21
votes
What's your computer/PC like?
(I'd be surprised if this hasn't been asked before.)
A few questions that come to my mind are:
What are your computers' specs?
How are your computer parts/cabling organized? (Are they?)
What is the resolution of your monitor(s?)
What OS is it?
I'm not really knowledgeable when it comes to technology, so you can add you own questions as you please.
Edit: In hindsight, my knowledge of specs is even poorer that I thought it was and I can barely read the answers. Ah well "^~^
The computer is a 11-13 year old Windows Vista turned Windows 7.
The screen resolution is 1024×768 pixels, and that's the high definition. (The low one is 800×600). I figured this out when I tried to change the resolution to a non 4:3 ratio, because my parents either put the monitor in storage or threw it out, and the monitor "setup" is now the TV, which isn't 4:3 and I will pick 2007 YouTube black bars a million times over having my screen stretched.
The specs I can find are:
1GB DDR2 (I do not know what this means, I'm assuming it's RAM) memory (originally 512MB, edited after looking for specs on the computer and it said 1GB, apparently my parents broke it and they hired a technician that swapped a part of the PC somewhere and put in a different RAM card/whatever.)
An (quote) AMD athlon 64 x2 dual core 3600+
An "HP pavilion a6125" CPU. (This box.)
Unfortunately, my parents are too poor or focused on other things to buy a new computer. Unsurprisingly I mostly use my phone or PS3 and complain about it here.
In what country do you live?
Edit: Checked your profile, appears you're in Brazil which complicates things...
It sounds like a $200 Pinebook Pro would be a better machine than that.
No, the only online/software things I need to use for school are an app my state government has requested be made and Google classroom.
(On a related note, this is not the kind of thing I was expecting as an answer and kind of makes me anxious, even if obviously these are nothing but suggestions.)
Probably because it primarily concerns me, and the only other people this could concern are my parents, so this is in a sense, very/directly personal. If this left the realm of suggestion, I'd need to explain this to them (and more likely than not demonstrate this is legitimate) and then have them and August (nicknaming a username? Based.) talk to eachother (maybe with me as translator, since they scarcely know English, this is Brazil) and make sure everything is in order for delivery and all that, all very personal things which make me anxious.
EDIT: is Raspbian preinstalled (or whatever the OS analogue of that is) in the computer?
Raspberry Pis seem to be quite expensive in Brazil (although from what I've heard, technology in general is).
The Raspberry Pi foundation has only one official reseller that I could find. A 2GB Raspberry Pi 4 there goes for R$440, or $80 USD (according to Google).
Very much. I was looking at my computer's stats and found WinSAT and it gave my graphics processing a flat 1.0 score, or rock bottom. It is a 12 year old computer so really I don't find it too surprising. It can sometimes take 10 seconds to begin rendering Chrome after clicking it (In the PC menu, not loading the components in google.com) and YouTube is basically unwatchable. Even updating flash already had issues with that computer, long before the company chose to shut it down more recently.
My main PC is primarily built to be a gaming computer.
I basically built this machine to play the Witcher 3 at 1080p, 60fps, with everything maxed out including HairWorks. It took until 2 years after the game came out to be able to build a machine that could do it, and I don't regret it at all. It wasn't an overtly costly machine, and it still runs games amazingly. I run most games at 1080p ~90fps with little to no compromises in graphics.
The only odd part out is the 750W PSU. I'd have gone with 550W or 600W but I previously was using it with a GTX590, a dual-GPU card from 2010 that sucked a lot of power.
I don't have RGB anything. I prioritize silence over lights and bling. The Define R5 is entirely sealed and soundproofed and runs absolutely quietly. It is a black box with nothing but one small, tasteful blue light to indicate that it's on. Of course, that also means it all runs a bit hotter than average so that's why I have such a big cooler. I previously had a much cheaper and more reasonable Xigmatek cooler that was fine but a rubber strap for the fan broke and I took the opportunity to go all out to see what a Noctua could do. Turns out it can do quite a lot.
