My Thinkpad T440p, its a reliable laptop that works amazingly. It may not be the most powerful but the keyboard is amazing and the build quality is better then any modern laptop.
Also a happy T440p owner. Nice laptop and the keyboard is great.
This. Don’t buy consumer laptops. You can get secondhand business laptops that are just as cheap and more durable. You won’t get one with a touchscreen but that’s about it for the downsides.
Never have I used a laptop and thought “boy, I wish this had a touch screen”.
Can’t miss what you don’t know. I refuse to purchase at a laptop without a touch screen.
When you don’t have a mouse it is great for quick interactions that cover a distance across the screen - interact with a button here, another over there, select a field far off from where my cursor is, screen skip, quick markup, etc. It’s also far friendlier to use when commuting or flying where there are bumps and little elbow room. It isn’t a 100% replacement for a touch pad but having it there to augment at times is such a boon.
I have a Surface 2. I only used the touchscreen when it’s in tablet mode or the dogshit type cover starts annoying the fuck out of me. I don’t miss it when I’m on my work laptop. As for moving the cursor and selecting things I just turn the cursor speed all the way up on every pc I use.
You won’t get one with a touchscreen
Your physiotherapist will thank you, and so will your neck, shoulders, and elbows.
Lenovo has decent clearance prices around Memorial day for their last gen ThinkPads. Otherwise they’re definitely not worth over 1k new like they pretend.
The problem is that the current generation is literally worthless in between their defective CPUs and pushing the new Windows spyware so I’m not sure the same statement will be true next year.
It’s been several years since I ran Windows on any of my laptops. And haven’t run into any CPU issues yet. In my experience if stay away from the slim models and go for the more high-end ones you’re good.
Cries in European. Any decent Thinkpad is 2.5k+ and rarely are any discounts. They just don’t care about private consumers over here. Either university students or big companies can get reasonable prices.
My Lumix S5 camera, it feels great to go from a micro43 camera to a full frame camera, though I am allready looking at the Sony A7 IV as a complement to my S5 due to it’s superior autofocus…
induction cooktop? I’d say dishwasher but that’s probably more plumbing and pumps than “technology”.
With all the other gadgets, I’m not so sure. I’ve had computers, laptops, phones for ages. Of course my first everything back in the 90s or 00s was a big thing. But since then it’s just the newest generation, a bit faster and with more extras, but noting substancially different.
Induction cooktop is a game changer. Water boils even faster than with gas, you have much more precise control over temperature, and you can still handle the metal cookware while it’s on the heat. Absolutely love it.
I have an induction cooktop as well and I do have one complaint about it. It uses capacitive touch to adjust the temperature instead of a knob so I spend far too long tapping it buttons to get the temperature set right whereas with a knob I could have just turned the knob.
Yeah, I agree. I don’t like touch buttons on devices like this either. Fortunately mine has temperature control knobs, but all the other buttons are capacitive. Still worth it imo, but definitely annoying.
Sure. I don’t know why they design most of them like that… I really can’t be bothered to tap nine times to turn it on. I went to quite some stores and decided on one with two capacitive slider fields. That’s perfectly fine. I just tap somewhere at that slider and it’ll be 1-9 (boost) depending on how far left or right I touch it. Or I swipe. Main thing being, it just takes one tap. Except if I use more than 2 pans, then I have to choose which plate the sliders apply to. Yeah and it’s still the same inconvenience as with every capacitive control field and you can’t place a box of pizzas or anything wet or metal on top of the controls or it’ll complain and start beeping. I learned to place things behind the controls, but guests regularly get scolded by the cooktop.
If I had to make a wild guess as to why it’s designed that way? Cleaning flat buttons seems way easier than cleaning knobs. And no moving parts. Maybe more resilient (can be made with cheaper parts) considering the flimsy electronics that would be underneath the knobs compared to the more industrial (robust?) kind under an electric range.
I’m… Skeptical. Mostly because I have a lot of cast iron and love it, and I’m not sure how well they’d work with induction burners. And also because I want to get a wok burner (yeah, the 100k+ BTU monstrosities) for doing stir-fry, and I’m not sure that the realistically affordable induction wok burners are going to manage that.
cast iron is pretty much perfect for induction.
for the wok: try it. Technology Connections did a video about them recently.
Basically: They should be fine. But it really depends on your stir fry style.
The somewhat good ones should be capable to get the heat into the wok. Keep in mind that a giant about of heat is getting lost on those burners. Not everything will heat the wok
Yeah, cast iron should work well. I also like the usual stainless steel or non-stick pans. I mean these get hot and cold almost immediately and I have good control over temperature. A heavy cast iron thing is made to store the heat and not do that. Depends on what someone is trying to achieve.
And something that doesn’t work are things that aren’t flat at the bottom. You just can’t have a wok that is completely round and put that on a flat surface. And also thin metals don’t work. So maybe use another cooktop for that. We own a wok that has a flattened bottom. But I don’t really like cooking with that thing. Not sure if it’s me or the wok.
There exists special wok induction stoves that have an indent for the wok, with the coils around it
Yeah, I’ve looked at those, briefly. I’m not sure if they would fit my wok, which is very thin cast iron (yes, actually cast iron, not a spun carbon steel wok). Hence the reason I want to get a wok burner that I’d end up needing to use outdoors.
Cast iron is fine with induction.
Cast iron like everyone else says works very well with induction, it’s pretty much the ideal material. However, unlike with a steel pan, you want to start on the low side and warm the pan up. It likely won’t cause issues immediately but if you frequently go straight to hot with a cast iron pan it can ultimately lead to the pan warping.
That’s good to know, and not something I would have expected.
Smart lights. What a world of difference coming home to my lights being on either from them automatically triggering, or me turning them on remotely. Or, being able to take a shower knowing my lights will be able to turn themselves off on whatever timer I set. It’s been an excellent expereince
I’ve been looking into some smart lights!
But I’m a bit confused, what do you use them for in the shower?
Not “In the shower persay” I have the Phillips hue lights and I have a set of them in my bathroom With Alexa, or any app to access them, I can set timers on the lights meaning I could have a 30-minute timer while I’m in the shower or whatever else I’m doing. They turn themselves on, turn themselves off.
Oh now I see what you’re saying, thanks. Yeah I thought maybe there was something about showering I’d been overlooking all these years lol
Light timers have been great. I feel having the ones in my bedroom work like a daylight alarm has been very helpful, and as you said, you never come home to a dark house, which is helpful if you’ve got arms full of groceries or such.
Also the smart thermostat in conjunction with smart outlets lets me turn on the room fans and AC when I’m on my way home.
Even having the ability to change color temp is nice so you can have harsh bright white if you need to see something you’re working on, but the majority of the time you can have nice warm or soft light.
I’ve been in the home automation business for over 25 years. Can confirm that smart lighting is the absolute best investment.
I’ve installed and programmed lighting systems for over $100k but have personally spent less than $250 for Ikea devices for my apartment. Just the ability to dim and set the color of the lights at certain times of day is key for me.
Controlled Lighting isn’t only about convenience, it’s about setting a mood. You can set a warm dim scene to be more calming or a bright white scene for cooking or cleaning.
I’m curous about these, how is the privacy on the apps? Having my data mined from my lightbulbs is my last consideration against taking the step tbh
Not linked to your identity…
…
Identifiers…
This seems contradictory. I’ll avoid them for now, thanks!
A small vacuum and mop Roomba clone. Having two dogs leaving fur everywhere made vacuuming every day a necessary chore but now I only need to empty out their base every day and they take care of keeping the floors clean. I don’t have them connected to my Wi-Fi though so hopefully that helps mitigate any hacking attempts.
The Scooba? I was thinking about getting one of those. How do you like it?
They stopped making Scooba a long time ago. Broke too much.
The vacuum’s a Matrix Shark and the mop’s a Narwal something or other. Aside from them getting stuck in corners or entangled in wires once a week they work great! A little wire management and careful furniture placement lowered the chance of that happening again. One dog pretty much ignores it and the other eyes it with suspicion and wouldn’t be in the same room it’s running in but otherwise I haven’t had any big issues yet.
VR, it was janky and barely worked, I still can’t wait for the future of AR.
Stand mixer. It’s so much easier to mix things now and I make less of a mess.
Oh, I forgot that in my list - I upgraded mine to a model that can handle my 2 loaves of sourdough dough (about 2 kilos) and it’s glorious. Had wanted one for a dozen years, finally started watching the prices and got it last year when it hit the lowest I’d seen.
