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== The article itself I wish that it went into more detail on the hardware choices that he used. I'm constantly toying with the idea of building a Linux box fo

== The article itself I wish that it went into more detail on the hardware choices that he used. I'm constantly toying with the idea of building a Linux box for dev work, but then get lost in the morass of hardware options. The high level description of his system sounds perfect (tons of RAM, fast drives, and triple monitors), but I'm not sure how to get there. == My own dilemma Every line of production code that I write is done in Linux - in a VM running on OS X. The killer app that keeps me on OS X is 1Password. It's too useful, and I haven't found a suitable Linux replacement. Any suggestions? The other "killer" is that it's extremely simple to get a great computer by pulling up the Apple Store site and clicking "buy this thing." Building my own is something I would have done a decade ago, but I've since lost track of what all of the hardware lingo means, or which companies are making decent components.

larrik 15y ago
Re: building your own: I'm sure you know that building your own desktop would let you get a vastly superior machine (in terms of raw performance) than buying an Apple. What you may not know, being out of the game for so long, is how much EASIER it is now. I don't build machines that often (maybe 4 in the last 5 years?), but when I do, I do some research, buy the parts, and then put them together. Then it works! In the 90's and early 2000 years, this process was a real hassle. Sometimes you run into weird issues (especially with weird on-board video configurations), but I've never had them bad enough to make the process longer than a weekend day. (In the 90's it could take a week or more). Is it easier than buying a Mac off the internet? No. You may easily make up your cost in time with your newfound productivity, though. (Or you can just install Linux on your Mac directly, instead of a VM).
- jdludlow 15y ago
  It's mainly the inertia of not knowing where to begin. It's good to know that the process is easier now though. At the risk of descending into total newbie-land, when you say "do some research" where do you start with that? Has the state of things really moved to the point where I can find a highly rated ATX motherboard, a power supply that won't catch fire, and start plugging in components? My general approach would be to read reviews to find potential compatibility issues, stick with good performance but not bleeding edge, and to stay away from anything in the bargain basement. (To everyone else who is replying about the 1Password replacement, +1 to all. Thanks. I'll check out those suggestions.)
  - angrycoder 15y ago
    Tom's Hardware does regular roundup articles for building gaming PCs in a certain price bracket. I use those as a starting point. I've always built my own systems and in the past couple of years it really has become just plug and play. If you are looking to build a linux box the only caveat is that nvidia and intel video cards are generally better supported. http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i5-overclock-performance-gaming,3097.html http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i5-overclock-perfor... http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/fx-overclock-crossfire-ssd,3098.html http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/fx-overclock-crossfire-s...
  - larrik 15y ago
    Personally, I have my list of trusted brands for each component (which are likely out of date, but whatever). I also poke around Newegg's reviews. As a general rule, I tend to prefer older high-end components over newer mid-range components. That usually gives you better bang for your buck (since "older" in computer hardware is often a single year). I never skimp on my power supply. A bad power supply can ruin your whole computer, and a flaky power supply can make it LOOK like another component is bad. Also, I buy the CPU/fan retail box combos, since custom fans invalidate your CPU warranty, and the boxed version has the thermal grease already done for you. This means you throw out overclocking, but you probably didn't want that anyway. I think the other guides angrycoder and kylek are likely to be more help than I am, though.
    - georgemcbay 15y ago
      "This means you throw out overclocking" Not necessarily. You can get surprisingly good overclocking results on most Intel chips even using the stock heat-sink/fan these days (and it has been this way for a while, at least since the Core 2 Duo days and even the generation prior to those). But yeah, for someone who isn't even sure he wants to build his own rig and who won't be using the machine primarily for gaming the overclocking can be skipped without much real world loss.
  - smacktoward 15y ago
