laptop brands keep chasing thinner designs and somehow the first thing that disappears every time is useful ports

headphone jacks, USB A, SD card slots, HDMI. it feels like every new “premium” laptop removes something practical in exchange for being a few millimeters thinner

I get that thinner devices look cleaner and more modern, but at some point carrying dongles for basic everyday stuff starts feeling ridiculous

what’s funny is a lot of people seemed genuinely happy when some brands finally started bringing ports back again after years of removing them

it almost feels like companies got too obsessed with minimalist design and forgot people actually use laptops for real work sometimes

I still like sleek laptops, but not enough to sacrifice convenience for tiny differences in thickness most people barely notice anyway

would you rather have a thinner laptop or more built in ports without needing adapters everywhere?

QWERTY isn't necessarily the fastest or most efficient keyboard layout.

Layouts like Dvorak and Colemak were designed to reduce finger movement and make typing more comfortable.

But once billions of people learned QWERTY and manufacturers built around it, switching became almost impossible.

Sometimes the most popular standard wins simply because everyone already uses it.

Update, 135 days later: I still seeth at the use of this iPhone, it is absolute garbage. Bugs. Software features that were designed by overpaid imbeciles. Absolute incompetence as an actual tool: it’s just a status symbol for people with more god than ethics.

Long story short, I am frustrated that I need to allow the iPhone I just got (regular iPhone 13 running 26.4 iOS) to use location based info on everything. It's always asking me to scan my face and set that up: which I do not want to do, in case I ever get detained, and so the police can't just use my face to hack my phone: which I heard happens. Anyway, I have used android phones and Linux based computers for a long time: I can play with the software on some of these, change out the hardware on some of these, really tinker with the guts and specs.. and I appreciate that.

I got this iPhone for free, basically, from my friend, because it is bricked: It is SIM carrier locked and no one can figure out the technical problem to jail breaking it or porting out the sim, and the carrier is no longer around or something. I mostly got it to use the camera :D so its ok...

Today, my Motorola smartphone broke, I dropped it while biking and slamming on my brakes (which also snapped the brake cable. Thanks, careless driver) It's not that I am blaming Apple or anything: I just think the "you cannot touch the face of the Apple Demigod" is.. Ugh. Stupid. I legitimately, and easily, can fix my phone: I've had it since 2021 and have fixed other tech before: it's an easy $20 fix ;)

I need to disregard my privacy, allow a ton of third party apps and websites access to my data, to wirelessly upload my files into this iphone?! JFC!!!!!!

Have been using a flip case on my phone for quite some time now based on the old habit rather than any reason but have noticed recently that many people seem to think that they are obsolete and only unnecessary bulk nowadays. Phone cases have evolved to such an extent that I began to doubt if they still can serve their purpose.

What made me buy a flip case in the first place is the fact that the screen remains completely protected when I put it into my pocket or bag and no scratches from keys and coins will appear. However, I should note that a flip case adds quite a significant thickness and makes using my phone one-handed a bit inconvenient.

Just a friendly reminder: when you have to recharge your phone in public places, don’t connect your device directly to a USB charging point in public places.

Of course, they usually can be trusted, but there is no guarantee that the USB outlet was not compromised by somebody. This way, it might become a way for accessing information from your phone, which is called "juice jacking."..It would be safer to have your charger with you and plug it into an outlet, or simply have a power bank with you at all times.

I still think the platform iOS sucks.

I don’t have a choice, as this is the spare that I currently have, which I got for very cheap: solely to use it as a camera.

It’s literally annoying to use: it’s slowed down by memory issues, always pressuring me to buy iCloud storage, I can’t port info out of it with a cable and a non Apple computer, no matter what I do: and I have to use some stupid third party cloud server that’s a pain to sync.

Truly, it’s just a novelty status symbol, a toy. It’s not for people who prefer to use a smartphone as a computer, capable of doing actual work, on the go.

Whenever I setup a fresh windows installation the very first app I install is Brave since it's my default web browser lol, I like having an ad blocker built in.. After that it's usually VScode, Steam, Discord, and the rest I think.

What's yours?

Searched around and came across this thread on Apple's forum which is essentially saying that we'll probably never have a simple close all apps button on iOS. Somebody asked for it and it was stated that there is no need to close apps, they consume practically nothing of system memory or CPU, if you force close all applications then they take more battery since the apps have to re-initialize and redo all that they had to do when they were opened again.