My girlfriend and I are on a huge sourdough kick right now, and we’d love to start making it ourselves. Do you have a recipe you’d recommend? Any tips and tricks you’ve learned from experience?
For 2 loaves, this one doesn’t need the mixer, way more process than recipe, super simple ingredients.
1000g flour (between 30-50% whole grain something, the rest white bread flour), 20g salt
700-750g water
200g refreshed starter, 100% hydration
Mix everything and let it sit 20 minutes to hydrate. Then I smush it into a big ball and wash the bowl, leave it wet and dump the dough back in. Stretch and fold immediately, then every half hour 3 or 4 more times. Cover the bowl with a plate or towel in between. No, you don’t have to knead it. Once it looks strong and elastic, after the last stretch and fold, make it a smooth ball (flipping it over usually works) and let it rise 2-3 hours, covered, until bigger and lighter.
Dump it carefully onto a big flat surface and split it in two. Make lazy dough balls, dust them with flour and cover with a flat towel or t-shirt cloth. Let rest for 20 minutes - this is called ‘bench rest’ Meanwhile line 2 bannetons (or flattish bowls- something shaped like you want the top of the dough to end up) with flat kitchen towels and dust with rice flour. Shape each loaf carefully and place into the baskets with bottoms up. Let rise then bake in preheated cast iron pot at about 450F, 230C ish, no fan, 20 minutes with lid then 30 without - I have to tent mine with foil because oven heats from the top.
There are 2 places you can pause this, since it’s such a long process. Either after stretch and fold (cover bowl with plate) or after putting them in baskets, which is what I do. If you do this you have to enclose them in plastic loosely, I use produce bags for that, and even if they don’t look like they rose in the fridge, the cold dough into hot pan enclosed makes steam that makes them rise so well.
It’s easier to do than describe so ask anything.
They say you need to be home all day to make bread and now I see why! Lol
Thanks for the thorough and thoughtful response, we’ll try it out next weekend!
Many have had big impacts. Piano, phone, computer.
I got a microwave with an inverter magnetron.
When you set your microwave to, let’s say, 20% power, a typical microwave will cycle the magnetron, so that it runs at 100% power for 20% of the cooking time and is off in between. With an inverter, the actual power output of the magnetron can vary, so it’s actual 20% power for the whole time. It does an excellent job of gently reheating things like sandwiches and cooked rice without drying them out or scorching. Also, if something has instructions written for a lower wattage microwave, I can just turn the power down until it’s close to that wattage instead of doing calculations to modify the time.
TIL. But also 2-3 times as expensive it seems.
Internal SSD with the operating system on it. No other upgrade I’ve made to my PC has ever been so substantial.
I have my OS on an NVMe drive and it’s one of the best decisions I made when building.
But the jump from SATA SSD to nvme is much less noticeable than the one from HDD to SATA SSD
HDD, SSD and NVMe all have different versions. Later generations are normally 2x faster than previous version. Comparable generations are normally an 8x speedup. (Later generations are in parentheses).
HDD to SSD is like 80(160)->300(600).
SSD to NVMe is 300(600)->2400(4800, 14000).So, it’s likely a similar upgrade, unless you did HDD-g1 to SSD-g2 to NVMe-g1 (using G1/G2 to simplify).
It’s also likely possible that your computer is running so fast that a doubling or quadrupling in speed is a diminishing return as you don’t notice the difference.You’re looking at the wrong numbers. Most people won’t notice the difference in transfer speeds for large files. Most people will notice boot and loading times, where the results are diminishing.
Let’s take a theoretical system that has an HDD and boots in around 30 seconds.
It gets upgraded with an SSD. According to your numbers, the Boot time would be better by a factor of around 3 or maybe 4, making the Boot only take around 10 seconds. That’s a difference of 20 seconds, clearly noticeable.
Now it gets upgraded to an nvme drive. The speed increases by an even greater factor of around 7 or so, but you barely notice that because the PC only boots 7 seconds or so faster, much less noticeable than the 20 second difference before, despite the drives being blazing fast in comparison.
I’m not saying nvmes are worthless or anything. Just that in day to day use for most people its not as noticeable as the HDD to SSD upgrade.
Noise cancelling headphones. I wish I could wear them 24/7.
Wireless ear buds.