    Ars Technica runs a guide every few months with their recommended components to build a desktop PC at a few different price/power levels. Here's their most recent one, from last December: http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/guides/2011/12/ars-technica-system-guide-december-2011.ars http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/guides/2011/12/ars-technica-s... Their advice is generally really good, so even if you don't end up buying the exact components they recommend, it's useful for establishing a baseline of what a good custom PC at a given point in time for a given amount of money looks like. As to compatibility issues, if you mean "compatibility with Linux," those sorts of problems are much less common today than they used to be, at least for desktop PCs. Laptops still require some picky shopping if you're planning to run Linux on them (thanks to things like proprietary drivers for wireless radios, grumble grumble), but compatibility with desktop parts is pretty robust.
- kylek 15y ago
  This guide has saved me countless hours (people are always asking me which parts to buy). Price ranges/etc included, and it's updated fairly often... http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/af150/The_FalconO6/CurrentLogicalPCBuyingGuide/Guide.png http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/af150/The_FalconO6/Curre...
gtaylor 15y ago
LastPass, works on Mac, Windows, and Linux.
dpeck 15y ago
Re: dilemma Have you tried keepass (http://keepass.info/ http://keepass.info/)? Certainly not as pretty as 1Password, but seems to be just as usable.
jacobr 15y ago
Keepass could be a decent replacement for 1Password, though I've never used the latter.
bryanlarsen 15y ago
I use KeepassX on Linux. I'm not sure if it's missing features that 1Password has, but it works great for me. For hardware, the Apple Store sells great laptops, but for desktops, it sucks. You can either get an underpowered mini for the price of a powerful Linux desktop or you can get an overpowered but out of date Mac Pro for the price of a small car. (OK, slight exaggeration). I highly recommend the Anandtech buyer's guides for figuring out what you want in a desktop. http://www.anandtech.com/show/5184/holiday-midrange-system-buyers-guide/4 http://www.anandtech.com/show/5184/holiday-midrange-system-b... seems like an excellent starting point. Also, don't be afraid of overclocking. You can get a LOT of extra performance for little effort on an i5-2500k or i7-2600k. My box has been stable at 4.7GHz for months, and it's speeded up my compile times immensely. It'd probably also be stable at 4.8GHz, but I bumped it down one notch just to give myself some headroom.
- jdludlow 15y ago
  I love my MBP, as it seems clearly designed to get some work done with minimal hassle. Apple's desktop choices are very frustrating. I only buy Mini's as a computer to attach to the TV. It's great for a little, quiet computer that I don't have to pay any attention to. I couldn't do much work on it though. The Mac Pro's always seem way overpriced for what you get. Thanks for the heads-up on the buyer's guide.
  - batista 15y ago
    Apple's desktop choices are very frustrating. I only buy Mini's as a computer to attach to the TV. It's great for a little, quiet computer that I don't have to pay any attention to. I couldn't do much work on it though. Really? Why? What'd you be missing exactly?
- mise 15y ago
  Did you manage to get KeepassX to integrate with your browser to auto-fill forms? I've switched to LasPass recently, but I'm still getting used to its browser-based management of passwords.
  - 15y ago
obtu 15y ago
On hardware: The segmentation of platforms makes the search space a bit complicated, but you can start from a list of prebuilt configurations (anandtech was mentioned), pick the one closest to your requirements, and swap/add/remove/adjust components a bit according to current functionality and price.
pwelch 15y ago
Another vote for KeepassX. Use it on both Mac and Linux (and the Windows version when I need to at work.) It's a great program.
yock 15y ago
Yeah, you could buy a Mac and be happy. I just bought a System76, and while the jury is still out they came highly reviewed and first impressions with the machine are positive. You do have options other than "build" and "buy a Mac."
jonursenbach 15y ago
I'm a LastPass fan myself. https://lastpass.com/ https://lastpass.com/ Works on every platform imaginable. And it does so flawlessly.
dkarl 15y ago