I run two 1080p monitors: a 23" Dell IPS, and a 24" BenQ 144Hz. They're 7 and 5 years old, respectively. I'm perfectly happy gaming at that size and resolution, as it is pretty cost-effective to run, especially if you want to game at 90 fps or higher on average. If I were to upgrade at all, I'd want an ultrawide 144Hz monitor but I know that would also require a significant upgrade in GPU tier so until I set aside something like $2k for such an upgrade, I am happy to wait and see.
The next time I upgrade, I'll be looking for a time when it's possible to get a GPU with enough horsepower to run most games in 4k at 120Hz comfortably, with raytracing. I expect I'll be waiting at least another five years.
My setup is very close to this. I have i7-6700 (without k and not overclocked), asus z170-p motherboard 16 GB DDR4 and RTX 2060. My motherboard has been acting up recently (my M.2 slot burned down and for some reason I get freezes if Intel Virtualization is turned on in BIOS), so I'm thinking of changing it and my i7 to Ryzen 2700 or something like that.
I also use this setup to work every day remotely, so I have 2 OSes, Windows 10 for gaming and Pop! OS for working. That's also the reason why my main monitor is 27" 2K IPS Philips, I was fine with my old one when I was just gaming for 2-3 hours, but when I began working everyday I very quickly decided that my eyes had enough of that PLS bullcrap that I had before and got a better monitor
Love this. Pics?
Nothing much to show, unfortunately. It's tucked out of the way in an unglamorous corner where I barely have to look or interact with it.
I have a (work subsidized) monster:
It was a bit of a nerve wracking build tbh. Those threadrippers are massive chips, and the DRAM required more than the usual amount of force to get in properly.
I also have two very similar workstations under my desk at work that I ssh into:
Both with more memory and Radeon VIIs (might ask my boss for one of the new Pros next time)
Wow, what do you do with that machine? :D
Right now I’m working on making a molecular dynamics code run (fast) on one of our soon to be launched compute GPUs!
I would be wary of installing Debian unless you go for Debian sid/unstable since the kernel is most likely going to be too old for your cpu and gpu setup but yeah, the lockdown browsers are scary.
A newer release of Ubuntu would be better kernel-wise. The issue is just that the kernel of Debian most likely won't have support for your hardware since it's too old. Although, personally I'm more of a Fedora guy. (Note you should probably avoid snap like the pest so might wanna remove that on Ubuntu, if you want more information on why snap should be avoided, you can DM me)
As for FreeBSD, It's an entirely different beast and I would probably not use it if you just want a free system. As for hardware support, I have no idea how that looks on the BSDs.
Also, I last semester I had no lockdown browser either from what I've seen so I should be safe on that side hopefully. The platform they want us to use isn't so bad either, they want MS Teams which is still infinitely better than Zoom so there's that.
I have (a) pretty neat setup(s) if you ask me :p
What do I do with all these? Be unproductive on the internet. I don't even game as much as the gaming performance of the specs would make you assume.
Main system:
Laptop which I currently only use as a Wi-Fi adapter for my main system:
Also I still have this machine around somewhere:
I also have a Raspberry Pi 3, but the microUSB power input kinda got ripped off so I am hoping to get that repaired somehow.
And I also have a phone that can technically run a pure Linux system but doesn't because I only ported it enough to take pretty screenshots and got bored.
Curious what phone?
A ZTE Axon 7. I ported postmarketOS enough for it to boot into Weston, and it kinda died out after that. (Here's my changes if anyone's interested)
Neat, how hard is it to get into for someone who's never done something like that? Kinda wanna try with my phone. (Sony Xperia XA2)
You seem to be fortunate: https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Sony_Xperia_XA2_(sony-pioneer)
Wait, wtf. I swear I looked previously at the device list?!
Seems it was added back in July.. that's cool.
