New laptop

[Oldiesmann]

Finally decided to order a new laptop. The current one I have still works pretty well but some of the keys don't work (1 and 4 don't work at all either at the top or on the number pad, and 5 and 6 are the only keys that work in the number row at the top of the keyboard; f, r and v don't always work) and the touchpad has been acting goofy at times, so it was time for an upgrade. This one was a refurb I bought off eBay in early 2020. This time I decided to go brand new.

16 inch display with 1920x1200 resolution
1TB PCIe NVMe M.2 SSD
Intel Core i7 240H processor with integrated graphics
1TB of space

I debated whether to stick with 1TB of space or upgrade to 2 but decided that 1 should be fine. Slightly less storage than my current laptop (current has a 128gb SSD and 1TB HDD) but even with a dual-boot setup I'm using maybe 650gb total (I have the HDD partitioned, with about half the space devoted to each OS; the 128GB drive is the C drive and the Windows half of the other drive is just general files and VM disk images; I'm using about 40% of the space on the Linux half of that drive).

The fun part will be installing Arch Linux on the new laptop. At least they have somewhat of a guided installation now (archinstall - still not a GUI like with most distros but better than manually configuring everything), but it will be a bit different with Windows and Linux occupying the same drive this time (which is how I had things on my old laptop before I got this one; I've still got that laptop as well but don't know where the charger is at the moment). I may go with an Arch-based distro like EndeavourOS or Manjaro instead just because it's easier to install those.

The laptop will be here sometime within the next week. It's slowly making its way to me from Thailand (it started out in one Thai city, then moved to a suburb of Bangkok, then to Singapore and was last seen in Anchorage, Alaska; HP says it's supposed to arrive early in the morning on the 4th but I don't think it would take that long to get here via FedEx even coming from Alaska and with the Thanksgiving holiday in there)

[Dave]

I don't use laptops anymore, I used to before I retired but the problem I found is adding extra storage internally. I could add 1 SSD but that was it. On my desktop I now have a total of 9TB where I've added various SSDs over time for my music collection.

I have to admit that some of the drives are for backups as I believe you can't have too many

I hope it all works well for you

[Skhilled]

I remember dual-booting on the same drive. LOL I haven't used it in awhile. But I have 2 drives in this PC plus 2 portable SSD's and a couple of USB sticks. I recently found out that you can run Linux off of those using Rufus:

https://rufus.ie/en/

And also UNetbootin:

https://unetbootin.github.io/

I plan on doing this sometime soon. It'll probably be next month when I'll have a bit of time off from work.

You'll save your current drive space and won't have to partition them.

EDIT: I was messing around after I posted the above and found this... Etcher:

https://etcher.balena.io/

[Oldiesmann]

I'm now thinking of switching to Endeavour OS instead. It's essentially Arch with a graphical installer, theming and a few other user-friendly features. That will avoid the headache of spending a lot of time closely following instructions in the Arch docs, having to use fdisk to partition things, etc. Endeavour uses the Arch repos so it would be just like Arch but with some enhancements.

[Dave]

It'll probably be next month when I'll have a bit of time off from work.

It's about time you retired. 64 next month, oh to be that young again 

[Skhilled]

I'm now thinking of switching to Endeavour OS instead. It's essentially Arch with a graphical installer, theming and a few other user-friendly features. That will avoid the headache of spending a lot of time closely following instructions in the Arch docs, having to use fdisk to partition things, etc. Endeavour uses the Arch repos so it would be just like Arch but with some enhancements.

I haven't heard of that one. I need to check it out.

It's about time you retired. 64 next month, oh to be that young again 

Don't be jealous. 

[Chen Zhen]

I don't use laptops anymore, I used to before I retired but the problem I found is adding extra storage internally. I could add 1 SSD but that was it. On my desktop I now have a total of 9TB where I've added various SSDs over time for my music collection.

I have to admit that some of the drives are for backups as I believe you can't have too many

I hope it all works well for you

All of that as internal?
USB 3.2 is fairly fast for file transfers so why not just get a couple of USB 3.2 hubs and load them up with SSD's.
I got a few SATA hubs that are a bit dated but the current available rigs are ie. M.2 Nvme hubs & those SSD's are a bit cheaper.

[Skhilled]

Personally, I've found that portable and USB drives work very well. I haven't tried hubs yet...

I do have a couple of portable SSD's. Lately, I've been using USB drives for PC and cell backup. But, I've been thinking of a hub situation so that I can connect them all, although I don't really have to.

