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September 29, 2021
For the longest time, ever since I got into computers in the 1990's, I've built my own PC's. I built PC's for friends and family, too. I enjoy putting together computers and making my own custom builds that are unique. They've always been something I can call my own and I knew every piece and part of them.
I've enjoyed the process of deciding on how powerful they should be or what primary purposes they should serve. That would lead to the choosing of individual parts from CPU's, to RAM, to graphics cards and storage.
One day a friend of mine was looking for a new computer and asked me if she should get a PC or a Mac. At the time I knew nothing of the Mac and had very little exposure to Apple as a company. So I went to the Apple store to have a look so I could give her an informed opinion. This was 2006 and at the time I was impressed by their operating system, OS X, and the beauty of their designs. So I bought one. Then I came back to my friend and recommended the Mac to her.
The primary reason for the recommendation was the software. OS X and some of the programs were far better than their Windows counterparts, especially in the A/V realm which I was playing around in at the time.
To my suprise I stayed with Apple and ended up deep in their cultish ecosystem for many years. I lost my way. I hadn't built a PC in more than a decade.
Over the years with the Mac, Apple had been taking small steps to eliminate customization of OS X, which to be fair, wasn't a whole lot that could be done anyhow. Plus they were getting more difficult to repair or upgrade the hardware components. Laptops are traditionally limited on upgrade options, but Apple's desktops were about as bad and getting worse than laptops. Soldering everything to the boards made upgrades impossible. Plus I was getting really bored with their products all around.
A few years ago I bought the new MacBook Air and I really liked the form factor and design of it. But the itch to build my own was getting stronger. After a month or two I sold the new MacBook Air and began building my own desktop PC again, the same one I'm typing this on.
Only this time I wasn't putting Windows on it. This time I was going with Linux.
I went through several distro's of Linux, called disto-hopping, before landing on Arch Linux where I have remained for a couple of years.
The learning curve to achieve what I wanted was a little high, but not too bad. It was when I discovered window managers that I really fell in love with Linux. Being able to customize literally everything on my screen was a dream come true. I couldn't do this on Windows and certainly couldn't do this on the Mac. But with Linux, the sky's the limit.
My favorite part of Linux is using the terminal and finding programs that do what I want in the terminal versus a graphical program. For instance, I'm writing this post in NeoVIM rather than a standard graphical word processor.
The customization force is once again strong with me.
Recently YouTuber Louis Rossmann who is a right to repair activist and MacBook repair shop owner reviewd this laptop from Framwork.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQLws5KfntE
He rarely does product reviews but this one caught my attention. This is a laptop that gets you as close to building a desktop PC as one has ever been. More importantly, it's designed with repairability and customization in mind. It has swappable modules for USB A/C, HDMI, DisplayPort, and so on. You can choose your CPU, RAM and storage sizes and all of which, are upgradable by the end-user.
It also comes with your choice of Windows OS, or bring your own OS, i.e. Linux. They say that they have sold more DIY versions without Windows than anything else they offer. That means the Linux community is behind this project in a big way.
The other thing I like is the display size, 3:2. That means it is not a widescreen. I've never been the biggest fan of widescreen's on computers and feel they're better suited for gaming and watching movies, not for working. Widescreens tend to make everything look so much smaller and more difficult to work on. So I am happy to see a non-widescreen laptop again.
The day after I saw Louis' video about the laptop, I ordered one. It was $100 down today and the rest would be collected at the time of shipment. In a batch of orders that should ship out in November.
I'm really looking forward to receiving this new laptop and putting Arch Linux on it. Check out their website and see for yourself how it's designed and able to be customized to your liking. I am in no way sponsored for this. I'm just excited for this new product.