|
There is a saying which says - 'Things will happen only when they are destined to happen'.
|
|
|
|
|
I have a Dell XPS15 that's now 3 1/2 years old. I would have preferred an XPS17 for the larger screen size and extra resolution that I enjoyed on my previous laptop, but either Dell Canada didn't carry it or it's been discontinued. No external monitor. My wife took over my large desk, so I'm stuck with a small one! But I have a 462GB SSD (strange number, that), so no issues with performance or disk space. And this laptop is so much lighter than the one it replaced (from 2011) that I couldn't believe it.
|
|
|
|
|
SSDs are fast like scaled cat.
SSDs are impurvious to shock. - finally.
But.
They have an Achilles heel.
They die without warning totally and completely. One day they're a drive, the next day they are nothing more than a coffee cup coaster.
So back them up early and often to an external spinner drive or other media.
|
|
|
|
|
OK, a SSD will make a substantial difference, but you can do even better. (If you're willing to splurge on a new machine.) Get a new machine, like a new Dell XPS. Make sure it has a M.2 form factor socket for a NVMe SSD. Get a Samsung EVO NVMe SSD. These SSDs have sequential read speeds around 10 times that of old SATA SSDs. Random reads are not so dramatically better, but are still very much faster. 
M.2 SSDs come in different lengths. Make sure you buy one that matches your machine's M.2 footprint.
|
|
|
|
|
When it comes the extending the life of a system, SSDs did in the 2010s what GPUs did in the 1990s.
Although I'm no longer (much of) a gamer, so video performance isn't as important to me nowadays. But everyone can appreciate faster disks.
|
|
|
|
|
I've been recommending them as the biggest performance improvement hardware investment since I bought a 64GB drive for a new server back in 2012. When the 480GB drives became affordable, I bought them for every laptop/desktop I use professionally and personally. They alone have extended the lifespan of 10+ y/0 hardware including the wife's 9 y/o all-in-one (i3) where a Win10 update had 'done it in'...she was ready to spend $800 on a new one. I convinced her to let me try a new drive, another stick of RAM, and fresh Win10 install...iirc it was around $350 after taxes. That system is now usable from a cold start in < 10 secs, and she is happy...one less old system in my garage! 
Now, the 1TB SSDs are the same price as the 480s I bought just a few years ago. I've got 2 with plans to replace the 480 in my main laptop as the system partition is almost full. I haven't decided yet if I will clone it or just start from scratch. It still has most of the HP crapware that came on it back in 2015 so I'm leaning on a fresh start. It'll take a few hours to reload everything, but it's a good chance to get rid of the cruft. A colleague gets the other one to replace (clone) the spinner in her 5 y/o laptop that has gotten frustratingly slow...besides, I don't trust spinners past about 5-6 years. Again, it's a good chance to extend the life of a system and save the time and expense of setting up a new system...at least for a few more years.
I have yet to have an SSD fail on me, but understand that when they do, the data is generally unrecoverable. Get at least one more SSD (since you have 2 bays) and use it for backups of the main drive.
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
|
|
|
|
|
SSD is like crack cocaine
Charlie Gilley
<italic>Stuck in a dysfunctional matrix from which I must escape...
"Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783
“They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
|
|
|
|
|
"Landmark Computer Science Proof Cascades Through Physics and Math:" [^] Quote: n 1935, Albert Einstein, working with Boris Podolsky and Nathan Rosen, grappled with a possibility revealed by the new laws of quantum physics: that two particles could be entangled, or correlated, even across vast distances.
The very next year, Alan Turing formulated the first general theory of computing and proved that there exists a problem that computers will never be able to solve.
These two ideas revolutionized their respective disciplines. They also seemed to have nothing to do with each other. But now a landmark proof has combined them while solving a raft of open problems in computer science, physics and mathematics.
At last Alan Turing can get some rest (because this proof possibly solves the "halting" [aka "decision"] conundrum).
«One day it will have to be officially admitted that what we have christened reality is an even greater illusion than the world of dreams.» Salvador Dali
|
|
|
|
|
BillWoodruff wrote: ... while solving a raft of open problems in computer science, physics and mathematics.
What an amazing age we live in:
- Science (and math) is moving ahead in leaps and bounds
- and humanity is moving twice as fast ... albeit in the opposite direction.
