I just had to get a replacement drive for my NAS. Cost about half of what I paid for 3 drives 2 years ago.

AMD based mini-pcs with something like 680M or 780M are around 500. But they are out of stock lately.

Does anyone know how difficult it is to swap keyboards on ThinkPads? I wanna get one used but the problem is, most of them don't have US keyboards since I live in Japan.

When you say cloud... I don't think people understand it is just a huge data centers. There are 288 in Canada, and ¼ of them are in the GTA (Greater Toronto Area).

Might be your font, I'm seeing "" straight quotes

I'm game for that :3

I wonder how would be best to make games now that run easily in a browser with very low specs. I know you can just use JS straight in the browser for some types of games but it isn't really something I have looked into much.

Damn that joke becomes less and less funny each year

This is the part people keep forgetting, or not caring about because they hate us

My old work place used to buy refurbushed ThinkPads, and they slid rather easily by sliding a switch. I have one of the more recent models (also refurbished) at home as well, I'll try to see if it's still the same.

I haven't tried it myself, but at least iFixit has a bunch of guides: https://www.ifixit.com/Search?query=thinkpad+keyboard&doctype=guide

Sweet, thank you!

That would be super helpful. I was under the impression that the recent ones aren't swappable, it would be great if I could replace my surface with an actual laptop soon.

Saving for my kids college went out the window.

Saving for my kids computers now

Even a lot of modern indie titles will play on a low-spec PC.

It's not actually the "older hardware" that's responsible for security vulnerabilities, it's Microsoft chosing to end support for Windows 10.

That "older" hardware capable of running Windows 10 is more than capable of running any Linux distro which will keep on getting security updates for a long while (and you can just upgrade it again if that stops as Linux is nowhere as hardware demanding as Windows, especially the latest, Electron + AI, Windows).

For people who just use their PC for Office software, e-mail and browsing - who are the ones getting entry level PCs - hardware has been more than powerfull enough for 2 decades, and it's only Windows bloatware having grown to use the available computing power that has forced people to upgrade the hardware.

Well, if the USD loses it's reserve currency status, even $1000 or $2000 are perfectly possible in 2 years.

Usually trivial to swap a keyboard, just gotta find the japan Lenovo FRU for the keyboard and order it. Sometimes you gotta buy the upper plastic too if the shape is different. If you have a model in mind I can find you the FRU and guide if you want.

This is around $250 (and that's the version for Europe, shipped from Spain and the price includes VAT).

Six months ago it was just $150, so the current RAM and SSD prices seem to be fully included in the device price.

I got one to replace an aging Windows 8 PC of a family member who only does web-browsing and e-mail and put Linux on it, and have another one at home working as a TV Box + Home server.

With Linux that's more than enough for browsing, e-mail and even office apps. Not a machine for gamers, but then again gamers aren't buying "entry level PCs".

And still blazingly fast for web-browsing, e-mail and office applications, as long as you don't put Windows 11 in it.

I mean GTX 1660 laptop, I forgot to write that in XD

I did the same for realtively new Thinkpad(p14s gen 5, I think). Got original US keyboard from Aliexpress (lucky). It was pretty easy just a couple ofnscreews and had to be careful with folding the flex pcb/cable.

They aren't weaponizing anything against consumers. They don't care about consumers anymore, they are irrelevant.

They think if they just spend more money they will win the AGI race and therefore the whole economy forever. Consumers don't factor into it at all.

Unless they outsource their OS support to CoPilot.

Access to the information superhighway will be relegated to only those who can afford a yacht. /s

yeah prebuilts are cheaper now, sadly

Real

Depends on how many corporations they can supply favorable polls to.

Oh damn, a new gtx 1660 costs more than the whole laptop then, great deal!

People believe it, I couldn't even convince my own father. He rather spend 600 bucks for a new laptop, for no reason.

Also distros aren't the final step of availability.
There are forks like elks linux runnable with 256Kb RAM.

I can't speak to the ease of the swap, but I do know lenovo is super great for letting you order parts.

https://support.lenovo.com/us/en/parts-lookup

I had to swap out the cooling on one of our newer legions at work and their parts game is on point.

Full circle back to the first days of the internet that only universities and the rich could use. Also high storage prices again when we've had it dirt cheap for decades.

Nothing new.

If ThinkPad, easy. If IdeaPad, watch out, might not be viable.

It's amazing how good Lenovo is about ThinkPad, and how crap they are about IdeaPad.

Technology keeps getting better and better; it is capitalism that keeps getting worse and worse.

Oh, yeah.

I'm just thinking the more well known stuff with the "fancier" desktops and shipped with applications like LibreOffice and Firefox which are probably closer to familiar and don't look like a step back for Windows and Mac users.

If you really want to extend the life of your hardware to the max, well, whilst Linux has discontinued support for 486 and Pentium processors last year, any hardware newer than that (so, around 30 years or less) will still run the latest kernel and as you mentioned there are distros targeting machines with very little RAM and HDD space.

My hope is that the crazy RAM and HDD/SDD prices and hence crazy prices for new PCs will push more people to try Linux.

You're not allowed to say 'Microslop' it's ILLEGAL!!!

Not now clippy... not now.

the majority of people access the internet on their phones or smart devices. almost exclusively.

desktop computer internet is going the way of the doh doh in terms of traffic. it's for nerds.

"You'll never own another computer cheaper than $500"

Chinese tech firms produce high end computers for less than $500

"SANCTION! TARIFF! EMBARGO!"

Now do cars, lol

You will never own an EV for under $80k

Crazy isn't it!

I stand by, phones are for consuming, computers are for creation. Of course humans thirst for consuming is unending, like an insatiable Godzilla.

Yeah well i'm a social pariah for not being a phone person. I'm over here like it's 2002 consuming most of my internet on a desktop, not even a laptop! I spend maybe 15m a day on my phone.

The prices for tech on Taobao in China and in the US are nearly identical for the vast majority of tech items. So much is excluded from the tariffs that it's silly they even exist on paper. There are indeed some newer items only available there, but they're rarely on the affordable end of pricing.

Laptops and computer hardware in particular surprise me. I was hoping to get a new Huawei or Xiaomi laptop the last time I was in China since I got my parents a Huawei I've been jealous of in the US several years before they were banned. Absolutely nothing I could find on Taobao or in store was comparable value even to computers from Dell/HP/Lenovo.

if you buy slightly used, you are doing something wrong paying more than 15-20k.

The used car market imploded when vehicle production dried up after 2008

Awesome. I do much as I can to live in 2003 (mostly using CRTs, watching my vhs tapes, playing dreamcast, ha!)

I do like my phone for on the go, but I've done all I can do de crapify it. Excited to get a pixel and graphene next year.