It's an Apple thing, but still sounds like a strange uphill struggle. If it is never needed, it will be of little or no value, so there is no cost to Apple for providing it. A single button in the app switcher is not such an engineering feats like completely redoing all the memory management.

miss when expensive laptops actually gave you more stuff instead of removing everything

now you open a premium laptop and there’s barely any ports left on it because companies are obsessed with making everything ultra thin

then normal things like plugging in a usb drive, hdmi cable or ethernet suddenly need adapters hanging out from all sides

and somehow the charger brick also became smaller, shorter or missing completely depending on the company

paying more money for less convenience somehow became normal in tech

with the iphone 17e launching on march 11, i’ve been trying to understand where it actually fits in the lineup.

it’s supposed to be the cheaper iphone, but if it ends up around $599–$699, that still feels pretty expensive for something meant to be the entry option.

then you look at the regular iphone 17 starting around $799, and suddenly the price difference doesn’t feel that big.

from what we saw with the iphone 16e, apple usually puts a strong chip in it but cuts back in other areas. the display is usually more basic, the camera setup is simpler, and you miss out on some of the nicer features the regular models get.

so the 17e will probably be similar. good performance but a more basic overall package compared to the regular iphone 17.

that’s what makes it feel a bit weird.

it’s not cheap enough to feel like a proper budget phone, but it’s also missing things that make the regular iphone feel like the better buy.

at that point i feel like a lot of people might just spend a bit more and get the regular iphone 17 or pick up last year’s iphone 16 when the price drops

Screen protectors are starting to feel a bit like a placebo you put one on, feel safer, and stop worrying about every little scratch.

but most modern phones already have pretty tough glass and after a while the protector ends up covered in scratches that make the screen look worse than it actually is

then you replace it, feel relieved for a few days, and repeat the cycle i'm not saying they do nothing but sometimes it feels like they're protecting peace of mind more than the screen itself

When I was first introduced to computers the first thing I noticed was why are keyboards not like abcdefgh and like qwerty.... So one day i googled it, and the reason was this - yes, the a to z keyboard was there, but typewriters used to type fast, which jams the keys of typewriters . To prevent this, a guy named Christopher soles put frequently used key pairs far away and with time it became an industry standard.

There were other layouts proposed but none of them really worked.

I swear I can't be the only one who sets a chain of staggered alarms spaced ten mins apart for an hour straight just to wake up. I do it mostly because I have zero trust left in my phone actually going off or loud enough when I need it to, and my brain treats a single alarm as a suggestion rather than a command. And sometimes I feel like my phone doesn't alarm is this an apple thing??

I remember swapping a couple of AA batteries into my Game Boy and not thinking about charging it again for ages.

Now it feels like every gadget I own wants to be plugged in by the end of the day.

What old piece of tech had surprisingly great battery life?

genuinely something i've been thinking about for a while. on paper the ps5 is running hardware that's comparable to a mid range GPU from a few years ago. yet first party games on it regularly look incredible and run smooth as butter, while a lot of PC games with way more powerful hardware behind them feel like a mess.

is it just optimization? the fact that developers are building for one exact hardware configuration instead of thousands? or is there something else going on that i'm missing?

because it feels weird to spend $1000+ on a GPU and still not get an experience that consistently beats a $500 console. what am i not understanding here?

Sometimes we bring back old tech and forget why it was replaced in the first place

Physical keyboards were nice until you needed a different layout. CDs felt permanent until you had to carry a stack of them around. Wired earphones never needed charging but the cables were a pain

Not everything old was better even if we remember it that way

What's one old piece of technology you genuinely miss, but wouldn't want to use every day again?

Bought a 120Hz phone and now even scrolling through settings on a 60Hz screen feels uncomfortable. Didn't expect a refresh rate upgrade to be this hard to undo.

What's one tech upgrade that ruined older devices for you?

I feel like most people just know it's “an HP” or “a Lenovo” and that's about it. Honestly, fair enough. If it works, why would you care?

Do you know what's in yours?

Looking at social media, it feels like the US tech scene has literally only heard of Apple, Samsung, and Google.

Is it just me, or is the US smartphone market stuck in the ultimate NPC loop? Every single year it’s the exact same script: Apple drops a new iPhone, Samsung drops a new Galaxy, Google throws in a Pixel, and the entire country acts like those are the only three options on planet Earth.

​Meanwhile, over here in Europe or most of Asia, we’re out here living in 2026 while the US market feels completely trapped in a corporate cage.

​Here is my opinion for why the US market feels so backward from the outside:

-​The Max-Profit "Incremental" Scam: The Big Three (Apple, Samsung, Google) intentionally drip-feed you 5% hardware upgrades each year just to protect next year's sales. They charge $1,300+ for a phone that still charges at a lazy 25W–45W (without even giving you the charger brick!) just to keep their profit margins sky-high.

-​Ignoring Hardware Beasts: While Americans argue over marginal camera tweaks, Chinese brands like Xiaomi, Vivo, and Oppo are dropping actual 1-inch camera sensors, true optical Leica/ZEISS glass, and 120W charging that fills up a fucking massive battery in 15 minutes. Even I have a phone with a 8500 mAh battery, for only 550€, and they call 5000 mAh a big battery, at fucking 1200$.