Building my own is something I would have done a decade ago, but I've since lost track of what all of the hardware lingo means, or which companies are making decent components. Desktop hardware hasn't changed much, so if you built a system ten years ago, you'll come up to speed pretty quickly. The main pieces are the same; they just have different features, performance characteristics, and different rules for figuring out which components interoperate. If you want a complete list of parts that will work together, Ars Technica still publishes their system guides regularly. Compatibility between different parts can seem complicated, but it's simple once you figure out the rules. To be extra safe and avoid accidental incompatibilities between components that should, by spec, be compatible, I always pick components that are popular with builders (measured by the number of reviews on NewEgg) and search the web for mentions of incompatibility between them.
pagekalisedown 15y ago
My killer app is Time Machine. There's still nothing as simple anywhere else. It's a great shame.
- sneak 15y ago
  Time Machine is very poorly implemented, and is quite fragile as a result. Keep rsync backups in parallel (not of your time machine volume, those actually depend on inode numbers(!)).
sandGorgon 15y ago
Sorry for the OT - why not use something like Lastpass ? They have been honest and pre-emptive about data security in general.
silversmith 15y ago
Honest question regarding the password managers: what would you do if you had to log into one of your accounts from a machine not owned by you? Say, you are traveling. You know there's a map, or something like that in your secondary email box. Only internet connection - the hotel PC. Would you risk accessing the master keychain from there just to look up that password? I simply can not phantom not keeping all my passwords in the only 24/7 available storage - my brain. Also, don't I find myself logging into that many services on daily basis, as I often use Google/Facebook/LDAP as the access manager.
- samt 15y ago
  The KyPass iOS app (over Dropbox) works nicely.
buro9 15y ago
I have a ridiculous system at home, and after years of building everything myself I now opt for base boxes that give me 90% of what I want. What I'm using is a HP Z800. It can take 192GB RAM in 12 slots (and mine does, I started on 24GB made up of very cheap 2GB sticks and upgraded later), and I also put in 2 Intel X5560 Xeon CPUs (they were new at the time and 4-core, if I did it again I'd be tempted by the X7550 which are 8-core). The Z800 chassis is one of those zero tools systems, and best of all it is virtually silent (quiet enough that you don't hear it even when the work environment is silent). Note: This stuff costs a bomb. Topping out the RAM is expensive, but if you go for the smaller sticks in many slots you really get a lot of value for money. The CPUs can cost a bomb too. But... if you're running many virtual machines (VirtualBox and Vagrant) then you shouldn't max out RAM and neglect CPU. On motherboards, unless you're going for a server or workstation motherboard you won't get the best out of the rest of the components. You want tons of bandwidth to and from the RAM and CPU. What else? Just use it. This type of hardware is incredible, but if it's just running Facebook then buy an iPad instead. I have nothing against people spending lots and not using it, but there's something really nice about great hardware being pushed at times. It sounds like I've a very similar setup to the one in the article, the only differences would be that I haven't yet put an SSD in (though I do have a 3 HDD RAID for data), and I prefer 1 very high quality large monitor over several large monitors (I like a desk that isn't dominated by the computer).
codedivine 15y ago
For Linux buying options, I would recommend System76: a variety of systems (desktops, laptops, servers) with Ubuntu preloaded. They are a Linux-only vendor and so are serious about making sure their hardware choices are Linux compatible. Thus, you don't have to worry about compatibility issues or driver hunting etc. https://www.system76.com/ https://www.system76.com/
gabriele 15y ago
you just can use Vim with blowfish encryption [1]. that's easy, secure and portable. [1] http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Encryption http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Encryption
chrismsnz 15y ago
I use KeePass (keepass 2 which runs under mono). I use a key file and a long passphrase to encrypt the database and store the encrypted password db on dropbox which handles the syncing across all my machines and phone.
Cymen 15y ago
You're the ideal candidate for http://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc http://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc which will typically recommend something like this: * Intel i5-2500k * Crucial M4 SSD etc It is getting easier and easier to build a desktop. If you want to, it is certainly within reach.
dazzla 15y ago
As an alternative to 1Password you can try Keeper (https://keepersecurity.com/ https://keepersecurity.com/). It has Linux, Windows, OSX, iPhone/iPad, Android, Windows Phone and Blackberry clients. With sync between all of them. (I work for Keeper Security)