I was pretty adamant that I was absolutely never going to get any, preferring wired and really looking for a phone that still had the jack. Then when new phone time came, I ended up having to choose between a micro sd card slot and the headphone jack. I tried for a bit with a USB-C to headphone adapter but ended up seeing some ear buds on sale and giving them a shot.
They last way longer than I expected, and the carrying case as the charger means I hardly need to worry about keeping another device charged. The freedom of not having the cord is really nice, especially when going for a bike ride or jog. I upgraded to a pair with a little over-the-ear hook and use them probably 10hrs a day every day they are great
I’m the opposite. I have to have music, and Bluetooth just sucks on Android. I’ve used Bose, air pods, Samsung beans, generic, etc, on multiple versions of Android, and they just suck so hard. lag all the time, can turn my head to the right without connection breaking. I’ve tested pockets, hoodies, with and without my watch, naked, nothing works. Bluetooth just blows.
recently got a pair of jvc explodes that I had a decade ago and couldn’t be happier. and I used my Bose headset with the cable too.
Samsung S9 for anyone wondering. have gone through multiple Samsung phones, an LG, tablets, etc.
I haven’t noticed Bluetooth being that bad on either pixel I’ve had, 3a and now 6.
I certainly get lag in my pixels but no disconnects.
Bluetooth has a general lag of several milliseconds, tens of milliseconds probably, for me. But it’s close enough to not bug me when watching videos. And I never have cutouts, not unless I walk very far away. Just tonight at work I was using my pixel buds, left my phone on the desk, walked to the bathroom probably 40 or 50 feet away and through at least 3 walls, didn’t miss a beat 🤷♂️
My old BT headphones back in the day couldn’t go 20 feet across the room line of sight.
BT has definitely gotten way better in recent years.
Getting nice in-ear monitors with replaceable cables is so much better than wireless for me. Great sound quality and they weak link that always breaks (the wires) is now no longer an issue. I’ve had the same IEM now for 10 years and just change the cables every couple of years.
dunno how old you are but all my friends that were heavy audiophiles with headphones are near def now.
I still have a 5 year old Jabra Elite Active 65t that is still trucking. I had a few glitches starting a year ago like the right earbud dropping in volume or it being stuck in a hung mode where they had to be completely depleted over a few weeks to reset them, they wouldn’t even charge.
However, they still work fine and are super convenient with hear-through for office work compared to wired IEMs way better for all fitness activities too, just not as good for really listening to music.
Battery life is still 3-4 hours after 5 years not including the case recharge (the case battery has degraded significantly more than the earbuds themselves, probably due to the high quality VARTA cells in the earbuds)
I am going to wear them into the ground, but jabra is doing a stock sellout before their new version of buds come out, so I bought the €140 Jabra Elite 4s for €60 for when these bite the dust, but they seem to be going strong still.
When I got my first HD tv. I had previously been playing oblivion on Xbox 360 on an crt tv and when I setup the HD I was absolutely blown away by the clarity. I remember my stupid fucking ex-wife trying to tell me there was no difference between the two.
Not very high tech, but I love it: a projector clock (an alarm clock that can project the time on a ceiling or wall).
Not having to turn over to see the time is extremely nice when I’m cozy in bed. I didn’t even ask for it - it was given to me as a gift. If you get one, be sure that the angle and order are highly adjustable.
I have a “No clocks in the bedroom” rule. As a person who has struggled with falling asleep, having a bright glowing display constantly reminding me how tired I’m going to be in the morning just gave me more anxiety and made it even more difficult to fall asleep.
I still have my watch and my phone, but those are things I need to purposely move to look at.
A projector clock sounds like hell to me.
Interesting take. I wish you the best.
Yeah. I think there are two schools out there, us anxious types that have to have the room pitch black without light source anywhere or we feel like a laser is drilling into our brain, and then normal people.
I use my phone or watch as my clock or alarm but I have a rule to not look at the time if I wake up early. If I’m not wide awake I go back to sleep until my alarm goes off. It’s bliss even if it’s only for 15 more minutes since I wouldn’t know how long I’ve been out again.
Beetlecrab Audio Tempera is the most inspiring electronic musical instrument I own. I got it in April, and I’m still finding new ways to use it. It does so much.
Oxi One really is the hardware sequencer to rule them all. Though I’m sure you could get by with a Hapax or Deluge if you don’t mind spending twice as much.
Not a purchase, but Csound has always been an invaluable companion to my music making process. It’s also entirely free and open-source.
