[NFBCS] Laptop Recommendations

Wed Oct 8 16:46:14 UTC 2025

Yup; lots of us use the headless dongle 

-----Original Message-----
From: NFBCS <nfbcs-bounces at nfbnet.org> On Behalf Of Jim Denham via NFBCS
Sent: October 8, 2025 12:31 PM
To: NFB in Computer Science Mailing List <nfbcs at nfbnet.org>
Cc: Jim Denham <jdenham at wcblind.org>; Doug Lee <dgl at dlee.org>
Subject: Re: [NFBCS] Laptop Recommendations

You can purchase a display emulator, aka a headless monitor, on Amazon for less than $10. Once you plug this into the HDMI port, you will have the second monitor option which Greg described. This trick dramatically increases battery life on my Samsung Galaxy Laptop.
Jim

-----Original Message-----
From: NFBCS <nfbcs-bounces at nfbnet.org> On Behalf Of Doug Lee via NFBCS
Sent: Wednesday, October 8, 2025 10:45 AM
To: NFB in Computer Science Mailing List <nfbcs at nfbnet.org>
Cc: Doug Lee <dgl at dlee.org>
Subject: Re: [NFBCS] Laptop Recommendations

I think that approach requires that your laptop already believe that you actually have a secondary screen available. I don't, and I don't see that option sticking after I close the box, nor does my monitor appear to shut down. This is a Dell Latitude.

On Wed, Oct 08, 2025 at 09:09:18AM -0500, NFBCS mailing list wrote:
   You can turn off the built in screen on a windows laptop. Here’s how:

    1. [1]Windows Key + P:
       Press the Windows key + P to open the display settings, then select
       "Second screen only" to turn off the laptop's built-in display and
       use only an external monitor.

   Sent from my iPhone

     On Oct 8, 2025, at 8:34 AM, Brian Shell via NFBCS <nfbcs at nfbnet.org>
     wrote:

   No monitor would be neat!  It just sucks down battery power on my
   laptop since you can’t really turn it off.

     On Oct 8, 2025, at 12:45 AM, Elijah Massey via NFBCS
     <nfbcs at nfbnet.org> wrote:

     I think it would be a good idea to consider the Framework laptops,
     because when you have hardware problems you can likely fix them by
     replacing parts. You can even upgrade the motherboard and CPU
     without buying a new laptop if you want to upgrade the hardware; the
     processor cannot be separated from the motherboard but everything
     else can be replaced and the motherboard can be swapped. You can get
     Intel or AMD processors up to the most powerful laptop models, and
     up to the maximum amount of RAM the motherboard can hold. Also, if
     you don't need a screen, when the Optima comes out next year you
     could transition to that possibly reusing a lot of parts since its
     based on the Framework, and get something more portable but just as
     powerful. When I look up what the battery life is, people get widely
     varying results, but mostly people seem to say it lasts at least 6
     or 8 hours.

     Also, I know you mentioned you need an X86 processor, but for others
     reading this I would also recommend looking at the MacBook Pro,
     which is based on Apple Silicon (which uses the ARM archetecture).
     It gets up to 24 hours of battery life, probably more than any X86
     laptop, and the M4 Max is significantly more powerful than the Intel
     Core I9-13900K, the most powerful Intel desktop processor, in both
     single-core and multi-core benchmarks according to Geekbench. You
     can run Windows and Linux in virtual machines using VmWare Fusion or
     UTM, and MacOS and Windows both have good built-in X86 emulators
     that can run most X86 applications well, and there are a few high
     performance X86 emulators for Linux as well.

     Sent from my iPhone

     On Oct 7, 2025, at 15:41, Michael Forzano via NFBCS
     <nfbcs at nfbnet.org> wrote:

     Hi All,

     I've been using HP Elitebook 840 laptops for work for years, and
     have had to replace one on average once a year due to various
     hardware failures (USB C ports, headphone jack, and keyboard were
     the most recent). I have the opportunity to purchase something
     different and wanted to ask for recommendations from fellow blind
     developers. I feel like I've heard good things generally about
     ThinkPads so was primarily looking at those though i'm open to other
     suggestions. The ThinkPad X1 Carbon seems to have good reviews
     across the board, but I'm concerned it won't be powerful enough for
     developer use cases. I use VSCode primarily and typically have up to
     2 or 3 workspaces open at once, and I tend to have a lot of browser
     tabs open at any given time. Good battery life is important to me
     (at least 4 hours with practical usage). I also took a look into the
     T14S (Intel version as an Intel processor is a requirement for me)
     and the reviews from PCMag etc. were mixed.

     Does anyone have personal experience with these, or other premium
     laptops in a similar class that they can share?

     Thanks,

     Mike

--
Doug Lee                 dgl at dlee.org                http://www.dlee.org/
"There's no limit to what a man can do or where he can go if he doesn't mind who gets the credit." Ronald Reagan?

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