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My computers

Wilkes

My latest computer, a custom built Linux machine with a Ryzen 7 5700G, 32GB of RAM and a 500GB M.2 disk. This computer is my 'hobby' computer where I will be messing around with Linux and hardware. I may even play around with the PCIe interface since it has a free PCIe 16x slot (as I am not using a discrete graphics card). It currently has Arch Linux powering it, though I can imagine that might change over time if and when I want to try another Linux/BSD distro.

MacBook Pro 15

One of my current daily drivers is a MacBook Pro 2019 15 inch with an Intel i7, 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. This laptop works great for day-to-day use; I find MacOS to be very comfortable, if a little bloated compared to my linux distro of choice, though the usefulness of the added 'Apple' features more than make up for it.

ThinkPad x230

The first computer I bought for myself, my ThinkPad x230 still sees regular use as a minimal lecture-note-writing machine. It has an Intel i5 (3rd generation I think?), 8GB of RAM and perhaps 250GB of storage running Arch linux. This laptop has lasted a long time of regular use and abuse, especially given that I got it second-hand. It has seen many a linux install, and the chassis is in dire need of replacement. The setup I have on Arch at the moment is my first step that got me thinking about the minimal amount of compute power I need in my life. It usually only runs zsh, tmux and vim. Sometimes I start netctl to connect to the internet briefly but I like that its off by default.

Raspberry Pi 4

My best Raspberry Pi is not being put to much use at the moment, currently serving as an SSH accessible Arm server for running dissertation project software. It may very soon turn into a minimal linux desktop machine - just like the ThinkPad - however this might not be necessary if I build a PC for tinkering with (I have an idea for embedding a Pi into the case to act as a sort of Arm co-processor). It is equipped with 4GB of RAM and 16GB of MicroSD storage.

Update 2021-11-20

It's now halfway to being a useful desktop computer. I have i3wm installed, along with terminal-based programs (e.g. vim, lynx) and I have themed it with the dracula colour scheme where I can (URXVT is not easy-on-the-eyes by default). I would use it more frequently, however I have regular problems with the display switching off and my being unable to get it to come back on. This likely isn't an issue with the Pi itself but with the display I'm using (LG 27UL850) with the Pi, maybe some funky HDMI hardware bug.