It’s never been harder to repair your electronics. When the keyboard in your shiny new MacBook dies, you’ll have to send it to a Genius. When the battery in your iPhone dies, you’ll have to break out the pentalobe screwdrivers. Your technology does not respect your freedom, and this is true all the way down to the source code: the Library of Congress is thankfully chipping away at the DMCA in an effort that serves the Right to Repair movement, but still problems remain.
The ability — or rather, right — to repair will inevitably mean using electronics longer, and keeping them out of the garbage. That’s less e-waste, but it’s also older, potentially slower and less powerful portable workstations. This is the question: how long should you keep your electronics running? When do you start getting into the false economy of repairing something just because you can? What is the minimally viable laptop?
The Slowing Pace of Upgrades
Moore’s law died a decade ago, and we’re long past the Megahertz wars of the 90s and 2000s. RAM is plentiful, even if Chrome gobbles it up, and network connectivity is ubiquitous. We are in the age of stagnation of personal computers. The exponential growth of computing power died sometime around 2004, and we haven’t looked back since. Sure, there are advances like newer, faster, more capable graphics cards and RGB RAM, but most applications for most people don’t require high-spec devices.
You simply don’t need to upgrade your computer as often now, and this sentiment is shared with experts and amateurs alike. It was only a few months ago that Apple discontinued the mid-2015 15″ MacBook, widely cited as the best laptop ever made. It’s not unusual to see actual hackers sporting a Thinkpad X220 or T420, machines released nine years ago. The latest version of Windows has lower minimum requirements than previous versions, and except for the upper echelons of computation (primarily running Fortnite at over 1000 fps), everyone is okay with the fact that you don’t need to have the latest and greatest personal computer; we’ve shifted conspicuous consumption onto phones. If a decade-old laptop is sufficient for basic web browsing and playing videos on YouTube, how much more do you need?
We’ve seen bottom of the barrel laptops before. We’ve lusted over them. The eeePC, launched in 2007, was underpowered for its time, but it was just enough for some light browsing. There were mods, and since there wasn’t a spinning disc drive, it was surprisingly responsive. Throw on a decent Linux distro, and you have something. Not much, but something.
What is the minimally viable laptop? How cheap is a machine that will allow you to do your work? Right now, you can pick up some very nice business-class laptops from eBay for a hundred bucks. You can get new batteries and power adapters for them. If you manage to pick up a ThinkPad, all the part numbers for each of the components are available, and you can find replacements anywhere.
Where is the Goldilocks Laptop? Screen Resolution as a Limiting Factor
How low can you go on the price performance curve of modern computing devices? No one would claim a butterfly keyboard Thinkpad 701 would be useful for modern work, unless you’re one of the really weird vintage computer nerds on Instagram. These days, very few people can claim they need a top-of-the-line workstation that’s also portable. Video editors and engineers notwithstanding, just about everything runs in a browser these days anyway. There must be a middle ground somewhere between the four inch thick laptops of old and the modern day luggable. What is it?
In my Thinkpad buyer’s guide from two years ago, a guide that’s still oddly accurate, the sweet spot for a laptop that will still see daily use is a dual-core Sandy Bridge CPU, 8 or 16 GB of RAM, and negligible storage because you’re going to put an SSD in there anyway. The only problem with these old business-class laptops picked up on auction sites is the display resolution. Seven hundred and sixty eight vertical pixels just isn’t enough, but there are plenty of places where you can pick up a 1080p panel. Compare this with its modern equivalent. Today, businesses are equipping their employees with a dual-core Kaby Lake CPU running at the same clock as what was available nearly a decade ago. You might get 32 GB of RAM, and this time the storage is an SSD. Display resolution hasn’t improved much, although there are rare and expensive variants equipped with OLED displays.
The age of the minimally viable laptop is here, and it feeds right into our right to repair. If your machine lasts longer, you’ll eventually need to repair it. If you’re still running a mid-2015 MacBook, you’ll be looking up some iFixit guides eventually. What, then, is the best laptop if you don’t care about having the best and most expensive. That’s a question we’re opening up to you: are you still using the computer you used to first sign up on Facebook? What is the minimally viable laptop, and what computer can you buy today that will still be useful in ten years?
“It’s never been harder to repair your electronics.”
Yes, but on the other hand it’s never been easier and cheaper to get spare parts – directly from china.
Fully agree. I purposefully do a lot of work on older machines. It guarentees that my stuff will run on basically everything. Up until a year ago my main machine was a C2D MacBook Pro from 2008. I still use that machine for daily stuff, but there is no sign that it is at any rate not relevant anymore.
My current mac is of 2015 vintage and although I tend to take care of my hardware and it typically is granted a long live, I know that my 2008 MBP could outlive this one simply because of the level of repairability of that machine.
