@Gargron I still use a MacBook from 2013, replaced the battery and power cable but otherwise still perfectly fine.

@Gargron pcpartpicker.com

@Gargron
Mine is from 05/2014 and still up and running well ! :)

@Gargron You should see some of the Green Ham Gaming videos, with some simple upgrades (mainly GPU and RAM), older desktops are really worth their bang-for-buck - even if the Coronavirus has slightly messed up pricing of them!

My favourite is "The Incredible i5 Dell"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-GxfU9Yem0

I only updated my desktop this year, because I tried to buy a desktop as a server and they couldn't fulfil the order. I'm planning on keeping my current one for at least six years.

I'm still using a MacBook from 2012 but I did upgrade the SSD at one point. Though now that AMD Zen3 is a thing, I'm thinking that maybe I want to build a ridiculously powerful hackintosh.

@Gargron Gotta second the pcpartpicker.com recommendations. I hadn't built a PC in decades, but they helped me put together a decent mid-tier gaming rig.

I saved about 30% on the price of a pre-built, and they ensure all the parts you get are compatible. Had it up and running in just one day, with minimal instructions. The result is performant.

There's also a lot to be said for sticking with current hardware as long as you can, though. Moore's Law is dead.

@Gargron Go for it ... start just-right and work up from there. (Don't make your first a top-spec box, have fun with cheap and easy midrange while you work out what your doing:)

@Gargron unless its gaming, most people could use a 5 year old computer as a daily driver perfectly fine. Not to mention mobile and tablet devices are almost just as powerful.

@Gargron I have a computer from 2010-2011 that still works fine, even on some newer games. I'd love to build one myself too. Perhaps next year will be the year?

@Gargron Cloning an SSD onto a larger SSD should be fairly simple - I do it all the time, on Ubuntu and Windows systems. Can just "ddrescue" and then expand partition sizes, etc.

Looks like expanding LVM and XFS is also simple.

I would just get a cheap SSD from Microcenter, for example, along with a suitable USB adapter, and Jump to a larger disk.

cheers

@Gargron I’ve done it once. It was interesting and fun. I built a Hackintosh. I knew if I couldn’t get the MacOS to work I could still install Linux or Windows. I did have it running MacOS for a few years. Just wiped it and installed Linux on it. Turned it into a Plex server.

@Gargron I built a sweet system back in 2009, till a few weeks ago it stopped. I narrowed it down to something obscure in Windows not identifying any devices properly.

I backed up, partition-wiped, and reinstalled Windows - both 64 bit and 32 bit - still the same issue.

Out of desperation I booted off a flash drive running Ubuntu, and I'll be fucking damned if it didn't see everything correctly.

So now my workstation (i7-920/24GB/4TB) runs Linux full time!

@Gargron i3-4160 and 730 geforce

@Gargron I'm using this computer I built from parts in 2016. i5 rather than i7, but still no performance issue. 16GB RAM, a small 128GB SSD for / (currently only 13.7GB used), and a 1TB spinning disk for /home, as well as swap and /var (to limit SSD wear from swap and logging). Just the mainboard integrated intel graphics card.

https://steinar.bang.priv.no/2016/02/06/debian-jessie-on-intel-skylake/

@Gargron SSDs, especially SATA models, have dropped in price a ton in the past 5 years. It sounds like it would be worthwhile to upgrade 👍️