What hardware are you using?

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Picked up a Dell Optiplex 7910 tower that Im going to run both WQin7 and Win10 for older games. Recent offerings have been bad as well as expensive, so Im going to use my older game collection to play some really good classic games.

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The 7010 arrived today and was in mint condition. It runs very well with a 3rd gen i5 3.2ghz cpu, I added 16gb of ram and a 1tb sata ssd. Runs Win10,Win7 and Linux very well.

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The 7010 is about the same specs as my Thinkpad X230t. The 230 is a laptop/tablet with a mobile processor and chip set, so it is most likely a bit slower. The X230t is my knock about machine. It goes to the shop, sits on the bench. It hold lots of documentation and directions. With the touch screen and stylus it keeps notes on projects along with the directions to complete the projects and for for more general building stuff, it works well for making sketches. It is a real work horse, while at the sametime being old enough and used enough that one does not need to worry about it getting dirty, more beat-up or damaged.

I run EndlessOS on it. Endless is very very stable and there is really no maintenance involved in keeping the system going. I like the Gnome desktop because it handles work spaces so easily and it has excellent gestures. Once you bring up a project on the bench, you can flick and swipe between different applications you are working with and swipe quickly between pages in the directions. Xournal++ opens pdf files and with the stylus you can make notes right on the pdf.

Although the X230 is capable enough to easily handle the Internet. It does have a browser and email installed, but they are seldom used. Generally I will assemble the information I want and place it a folder on my NextCloud instance. Then the X230 accesses from Nextcloud, with any notes or pdf annotations I make being written back to the NextCloud folder. Then I can access the info from a machine that is not covered with shop/work gunk.

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Whats nice is I can upgrade the 7010 and the parts are dirt cheap. The i7 3770 is a very capable cpu able to run modern games very well with a decent video card. Overall I prefer the i5 3450/3470 cpus and Im runniung an older Geforce GT 740 card which is a good crossover card for older and newer needs.

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Im still amazed how much Ive been using my Chromebooks/boxs and have setup some of my older family members with them for general daily use. Being able to powerwash them, theres virtually no technical issues so once you get past the early learning curve nobody calls me with tech issues. The schools are using Chromebooks as well and its become my main portable device when Im out and about. Adding Linux support you can use a wider array of apps but in many cases the Android apps are enough for most users.

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My wife and I will be downsizing heavily in the next 5 years and I need to become more compact, smaller hardware and move away from Windows for the most part. Less money to spend so older hardware is a must ,so Im extensively experimenting with cheap mini pcs and laptops, to see what will work best. More than likely 2029 or so will be my last year for Windows, as I move to Linux mainly as well as Chrome OS possibly.

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Ive been using my Chromebox now for a week exclusively and its been fine. Ive been able to do everything I typically do except for high end gaming.

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A friend gave me a HP 11a g8 ee 11.6 inch Chromebook ,which still has support till 2029. Very light, decent keyboard and touchpad and performance is good. The screen unfortuntely is a TN panel at 1366x768 but it was as bad as I expected. For carrying around its a lot easier than my Acer 514 14 inch Chromebook. They sell the 11a on Ebay fo $44 which is cheap for a laptop that can do what most people need daily.

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Continuing to use Chrome OS only and so far so good. For mobile use its a real winner as its very secure compared to many other options. Battery life is amazing and they are also very light compared to even ultrathin laptops.

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I was offered a Acer 311 N4000 chromebook so I took it and Im presently refurbishing it and setting it up.