“2015 vintage”
I used my 2007 Macbook until 2015. One of the main reasons for my upgrade was the processor fan started making a horrible grinding noise, and I couldn’t find a replacement for it. So I got myself the (then current) 2015 MBP, and I can barely replace anything on it… not even the RAM or SSD?!!!
I love macOS for laptops but I hate the new MacBook keyboards and trackpads. I bought a 2013 Retina MacBook Pro with a Haswell dual-core a few months ago and it’s been perfect for me. No plans to get something else any time soon.
I just upgraded the ssd (125GB to 1 TB) in my 2014 MacBook Air and I am thinking about upgrading the battery I don’t see replacing it any time soon. It does everything I need and the battery still lasts 3-4 hours, it has a nicer keyboard than current apple machines and enough ports for my needs. I actually bought the same 2014 model (used) for my dad for Xmas last year.
Batteries are the big problem for older laptops. Finding batteries that work like new OEM batteries is almost impossible. The batteries have a shelf life and even when not used they degrade over time. I tried to buy batteries for an older HP laptop and got something that had been sitting on the shelf for a couple of years, they didn’t last more then a few months before the runtime was down to a quarter of what it should have been.
But for desktops the older machines can have very long and trouble free lives. Until a few weeks ago I used a discarded HP Z400 workstation upgraded with cheap SanDisk SSDs for storage (and it’s still in use in my household as someone a daily driver by someone else). I picked up that HP close to 4 years ago. I also have an old i5 HP SFF machine as my workshop computer, and my “new” daily driver is an old workstation based on an Intel SC2600CO motherboard with dual Xeons and 32GB of RAM. You can pick up old hardware like this for much less than you would pay for something shiny and new.
You seem to be living in a different reality than me. Yes. Everything runs in a browser. And even modern websites and media formats put a workload on a (non-workstation, portable) laptop that makes hardware older than ~4 years run totally sluggish. Linux does not change that (and yes, I do run Linux). Plus the “minimally viable laptop” will depend on the needs to the individual person, so there is no answer to the question.
The general rules of “choose a long warranty”, “make sure it’s upgradable” apply to any purchase. Always have.
Aww, I really liked my Eee PC.
My wife uses a ~2009 Sony Vaio and it’s had a ram up grade (4GB) and a bigger hdd but she won’t be parted from it
The premise: “The age of the minimally viable laptop is here” has been a thing for 10 years. Dell, HP, and Lenovo spit out business class laptops that are serviceable, high rez, and fast.
I’m on a Dell E7440 laptop now, Intel Quad core i5, 8 gig ram, 256 SSD, rez is 1366×768, and super thin,
Picked up for $150 USD. A similar tower goes for $125. Used, of course.
I suspect Intel is the culprit here. Ever since the quad core CPUs were released, the laptops have become reusable.
It’s not the latest/greatest urge users respond to, it’s serviceability.
If you follow the money, the latest scam is to force windows 7 users into Windows 10 with an encryption scheme.
I am slowly removing Microsoft products from my little corner of the planet.
Your mileage may vary.
I picked up a set of used laptops for my family 6 years ago. Those laptops are all aging poorly because of physical stresses, so when the chipsets start dying it makes replacing motherboards a tough decision. I have resuscitated them so many times they are scarred and a little funny looking.
When I began my refresh I was pleasantly surprised by the finesse of the new machines. The specs are not that different, but the performance is good. Power requirements, battery technologies, PCIE Busses, and southbridge comms and refined UI are compelling improvements. My minimally viable laptop needs to install hefty apps for years, but I still need the right to repair because these babies need to give me nearly a decade.
Yeah, it’s unfortunate that the size constraints have led to no form factors. It would be great if you could replace a dead main board with a same-form-factor replacement that had newest chip set. The aluminum cases on many of today’s laptops would keep on ticking for a long time if parts could be upgraded around them.
My Dell E5440 worked brilliant until the last win10 upgrade which broke ACPI for those using UFEI
Now it wont turn off
Because of a “fix” MS made and dell wont issue a new ACPI driver to fix the flaw because tehe laptop is obsolete
It’s obsolete?!?
It worked fine before the update…
It’s got a SSD and 16Gb with an i5.
This is obsolete?
WTF ?
All for the want of a software patch.
Linux or downgrade to a version without that patch?
Wait, won’t it run Linux??
Even my 2005 vintage desktop PC running Linux Mint MATE is faster than my 2016 laptop running Windows 10. Derive your own conclusions from there.
Build quality is a huge factor for me. I hate typing on a shitty keyboard that squidges under my fingers. I’m really interested in the upcoming Pinebook Pro. The first edition Pinebook had terrible build quality; with 4GB RAM, GPIO, an ARM64 CPU, 1080p display and a look like a Thinkpad T-series, as long as it’s reasonably sturdy, it could be pretty close to perfect.