My main computer is as follows:
I also have an older wallmount in the closet to handle the 3D printer and streaming duties and I'm building another casemod PC that'll control my CNC machine and do photogrammetry. Edit: I also have my wife's old (HP I think) laptop that she gave to me after buying a new one that I'll be using to tune ECUs in my cars.
Why enterprise instead of pro?
Volume license given to me in exchange for some freelance IT help as I was building the PC.
I use a Dell Precision 5510. I got it for my engineering undergrad when I had to run software on my machine, but it's overkill these days. Still a great laptop, though! Very easy to take apart and clean.
Specs:
I paid for the Dell support and was very happy with it when I had some issues. This machine can be a little quirky and I wish it had a third USB port, but overall it's been rock solid.
Edit:
Accessories:
There are roughly three that I use regularly.
Ahhhhh, an X62!!! God, that's awesome, I'm so jealous. I have an X61t, which I dearly love, but I would kill to get this thing with modern internals, my A275's 16:9 screen drives me crazy. I want to throttle the person that decided to switch laptop screens from 4:3 to 16:9, they're so much more annoying to use on laptops and desktops because you lose so much vertical space and on laptops especially they become so wide.
Are you sure the waking problem is firmware? Most of the time weird waking issues can be fixed by registry edits.
I'm running Linux, so it certainly won't be a registry fix. ;)
I don't know exactly where the problem lies—Bluetooth module firmware, system firmware, some other firmware—but it's nowhere in the software, because the system is asleep and nothing is running when it happens. It's possible there's some EFI variable not exposed through the firmware config utility that would fix the trigger-happiness of wakeups, but I haven't found it. Turning off bluetooth is stupid, but does the trick.
My mistake, heard work computer assumed Windows.
Main desktop, honestly I can't remember the specifics for most things but it has a ryzen r7 2nd Gen and a gtx 2070 super. It dual boots Ubuntu and windows.
I also have a personal macbook pro for development, plus a work MacBook pro for, well, work.
I have 1 superwide monitor, 2 1440p 27inch monitors.
I also technically have an xps 15 but I don't really use it anymore.
Main Desktop, which I use for games and my job (which is developing XR, so, good overlap there).
Specs
Cable Organization
Not really. I used the openings in the NZXT where available to route things away from where airflow needed to go, zip tied some stuff here and there, but nothing fancy.
Other Accessories
Other notes
The 2 monitors have a glossy finish on them, which I ordered by accident. I intended to order the matte finish ones to reduce glare (as most people do), but instead got these. I used them for a while and I've changed my mind. Yea there can be glare if you put them opposite a window or a bright light, but overall the colors are so much more vivid. I recommend it.
Hah, I feel you, I'm running a VR headset on my GTX 1070. Beatsaber runs fine, everything else is struggeling super hard, even simple looking games like Superhot
I use a 1070 too. Alyx ran fine, do you think a 1080 would be much better? My brother might want to get rid of his pc and I’m thinking of swapping the gpu before selling the pc
Alyx and Beatsaber run fantastic, everything else seems to push its limits. A 1080 would be a bit better, but I'm not sure if good enough to warant upgrading
Asus ROG Strix B450-F Gaming Motherboard
AMD Ryzen 5 2600 CPU
32 GB DDR4 3000 MHz RAM
AMD Radeon R9 290 GPU
4 TB 5400 RPM HDD
1 TB SATA SSD
Thermaltake 600 W PSU
Corsair 100R Carbide Midtower Silent Case
AOC 27" 4K IPS Monitor
Windows 10 Pro
My main PC is built around a hand-me-down gaming build my ex made a couple years ago (he built a new one with his stimulus check, so I got my hands on the CPU and mobo from him):
I mostly play Civ6 on it, which this handles fabulously.
I also have an Asus Vivobook 14 laptop I purchased recently ($349, it was a decent deal):
It does what I need/want it to, no complaints there.