larrik 15y ago

Re: building your own: I'm sure you know that building your own desktop would let you get a vastly superior machine (in terms of raw performance) than buying an Apple. What you may not know, being out of the game for so long, is how much EASIER it is now. I don't build machines that often (maybe 4 in the last 5 years?), but when I do, I do some research, buy the parts, and then put them together. Then it works! In the 90's and early 2000 years, this process was a real hassle. Sometimes you run into weird issues (especially with weird on-board video configurations), but I've never had them bad enough to make the process longer than a weekend day. (In the 90's it could take a week or more). Is it easier than buying a Mac off the internet? No. You may easily make up your cost in time with your newfound productivity, though. (Or you can just install Linux on your Mac directly, instead of a VM).

jdludlow 15y ago
It's mainly the inertia of not knowing where to begin. It's good to know that the process is easier now though. At the risk of descending into total newbie-land, when you say "do some research" where do you start with that? Has the state of things really moved to the point where I can find a highly rated ATX motherboard, a power supply that won't catch fire, and start plugging in components? My general approach would be to read reviews to find potential compatibility issues, stick with good performance but not bleeding edge, and to stay away from anything in the bargain basement. (To everyone else who is replying about the 1Password replacement, +1 to all. Thanks. I'll check out those suggestions.)
- angrycoder 15y ago
  Tom's Hardware does regular roundup articles for building gaming PCs in a certain price bracket. I use those as a starting point. I've always built my own systems and in the past couple of years it really has become just plug and play. If you are looking to build a linux box the only caveat is that nvidia and intel video cards are generally better supported. http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i5-overclock-performance-gaming,3097.html http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i5-overclock-perfor... http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/fx-overclock-crossfire-ssd,3098.html http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/fx-overclock-crossfire-s...
- larrik 15y ago
  Personally, I have my list of trusted brands for each component (which are likely out of date, but whatever). I also poke around Newegg's reviews. As a general rule, I tend to prefer older high-end components over newer mid-range components. That usually gives you better bang for your buck (since "older" in computer hardware is often a single year). I never skimp on my power supply. A bad power supply can ruin your whole computer, and a flaky power supply can make it LOOK like another component is bad. Also, I buy the CPU/fan retail box combos, since custom fans invalidate your CPU warranty, and the boxed version has the thermal grease already done for you. This means you throw out overclocking, but you probably didn't want that anyway. I think the other guides angrycoder and kylek are likely to be more help than I am, though.
  - georgemcbay 15y ago
    "This means you throw out overclocking" Not necessarily. You can get surprisingly good overclocking results on most Intel chips even using the stock heat-sink/fan these days (and it has been this way for a while, at least since the Core 2 Duo days and even the generation prior to those). But yeah, for someone who isn't even sure he wants to build his own rig and who won't be using the machine primarily for gaming the overclocking can be skipped without much real world loss.
- smacktoward 15y ago
  Ars Technica runs a guide every few months with their recommended components to build a desktop PC at a few different price/power levels. Here's their most recent one, from last December: http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/guides/2011/12/ars-technica-system-guide-december-2011.ars http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/guides/2011/12/ars-technica-s... Their advice is generally really good, so even if you don't end up buying the exact components they recommend, it's useful for establishing a baseline of what a good custom PC at a given point in time for a given amount of money looks like. As to compatibility issues, if you mean "compatibility with Linux," those sorts of problems are much less common today than they used to be, at least for desktop PCs. Laptops still require some picky shopping if you're planning to run Linux on them (thanks to things like proprietary drivers for wireless radios, grumble grumble), but compatibility with desktop parts is pretty robust.
kylek 15y ago
This guide has saved me countless hours (people are always asking me which parts to buy). Price ranges/etc included, and it's updated fairly often... http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/af150/The_FalconO6/CurrentLogicalPCBuyingGuide/Guide.png http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/af150/The_FalconO6/Curre...

gtaylor 15y ago

LastPass, works on Mac, Windows, and Linux.

dpeck 15y ago

Re: dilemma Have you tried keepass (http://keepass.info/ http://keepass.info/)? Certainly not as pretty as 1Password, but seems to be just as usable.

jacobr 15y ago

Keepass could be a decent replacement for 1Password, though I've never used the latter.

bryanlarsen 15y ago

I use KeepassX on Linux. I'm not sure if it's missing features that 1Password has, but it works great for me. For hardware, the Apple Store sells great laptops, but for desktops, it sucks. You can either get an underpowered mini for the price of a powerful Linux desktop or you can get an overpowered but out of date Mac Pro for the price of a small car. (OK, slight exaggeration). I highly recommend the Anandtech buyer's guides for figuring out what you want in a desktop. http://www.anandtech.com/show/5184/holiday-midrange-system-buyers-guide/4 http://www.anandtech.com/show/5184/holiday-midrange-system-b... seems like an excellent starting point. Also, don't be afraid of overclocking. You can get a LOT of extra performance for little effort on an i5-2500k or i7-2600k. My box has been stable at 4.7GHz for months, and it's speeded up my compile times immensely. It'd probably also be stable at 4.8GHz, but I bumped it down one notch just to give myself some headroom.

jdludlow 15y ago
I love my MBP, as it seems clearly designed to get some work done with minimal hassle. Apple's desktop choices are very frustrating. I only buy Mini's as a computer to attach to the TV. It's great for a little, quiet computer that I don't have to pay any attention to. I couldn't do much work on it though. The Mac Pro's always seem way overpriced for what you get. Thanks for the heads-up on the buyer's guide.
- batista 15y ago
  Apple's desktop choices are very frustrating. I only buy Mini's as a computer to attach to the TV. It's great for a little, quiet computer that I don't have to pay any attention to. I couldn't do much work on it though. Really? Why? What'd you be missing exactly?
mise 15y ago
Did you manage to get KeepassX to integrate with your browser to auto-fill forms? I've switched to LasPass recently, but I'm still getting used to its browser-based management of passwords.
- 15y ago

obtu 15y ago

On hardware: The segmentation of platforms makes the search space a bit complicated, but you can start from a list of prebuilt configurations (anandtech was mentioned), pick the one closest to your requirements, and swap/add/remove/adjust components a bit according to current functionality and price.

pwelch 15y ago

Another vote for KeepassX. Use it on both Mac and Linux (and the Windows version when I need to at work.) It's a great program.

