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Windows 10 vs. Ubuntu Linux Performance On A $199 AMD Ryzen Laptop
This $210 AMD Ryzen laptop may well be the best-value business notebook ever
Motile 14" Laptop: Ryzen 3, 1080p, 4GB RAM, 128GB SSD ($199)
Motile 14" Laptop: AMD Ryzen 5, 14" 1080p, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD ($299)
MOTILE 14 Review $299 RYZEN 5 3500U Performance Laptop Amazing Value! (10m40s video)
$299 MOTILE 14" Performance Laptop Emulation Test - RYZEN 5 3500U (11m50s video)
External GPU On A $300 Walmart Laptop! MOTILE 14 + Radeon RX590 (10m52s video) (lol)
These $200-$300 laptops have a stellar reputation compared to the $80 landfill-tier EVOO 10.1 tablet that Walmart is associated with.
The main problems are probably single-channel RAM (although at least it can be upgraded), apparently a crappy Wi-Fi card, no USB-C charging, and they are Zen+. It's possible that Zen 2 "Renoir" could allow 4 or 6 cores in place of what is currently 2 or 4 cores, although it would take a while for prices to drop down to these levels.
Personally, I might take a break from laptops and try building a small form factor PC using Zen 4 (AM5 socket), which may be released in 2021. AM5 should support "mainstream" CPUs with at least 24 cores, possibly 32 cores.
Also, @krishnoid, Lenovo 100e is at $99.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday February 05 2020, @09:28AM (21 children)
Having used 2/4/8 GB machines in the last year for browsing, I don't think most people need that much. It's probably not a catastrophe if some infrequently used tabs have to reload. A solution could be to siphon some of that browsing off your "work" system if possible (I don't know what you're doing with Firefox). Have 2-3 computers nearby. One can do real work with 32+ RAM, another one or two can do non-essential browsing and video streaming.
It would be nice to have the ability to just add 32 GB or 64 GB of RAM into any laptop. ~$100 for 32 GB is not an unreasonable upgrade for any tier IMO. The problem is that many systems are including soldered RAM with no DIMM slots, only 1 DIMM slot, low limits (sometimes 8 GB), or making it extremely hard to access the DIMM slots. We could blame these trends on Intel influencing the course of the industry with its Ultrabook initiative, but it was probably inevitable.
If you don't have a problem finding a display, or can carry a portable display [anandtech.com], carrying a flat SFF/NUC could be better. Two 2 DIMM or SO-DIMM slots capable of taking up to 64 GB should be possible.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Mojibake Tengu on Wednesday February 05 2020, @11:13AM (20 children)
Lol. I have 19 total powered on, running or dormant computers currently in my kitchen&bedroom just now, 6 monitors and 4 displays. I am used to that scale for decades. One good machine per critical task. Some of them racked. Two iPads just for video/music streaming, for not to clutter the desktop. Every bank I ever touch accounts in has its own dedicated banking laptop webterminal.
What I commented is, the typical web browsing today requires lot of RAM, because of poor software architecture and graphics usage. Those tiny laptops are no good for that. Platforms perfect as routers or industrial, but not for common users.
More, you cannot compile full desktop Gentoo with KDE or LibreOffice on a 4G RAM machine, I did just that for years and it is demonstrably unsustainable. Those 4G RAM toys are unusable for upcoming C++2.0 compilers too. People who buy those now will suffer soon, badly. Many phones have more RAM these days. I have a pile of such cute small (2-4G) toys too (EEEPC's, Lenovo tablets, old HPs), but keeping them cold or experimental only with slim systems like netbsd, for a reason. Even my last robot construction (N4200) has maxed 8G RAM for just processing herself, and I consider it insufficient for practical purposes.
The edge of 太玄 cannot be defined, for it is beyond every aspect of design
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday February 05 2020, @02:49PM (11 children)
Ok, fine, you've got your RAM situation figured out.
But wait.
"Herself"? How sophisticated is your sex robot, R2Deep4U? Or is it a tank... Girls und Panzer?
