site banner
PaperclipPerfector  7mo ago (text post)   2599 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 17, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

1
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I'm in need of a new laptop, any recommendations?

I use mine for officework, schoolwork, watching movies/TV, websurfing, and the occasional teleconference. I'll almost certainly wipe the OS and install Mint instead, and I don't really want to be a part of the Apple ecosystem.

If you mean literally new, I couldn't suggest anything with a price tag that doesn't shock the conscience, and that's mostly out of my wheelhouse anyway. But none of the tasks you've listed have appreciable performance requirements other than perhaps hardware accelerated AV1 decoding.

So what you can do is find a used Dell/HP/Lenovo business (not consumer!) laptop with an i5-1135g7 (barely slower than the i7 and considerably cheaper) and at least one user-replaceable RAM slot, such as this Thinkpad, and upgrade the RAM to 16 GiB. I think^1 you should be able to drop in a single 8 GiB SO-DIMM to get dual channel. The i5 was usually paired with only 8 GiB which is too little unless you have extremely minimalist browser tab hygiene, and also OEMs have an unfortunate habit of leaving 1 memory channel unpopulated, which halves your memory bandwidth. But buying laptop RAM on the open market is way cheaper than the price difference between i5 and i7 models.

  1. Just linked for the documentation. Buying RAM 1st party is pointless and expensive. Probably should go 1st party for batteries, though.

Probably should go 1st party for batteries, though

I'm almost certain this is the proximate cause of me needing a new laptop. Lesson learned.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats