4 ms·

Heat dissipation and lots of ports are why I have a desktop. I don't want that from my MacBook Air. A fan isn't necessary or desirable for a machine that is pri

Heat dissipation and lots of ports are why I have a desktop. I don't want that from my MacBook Air. A fan isn't necessary or desirable for a machine that is primarily used for web browsing, watching movies, and light gaming.

saulpw 2y ago
You know what I want for my desktop, is a battery, so my computer doesn't reboot when I lose power for 5 seconds. Yes I know about UPSes, but they're $100+ and unwieldy. I just need 30 seconds grace period to save my work! This is the main reason why I probably won't get a desktop again.
- chmod775 2y ago
  Amortized cost of a desktop is like 1/3rd that of a laptop of comparable performance. You're willing to pay thousands more because you don't want to pay for an UPS? This doesn't check out. The space argument makes more sense and from that I assume you're in a space constrained apartment. At the end of day I'm more curious what causes those intermittent power outages. Are you regularly tripping breakers?
  - saulpw 2y ago
    It happens twice a year, it goes out neighborhood-wide during a storm or an animal chewed through something. Anyway I don't know where you get that "amortized cost" number. They seem a lot closer in price than that to me.
    - Panzer04 2y ago
      Depends on the class of performance you want. I think at the low end laptops are surprisingly cost-competitive with desktops, but if you want high-end laptops either don't exist or are hilariously expensive. Also depends on the type of laptop. A desktop-replacement laptop with extremely basic frame and screen (ie. cheap and shit) can have excellent specs at a competitive price, whereas an XPS or mac with a great screen, aluminium frame etc will be very expensive relative to the specification.
      - chmod775 2y ago
        This. Additionally desktop parts last longer and can be upgraded individually. They also have good resale value, offsetting the cost of upgrades (especially true for GPUs).
        skydhash 2y ago
        True even for the mini form factor (the 1L desktop that uses laptop component). As you do not have to stay close to it, you have a great experience out of the box. I could use a chromebook for what I still use the laptop for (browsing and ssh from the sofa)
- immibis 2y ago
  Silly and dangerous idea: open up a power supply, study it thoroughly, then connect a 300 volt battery bank in parallel with the DC link capacitors.
- sdenton4 2y ago
  The UPS is a battery...
the_af 2y ago
For some of us, a laptop is essentially an easily movable desktop. It's not portable as in "I want to travel with it", it's portable as in "I can easily take it anywhere within my house/office". Those kind of "movable desktops" benefit from performance, additional ports, etc, and instead have little use for thinness or less weight. I simply cannot see myself ever owning a bulky, noisy desktop ever again.
- wtallis 2y ago
  The desktop replacement segment of the laptop market exists, but does not undermine the validity of more portable machines or make a fanless laptop a terrible idea. The viability of desktop replacement notebooks as desktop replacements is in large part due to the efficiency gains driven by the demand for the other kind of laptop—the ones that are thin and light. A 5lb+ slab of a notebook is still a pretty constrained form factor compared to the thermals and acoustics of a mini tower desktop. I can understand you characterizing desktops as bulky, but calling them noisy in comparison to desktop replacement laptops is ridiculously wrong. Small fans with restricted airflow are what makes computers noisy, and they're much easier to avoid with a desktop form factor. Your laptop cannot sustain desktop performance without getting loud, and if it doesn't get loud under sustained load it's because your laptop is choosing to instead get slow.
- skydhash 2y ago
  > it's portable as in "I can easily take it anywhere within my house/office" As I grow older, that is becoming less and less true. Unless it’s for quick tasks, I prefer my office chair, my big monitor and my comfortable keyboard. Laptop are still great, for ad-hoc computing and traveling, and I’d prefer a less power-hungry device for these.
- einpoklum 2y ago
  My argument was actually focused on "I want to travel with it". But - I travel with it to places where I need to connect to to things: A monitor in a hotel room; a USB device of a friend or host; a physical network in an institution or company or a home I'm visiting. That's what the ports are for. As for the keyboard - I absolutely need a decent keyboard to type, traveling or no.
Groxx 2y ago
I've recently started using a fanless laptop as my primary day to day device, and 100% agreed I'm never going back. I'll give up a LOT of performance for silent and long battery life, because I find waiting a second occasionally much less annoying than a fan blasting randomly, or my legs baking. SSDs have largely resolved the perceived UX latency issues that used to occur, CPUs and GPUs now are far more powerful than needed for everything but specialized stuff (compiling, encoding, stuff that intentionally maxes out the machine. Regular applications do not do this, on purpose, but they do regularly bog down on I/O). Though the screen on this thing is awful.