I started my build when I didn't have a lot of money. I also had a strange hardware bug that required me to upgrade some parts earlier than I would have done them normally.
The only reason why I knew what half of these were was because I had an old list on PCPartPicker that's partially up-to-date.
As you can probably guess from the GPU, this is a gaming PC. I ended up buying the GPU because it's close enough to being the best, and I wanted something that would give me some longevity. Beyond that, I play most games on a big 4K TV and I like being able to render at full resolution - a task that usually isn't that hard because I don't play too many AAA titles any more (though to be completely fair, that frequency has been rising). I also really wanted to get into VR, so I figured it was worth investing a little more than I would normally.
I certainly didn't buy the motherboard I did just because it was the cheapest one with integrated wifi. At least that's what I am telling myself. It was because I wanted something compatible with the upcoming generation of AMD chips. Of course, that was a purchase right between when AMD announced that they would not support it on B450 and when they announced they were changing their minds.
There was really no need to order that NVME storage drive. I was just thirsty for big numbers and really wanted more storage space for a few games that have really bad load times on magnetic media.
I get a discount on computer parts from my work and I game a lot so this is a lot more tricked out than it needs to be but:
I also have a media server on spare parts running freenas with 6tb Of storage which I also use to run my Plex, pihole and home assistant
Starting off with the list, can also view on PCPartPicker. Ignore the price because it has been upgraded many times since originally built. And I never bothered to correct all the prices.
Built my rig back in 2016 so I've gotten a good couple years out of it, though I am going to be updating to a new rig this year after all the new parts release. It has treated me rather well, but I am disappointed by the time I've gotten out of this cpu. When I built it I was expecting to be able to just swap in a new gpu around this time and still be good to go, but 4 cores/4 threads just isn't enough for modern games. I upgraded to a 1TB SSD back when FO4 released, and spent a rather crazy $260 on it. GPU picked up off an old man who was a flight sim fan and decided he didn't need 3 GPUs, so I bought it for $230. Was forced to add a network card after a lightning strike killed my Ethernet port on my motherboard. Up until the other week I was using a Phanteks PH-TC14PE CPU Cooler, and it worked pretty well. But with my wish to upgrade my rig at the end of the year, decided to spend the money now and upgrade to water cooling. The GPU Water Cooler was essentially required, stock cooler on this gpu is terrible and would constantly thermal throttle.
I've got an old gaming rig that doesn't run much these days, but my primary driver is a 2019 16" Macbook Pro:
It's a work computer and it's probably overkill since I'm just writing JS/PHP these days. I do some light gaming, mostly WoW and the occasional game of Civ 6. It runs WoW the smoothest I've ever been able to run it, so no complaints from me there. I do wish I had more storage though since you can't upgrade it. I'm currently only using about 1/4 of my available storage, but I'm also using an external HDD to store certain things like VMs and larger files.
Then my other "computer" is a new addition as of today! I bought an AlphaSmart 3000 in an attempt to give myself a distraction-free platform for writing. Mostly just journaling for now, but maybe some short stories down the road.
My main computer is custom-built. I've changed some parts recently, such as the graphics card, but generally it is unchanged since 2012. Here is a summary:
Monitor
I chose the GTX 750 Ti specifically because it supports VGA, which my monitor requires. I use a CRT monitor because, for me, the benefits outweigh the drawbacks:
I cannot stress enough how great it is to be able to choose between multiple resolutions, especially for my eyesight.
Operating system
I originally used Windows 7 on the computer and later upgraded to Windows 10. But using Windows 10 just annoys and frankly depresses me. It is remarkable how low Microsoft has fallen as a consumer-oriented company. For the last year, I've used Windows XP on it. Generally, it is a joy to use. It's without security updates since 2019, but still works fine if you are careful and know what you're doing. The only drawback is that the 32-bit version can't use more than 2 GB of RAM. I might switch to the 64-bit version soon, or upgrade to Vista or 7.
