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I ran on a 4G machine until very recently, and from experience I know you're right. You can still run "Electron apps" by the way, just not 6 of them, and not in

by arp242 3y ago

I ran on a 4G machine until very recently, and from experience I know you're right. You can still run "Electron apps" by the way, just not 6 of them, and not in combination with 28 Firefox tabs and full HD movie in the background. I did have some problems at times, but my dev usage isn't typical. I currently have 8G and I never have any problems. But also: these machines don't ship with a Linux desktop, lightweight or otherwise. You need to judge these machines as-sold, and almost all are sold with Windows as the only option, and 4G really does seem so low I would argue it's just not fit for purpose as a general purpose device, and really shouldn't be sold as such. It's like a car that's advertised as a general-purpose car that can only drive 80km/h. Is it a perfectly functional car? Sure! But also: not really what people expect, and not really fit for purpose. It's fine to sell this if people know what they're buying, but most people don't really know what they're buying with "4G RAM". Whether that is a sorry state of affairs or not doesn't matter, it's the reality of it.

cassepipe 3y ago
Running linux mint on 4th generation i5 with 4GB RAM worked ok but 8GB was really more comfortable (as in never worry about RAM no more) and you can easily get some for cheap so it's definitely a quick easy win. But the dramatic speed difference ? HDD to SSD. That one upgrade allowed to be a dev on that old machine for three more years, until the motherboard died last year, RIP. I got almost 10 years out of that hardware with two cheap and easy upgrades. Nice. On the other hand I don't recommend hardware older that 2013 as you get in performances that are really not comfortable or capped upgrade : That one Late 2007 Intel Core 2 Duo MacBook was usable but Linux was a pain to install on, RAM was capped at 4GB and it was not comfortable performance wise. Cheaper hardware for the same era is barely usable for casual tasks. Another thing I didn't mention with the 4th generation i5 laptop is that the plastics are always the first thing that break and it's a bit of a pain to have to replace it although it's cheap. Went with Framework 12th generation now and I am definitely intending to keep 10 years too. It feels much more sturdy, it's very nice. You just need a nice physical shell with upgradeable parts imho.
InCityDreams 3y ago
>It's like a car that's advertised as a general-purpose car that can only drive 80km/h. Trying to get the analogy: it can 'only' do 80, or there are lower speeds possible and 80 is the max? I wouldn't mind a car like that...to and from work at the moment the most i need is about 45 tops.

by arp242 3y ago

cassepipe 3y ago

Running linux mint on 4th generation i5 with 4GB RAM worked ok but 8GB was really more comfortable (as in never worry about RAM no more) and you can easily get some for cheap so it's definitely a quick easy win. But the dramatic speed difference ? HDD to SSD. That one upgrade allowed to be a dev on that old machine for three more years, until the motherboard died last year, RIP. I got almost 10 years out of that hardware with two cheap and easy upgrades. Nice. On the other hand I don't recommend hardware older that 2013 as you get in performances that are really not comfortable or capped upgrade : That one Late 2007 Intel Core 2 Duo MacBook was usable but Linux was a pain to install on, RAM was capped at 4GB and it was not comfortable performance wise. Cheaper hardware for the same era is barely usable for casual tasks. Another thing I didn't mention with the 4th generation i5 laptop is that the plastics are always the first thing that break and it's a bit of a pain to have to replace it although it's cheap. Went with Framework 12th generation now and I am definitely intending to keep 10 years too. It feels much more sturdy, it's very nice. You just need a nice physical shell with upgradeable parts imho.

InCityDreams 3y ago

>It's like a car that's advertised as a general-purpose car that can only drive 80km/h. Trying to get the analogy: it can 'only' do 80, or there are lower speeds possible and 80 is the max? I wouldn't mind a car like that...to and from work at the moment the most i need is about 45 tops.