Roberto von ArchimboldiFeb 26

I have some computer questions.

If I fork out £200, the government wants to give me a further £900 for a laptop or a machine with 4GB of RAM. I think that I should take the money. But what should I buy? I would like it to be repairable because I spill things a lot and a modern laptop is not going to go obselete, I think

I need Windows because there is not yet workable voice to text software for Linux. As the government are going to pay for the licence, can I run windows in a virtual machine inside, say, Debian? Would that stop windows spying on everything else I do?

I would like a three button mouse because then I can use the middle button as a drag lock.

I am happy to buy refurbished machines but I feel like at that price I will be able to buy some that goes whiz-bang and that sounds fun.

#Laptops, #Debian, #AdviceNeeded , #ConsumerQuestions

Show threadMair A-W
@RobertoArchimboldi you can certainly run windows in a virtualbox VM in Debian, but I think you need a lot more than 4gb of RAM to do so usefully. I don't know about the other questions but running Windows in a VM will only stop windows spying on what you're doing to the extent you're doing it outside the VM, so I suppose it depends what you plan to do with the machine besides your Windows applications...
Feb 26 at 10:19amWeb
Show threadRoberto von ArchimboldiFeb 26
@mair thank you. I know that RAM now costs an arm and a leg, but how much would I need? Looking at the internet, I think that I ought to be able find something with 16GB for that price
Show threadMair A-WFeb 26
@RobertoArchimboldi my refurbished Lenovo cost me EUR 333 in 2024, and it's got 32GB of RAM. Windows is... OK.
Show threadRoberto von ArchimboldiFeb 26
@mair where did you buy it from?
Show threadMair A-WFeb 26
@RobertoArchimboldi amazon marketplace. (the seller seems to be this company https://belco24.de/Notebooks/Lenovo/ThinkPad )
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Thinkpad gebraucht. Die besten Preise für gebrauchte lenovo thinkpad. Billig thinkpad lenovo gebraucht kaufen online
Show threadRoberto von ArchimboldiFeb 26
@mair thank you
Show threadMair A-WFeb 26
@RobertoArchimboldi i guess bear in mind that if you take the virtualbox route, the VM can only be allocated about half, max 2/3 of the RAM and processing power. So i have 32GB and two processors, but Windows has 24GB and one. I dont know what specs Windows 11 recommends these days...
Show threadRoberto von ArchimboldiFeb 26
@mair thank you. That is very helpful