Tag: hardware

A slow start to an otherwise normal Tuesday

All sorts of posting happened this weekend on the old weblog/blog. I was super productive on the writing front as well. It was just one of those weekends where a lot of words happened. Then we ran into Monday where things just fell off the applecart and no words were written for the blog. It’s entirely possible that it was due to the need for a visit to the chiropractor. One of the things that just disrupts all my writing momentum is a bit of back pain. As a disrupter that cause is undefeated for sure. Today I got back up at 0500 without my alarm and sat down to write in front of my Dark Base Pro 900 computer case by Be Quiet! a company from Germany. They make a very quiet computer case. I’m actually curious when they will release a successor to the highly successful 900 series. 

Most of you who read this blog know that building a custom computer is a fun adventure, but not an adventure that happens every year. Right now my current parts configuration is working out well enough. I’m not really in the market for a full computer rebuild at this point. Most of the time that happens it is a part by part ordering process. I would probably start with whatever Be Quiet! produced as a new computer case and then slowly add new parts until it was time to swap the new computer in to replace the old one. Generally speaking, my computer needs involve one desktop as my primary daily driver and a laptop of some sort to allow me to go mobile. 

I’m probably not buying any major computer hardware at the moment. At some point, my Pixelbook Go is going to have a hardware failure and be replaced with a new laptop from System76. That could happen at any moment or a year from now. Nothing really resides on the Pixelbook Go in terms of files as it happens to be a nearly completely cloud based device. Opening code notebooks or word processing documents is really about saving things to the cloud and moving along. That type of scenario is nice as you can switch seamlessly between the laptop and desktop without any friction.

Ugh… when is the next Google hardware event?

Today in the middle of watching This Week in Tech (TWIT) episode 723, I started wondering when the next major Google hardware event is going to be held. Right now, I just spent some time learning about the new HP Chromebook 15 that seems to be a very compelling sub $500 dollar mobile computing option. My next piece of mobile hardware is probably going to be the Google Pixelbook 2 (or whatever they end up calling it).

I’m in the market for a new Chromebook

Here we go again with some technology related challenges. My ASUS Chromebook flip C302 now has had two separate keys fail on it. The number 5 and 6 keys are not working at all. Both keys have been taken apart and I messed with them several times. None of that worked out. Right now I am working on a Google Docs file on my Pixel 3 XL smartphone typing on a Bluetooth keyboard. That could be the new normal for some time. This is one way to go about writing and it could be the path forward. It is for sure the lowest cost path forward given that I already have the phone and the Logitech Bluetooth keyboard. Maybe that is enough to seal the deal and drive me to writing on my phone. I had tried this before for a few days and it did not work out very well.

This time around might be different. I just went into the keyboard settings and turned off the onscreen keyboard when the physical keyboard is connected via Bluetooth. Just making that one change increases the amount of screen open to viewing words by about double. Maybe that will help make this more interesting this time around. My plan is to go back to writing for over and hour a day. Most of that writing time will happen at night right before bed. For better or worse that writing window has always been the best way to go about producing a large amount of words. This is one of those times where thinking out loud is probably the right way to go about things.