If I were to build a work system today, I would take the following road.
I would go with a laptop with an SSD, at least an i5, an upgraded video
card like nvidia instead of the video built in the CPU, and I would go
with something that had decent resolution.
A laptop like this one :
http://www.dell.com/en-us/work/shop/dell-laptops-and-notebooks/vostro-15-5000/spd/vostro-15-5568-laptop/cav155w10p18s038
I'd add an external backup drive, an external keyboard, an external
mouse, and I'd add 2 external flat screen monitors of around 21 inches
each.
Two of the reasons I moved back to Windows after running Linux Mint for
4 or 5 years was I was not able to take advantage of the screen share
utilities such as Go-To-Meetings and I wanted my printer to be plug and
play so I can use all it's features.
At one point I was running a laptop with one external flat screen.
Makes a lot of sense, since you are doing everything on one box that is
also mobile.
And I think moving as much as you can to the cloud is a good thing.
Now this configuration is what fits my needs. What are your needs? Are
you editing images or videos? Are you a developer? Or are you
researching Linux, or is your research about external things?
For a simple configuration I'd go with a cheap used laptop with an i3
and bottom of the line resolution, add and SSD, add Mint, add an
external backup drive.
I have 3 or 4 of these SSDs and they are on sale :
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?item=N82E16820147676
I have two cheap used laptop running these. Great performance and as I
recall they have a 5 year warrantee. I use one as a Linux web server
for testing. The other I might use for an experiment. I'd like to load
Mint on it and see how far I can push the cloud. I'd like to do
everything external, using mostly free stuff. I do some video editing
so I may need a little more power.
On 2018-05-21 19:30, mike enriquez wrote:
> I am planing to build a Linux computer. I have Ubuntu 16.0 on an old
> Dell XPS. I will be using it as my research computer. So "I will be
> going where where others do not dare to go." I want a VPN on it
> because I have not been able to install a VPN on the computer I now
> have. I want a 64bit OS.
>
> I know that most people say to use and old computer to run Linux. I
> need ideas on Hardware to avoid and use. What would you do if you had
> to build your own Linux computer from scratch?
>
> Thanks for your input.
>
> Mike Enriquez
>
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