Some tough questions on buying a new laptop

peterbr

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I'm on the market for a new laptop and am wondering if people might have some thoughts on the following couple questions. The first one is, well, especially technical (and maybe unanswerable).

I've read some hair-raising stuff about Intel vPro tech, which contains AMT--Active Management Technology. According to what I've read, AMT / Management Engine could be used by hackers / NSA, etc. to spy on everything going on on your computer (see article on ExtremeTech website). It seems, though, that almost any affordable yet powerful laptop has chips w/ vPro. I gather vPro by itself may not be sufficient for attacker access, but am not sure just what would need to be present to make this an open door to the computer?

A second issue is more mundane. Some years ago, I splurged for an expensive i7 laptop, figuring I could use it as a substitute for a desktop. I need to periodically do some very computationally intensive work. While the i7 could handle the work, I don't think the laptop could. Whenever the processor was above 15% use, the fans would go like crazy and I was afraid I'd burn the machine out. For that matter, anything above about 2.5% use and the fan would start to get annoying. For the most part, I've avoided using the laptop above 15%, so it wasn't an option for my more intensive work.

So, I'm now looking at laptops with options between i5 chips and powerful i7 or even Xeon chips, but am wondering whether with the current generation of chips I'd be able to fully use more powerful chips or not? I find it disturbing to have a laptop fan sounding like my vacuum.
 
what software are you running? Maybe I can help but i need to know the software or what is the software being used for. I dont think Xeon processors with laptops are a good option for anything even rendering.
 
Sure Dohko15: I'll be running KDE desktop in Ubuntu. Inside that, Virtualbox with Windows running a Citrix virtual desktop over VPN (currently takes up about 15% of my entire processor--stresses my current computer). Stanford CoreNLP (Java) and Python for language processing. Stan (Bayesian estimation) and sundry maximum likelihood procedures tying up as many threads as I give them. I use my current laptop for development, so I rarely run anything computationally intensive for more than 15 minutes because I worry it may break the laptop. I set up a remote desktop for runs longer than that (could be a day or so). I'd at a minimum want something that could keep up with my current desktop (i7 chip with a CPU benchmark around 6100 according to Passmark), but hopefully with less huffing and puffing (it's a 2011 32nm chip). Would be ideal if I could run day long estimation routines on my laptop without it breaking a sweat, because my connection with the remote desktop tends to break after a day or two (so can't get much done on trips), but suspect the 'without a sweat' won't happen.
 
'll be running KDE desktop in Ubuntu. Inside that, Virtualbox with Windows running a Citrix virtual desktop over VPN (currently takes up about 15% of my entire processor--stresses my current computer).

correct me if im wrong im sure i am

youre gonna run windows with virtual box and inside windows a virtual desktop? Then youre gonna access that virtual desktop with VPN. You're gonna use your laptop as a remote server?
If thats the case youre not gonna be needing a Xeon processor unless you run a bunch of VMs and each needing a lot of cores.

Setting that aside:

Stanford CoreNLP (Java) and Python for language processing. These don't require a monster CPU.

Stan (Bayesian estimation) and sundry maximum likelihood procedures tying up as many threads as I give them. This is where you might need a Xeon, a quad core will only give 8 threads to run efficiently. But how intensive are these tasks I don't know.

Yeah running computations all day long a laptop will reduce its lifespan significantly if you hear the fan kicing up, then you should just not do it and use a desktop or something else.

A workstation laptop might survive all of these though as long as it has a good cooling technology. But damn that's a very expensive investment. :neutral:
 
Thanks Dohko15 :) . That goes a ways toward answering my question.

Just to clarify, my much preferred OS is linux. But my workplace requires me to be running Windows in order to work remotely on a virtual desktop. So, I put the remote desktop in Windows in Virtualbox in Linux.

Am getting the impression that the best setup for me would be a relatively cheap laptop and purchasing something like an Amazon linux server in the cloud for computationally intensive work. Big issue is how much should I nevertheless invest in a laptop so it's snappy for development work and three layers of virtualization.

One thing I'm wondering is whether the current generation of laptop processors (14nm) generate noticeably less heat than older chips (32nm)?
 
I may have a 'sort of' solution to my concerns about vPro and TrustZone. Looks like recent AMD chips no longer have TrustZone. But such chips as the AMD A10 Pro are still based in 28nm tech (not sure how much difference that makes, but maybe for heat), have Passmark benchmarks about the same as my 2011 Intel chip, and still cost a pretty penny. Maybe the solution, if I want to engage in anonymous activities online (political), would be a cheap AMD based desktop or laptop. Question is how cheap could I go and still be able to run a secure virtualized OS without much lag?
 
Let me take that back. Recent AMD "A" series chips continue to use Trustzone--just had a harder time finding technical info on the issue.

I also recently learned about AMD's Ryzen chip. Looks like it could be a good advance in performance and price, though it'll probably be end of year at least before Ryzen based laptops become available. It doesn't, apparently, use TrustZone, but it still has a PSP / ARM security processor that people worry about creating back doors for attackers, including, ahem, state actors. But one difference between AMD and Intel is that Intel vPRO / ME is specifically designed to allow remote and invisible access and control to a computer. AMD ARM looks to be primarily a DRM / secure content scheme. It's not inconceivable that it could connect out to the network, but that doesn't seem to be what it's meant to do. Libreboot is also trying to convince AMD, which is acting receptive, to release the source code behind its ARM security scheme. That would get some eyes on it and reassure the public that the ARM isn't meant to spy on people's computers. Libreboot should start a petition!
 
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