[Chen Zhen]

Just to be clear.. I meant to say USB 3.2 external drive bays but you know what I meant.
I have 2 external SATA3 drive bays on my desktop (both X2 bays) and 2 external HDDs, all of which have my older drives.
Internally I only have 2 SATA3 SSDs and it's an older rig so all my PCIe slots are filled with internal USB 3 hubs and the GPU is on the 16x PCIe. No room to put in a 4X or 5X PCIe M.2 bay.
Next year I'm likely going to upgrade my PC to something more modern but it will probably be a used (approx. 5 yr) rig that has decent specs & a lot of room for expansion.

I've been browsing for some externals & found the MAIWO 4 Bay M.2 Nvme Docking Station which I might purchase.
Most of what I see from other brands are only 2 bays for external M.2 SSD's so I'm wondering about the speeds when you have that many in tandem via USB 3.2.
It will definitely need higher wattage so I kind of wonder why those type of devices don't come with 100W power supply. I suppose the PC is usually not going to run more than 2 at once so perhaps that's the reason.
Internal PCIe drive bays are likely faster with that interface but I would think you'd need decent cooling inside your tower (like an extra fan).

[Oldiesmann]

New laptop arrived today. I've gotten Windows basically configured the way I want it now - reinstalled some apps, uninstalled a bunch of stuff I didn't want/need, etc. The next step, either tomorrow or Sunday, will be to reinstall Linux. This time though I'm going with EndeavourOS, which is basically Arch with a GUI installer, theming and a few other things (such as a graphical package manager and firewall). I decided to go that route instead of straight Arch because installing Arch is a pain and I don't feel like going through that again (though I haven't done anything with the archinstall script thing, which didn't exist last time I installed Arch, but looking through the docs I'm not sure that would make things much simpler).

Still to do on the Windows front:
Finish transferring over any files I want to keep from the old laptop (I already copied all my MP3s off to a portable SSD to save a few gigs of space, and I don't listen to them much anyway so I'll just leave them on the portable drive)
Finish configuring installed software as needed
I'll probably also shrink and partition the C drive before installing Endeavour to make life easier as well - that way I just tell it which partition I want it to use and it can partition things further from there as it deems necessary

I may also need to tweak the BIOS settings before installation. As I recall, I had to disable Secure Boot to be able to dual boot with Arch, but I'll figure that out later.

[Dave]

All of that as internal?
USB 3.2 is fairly fast for file transfers so why not just get a couple of USB 3.2 hubs and load them up with SSD's.
I got a few SATA hubs that are a bit dated but the current available rigs are ie. M.2 Nvme hubs & those SSD's are a bit cheaper.

Attached is the grab of my non NAS drives. I made a mistake with the total as internal there is 7TB, disks 4 & 5 are external SSDs. You'll see there is an 'A' drive which is a clone of my 'C' drive

[Dave]

New laptop arrived today. I've gotten Windows basically configured the way I want it now - reinstalled some apps, uninstalled a bunch of stuff I didn't want/need, etc. The next step, either tomorrow or Sunday, will be to reinstall Linux. This time though I'm going with EndeavourOS, which is basically Arch with a GUI installer, theming and a few other things (such as a graphical package manager and firewall). I decided to go that route instead of straight Arch because installing Arch is a pain and I don't feel like going through that again (though I haven't done anything with the archinstall script thing, which didn't exist last time I installed Arch, but looking through the docs I'm not sure that would make things much simpler).

Still to do on the Windows front:
Finish transferring over any files I want to keep from the old laptop (I already copied all my MP3s off to a portable SSD to save a few gigs of space, and I don't listen to them much anyway so I'll just leave them on the portable drive)
Finish configuring installed software as needed
I'll probably also shrink and partition the C drive before installing Endeavour to make life easier as well - that way I just tell it which partition I want it to use and it can partition things further from there as it deems necessary

I may also need to tweak the BIOS settings before installation. As I recall, I had to disable Secure Boot to be able to dual boot with Arch, but I'll figure that out later.

Sounds like you're going to have fun with it. I hope it all works out for you

[Oldiesmann]

I've gotten most of the software I was using reinstalled at this point and generated a new SSH key for Git (because apparently you can't easily transfer them). Now I'm reinstalling PostgreSQL, and I still need to reinstall the various updates for wampserver, but I'll get to that soon.

The only thing I don't really like about this laptop is it seems the display isn't as good as the one on my old laptop. The colors just seem brighter and more vivid on the old one. Not sure why, but it's not worth the hassle of returning this one and buying a new one at this point.