saulpw 2y ago

You know what I want for my desktop, is a battery, so my computer doesn't reboot when I lose power for 5 seconds. Yes I know about UPSes, but they're $100+ and unwieldy. I just need 30 seconds grace period to save my work! This is the main reason why I probably won't get a desktop again.

chmod775 2y ago
Amortized cost of a desktop is like 1/3rd that of a laptop of comparable performance. You're willing to pay thousands more because you don't want to pay for an UPS? This doesn't check out. The space argument makes more sense and from that I assume you're in a space constrained apartment. At the end of day I'm more curious what causes those intermittent power outages. Are you regularly tripping breakers?
- saulpw 2y ago
  It happens twice a year, it goes out neighborhood-wide during a storm or an animal chewed through something. Anyway I don't know where you get that "amortized cost" number. They seem a lot closer in price than that to me.
  - Panzer04 2y ago
    Depends on the class of performance you want. I think at the low end laptops are surprisingly cost-competitive with desktops, but if you want high-end laptops either don't exist or are hilariously expensive. Also depends on the type of laptop. A desktop-replacement laptop with extremely basic frame and screen (ie. cheap and shit) can have excellent specs at a competitive price, whereas an XPS or mac with a great screen, aluminium frame etc will be very expensive relative to the specification.
    - chmod775 2y ago
      This. Additionally desktop parts last longer and can be upgraded individually. They also have good resale value, offsetting the cost of upgrades (especially true for GPUs).
      - skydhash 2y ago
        True even for the mini form factor (the 1L desktop that uses laptop component). As you do not have to stay close to it, you have a great experience out of the box. I could use a chromebook for what I still use the laptop for (browsing and ssh from the sofa)
immibis 2y ago
Silly and dangerous idea: open up a power supply, study it thoroughly, then connect a 300 volt battery bank in parallel with the DC link capacitors.
sdenton4 2y ago
The UPS is a battery...

the_af 2y ago

For some of us, a laptop is essentially an easily movable desktop. It's not portable as in "I want to travel with it", it's portable as in "I can easily take it anywhere within my house/office". Those kind of "movable desktops" benefit from performance, additional ports, etc, and instead have little use for thinness or less weight. I simply cannot see myself ever owning a bulky, noisy desktop ever again.

wtallis 2y ago
The desktop replacement segment of the laptop market exists, but does not undermine the validity of more portable machines or make a fanless laptop a terrible idea. The viability of desktop replacement notebooks as desktop replacements is in large part due to the efficiency gains driven by the demand for the other kind of laptop—the ones that are thin and light. A 5lb+ slab of a notebook is still a pretty constrained form factor compared to the thermals and acoustics of a mini tower desktop. I can understand you characterizing desktops as bulky, but calling them noisy in comparison to desktop replacement laptops is ridiculously wrong. Small fans with restricted airflow are what makes computers noisy, and they're much easier to avoid with a desktop form factor. Your laptop cannot sustain desktop performance without getting loud, and if it doesn't get loud under sustained load it's because your laptop is choosing to instead get slow.
skydhash 2y ago
> it's portable as in "I can easily take it anywhere within my house/office" As I grow older, that is becoming less and less true. Unless it’s for quick tasks, I prefer my office chair, my big monitor and my comfortable keyboard. Laptop are still great, for ad-hoc computing and traveling, and I’d prefer a less power-hungry device for these.
einpoklum 2y ago
My argument was actually focused on "I want to travel with it". But - I travel with it to places where I need to connect to to things: A monitor in a hotel room; a USB device of a friend or host; a physical network in an institution or company or a home I'm visiting. That's what the ports are for. As for the keyboard - I absolutely need a decent keyboard to type, traveling or no.

Groxx 2y ago

I've recently started using a fanless laptop as my primary day to day device, and 100% agreed I'm never going back. I'll give up a LOT of performance for silent and long battery life, because I find waiting a second occasionally much less annoying than a fan blasting randomly, or my legs baking. SSDs have largely resolved the perceived UX latency issues that used to occur, CPUs and GPUs now are far more powerful than needed for everything but specialized stuff (compiling, encoding, stuff that intentionally maxes out the machine. Regular applications do not do this, on purpose, but they do regularly bog down on I/O). Though the screen on this thing is awful.