jestyrPC speed gains erased by modern software
The real sad part for me is the amount of e-waste this produces. Especially in devices like laptops.
A clean Linux distro can extend a laptops life by a decade. I have a laptop from the c2d era that I threw an ssd in and put Linux on. Perfectly serviceable as a basic machine.
I don’t typically see computers getting replaced because they are “slow” but because of factors more related to support like apple dropping support for older models just because of reasons. Or companies doing routine system replacements because their fleet of computers are getting banged up and damaged and since they are XYZ years since their release and are no longer in production their costs and complexity with repair, maintenance time, etc… Are no longer worthwhile. Not to mention, the more insecure members of our species feel their self worth is dependent on how fancy and new their things are.
If you want to point fingers at why performance for operating systems and programs has declined over the years I would say it’s mostly in part due to security functions.
I have an ancient early W7-era AMD dual core (bulldozer based? So it’s actually like 1.5c) that runs just peachy on Lubuntu LTS, 8gb of mismatched used Ram I got for free, and an ancient slow HDD.
I use it for D&D (Roll20 and Foundry) and MTG (Cockatrice).
I tested W10 with a ReadyBoost sd card and 2gb RAM and it barely worked.