2024-04-21                         from the editor of ~insom
   ------------------------------------------------------------

   I have rearranged my office and more importantly; my
   computing. Again.

   Back in early 2020 I got a new laptop and an eGPU and my
   wife got the same model laptop and this was all based on the
   fact she was going to-and-from work, I'd like to compute
   from different places and we could both just have a little
   dock with a monitor and plug in our Thinkpads and have
   access to decent graphics for games.

   Then the pandemic happened and I basically didn't leave my
   house for 18 months, and even after: my job went fully
   remote, so my laptop mostly stayed in one place. If I had a
   do-over, I'd have bought a more powerful desktop, as the
   laptop involved several compromises. (Later on: I did. I
   bought a machine specifically for Rust development, although
   I use it for more than just that. Tells you something about
   the toolchain for the language.)

   For my birthday, a couple of years ago, I bought a gaming
   PC, with an RTX 3060 video card etc. and even then I didn't
   really push it: I just wanted enough CPU and GPU to not need
   to think if a game was going to work properly on my
   computer. It's been my primary Windows machine since, but I
   never probably justified the purchase, given the hours I
   play and also the kinds of games I play (rarely AAA, or at
   least, not AAA of the 2020's).

   I got a Steamdeck last year and it's been amazing. I now do
   almost all of my gaming on it. It makes having a gaming PC
   seem even more of a farce.

   So: I got to thinking: _what_ is my Windows PC for?
   Basically, most of the time, I use it because it has a
   comfortable chair in front of it and a nice screen. I use my
   Debian-Thinkpad for "productive" things, including most
   programming, and I had a little standing desk thing I mostly
   use when I'm at home: but I've learned that I like to stand
   for reading and learning, but sit for writing or creating.

   Oh, did I mention the gaming PC is obnoxiously loud? It's
   probably actually quiet by gaming PC standards, but as I am
   not gaming on it, it's pretty loud for some Firefox and some
   VSCode (and occasional CAD).

   Today I have taken a spare Thinkcenter and put Windows 10 on
   it. The main thing this will be for is for running Fusion
   360 (I wish I had a better cheap or FOSS alternative to
   this, but I don't). It's silent! I also run music-creation
   software under Windows, but tbh I do so little of this that
   perhaps giving up the ability to do that for a while will
   nudge me into using other devices for making music. The new
   machine is comparatively slow, only having an Intel GPU and
   a several generation old CPU, but that's a feature. It runs
   Fusion well enough (surprisingly), but not web browsing. I
   expect to even use the machine rarely.

   I've hooked up one of those USB3<>HDMI-and-ports dock things
   to the monitor and keyboard on my desk, and I can now dock
   my laptop or dock my Steamdeck, giving me the "gaming PC
   experience" with my portable (although, again, not on fancy
   games) and also giving me a pleasant big screen / nice
   keyboard / comfy chair for the laptop.

   We'll see how long this lasts, but the dockability of things
   feels really great. I can pick up either game or work or
   whatever and do it somewhere else, but I am also not trapped
   with a small screen or using an onscreen keyboard instead of
   a real one etc.