The scourge of fully soldered and non-upgradeable laptops

[_MT_]

What all those Windows OEMs are ignoring is the fact that, even when soldered, their laptops are still as pricey as ever, and at one point, you are better off going full Apple instead, because at least there, if something fails, there are less hoops to jump through to get a replacement.

What hoops are you talking about? I never had to jump through any and I have received service Apple can only dream about. Funny thing is that unofficial Apple re-sellers back in the day before the official re-seller program offered the same level of service. They had to switch to Apple Care instead when they went official. I never had serious issues, but the small niggles I had like a switch developing a rattle (required a new motherboard) or a black pixel were resolved within a couple of days and at my home. It has happened that wrong parts were supplied as the operator misdiagnosed the problem - but two days is still great and I could keep using the laptop; of course, it could be more with a weekend or holidays getting in the way. Complete replacement can be problematic as I tend to have customized systems which they make to order. But then you're probably talking about accidental destruction (like when my colleague wrote off a laptop in a car crash) rather than a warranty repair.

Actually, soldering RAM and SSD can be more expensive. You're saving some money on assembly, connectors don't come free either, but you might not have that high a volume, it becomes more problematic to offer larger number of configurations, the logistics, stockpiling of spare parts. Modules might require assembly, but they offer flexibility. Or you end up with the mess Microsoft has where I have to pay for a more expensive CPU if I want more of ridiculously overpriced RAM.

[elect]

Just start voting using your wallet.

Personally I started with the Fairphone 3+ and now I'm gonna buy a laptop from Tuxedo or Xmg

[Paulus]

Soldered RAMs are OK. There are some technical reasons for that, very likely for BOTH performance and energy efficiency. There is a reason why there are no GPUs with socketed VRAM. Also, just look at what LPDDR4X on Ice Lake, Renoir, and Tiger Lake SoCs can do: crazy memory bandwidth with very low power, both when idling and active.

However, I absolutely disagree with soldered storage. First, they don't need that much bandwidth (the fastest PCIe 4.0 SSD can't still outperform a single channel DDR3 1066 MHz). Then they have a limited lifespan. Finally, accidents do happen and if somehow the laptop's motherboard got fried (such as from electric surge, liquid spill, or simply because of a failed firmware/BIOS upgrade), with a soldered storage you're done.

[vertigo]

Agreed that CPU upgrade is next to pointless, especially on an Intel system. You're going to spend half as much getting a barely newer and/or faster CPU, which will be the best you can do due to newer ones using a different socket (hence why it makes a bit more sense with AMD), as you would just getting a new mobo/CPU combo which will also get you the newer I/O and features and possibly memory. However, depending on the upgrade, you can reuse drives and sometimes reuse RAM and definitely GPU if you're not a hardcore gamer.

I build my own desktops and probably upgrade every 3-5 years, so I always replace mobo/CPU/RAM, but I often will transfer my GPU, some or most of my storage drives, and my ODD. Even the case and PSU can be reused, though I usually don't because I typically end up giving my old setup to someone, and even desktop cases are unfortunately rarely modular enough to even allow swapping out ports for newer ones, which is another thing that bugs me (I've looked at fairly expensive, high-end cases like Caselabs and Mountain Mods, but wasn't willing to spend that kind of money when they didn't even offer something as basic as a USB 3.0 panel upgrade years after USB 3.0 was out; no wonder Caselabs went out of business).

So yes, having the ability doesn't mean you will use it to the full extent, but it does save quite a bit of money: initial purchase (being able to shop around not only based on price but to be able to get exactly what you want); repairs (being able to replace a CPU/GPU/RAM/SSD/etc that goes bad, vs needing to deal with a warranty repair/replacement of the whole computer or having to buy a whole new computer, not to mention being able to do it myself vs having to have someone else do it, whether on-site or not); and upgrading (as much as I hate my Surface, if I could bump the RAM up to 16GB for $50 that would make it significantly less crappy and help allow me to limp along with it until I find an adequate replacement, and last time I rebuilt my desktop I reused my GPU among other things, but I may very well end up upgrading that and the SSD well before upgrading the CPU/mobo/RAM again).