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Informative) by Mojibake Tengu on Wednesday February 05 2020, @04:12PM
She is a tank, a design v2. A T'REX chassis from DAGU, metal tracks.[1] A Gigabyte GB-EAPD-4200 industrial IoT box[2] fits exactly into that chassis by its length on chassis width. That's why I grabbed it. The CPU is a katastrophé, though.
But the explanation you ask for is this:
Nearly all of my machines have girly hostnames, that's my contribution to the world gender situation.
Sophia, Asteria, Lyssa, Dione, Melinoe, Thalassa, Arsinoe, Kleone, ... mostly nymphs, fairies, goddesses. [3]
Some are a bit dangerous, like Hydra or Lamia. I you meet Lamia, you are already pwned.
But you will probably never interact with most of them, since they live on IPv6 only mostly, and are properly veiled.
However, the tank is Echidna. Echidna is not a nymph. She's a war dragon... A tribute to Warzone2100, if you remember that one.
[1] I never buy from Amazon but that's good reference https://www.amazon.com/Dagu-TRex-Metal-Tank-Chassis/dp/B00R5C7I5G [amazon.com]
[2] https://www.gigabyte.com/Mini-PcBarebone/GB-EAPD-4200-rev-10 [gigabyte.com]
[3] https://www.theoi.com/greek-mythology/nymphs.html [theoi.com]
The edge of 太玄 cannot be defined, for it is beyond every aspect of design
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday February 05 2020, @04:59PM (9 children)
Careful, now. You wouldn't want to offend Keith Laumer, or certain members of his Dinochrome Brigade.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday February 06 2020, @01:57AM (8 children)
I have no idea what either you or the GP are talking about.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 3, Touché) by Runaway1956 on Thursday February 06 2020, @02:20AM (5 children)
I'm very much accustomed to that fact of life by now. Nice that you admit it for once.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Laumer [wikipedia.org]
Tanks and tanker crews figure in a lot of futuristic stories. Laumer put women into tanks, and he made some tank AI's feminine. Laumer was an Air Force kind of guy, and that comes through in his writings. The Dinochrome Brigade should have been the Dinochrome Corps, TBH. David Drake does a better job of portraying tanks and tankers, but Laumer stands alone with his exploration of AI in war machines. Others have emulated him, but he still stands alone. 'Big Boys Don't Cry' by Tom Kratman is probably the most worthy attempt to go where Laumer went.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday February 06 2020, @02:29AM (4 children)
...you masturbate to some odd material. Just sayin'.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Troll) by Runaway1956 on Thursday February 06 2020, @02:38AM (3 children)
You, calling me odd? Irony at it's finest. You are the poster child for dysfunction, after all. The world watches, as you explore the world of pharmaceuticals.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday February 06 2020, @02:59AM (2 children)
I don't even drink alcohol, you stupid motherfucker. That's *why* I make a good pharmacy tech, because I'm a straight-edge lifestyler and have a healthy respect that borders on fear for these chemicals.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Troll) by Runaway1956 on Thursday February 06 2020, @04:48AM (1 child)
The hate again. It just bleeds through, no matter the topic of discussion. Or, is "stupid motherfucker" a term of endearment among you and your kind?
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday February 06 2020, @04:54AM
Stop fighting, you two.
Be consummate consoomers.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Monday February 10 2020, @12:24PM (1 child)
I would recommend starting with one of his Bolo short stories. "The Last Command."
It's available free online.
The Last Command" [freedoors.org]
No problem is insoluble, but at Ksp = 2.943×10−25 Mercury Sulphide comes close.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Tuesday February 11 2020, @12:42AM
Thanks for that link. Good, if somewhat predictable story. The editor's afterword is interesting.
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Wednesday February 05 2020, @05:58PM (7 children)
Get rid of the ads and then you can browse with 1GB easily.
(Score: 2) by Mojibake Tengu on Wednesday February 05 2020, @06:55PM (6 children)
Hardly. I am totally ad-less (adblock and privacy badger) and my Firefox is over the 12G just now. Almost 900M is just a Xorg. I would not call that can browse with 1G easily.