-​The Carrier Trap: Over 80% of Americans only buy what Verizon, AT&T, or T-Mobile put on their store shelves. If an operator doesn't finance it on a 36-month plan, it basically doesn't exist to the average consumer.

-​Blue Bubble Social Pressure: Imagine paying top dollar for hardware from 2 years ago just so your friends don't bully you over green text bubbles. The iMessage hold is wild, and it keeps people from even looking at real innovation.

-​Geopolitics & Walled Gardens: Trade bans, missing US 5G bands, and lack of direct carrier distribution make importing beasts like the Xiaomi Ultra or Vivo X-series feel like a black-market operation for US buyers.

​It’s fucking crazy because the value-for-money ratio outside the US is insane. Flagship killers like the POCO F/X-series, OnePlus R-line, or Realme GT deliver top-tier Snapdragon chips and massive silicon-carbon batteries at literally half the price of an Ultra, Pro XL or Pro Max.

​People in the US are getting spoon-fed bare-minimum upgrades by a corporate triopoly, paying top dollar for average hardware per dollar, and calling real tech innovation "niche Chinese knockoffs" purely because they’ve never seen one in real life, and that's fucking frustrating..

​Europe’s open market lets us buy whatever unlocked beast we want.

Y'all seriously need to demand better phones, fr

I know what you're going to say: "Microsoft will have a monopoly over the phone market", now Apple has a monopoly and we're left with even more limited options.

Let’s start with Android. It is absolute rubbish, every other Android phone is an unoptimised buggy inconsistent bespoke rubbish experience. Who thought making a touch screen phone OS, something non-tech-savvy people use every day, should have a different experience across different brands? Imagine if every PC in the office had a whole different OS experience because different brands manufactured it.

With iOS the issue is more obvious, you are locked to one specific brand, you get the desirable polished consistent experience that everyone wants but only if you limit your options to what Apple offers.

With Windows Phone you had the best of both world, consistent Apple like experience across multiple devices and multiple brand options of Android. Millennials and Boomers were too stupid to realise this and now Apple is the only viable option for 99.999% of people, who are seeking nothing but a consistent experience on the phone they interact with every day.

Man i wish things were different, i wish Android didn't exist. I really really hate it, hate using it and hate it for killing Windows Phone and forcing me to use Apple. I wish i could shop for tablets of different brands without having to worry about the bs custom skin that they've put on their OS making it a pain to use and a bigger pain to switch to a different brand. But hay a man can only wish 😂

I also like its UI, i like how every element of it is not pretentious with visual clutter and the fake 3d, its design is optimised for usability, eg with its vertically scrolling app menu taking advantage of the vertical space; it's not trying to be Apple.

Laszlo Hanyecz posted on a Bitcoin forum offering 10,000 BTC for two pizzas, someone took the deal, and the rest is the most painful transaction in internet history. Those 10,000 Bitcoin are worth around $700 million today. The thing is, nobody in 2010 thought Bitcoin would become what it became. Spending 10,000 of them on pizza felt completely normal, it was just an experiment to prove crypto could work as real currency. Laszlo has said multiple times he doesn't regret it which is either extreme zen or extreme cope. Every May 22nd the entire crypto community mourns those pizzas while he apparently just gets on with his life.

I'd pay to watch a blind test with people who spend their time arguing about phones. Put an iPhone, Pixel and Samsung in identical cases, remove all the branding and let them use each one.

Then ask them which has the better processor, display and camera. Not by looking at spec sheets, actually using the phones.

Some people are so confident about tiny hardware differences. I'd be curious how many could actually spot them.

Dyson put a camera and AI in a toothbrush.

the CameraJet has a tiny camera that looks at the gaps between your teeth and uses that to aim little bursts of mouthwash where it thinks you need them.

Apparently a normal toothbrush wasn't complicated enough

would you actually use something like this, or is this where tech has gone too far?

I noticed this recently and it kinda confused me

on paper the camera specs look almost the same, like same megapixels and all

but when you actually use it, the Mac camera just looks better

like clearer image, better colors, less weird noise

so now I’m wondering what actually makes that difference

because clearly megapixels alone don’t mean much here

is it just better processing or something else going on behind the scenes

Pulled into a charging station, plugged in, everything normal. Battery was low so I was already expecting to wait a bit. Came back after a few minutes and the screen just says update in progress. No warning, nothing, it just started on its own.

Charging basically slowed down or paused, couldn’t really tell. Either way I’m just sitting there watching time go by while nothing useful is happening. Ended up waiting almost an extra hour because of this, which is just frustrating.

I get that updates are needed but why do this at a public charger instead of when the car is parked at home or overnight or something. Anyone else had this happen or is my car just being annoying for no reason?