And MS is far from the only one charging ridiculously excessive amounts to step up RAM or storage amounts. Many/most others do it too, as well as requiring i7 just to get >8GB RAM, so not only do you have to pay twice as much (or more) for that extra 8GB as you would pay for a full 16GB on your own, but you have to pay for the upgrade to the i7 as well. So you end up forking out $200-300 more than you should have to and getting a CPU you don't even want just to have a usable computer, which is why I'm not typing this on an HP right now, since that's the only reason I didn't get a Spectre several months ago.

[stdremoveif]

If a laptop has enough space for a 2.5" slot, it should have battery there instead

[Spunjji]

"The motherboard chipset, of course, patently limited the upgrade path because it's a foregone conclusion that in a few generations, new CPUs wouldn't support its motherboard chipset or socket"

Read as "one generation" for Intel 😏

[_MT_]

However, depending on the upgrade, you can reuse drives and sometimes reuse RAM and definitely GPU if you're not a hardcore gamer.

You don't have to be a hardcore gamer. I always tended to buy a sort of upper-mid range cards for occasional gaming. But, in a few years, performance can go up significantly, games get more demanding and you might want support for newer APIs. And HDDs are mechanical, they wear. I might have kept it, but I would always buy newer, bigger drives. Granted, in a desktop, HDDs were the one thing that I actually upgraded (well, usually, I just added more). I sort of allowed them to live their own life independent (out of step) of the rest of the computer. Because I could. It wouldn't be that big a deal if I couldn't. I guess partly because swapping drives meant transferring data. As long as there was space, it was easier to keep it. I have never reused RAM. Even if the same technology was still used, it was cheaper and I wanted more (bigger modules). Frankly, quite often, I happened to buy a computer at the wrong time, before a significant change. I needed it so I bought it. Which limited upgrade potential.

[vertigo]

However, depending on the upgrade, you can reuse drives and sometimes reuse RAM and definitely GPU if you're not a hardcore gamer.

You don't have to be a hardcore gamer. I always tended to buy a sort of upper-mid range cards for occasional gaming. But, in a few years, performance can go up significantly, games get more demanding and you might want support for newer APIs. And HDDs are mechanical, they wear. I might have kept it, but I would always buy newer, bigger drives. Granted, in a desktop, HDDs were the one thing that I actually upgraded (well, usually, I just added more). I sort of allowed them to live their own life independent (out of step) of the rest of the computer. Because I could. It wouldn't be that big a deal if I couldn't. I guess partly because swapping drives meant transferring data. As long as there was space, it was easier to keep it. I have never reused RAM. Even if the same technology was still used, it was cheaper and I wanted more (bigger modules). Frankly, quite often, I happened to buy a computer at the wrong time, before a significant change. I needed it so I bought it. Which limited upgrade potential.

Yeah, I realize you don't have to be, but if you are, you're replacing the GPU, whereas if you're not, you may or may not. As I said, in my case, I didn't on my last rebuild. I'm still running a 770 and have had no issues on any of the games I've played.

Drives, I do typically replace for larger quantities, but I do that even during the lifespan of a computer, so it both allows me to do it anytime and to not do it during a rebuild if I've replaced them recently. And the old drives then become backups, so two 4TB drives would get replaced by a single 8TB in the computer, but the old ones are then kept as backup. My point is that it's nice to have options, and when those options exists, people can and will replace various things at various times, proof that it's helpful and even necessary to be able to do so, which is why it's a problem that laptops can't.