The edge of 太玄 cannot be defined, for it is beyond every aspect of design
(Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Thursday February 06 2020, @04:22AM (5 children)
SoylentNews is social media. Says so right in the slogan. Soylentnews is people, not tech.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday February 06 2020, @05:00AM (4 children)
I can do 60 tabs on a single 4 GB device.
1 tab per 1 device? Well, it's a valid lifestyle choice.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Thursday February 06 2020, @01:25PM
SoylentNews is social media. Says so right in the slogan. Soylentnews is people, not tech.
(Score: 1) by pTamok on Thursday February 06 2020, @09:18PM (2 children)
Hmm. On my 8 Gigabyte RAM laptop, I find I need to save my tabs and restart Firefox after a while when I get to around 550 (yes, five hundred and fifty) tabs. Its an AMD A10 processor, so not exactly up to the minute. With that number of tabs open my cpu is bumping along between 1 and 5% and RAM usage about 30-40%.
I use uMatrix and uBlock origin.
It probably has to do with me tending not to stream videos or audio.
It works for me. Obviously, other people have different use-cases and usage profiles. I remember Jerry Pournelle saying you should have one cpu per task, and if cpus are cheap and efficient enough, and similarly inter-system communication, I'd agree with him: but my real-life experience is that the Linux scheduler works well.
Note, I just reset my phone's (Sailfish) browser having got to roughly 550 tabs on that too.
This probably says more about my browsing habits than the hardware's capabilities.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday February 06 2020, @10:25PM (1 child)
IMO, beyond the 60-100 tab range, you have a lot of tab clutter, and maybe multiple browser windows open. You might forget some news story that you have open that you wanted to submit, for example. Maybe it works for you but for me that is the danger zone. Currently I have 23 (on a 4 GB system) + 25 (8 GB) + 105 (4 GB) tabs open.
Also, I would question whether these 550 tabs are really in memory. I think 20-25 MB per tab is a typical average, maybe less than 5 MB for static content but jumping to 100 MB or more if there is heavy multimedia content, scripts, or whatever. And then memory usage can slowly creep up if some scripts are left running (a default behavior of most script blockers is to allow scripts on the domain, only blocking third-party and blacklisted domains by default).
So if you click on an old tab or use the keyboard command to cycle through them, do some of them reload? Less of it is stored in memory in that case (favicon, title, URL, and page offsets are probably the bare minimum, maybe a snapshot of the DOM?).
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by pTamok on Thursday February 06 2020, @11:15PM
I have lots of tab cruft, but am strictly a two windows person: one general browsing, and one private browsing.
As for the tabs, you are almost certainly correct about reloading (I just checked, and yes), but for me, that's no big deal. I can wait for a couple of beats if I switch to a really old tab.
I am cruel to Firefox: I shut down the machine without shutting down Firefox, so on restart, FF offers to Reload/Restore/Resume, which is nice. It rarely fails these days. So, given the daily reboots, and FF resume behaviour, a lot of those tabs are probably just stubs waiting to be kicked into life and reloaded. The computer allows me to be disorganised, which is great.
Every so often I save all the tabs into a new bookmarks folder, so my bookmarks storage is huge (more than a decade's worth*). It has been a useful resource on multiple occasions, as searching the bookmarks has recovered stuff I couldn't find by regular Internet Search engines.
Anyway, letting the computer do what it is good at (keeping track of the detailed stuff) so I don't have to strikes me as a defensible approach. I do the same with email: keep everything, and use search to dig out things I need later. I have not yet found a workable approach for audio, picture, and video archives. I hope someone comes up with an AI cataloger that runs on my system that can attach accurate automatically generated metadata to such stuff, so I can search it easily using textual search tools. I have no doubt the TLAs have such things. Curating unstructured media is a hard problem.
*In principle, I could just search through the History, but the Bookmarks are easily editable and exportable, and still allow me to index stuff in a way that works for me. It's also interesting looking at the old Bookmarks to see how many sites still work or not, and 'permanent' URLs that have turned out not to be...here's an example that still works: https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/08/11/06/1549256/how-to-verify-cd-r-data-retention-over-time [slashdot.org] and another http://www.inference.org.uk/saw27/notes/backup-hard-disk-partitions.html [inference.org.uk]