The "Two Laptops" Problem Solved

I think I’ve solved the two laptops problem. I realized that its not really a problem worth solving. I’ve taken professor Might’s advice on tools and decided to use a single computer, period. Now, instead of two laptops with varying pros and cons, I have invested in a single computer that does decently well for all my needs.

I only had a handful of requirements:

• It had to be fast enough to handle most of my needs without lag; any intensive workload can be offloaded to a server.
• It should have enough battery life to last at least 9 hours of coding without a power supply.
• It should be light enough to carry in a backpack with a notebook or small textbook.
• Complete disk backup should be straightforward.

I’ve had some thought and decided to go with a 2020 Macbook Pro with the M1 chip and 16GB RAM. It has great battery life and the performance should be more than sufficient for my usual computational activities.

Though my prefered environment is linux, I could no longer deal with fixing the random issues any longer. Being a full time college student and working part time already requires considerable time; I could not afford to deal with spending a few hours out of my day fixing some random issue that came up on my computer.

However, I didn’t just assume that macs were a lot more stable. I was able to spend some time with an early 2015 Macbook Pro for a few months before making my decision. Along with the consistent stability and a clean solution for software packaging and installation, I was pleased to find a very straightforward backup solution as well. After hours of frustration trying to set up some sort of backup solution on Linux, it was refreshing to see the ability to easily do a full backup and restore of all files, applications, everything! I was pretty much sold after that.

Now I have a single, powerful computer I can use docked at home or on the go without having to take the charger. I must admit, this is a much better solution compared to what I was thinking of with the two laptops problem. I still have the LG Gram; I’m currently using it as a testing machine for trying out distros and software. Hopefully this workflow is solid enough to be permanent.

That is all.