Who's worried about a zombie apocalypse??? we've got people!
|
|
|
|
|
Don't remember who told it, but accurated too:
Quote: Humanity is winning knowledge with incredible speed, pity that it is losing wisdom even faster.
(or something like that)
M.D.V. 
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
|
|
|
|
|
Imagine having been born in 1895. By age 50, you would have gone through WW1, the Depression, and WW2.
But I would agree that many things are headed in the wrong direction, wisdom among them.
|
|
|
|
|
I was singing in a church choir, doing the Mozart "Coronation Mass". The conductor made some remarks about what some people managed to achieve at an age of 23 years. I couldn't resist raising my hand and remark: "Yeah, and at your age, he had managed to be dead for five years!"
The entire choir, and the conductor, went remarkably quiet after my comment.
|
|
|
|
|
Nelek wrote: Humanity is winning knowledge with incredible speed
Or just stealing it[^].
This is common knowledge that I remember first reading about in Dawkins' The Blind Watchmaker, back in 1986, so some knowledge-winning, it seems, is more a case of looking for ideas to put one's name on, so that people in the future will believe they are yours.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
|
|
|
|
|
Mark_Wallace wrote: Or just stealing it[^].
I know... we bring our 5 cent against it every day with all the cheaters and plagiarists here in CP . They are worst than a plague  
M.D.V.
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
modified 7-Mar-20 19:37pm.
|
|
|
|
|
Good read
Monday starts Diarrhea awareness week, runs until Friday!
JaxCoder.com
|
|
|
|
|
Java's split() behaves very weirdly. I was needing to split on a caret ^ and
"Test1^Test2".split("^") was throwing an error. A quick google search says that special characters need to be escaped. No big deal, I do
"Test1^Test2".split("\\^") and still same error (invalid escape sequence characters...)
I google for a java fiddle and test it in the fiddle and it works great. So, I check eclipse and find that I have java 1.8 so I include that in google.
Luckily I find a new response that says to use java.util.regex.Pattern.quote(). So, I try
"Test1^Test2".split(java.util.regex.Pattern.quote("^")); and that actually works.
The documentation says string.split() has been around since Java 1.4 so why in the world would eclipse behave different than other java compilers?
Social Media - A platform that makes it easier for the crazies to find each other.
Everyone is born right handed. Only the strongest overcome it.
Fight for left-handed rights and hand equality.
|
|
|
|
|
"He that lieth down with dogs shall rise up with fleas." --Benjamin Franklin
|
|
|
|
|
ZurdoDev wrote: so why in the world would eclipse behave different
Because it's Eclipse.
|
|
|
|
|
Marc Clifton wrote: Because it's Eclipse.
"As a matter of fact, it's all dark"
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
|
|
|
|
|
StackOverflow[^] seems to think your second code block should work.
What does java.util.regex.Pattern.quote("^") return, and how does it compare to "\\^"?
"These people looked deep within my soul and assigned me a number based on the order in which I joined."
- Homer
|
|
|
|
|
Richard Deeming wrote: StackOverflow[^] seems to think your second code block should work.
Ya, 95% of the search results all say that should work, and it actually does in a java fiddle.
Richard Deeming wrote: What does java.util.regex.Pattern.quote("^") return, and how does it compare to "\\^"?
It was something like "\\Q\\E". 
Social Media - A platform that makes it easier for the crazies to find each other.
Everyone is born right handed. Only the strongest overcome it.
Fight for left-handed rights and hand equality.
|
|
|
|
|
Regex vs non-regex? Your last example is rather explicit. The previous ones...well, somebody clearly doesn't like them. For some reason.
|
|
|
|
|
Someone doesn't like regex?!? 
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
|
|
|
|
|
ZurdoDev wrote: why in the world would eclipse behave different than other java compilers?
Unless it has changed recently, eclipse is not a compiler, it uses the installed version of Java to perform compiles.
|
|
|
|
|
So I wasn't the only one thinking that... yeah, it's an IDE afaik.
Cheers,
विक्रम
"We have already been through this, I am not going to repeat myself." - fat_boy, in a global warming thread
|
|
|
|
General 
News 
Suggestion 
Question 
Bug 
Answer 
Joke 
Praise 
Rant 
Admin 
Submit an article or tip