As for replacing before a significant change, as you know that's always the case just because there's always some significant change around the corner. But I always wait until an upgrade is actually worth it, to get significantly more performance and different features, e.g. new USB gen or, with my last build, M.2 was the big driver for upgrading, since I needed and NVME drive (yes, needed, since Windows apparently doesn't run from RAM but rather from the drive, and when doing stuff that heavily accessed the drive, like RAR unpacking, Windows would temporarily freeze up, which also happens on my Surface). My mistake on my last upgrade was doing it right when RAM prices went through the roof, especially since I was putting 64GB in it. Luckily I found a deal with a good price, which was the absolute only one I saw over the course of around a month plus of looking, including around BF/CM.

[doa379]

The article is worrying about the wrong things. Upgradability has limited returns for a given device. So it's economically best to leave the spec of a device intact. You don't gain much for performance through upgrades especially for laptops, notebooks, tablets. You might gain some capacity when it comes to RAM or storage. But even power users aren't maxing out the capabilities of their devices. They would have you believe that they are, they are not. You can already get a great deal of performance by altering work flows and/or using carefully written software. But if you're unable to do this then get the device that suits you now and stop complaining.

[vertigo]

The article is worrying about the wrong things. Upgradability has limited returns for a given device. So it's economically best to leave the spec of a device intact. You don't gain much for performance through upgrades especially for laptops, notebooks, tablets. You might gain some capacity when it comes to RAM or storage. But even power users aren't maxing out the capabilities of their devices. They would have you believe that they are, they are not. You can already get a great deal of performance by altering work flows and/or using carefully written software. But if you're unable to do this then get the device that suits you now and stop complaining.

My desktop has 64GB of RAM and is consistently using over half, meaning 32GB wouldn't me enough. My laptop has 8GB and my main browser is constantly crashing due to running out of memory, even with a 16GB page file. Which brings me to the point that I'm constantly running out of space on my laptop's 250GB SSD, so having to use such a large page file only makes that worse. Even on my desktop, which has a 1TB SSD and 8TB main storage, I often find myself running low and having to move or delete stuff I'd rather not, and I intend to upgrade both within the next couple years or so. As I mentioned earlier, if I were able to upgrade the RAM and storage in my Surface, it would help significantly. Though it would still need to be replaced for other reasons, including the fact the CPU is often spiked for minutes at a time, bringing everything to slow motion, because it's just not able to keep up anymore, especially with certain websites that are incredibly poorly optimized. If I could upgrade the storage in my phone, I could probably use it a few more years, but instead I've been looking for a replacement for a while just to get one where I won't constantly have low storage issues. So yes, I am maxing out my computers' capabilities, which is why I build my desktops the way I do, why I prefer desktops for the ability to upgrade them, and why the current state of laptops is so problematic.

I'm sorry we can't all be like you and write our own browsers, office software, file managers, etc, to make them run at maximum efficiency, or somehow make poorly made websites magically run better (or just not use them). Some of us have to use the available tools, which are pretty much always never all that well-written. And saying it's economically best to leave a computer's specs is ridiculous; it's common knowledge that an SSD upgrade, followed by a RAM upgrade, are the best ways to cheaply improve a computer's performance and give it new life, allowing for its continued use vs paying several hundred dollars plus for a replacement, and I have done so in the past when able.

Even with CPUs, which generally don't make much sense, there can still be a benefit. Just look at the latest 5000-series Ryzens coming out which use the same socket as the previous 2 (or more?) generations and, if AMD's claims are remotely true, would allow for a very significant boost in CPU and GPU performance just by swapping it out, which could be very enticing for many users I imagine.

As for getting "the device that suits you now," the problem with that is that many devices don't come with adequate RAM and/or storage, and if it's non-upgradeable, then it rules it out, which severely limits options. You may be happy choosing from a small handful of options just because OEMs place arbitrary limits and don't allow upgrades, but many of us are not. And you may be fine just buying whatever garbage the OEMs want to sell you, but we're not. So if you don't like the "complaining," then just keep giving your money to companies that want to rip you off and jumping through hoops to "[alter] work flows and/or [use] carefully written software" just so your under-specced computer will do the job, instead of just getting one that can do what you need without a hassle. The rest of us will continue voicing our opinions and voting with our wallets, which is how you let manufacturers what you really want so you can get a device that fits you, not one that they want to sell you. I'm not sure why you're even on a review site if you can't see the point in that.

