4 ms·

The ATX standard is the reason why no one bothers buying desktop computers any more except extremists and gamers. These computers are way too large and ineffic

The ATX standard is the reason why no one bothers buying desktop computers any more except extremists and gamers. These computers are way too large and inefficient and ridiculously noisy too, because they aren't properly engineered for sound and ventilation (because they're held back by the 90s-era ATX standard). Everyone's just given up on it altogether and now they use laptops, or worse, tablets. Even corporate desktops abandoned ATX ages ago and went to proprietary SFF cases.

logfromblammo 10y ago
I am moving from a laptop as my at-home computer to a quiet-build mini-ITX system literally this week, after the last parts arrive from Newegg. I think the ongoing market fragmentation resulting from the incompatible proprietary laptop form factors is pushing the whole industry towards consolidation and mergers, and will result in less consumer choice in the long run. I have been privately railing against this crap ever since Dell started shipping not-ATX-but-looks-like-it-at-first-glance power supplies in late 1990s. And Apple has always almost gratuitously used proprietary connectors and form factors, even when a perfectly usable standard already existed. They can all go to a Hell where nothing can interoperate without at least two adapters, and you never have both. I was driven to the custom build when the headphone jack on my laptop broke. I opened up the case and desoldered the broken one, and the microphone jack, and resoldered the unbroken jack into the headphone jack's place. That worked for a while. Then the laptop keyboard stopped responding to about 5 keys--all of them rather indispensable for typing words. So I replaced the keyboard, and the replacement is just a millimeter too small, so it constantly pops out of its recess whenever it shifts and the plastic clips disengage. Then the headphone-jack-formerly-microphone-jack broke like its predecessor. I already knew the component itself was impossible to find to replace it, so I looked to replace the motherboard. That would cost more than a newer, more capable laptop, if the part had even been in stock. So I'm building a system such that if anything breaks, I can just replace that one part. I can't get decent repairability without building it myself, and I can't build it myself if there aren't any rassafrassin' standards! I would have built my own clamshell computer (not even necessarily a "laptop"), but no one mass-produces an empty clamshell case for consumer sales, because there is no laptop-standard form factor. Replacement parts for laptops are always expensive, and frequently out of stock.
- Grishnakh 10y ago
  I did something of the opposite: I used to have a big desktop. I got a laptop later so I could do stuff at coffee shops and elsewhere. But I eventually got tired of the size and noise of the desktop (even though it was loaded with big, slow 120mm fans), and of the syncing issues with the laptop. I had wanted to build a quiet miniITX system, but finally gave up on that idea because of everything I've seen with "standard" ATX and ITX cases: they just are not engineered for quietness. The best you can do is go to water cooling, and I find it ridiculous that I'd have to go to those lengths for some quiet. So instead I've just gone the laptop route. I can buy a Dell enterprise-level Latitude laptop on Ebay for $150 easily, that's only a few years old, and it's portable and quiet and reliable. It even comes with a magnesium chassis. And if it breaks, I can buy a new one for $150 and resell the old broken one on Ebay to someone who wants the parts. These laptops are extremely ubiquitous (because they're used by so many businesses), so the parts are readily available if I want to just repair it, plus they're built to be fairly easily serviced (the older E6400 and E6410 had only one screw on the back panel). If you were buying consumer laptops, that was your problem: those things are crap and not made for easy servicing. You complain about "if the part had even been in stock": on my Dells, I can easily buy any part I want on Ebay: a new screen, a new motherboard, a new keyboard, a bare back panel, a speaker grill, anything. Everything is in stock. You don't need to build a laptop yourself to get decent repairability; you just need to get a decent laptop and not a consumer-grade POS. Then, so I can have a nice workstation, I got a docking station that supports dual DVI/DisplapyPort monitors, USB3, etc. These docking stations are standardized for Dell business laptops, so I can plug a huge range of them into it.

logfromblammo 10y ago

I am moving from a laptop as my at-home computer to a quiet-build mini-ITX system literally this week, after the last parts arrive from Newegg. I think the ongoing market fragmentation resulting from the incompatible proprietary laptop form factors is pushing the whole industry towards consolidation and mergers, and will result in less consumer choice in the long run. I have been privately railing against this crap ever since Dell started shipping not-ATX-but-looks-like-it-at-first-glance power supplies in late 1990s. And Apple has always almost gratuitously used proprietary connectors and form factors, even when a perfectly usable standard already existed. They can all go to a Hell where nothing can interoperate without at least two adapters, and you never have both. I was driven to the custom build when the headphone jack on my laptop broke. I opened up the case and desoldered the broken one, and the microphone jack, and resoldered the unbroken jack into the headphone jack's place. That worked for a while. Then the laptop keyboard stopped responding to about 5 keys--all of them rather indispensable for typing words. So I replaced the keyboard, and the replacement is just a millimeter too small, so it constantly pops out of its recess whenever it shifts and the plastic clips disengage. Then the headphone-jack-formerly-microphone-jack broke like its predecessor. I already knew the component itself was impossible to find to replace it, so I looked to replace the motherboard. That would cost more than a newer, more capable laptop, if the part had even been in stock. So I'm building a system such that if anything breaks, I can just replace that one part. I can't get decent repairability without building it myself, and I can't build it myself if there aren't any rassafrassin' standards! I would have built my own clamshell computer (not even necessarily a "laptop"), but no one mass-produces an empty clamshell case for consumer sales, because there is no laptop-standard form factor. Replacement parts for laptops are always expensive, and frequently out of stock.

Grishnakh 10y ago
I did something of the opposite: I used to have a big desktop. I got a laptop later so I could do stuff at coffee shops and elsewhere. But I eventually got tired of the size and noise of the desktop (even though it was loaded with big, slow 120mm fans), and of the syncing issues with the laptop. I had wanted to build a quiet miniITX system, but finally gave up on that idea because of everything I've seen with "standard" ATX and ITX cases: they just are not engineered for quietness. The best you can do is go to water cooling, and I find it ridiculous that I'd have to go to those lengths for some quiet. So instead I've just gone the laptop route. I can buy a Dell enterprise-level Latitude laptop on Ebay for $150 easily, that's only a few years old, and it's portable and quiet and reliable. It even comes with a magnesium chassis. And if it breaks, I can buy a new one for $150 and resell the old broken one on Ebay to someone who wants the parts. These laptops are extremely ubiquitous (because they're used by so many businesses), so the parts are readily available if I want to just repair it, plus they're built to be fairly easily serviced (the older E6400 and E6410 had only one screw on the back panel). If you were buying consumer laptops, that was your problem: those things are crap and not made for easy servicing. You complain about "if the part had even been in stock": on my Dells, I can easily buy any part I want on Ebay: a new screen, a new motherboard, a new keyboard, a bare back panel, a speaker grill, anything. Everything is in stock. You don't need to build a laptop yourself to get decent repairability; you just need to get a decent laptop and not a consumer-grade POS. Then, so I can have a nice workstation, I got a docking station that supports dual DVI/DisplapyPort monitors, USB3, etc. These docking stations are standardized for Dell business laptops, so I can plug a huge range of them into it.