Thanks.
It's difficult to find a new laptop without that nasy-ass bloated Windows 10 on it, unless you get a Mac or android, or are handy enough to put something better than W10 on it yourself.
I guess W10 is good enough if most of your web & computer experience was on a phone, android tablet, chromebook, or Amazon fire. But if you're used to a real computer, you don't want Microsoft to turn it into a giant phone. If we want a phone, most of us already have one in our pocket. Nice smart andriod phones & tablets can be had for under $60, so we don't need a computer that imitates a cheap phone.
Even if I wasn't forced into early retirement with disabilities, I don't think I'd buy a new computer as-is right off a store shelf. They build them like crap these days. With the poor quality of the modern, made in China machines (almost all of them are from China including Apple products), you'll be lucky to get 2 years out of them before you have a serious breakdown, or they're obsolete.
I got a dual core 3ghz laptop that will run circles around most new quad core laptops... but I had to do some tweaking to make it so. And 2 years from now when that new laptop is broke & obsolete, mine will still be running, & still be able to run anything modern. I got it refurbished delivered to my door for $79. It looks like brand new, & even came with 2 new batteries. 5 1/2 hours runtime playing HD video per charge.
My current primary machines are a pair of quad core 3.2ghz (but will run up to 3.6ghz per core) mini desktops. I got them used off of e-bay. 1 for $79, & 1 for $89. With just a little work, they'll run faster & better than anything in a store. 10 years from now, they'll still be running, & be just as good as many new ones.
I tend to select robust upgradable stuff that's built like a truck. That way I can still upgrade them with the times, & they're built to last a decade or more. I look for good office & commercial grade machines. A company that has to buy a dozen or a few hundred computers for their offices, will not want to replace them in 2 years. They expect to get at least 10 years out of them before buying a dozen tp 100 new ones.
I read in the pro video forums, that people processing, converting, & editing video are processing them at 10-15 frames per second on 8-core machines overclocked to 4-5ghz per core, liquid cooling, that cost $4,000-$5,000.
Using the same software, even my very old single core 3.46ghz 2007 machine could do it at 20-30 FPS. My old dual core desktops & laptop could do it at 50-80 FPS. My current quad cores can do the same job with the same software at 200-600 FPS. So while their new $5,000 computer is taking all day or night to process a movie, I'm doing the same thing with the same software in 5-30 minutes.
Number of cores & core speeds are not the only governing factors for overall performance. A better built single core machine, properly configured, without bloatware, with the OS set up properly for what you need it for, will actually outperform most new crap with quad cores on the shelf. They even lie about their speeds because of boost technology. They may say 3.6ghz, but they don't tell you that speed is for brief bursts, under optimum & coolest conditions in turbo-boost mode, where in normal continuous operations, at normal room temperature, they may only run at 1.1-1.3ghz.
So in a speed test of brief bursts of processes, it shows fast -- good for loading a Facebook page fast. But it's not really that fast taking all day or night to process an HD movie or playing a game. They cheat on the specs on modern equipment, where in real world continuous use, they'll never perform as good as the specs. With Windows 10 bloatware in them, it's even worse. The processor is working harder for Microsoft & windows than for you. They'll never perform better than a good older computer set up well.
This is the same kind of thing that killed Windows Vista. You needed a computer twice the size just to do what you could already do with W7 or XP.
Topic: Mary Beth back with us ....? (Read 10256 times)