yock 15y ago

Yeah, you could buy a Mac and be happy. I just bought a System76, and while the jury is still out they came highly reviewed and first impressions with the machine are positive. You do have options other than "build" and "buy a Mac."

jonursenbach 15y ago

I'm a LastPass fan myself. https://lastpass.com/ https://lastpass.com/ Works on every platform imaginable. And it does so flawlessly.

dkarl 15y ago

Building my own is something I would have done a decade ago, but I've since lost track of what all of the hardware lingo means, or which companies are making decent components. Desktop hardware hasn't changed much, so if you built a system ten years ago, you'll come up to speed pretty quickly. The main pieces are the same; they just have different features, performance characteristics, and different rules for figuring out which components interoperate. If you want a complete list of parts that will work together, Ars Technica still publishes their system guides regularly. Compatibility between different parts can seem complicated, but it's simple once you figure out the rules. To be extra safe and avoid accidental incompatibilities between components that should, by spec, be compatible, I always pick components that are popular with builders (measured by the number of reviews on NewEgg) and search the web for mentions of incompatibility between them.

pagekalisedown 15y ago

My killer app is Time Machine. There's still nothing as simple anywhere else. It's a great shame.

sneak 15y ago
Time Machine is very poorly implemented, and is quite fragile as a result. Keep rsync backups in parallel (not of your time machine volume, those actually depend on inode numbers(!)).

sandGorgon 15y ago

Sorry for the OT - why not use something like Lastpass ? They have been honest and pre-emptive about data security in general.

silversmith 15y ago

Honest question regarding the password managers: what would you do if you had to log into one of your accounts from a machine not owned by you? Say, you are traveling. You know there's a map, or something like that in your secondary email box. Only internet connection - the hotel PC. Would you risk accessing the master keychain from there just to look up that password? I simply can not phantom not keeping all my passwords in the only 24/7 available storage - my brain. Also, don't I find myself logging into that many services on daily basis, as I often use Google/Facebook/LDAP as the access manager.

samt 15y ago
The KyPass iOS app (over Dropbox) works nicely.

buro9 15y ago

I have a ridiculous system at home, and after years of building everything myself I now opt for base boxes that give me 90% of what I want. What I'm using is a HP Z800. It can take 192GB RAM in 12 slots (and mine does, I started on 24GB made up of very cheap 2GB sticks and upgraded later), and I also put in 2 Intel X5560 Xeon CPUs (they were new at the time and 4-core, if I did it again I'd be tempted by the X7550 which are 8-core). The Z800 chassis is one of those zero tools systems, and best of all it is virtually silent (quiet enough that you don't hear it even when the work environment is silent). Note: This stuff costs a bomb. Topping out the RAM is expensive, but if you go for the smaller sticks in many slots you really get a lot of value for money. The CPUs can cost a bomb too. But... if you're running many virtual machines (VirtualBox and Vagrant) then you shouldn't max out RAM and neglect CPU. On motherboards, unless you're going for a server or workstation motherboard you won't get the best out of the rest of the components. You want tons of bandwidth to and from the RAM and CPU. What else? Just use it. This type of hardware is incredible, but if it's just running Facebook then buy an iPad instead. I have nothing against people spending lots and not using it, but there's something really nice about great hardware being pushed at times. It sounds like I've a very similar setup to the one in the article, the only differences would be that I haven't yet put an SSD in (though I do have a 3 HDD RAID for data), and I prefer 1 very high quality large monitor over several large monitors (I like a desk that isn't dominated by the computer).

codedivine 15y ago

For Linux buying options, I would recommend System76: a variety of systems (desktops, laptops, servers) with Ubuntu preloaded. They are a Linux-only vendor and so are serious about making sure their hardware choices are Linux compatible. Thus, you don't have to worry about compatibility issues or driver hunting etc. https://www.system76.com/ https://www.system76.com/

gabriele 15y ago

you just can use Vim with blowfish encryption [1]. that's easy, secure and portable. [1] http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Encryption http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Encryption

chrismsnz 15y ago

I use KeePass (keepass 2 which runs under mono). I use a key file and a long passphrase to encrypt the database and store the encrypted password db on dropbox which handles the syncing across all my machines and phone.

Cymen 15y ago

You're the ideal candidate for http://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc http://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc which will typically recommend something like this: * Intel i5-2500k * Crucial M4 SSD etc It is getting easier and easier to build a desktop. If you want to, it is certainly within reach.

dazzla 15y ago

As an alternative to 1Password you can try Keeper (https://keepersecurity.com/ https://keepersecurity.com/). It has Linux, Windows, OSX, iPhone/iPad, Android, Windows Phone and Blackberry clients. With sync between all of them. (I work for Keeper Security)