I still love having a battlestation for my day to day work and only use the laptop on the road (and I suppose on the sofa fairly regularly). Running Linux, it tends to be the wear and tear that calls for upgrade and not the reduction in performance. So the place that I’m at right now is battery life. I would expect my battlestation to be useable for at least 10 years — if the laptop can exceed half of that I think that’s reasonable.
The laptop battery is not necessarily meant to be user replaceable. But it’s not glued in place or anything like that. Brand name is about $130, and I should be good to go with my first swap on this 2016 Dell XPS13. If it keeps the machine going for at least another 3 years, that really starts to make the initial cost of the machine worth it.
Enter the HP Battlestation Wars.. My video edit tower, HP Z800, 24 gig ram, dual Xeon quad core @ 3.20 gHz, 2 TB hard drive, dual DVD burners, $175.00 USD.
Yes, still on Windows 7 Pro.
Yes, hot swap capable, hardware R.A.I.D. what’s not to like?
I just picked up an HP Z400 with 24GB RAM, Quadro 600, and a quad-core Xeon W3550 for $40 from a local computer recycler. The COA was for Windows 7 Pro, but Windows 10 installed and upgraded to Pro without issue. It became a FreeNAS box once I transplanted in innards into a full tower case that held more 3.5″ drives. I also purchased 3 Dell T3500 workstations (also $40/ea) with similar specs to the Z400. Sure, they’re all approaching double-digit age, but they’re still fast and, in my opinion, totally usable by today’s standards. I was reliving Portal 2 on one of the T3500s just last night.
The noise ? :)
DL380 – 2 Xeons w/6 cores, 18 RAM slots, 6 SAS drives with raid – hot swappable. Built in remote management. GBP 80 upwards. Granted, it’s rack mount and the video out is VGA.
M1000E – 16 blades, 2 Xeons/blade w/6 cores & 32GB. 40GB backplane. ISCSI offloading on the blades. GBP 200 for the chassis, management cards, network cards and some blades, further GBP 200 to get full complement of blades. Power bill is a bit unfunny :-/
Few days ago, I tried a Celeron 900 2.2Ghz + 4 GB RAM + SSD + intel GMA 4500 on windows 10, That runs surprisingly like a charm ! (only WDM driver for the intel does not support opengl 2.1 :/ )
I have a Compaq mini 311 (Intel Atom 250 + Nvidia ION + SSD) and this one is quite slow. I think that old Intel Atom CPU aren’t good for fine use.
Don’t send your macbook to a “genius”. Send it to Louis Rossman.
rossmanngroup[DOT]com
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Running a W520 with SSD, spinny disk in the expansion bay and 32GB of RAM. It eats virtual machines for breakfast, and the power brick doubles as an offensive weapon. Made the move to ubuntu full time after my 2017 MBP met with an unfortunate accident. Just couldn’t justify replacing a machine that infuriated me on a day-to-day basis. W520 is faster and more capable than the MBP on a subjective basis, but I really miss the higher res screen. The W520 cost me GBP 350 fully configured, which is astounding. Additional power bricks are GBP 20 (not GBP 100, thanks Apple). Docking stations are GBP 50 and come with a fab array of ports and extended video capabilities.
I’ve also got an X220, but the vertical resolution is pants so it doesn’t get much use. Battery life is pretty good though.
I do also miss the touchpad on the MBP a bit – my thumb suffers from mouse clicking on the Lenovos.
I do like the W5420, (the “W” is for upgraded video as in Workstation) but for browser wars, my little Dell E7440 works fine.
I don’t know what you all are complaining about, I have 2 TRS-80’s, a comodore 64, and 2 desktops installed with DOS 6.22 Windows 3.11…I CAN’T DO MUCH WITH THEM! but they do work. Every P4 and above I have been able to successfully upgrade to windows 10.
I;m not a proponent of windows 10, I have a few linux systems as well, but when I go to fix a pc, it’s usually a problem with windows 10, so I stay familiar with it so I know what I’m supporting, I’m fairly certain I’m not the only one who thinks this.
Moore’s law didn’t die, it just doesn’t function in the way you want it to.
I know that Moore’s law is related to transistors / memory doubling on the same footprint every 2 years.
But I mean that other things, regarding computing technology, still “feel”like they obey to the same rules.
Example: on the same computer, the websites I like to visit seem to increase or double in size every two years.
And they will be loading slower and slower, even though my internet speeds get’s faster and faster as well.
A big part of that is caused by some lottery popup widescreen add that must be shown in the fullest colors and biggest framerates. But also my browser itself and the amount of memory it requires seem to double every two years.
So while my computer still runs the same software from decades ago without problems, the internet related applications just slow everything down. I do run add block plus, which makes it better, I just wonder for how long.
So while Moore first stated that everything will get better every 2 years, it simply now means that everything will get worse every 2 years. Yet, we all are in denial as we would all still like to call this process “progress”.