What Do You Do On Your Computer?

#1

Everyone wants/needs a computer for a different reason. Some just need a Chromebook or tablet to complete basic tasks, such as browsing the web, sending emails, and consuming media. Much of the education market also falls under this general category. Others need more powerful hardware to edit videos, make graphic designs, play immersive video games, or run processor hungry, 3D intensive applications. Depending on what you need to accomplish, the computer, specifically its processor, required will vary. Of course, you can always buy more than what you were originally looking for to be safe. However, that typically comes at a pretty steep price.

Not only that, but Macs and PCs are sometimes considered to have different primary use cases.

So, what do you need your computer to do, what computer do you have, and do you regret your decision? Are you planning on upgrading your computer soon? If so, what one are you thinking about purchasing, and why? Share your experiences! What other features are must-haves for you in a laptop? Let the community know! Maybe youā€™ll influence someoneā€™s decision.

Thank you and have a nice day!

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#2

3 year old Asus Window 10.1 Laptop with Solid state drive for me. I recently made a very rare fully licenced software purchase of Cyberlink Power producer, wave editor and photo producer bundle. It does just about everything that you can think of in video editing and the laptop runs it very smooth and fast. The laptop also features excellent sound with an included plug in sub woofer.

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I would probably upgrade to a tablet at some point for portability reasons but it must have the ability to be charged by a power pack.
I donā€™t regret my decision on this laptop even though I overbought and probably over paid for it. I would likely go with Dell next time as they proved to have a great service warranty. On my sons Dell Chromebook they sent me a fan and heat sink and allowed me to install it myself and not many companies will do that.

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YouTube Creators PC or Mac configuration
#3

I:

  • I have a powerful hand-built server on which I run VMs of different OS to deliver any kind of application I require. For example a Windows 7 VM on which I run Office apps and Visio.

  • I have a Raspberry Pi on which I act as a gateway, usually it is a SSH gateway, my VPN gateway.

  • The server and Pi, wired and Wifi routers, are on a 1300VA UPS to handle roughly an overnight power outage.

  • The server and Pi use rsync to mirror each other, so they have a copy of each otherā€™s data.

  • My devices ā€œI touchā€ are all very power-efficient and ā€œstatelessā€.

  • My laptop for home is a Chromebook, I put into Dev mode and run ChromeOS and chroot into Linux off which I run local apps. Chromebooks are excellent, particularly if you use client/server for computationally (electrically) intensive apps. This is my most typed on device. I need to do say large video editing, the video is on the server, and edited in whatever OS is best, e.g. MP4 video editing is best done on Ubuntu. If Iā€™m using a Windows application, I use Chromebook on Linux and an RDP client to the console of a Windows VM on the server.

  • My laptop for travel is a Pixel C, which is a 10" Android tablet with BT keyboard. It lasts about 8-10 hours on battery and needs 2.6A 5V input, for which say a Powercore 26800 can keep it going for 2-3 days off-grid. If I need apps which are not native to Android then I SSH via the Pi with SSH port-forwarding for the Windows VM console RDP port through the tunnel, then use RDP client to access the forwarded port. As such on a small robust laptop I have access to all OS, all apps.

  • My next smallest device is a Nexus 7 2013 model, it is more for when i want something smaller than the Pixel C but bigger than a mobile. It is ancient by modern standards, it tends to end up propped above the kitchen sink when washing dishes, or on the little table on a long flight.

  • Mobiles are a mix of device to suit the day, have a OnePlus 3T, Moto G4 Play, and some ancient ones I renovate like Nexus 4, 5 for different situations. For example if i wanted to go for walk in a high crime area Iā€™d carry my no-value mobile and a little cash, if you hold a knife to me, then please take everything I own.

  • In a family memberā€™s house I run another Raspberry Pi and rsync to it. This covers for total destruction of my home server setup. I narrow the rsync to important folders.

  • My portable devices all run a local encryption client (Truecrypt compatible usually) and use SSH and rsync to keep a copy of my key folders locally.

I have currently 40 years of technology experience, and ā€œstatelessā€ client/server, with replication between devices, is a hard learned lesson. The Cloud will fail. Your device will fail. The Internet will fail.

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#4

I like watching TV series on my computer, the game of thrones is my favorite one!:joy_cat::joy_cat::joy_cat:

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#5

At home Iā€™ve got a 3 year old pc I built myself (I always build my own). Itā€™s nothing ā€œspecialā€ being a 4th gen i5, 8GB ram and an average graphic card. But it runs pretty much silently, due to my massive sound proofed case :slight_smile:
I use it for general web browsing, gaming and photo editing.
Iā€™ve also got a 6 year old little 12" i3 laptop for taking away with me. Itā€™s been upgraded with ram and an SSD over the years.

At work though. I have lots of toys :smiley: My job is installing and taking care of a reasonably large server and network infrastructure.

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#6

Do you mean, other than porn n cat videos? lmao

#7

I use a very old thinkpad (ca 10 years old)
Works properly with LINUX MINT.
Would NOT work with Windoofs (Sic).

#8

So I got the software part, now letā€™s get down to Hardware configuration. Whatā€™s your rig to edit videos and what software are you guys using, Iā€™m more interested in the Hardware software combination. Do you struggle when editing? Rendering times? Whatā€™s your set up to record? Thanks

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#9

Use whatever camera or source you want to record, transfer the files to your computer ā€¦in my case Iā€™m using a 2013 Macbook Pro, I then open up my editing program and load the video into that, go through frame rate or frame by frame and edit as needed, select render to see what the video will look like. Go back in and edit or tweak it as needed and then finalize it all.

But, I hate editing so I try to just do it in one take with minimal pauses and edits, this way I just upload the video and go about my business

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#10

My school provided me with an old Mac book air which I use for homework usually I use my iPad a lot not gonna lie because itā€™s easy to sit in bed and take everywhere.

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#11

Video editing is getting pretty impressive.

#12

8 yr old MacBook Air :computer: 4gb ram 256gb ssd
Just replaced the battery a couple months ago. Used for all my needs. Office Laptop is provided by employer.

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#13

Whatā€™s specs have your Mac??

#14

Alien ware 15 r3 i5 7300hq 8gb ram 1060 6gb tb hdd

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#15

I have told already:
I own two old Lenovo thinkpads T410S.
Quasi twins.
One I use, the other is in the cupboard.
From time to time I change.

Should be same aged as your Macbook.
(I would suggest to enlarge the RAM :wink:
4GB isnā€™t that much, SSD is large enough)

No more office computer, thank goodness! :joy:

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#16

ram is soldered so canā€™t upgrade :confused:
For most uses it works great

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#17

Thats APPLE! What a ā€¦ :angry:

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#18

Unsolder it!

#19

Would be easy by using a genuine

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Apple tool! :joy:

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#20

You sure itā€™s appleā€¦ Looks a bit modern to me :wink:

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