It's just a laptop: a refurbished T450 with an i7-5600U, 16 GiB of 1600 MHz DD3, and a Crucial 500 GB SSD. I got it this January - laptop, SSD & additional RAM - for around €500, and it has been a huge upgrade on my previous 2011 Acer Travelmate - i3-2350M, 4 GiB of RAM, and a 256 GB SSD.
I use it together with a wireless mouse, and I'm not sure why I never thought of getting one before: it's much, much better than using only the touchpad or having to mess around with cables and whatnot. I have a few cables connected to it, but that's just because both my desk fan and lamp use USB, and I have yet to get around to finding a powered hub for them. Other than that, I only have to worry about the power cable: even my printer is wireless.
I run Debian 10 on it. I did a minimal installation, set up i3, Emacs and Firefox, which I mostly use to browse the Internet, to leave scathing comments on Reddit, to keep my notes and journals organized, and to code. I don't really game or do much else beyond that.
My laptop/tablet is a Surface Pro 3 that's still trucking along pretty well, though in all honesty it's mostly just a reddit, twitter, facebook, and tildes machine at this point. That being said, it has
I bought it about a year ago from a college surplus store, and they must not have used it that much, as the battery at full holds about 90% of it's design capacity, and it's pretty much a perfect web browsing machine for me still. I plan on using it until it breaks, whether if that means I break it from damage, or if something internal breaks from usage (like the battery, or if the SSD craps out on it).
My desktop I built when I was in my last semester of High School in about 2016, and covers most of my gaming needs (with the rest of my gaming being done on mostly the Switch, or the console game here and there), and it's specs look like. Since it is my first PC build, the cable management is all over the place inside of it. The important part is that at least I've never had any overheating issues with it, so meh.
While it still chugs along alright if you leave games on low settings for the most part, since I've actually managed to land a job with after graduating college, I think I'm going to build a new computer once I get a decent amount saved up to do so. This might replace my Optiplex I have as a server, but since its processor isn't really that much better (if at all), idk what it'll end up being, but I still haven't saved enough for the new computer fund yet, so meh.
I also have a mini server running on a Dell Optiplex 3010 that literally just hosts an owncloud instance for my music and other files, with the specs of:
I also bought this one from the college surplus store, I figured it was literally cheaper to buy this computer, set up owncloud, and pay for the electricity costs of it than pay for the 1TB of cloud storage otherwise, plus the important files are backed up on all three machines here, so if say the Hard drive just massively failed me in this, I'd still have the other two machines as backups as well.
I've had sooooo many problems with my SP3, I've just about given up on using it and only use my desktop now. The keyboard on the SP3 doesn't right click anymore, which is my single largest annoyance, but also the fan is seemingly broken, and whines like that's its job.
Desktop machine is a mid-2010 27 inch iMac, expanded to 20GB ram. It still serves me well. Maybe I should upgrade since it won't run an OS later than High Sierra and newer graphics might be nice for games, but I'm not sure I want an all-in-one computer again, so I don't know what to get.
Laptop is a refurbished 2017 Macbook Pro that I got since I don't have a work computer anymore. Since I'm not travelling it's mostly for video calls. Maybe I'll try dual booting Windows when the next Flight Simulator comes out.
It would make sense to get a new monitor to replace the iMac and just use the laptop, but I'm reluctant.
I also just ordered a iPad Mini since I'm tired of using a tablet that loses Tildes drafts when I switch tabs in Chrome.
Also, for electronics projects, a few spare microcontrollers sitting in an electronic parts organizer that are faster and have more memory than a lot of computers I've owned. They won't run Linux or drive a screen, though.
My computer right now is a MacBook Pro:
However, I've been designing a Small Form Factor PC case, so I can build a small, aesthetic gaming PC in order to run windows when Apple Switches to their ARM chips.
http://www.winterdesign.co if anyone's curious :)
Not to sidetrack, but the case looks fantastic. Maybe I missed it in the description, what motherboard size is this case limited to?
