, rebase on web technology to benefit from a wider swath of developers and greater software maturity
excuse me i think its libre* not calibre. i use both 😅 I only use it when typing work or college applications stuff and so i cant justify buying word but god i hate when i have to use the non office stuff
LO Writer is cool once you get used to the ugly interface. But did you know that there's a free version of Word online? You just need a Hotmail/Live/Outlook account. Have you tried that? It works like Google Docs but without an offline mode.
I know I have a billion complaints but when I used it, it would lag and glitch up where I would type faster than it could keep up and I would get word jumbled. I think next time I need it though Ill use that over libre though 😅😅
Another example: Samsung Galaxy S5 was waterproof and had an easily user-replaceable battery (back cover designed to be removed). Galaxy S6 was neither waterproof nor had a user replaceable battery.
Yeah my desktop is still fine after 6 years. Only upgrade i got was a free 8 gb of ram from a friend who built a new pc. I've also gotten SSDs as I've upgraded OS's. My coworkers don't understand why I haven't built a new computer yet but the fact is I haven't ran into anything that it can't handle comfortably yet, so why bother.
With laptops we still are at that point, partially due to horrible software. Battery life is still really bad on laptops, and it keeps getting better as tech improves. It would already probably be adequate if it was not for the fact that nearly all software is horrible, and literally every PC operating system is deeply flawed and horrible on laptops.
Battery life in modern devices would be phenomenal if they kept battery sizes the same while reducing the power consumption of all the components, but they decided cutting battery size was acceptable in order to make a smaller/lighter laptop. Where’s the 96Wh, 9-cell battery in a <15W ULV notebook? Oh right, best we can do now is like 45Wh non-removable.
Linux is terrible if you aren't super into software. I use computers way way more than most people because they are extremely useful tools for my work and several of my hobbies, and I despise how often stuff breaks in Linux. Some of the more bloated distributions aren't as bad in this respect, but they have issues on laptops because of the bloat.
I already have a desk top pc that I use for gaming and stuff and just need a laptop that can handle internet and word processing. How is Linux for the simple things?
It depends on how simple. If all you wanna do is watch videos, type stuff up, and do email stuff, it's easy. But if you wanna do something still simple but slightly less so, like plug in two microphones at once, or install a free lightweight game, or record your screen and then edit what you recorded to show someone how to do something, or edit audio beyond what is easy in Audacity, etc, it becomes annoying and complicated and nothing works without hacks and workarounds for every step of the process.
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Computers mostly do last for decades. I'm typing this on an eight-year-old Thinkpad, and most of the other hardware in my house is from 2010 or earlier.
The problem is that software stops supporting it, or new software has vastly steeper requirements. Think about laptops from the early 90's - black and white screens, floppy drives, network connections were built-in phone modems if you were lucky. Most of them still run! There's just nothing to do on them anymore unless you're a retrocomputing geek or want to use them for a tiny number of very specific use cases, like running some very old word processor or something.
Don't knock the utility of Word 2003 and it's perpetual license vs. Office 365's subscription model.
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I'll knock both of them when sane alternatives like LibreOffice exist.
That said, productivity software sucks. It hasn't meaningfully advanced in UI since the 90's, and hasn't advanced in features since online collaboration appeared in the late 00's. Development on FOSS alternatives is wasted spent chasing compatibility with Microsoft's broken formats. It performs poorly, uses absurd amounts of processing power and RAM for relatively straightforward tasks, and the plethora of supported document formats are dreadful from a portability, programmability, interoperability, or user friendliness perspective.
The issue, then, is two-fold: productivity software is trapped in a document format hell, and the lack of code re-use across development houses prevents the software ecosystem as a whole from advancing. If it were possible to have a standardized core - a rendering engine, a math backend for spreadsheets/etc., a database format, a standard set of document formats that are extremely easily edited by humans and machines, scripting and markup languages - and re-use that core across industries, with different frontends for different purposes, the software would stop sucking. Improvements to the core would benefit everyone, and UI developments could be shared in a collaborative effort instead of a competitive environment where copying is forbidden.
tl;dr: do a free software socialism to productivity software, rebase on web technology to benefit from a wider swath of developers and greater software maturity
nothing makes my blood boil more than the fact I have to use calibre now. I HATE IT SO MUCH. fucking subscription fuck
Tips on collecting unemployment for 2020: Use Times New Roman font for your resume to guarantee HR throws it in the trash.
why doesn't hr like tnr?
Same reason they don't like one page resumes in even years and two page resumes in odd years. It's all about chasing the latest trends.
Or it's ageism by any other means.
Wtf
Calibre? The ebook software?
excuse me i think its libre* not calibre. i use both 😅 I only use it when typing work or college applications stuff and so i cant justify buying word but god i hate when i have to use the non office stuff
If you hate LibreOffice so much why don't you just use Google Docs? Smh my head liberal DESTROYED.
I just like word idk also docs fucks up my formatting so much
LO Writer is cool once you get used to the ugly interface. But did you know that there's a free version of Word online? You just need a Hotmail/Live/Outlook account. Have you tried that? It works like Google Docs but without an offline mode.
I know I have a billion complaints but when I used it, it would lag and glitch up where I would type faster than it could keep up and I would get word jumbled. I think next time I need it though Ill use that over libre though 😅😅
docs has serious issues and lack of features. Use libre office.
I'm on a 2009 iMac
use VMs for most shit
I hope you're using Linux, the latest version of OS X supported by 09-era Macs is pretty fucking old at this point, isn't it?
yeah arch with the LXQt desktop environment and bunch of other lightweight shit better for older hardware, the mac os x is 10.5 or something
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My gaming pc is still working with only a few parts swapped out and it'll be a decade old next year.
My computer probably will, though I will probably upgrade it overtime.
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Another example: Samsung Galaxy S5 was waterproof and had an easily user-replaceable battery (back cover designed to be removed). Galaxy S6 was neither waterproof nor had a user replaceable battery.
Yeah my desktop is still fine after 6 years. Only upgrade i got was a free 8 gb of ram from a friend who built a new pc. I've also gotten SSDs as I've upgraded OS's. My coworkers don't understand why I haven't built a new computer yet but the fact is I haven't ran into anything that it can't handle comfortably yet, so why bother.
With laptops we still are at that point, partially due to horrible software. Battery life is still really bad on laptops, and it keeps getting better as tech improves. It would already probably be adequate if it was not for the fact that nearly all software is horrible, and literally every PC operating system is deeply flawed and horrible on laptops.
Battery life in modern devices would be phenomenal if they kept battery sizes the same while reducing the power consumption of all the components, but they decided cutting battery size was acceptable in order to make a smaller/lighter laptop. Where’s the 96Wh, 9-cell battery in a <15W ULV notebook? Oh right, best we can do now is like 45Wh non-removable.
how is linux doing on laptops?
Linux is terrible if you aren't super into software. I use computers way way more than most people because they are extremely useful tools for my work and several of my hobbies, and I despise how often stuff breaks in Linux. Some of the more bloated distributions aren't as bad in this respect, but they have issues on laptops because of the bloat.
I already have a desk top pc that I use for gaming and stuff and just need a laptop that can handle internet and word processing. How is Linux for the simple things?
It depends on how simple. If all you wanna do is watch videos, type stuff up, and do email stuff, it's easy. But if you wanna do something still simple but slightly less so, like plug in two microphones at once, or install a free lightweight game, or record your screen and then edit what you recorded to show someone how to do something, or edit audio beyond what is easy in Audacity, etc, it becomes annoying and complicated and nothing works without hacks and workarounds for every step of the process.