[A]

The article is worrying about the wrong things. Upgradability has limited returns for a given device. So it's economically best to leave the spec of a device intact. You don't gain much for performance through upgrades especially for laptops, notebooks, tablets. You might gain some capacity when it comes to RAM or storage. But even power users aren't maxing out the capabilities of their devices. They would have you believe that they are, they are not. You can already get a great deal of performance by altering work flows and/or using carefully written software. But if you're unable to do this then get the device that suits you now and stop complaining.

This is a joke right?

I currently have 14gb of memory and 14gb of swap being used. I can easily benefit from 32gb ram or better yet 64gb ram.

An XPS 15 with 8gb ram costs $1,579. 32gb ram costs 250 and 64gb costs $550.

In comparison I can buy 64gb of ram same clock speed for $250. And 32gb for $130.

I can get similar savings on the hd too. And if I reuse from an old pc, I can even get larger savings.

[Eduard Pertíñez]

Here I have a whole new type of story for you NoteBookCheck. Take an LG Gram (say 17Z990  8) and a new one (say 17Z95N) and try to exchange motherboards. I found no info about it being possible or not. Or where to buy an spare new one.
I own a 17Z990 LG Gram and I am very happy with it, but I could use a i7-1165g7 with Intel Iris Xe graphic card. And I could use the new battery also.
I would bet LG Gram 17 has not changed it's internal structure so much in two-three-four generations. It would be a very interesting report you could do, and could work for many other laptops out there.

[Rick Ornato]

I have been in the industry for 30+ years. Flexibility is in the industries best interest. Every once in a while a CEO comes along and wonders why they are leaving money on the table and do things like taking the "Apple" approach to hardware (proprietary hardware; closed source approach) or try to cut out the channel by going direct to the end user. It fails miserably and the CEO gets fired and they go back to business as usual. An 1/8th of an inch thickness doesn't change anyone's life.

On another note, trying to find a laptop in Jan of 2021 with more than 16gb of ram is next to impossible right now. The Car dealership model of "impulse buy/discount the floor model" is dead. Basic systems that can be ordered form the factory ala Dell is the future. The sooner they figure this out the better.

[Survivor]

This ever growing trend of soldered memory / storage in laptops has been infuriating me! >:( Having such a device would basically force me to buy a new one years earlier than I normally would. Imagine they did something comparable with cars, bikes and such...

So far I have replaced memory and storage in all my family's laptops. In general that has increased each devices' lifetime by at least 4 years.

In the past 20 years we have only bought 8 laptops in total so far (some of them used). Two of them had issues with a memory module at some point, unfortunately. So we simply replaced the defective memory. And one of those laptops is still being used almost every day for hours. We bought it in 2009. :)

Anyways, when buying computers my key requirements in this regard are:
1. Upgradability / Repairability (at least memory and storage)
2. Easy access of swappable components (glued devices are a no-go!! >:( )

That's one of major the reasons I would -never ever- buy an Apple product! ;)

[Anonymousgg]

Raspberry Pi will sell you an 8 GB soldered single-board computer for $75. Some laptops and tablets are still packing 4 GB soldered at over $350.

The problem with soldered RAM isn't necessarily the upgradeability. It's that it makes the RAM upsell much worse. Ideally, you would want to buy a device with a minimum of 4 GB or 8 GB and upgrade it to 32 GB or 64 GB yourself. If you could get 16 GB soldered at the right price, you wouldn't care as much. But we are being overcharged for RAM, especially at the lower price points.

Soldered + 1 module could be an acceptable compromise, even if you end up with a mismatched 36 GB or 40 GB configuration.