ITX or Mini DTX, if you're willing to lose the bottom radiator.
Hmm, well let us know when it’s on Kickstarter (if that’s allowed here). I’ll back the project if it’s not outrageously expensive.
Thank you, will do! :)
I do have two! A 2013 13" Macbook Pro. It has 8GB DDR3 RAM, a 256GB SSD and a dual core Intel Core i5 (2.4GHz). The display has a resolution of 2560x1600, currently running macOS 10.15.whatever
And then I have my Windows gaming rig. I originally built it in 2012 using a Nvidia GTX560 (I don't remember which manufacturer though), 8GB DDR3 RAM, an Intel Core i5-3550 (quad core @3.3GHz), and a 512GB SSD (I think one of the Samsung EVO ones, but not sure).
I have since upgraded the CPU to a i7-3770, a (MSI I think) GTX1070, a 1TB Samsung 840EVO SSD (which I essentially got for free) and 8 more GB of RAM.
Attached is a 1080p 60Hz Monitor as secondary, and a 2160p 60Hz Monitor as my primary one.
I'm currently waiting for AMD and Nvidia to announce their next generation of GPUs, as the 4K Monitor and VR Headset are pushing my 1070 to its limits and even ligter, non-AAA games are beginning to struggle. I'll also likely completely rebuild it using AMDs Zen3 offering once that comes out, keeping not much besides the GPU, SSD, and maybe PSU.
As for usage, gaming and watching Netflix is done on the big boy, developing with a few minor exceptions on the Macbook. Browsing the web depends, if the desktop is turned on and I'm sitting in front of it I'll use it, if not I'll use the Macbook.
Here's my desktop:
Most of it is pretty old, but I did upgrade some parts along the way. It's pretty amazing how fast it still is with a CPU from 2012. For gaming however, it's long past its prime. I can barely play Modern Warfare (2019) at 1080p with 60fps, on the lowest settings. Most older games do just fine though, with some graphics tweaks. I aim to upgrade it when AMD and Nvidia release their next CPU/GPU cycles.
What I hope to upgrade to:
Future upgrades:
I'm on a late 2013 15" macbook pro for most of my stuff. When I'm out on the town I have a Toshiba Chromebook 2 with Gallium (Kubuntu / 18.04) -- it works well... and if someone steals it, I don't really care.
I've got a 1440p monitor as my main. I used to be all dual monitor, but I just don't need it, for the most part.
I use a notebook now, but plug in an external monitor keyboard and mouse when i'm in my home city on weekends.
I'm from Brazil too. I'm glad I bought this before the dollar skyrocketed and hardware became super expensive. Got this on a sale for only R$1800.
It's rare a laptop with IPS Full HD screen this cheap so I lucked out.
Could do without the Geforce to be honest since I don't care about games and would prefer more battery life and being able to switch from Xorg to Wayland.
I currently only have a laptop, an Acer that I received as a much-needed upgrade from my previous laptop which I had for 4.5 years. As a result there isn't too much attention paid to specs, but they're not bad:
I have a wireless mouse, strongly recommended, so the only cable is the charger (and currently an Ethernet cable). I don't like to move the cables around if I can avoid it simply because arranging cables on a desk is fiddly. I'd like to build a desktop some day in the far future when I have the means :)
I have 2 machines.
Laptop :
Model : Acer Aspire 3 A315-42
CPU : Ryzen 5 3500u
GPU : Vega 8
RAM : 8GB DDR4 (6GB available because of the iGPU)
STORAGE : It's some Hynix 250GB NVMe
Screen : Some really bad 1080p TN panel
The screen is more of a problem than I actually would've thought and I was hoping to use it for school when I bought it earlier this year but then everything went to shit so sadly never really came to much use.
Desktop :
CPU : Ryzen 5 2600
GPU : RX 580 4GB
RAM : 16GB DDR4 3200MHz
STORAGE : 480GB Kingston SSD + 750GB HDD
Screen : BenQ 1080p IPS screen
This beast makes me quite happy. I used to be running on a modified hand me down and it was passable but this is a really big improvement comparing to the days below 1080p with a C2Q Q6600. The extra horse power will probably come into use outside of gaming when I'll most likely need to make a Windows VM for school although maybe that won't be needed, we'll see.
It's worse than I'd wish but it's not that bad.
Both run Fedora Silverblue 32 only. I'll probably be using Fedora Silverblue 33, tried yesterday but it was broken.
My main PC is a gaming machine with an i5, 16GB RAM, GTX 1070 that I built a few years ago. It's running Windows 10 at the moment but I intend to reformat and put Debian on it when I get a weekend free.
Lately I've been thinking about buying a Raspberry Pi 4 to use to work from home to cut down on electricity waste.
My laptop is a 13 inch 2017 Macbook Pro
-Intel core i5 CPU
-8 gb of RAM
-Integrated graphics
-512 GB of storage
My desktop is a custom built PC
-Ryzen 5 2600 CPU
-Asus GTX 1660 Super GPU
-16 GB of RAM
-512 GB SSD (storage)
-OS is Windows 10 Home
My monitor has a 2560 x 1440 resolution, its the Dell UltraSharp U2717D.
I have a late-2012 iMac 27". Baseline specs aside from being upgraded to 24 GB of RAM and a 1.1 TB fusion drive consisting of 1TB SSD + 128 GB SSD. I had to open it up about a month ago to upgrade the previously-rotary HDD part of the fusion drive due to drive failure.
It's still an extremely capable machine, very fast even with ~100-200 Firefox tabs open and sometimes 1-2 VMs. Despite this, it is now considered obsolete by Apple and will not be supported by macOS 11 Big Sur. :(
The home desktop is an Intel NUC i7, 16GB RAM, and an M.3 drive. It's using a USB-C adapter to connect to two 24" 1920x1080 screens. Basic dell USB keyboard and mouse with a Dell sound bar and a Logitech camera on top. It runs Linux Mint, whatever's latest these days.
I don't do a lot of gaming anymore (life got in the way), so the video/GPU doesn't matter much. It does coding, virtual machines, networking, running services as needed. I've been really happy with the setup overall.
I have a MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2012):
I use it mostly in my desk with (cheap) cabled keyboard and mouse (I don't want to deal with disposable batteries). So far my experience with cheap mice has been great but finding a good cheap keyboard has proven harder. I'm now on my 3rd keyboard. The typing feel on this one is very good but the device is too light and doesn't have rubber "feet". So I had to improvise and kind of glue it to the desk lol. If anyone has a suggestion for a keyboard with good price/quality relationship, please let me now.
Anyway, I have the cables nitly (for my standards) arranged in my desk and it's easy to move the laptop if I need to. I kind of built a stand for it with books so that it sits at an ergonomical height.
When I'm working I usually connect the laptop to my 1080p TV for the extra screen real estate.
The computer's specs are mostly fine for me. I don't game and I like that I can take it to a cafe and work there for hours without needing the charging cable.
What I sort of dislike about it:
In the future I will probably buy a refurbished Thinkpad and install Linux on it.
Since I'm in a writing mood I'll also talk about my phone. Its a 2013 Samsung Galaxy S4. I installed LineageOS4MicroG on it which is a modified (google-free) version of Android 10. I bought the phone for less than 50$ and also bought a new battery (removable batteries for the win) for less than 10$.
The battery life could be a bit better (as in more comfortable) and the GPS doesn't work. The latter is a software bug that is an open issue in the OS's repository. at this point I barely need GPS, but having it would make the phone even better. Like a digital swiss-knife.
Finally, as you can probably tell I'm a value oriented person. If you guys have any comments on how to keep your setups cheap but quite good, please let me know. I like to learn how to get more out of the same resources/money.