Some fairly recent systems are also VGA only
Just put in a $100k-ish Dell FX2s blade enclosure. VGA only (though plugging a monitor/keyboard into this thing is admitting defeat … It’s got a serial port)
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It was originally called the clit mouse, but they changed it because so many computer guys couldn’t find it.
Thank you. I’ll see myself out.
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Apparently not, until all those “antiquated” systems still in use get upgraded to cloud storage.
Quite a few of them still lurking around, even in the basements of big corporate headquarters. Probably won’t see the planet’s entire data infrastructure go cloud-friendly until the physical communication lines are sufficiently robust and ubiquitous that every permanent structure in the country gets high-speed data…
Bound to void the warranty, but on some chassis the keyboards can be swapped…
http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Install_Classic_Keyboard_on_xx30_Series_ThinkPads
Personally I wouldn’t chance it. IMHO, the new chiclet Thinkpad keyboards are inferior, but still better than most of the contemporary competition.
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You mind us of ergonomic models (requiring a down stereo-periscope to use a laptop on a lap,) and the Kevin Hectic character of MOOD or some FPS like that, where using a gun’s sniper scope to zoom in also sees the ‘character view’ neck extending up to 4 feet forward to scope on ahead. The front facing camera doing dual duty as ab-dysphori-o-scope and perkometer, with neither the mercy of teal gobos nor of cutting to commercial. But what if it had a pack-of-cards (fanned!) display and 4 edge-oriented lips at the corners?
[…and might I say that is fine frozen bathwater and a very quick release from the rinse pan?]
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Noted when I went to BangGood.com to ballpark a 5-year employee perk (WiFi webcam, $20) and ran into $60 keysets. Nail lacquer, don’t fail me now.
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Someone living in Eastern or Central Europe? I’m typing on dual alphabet (latin/cyrrilic) keyboard right now.
I’ve worked as a sysadmin for a few years, now I deal more with embedded systems and measurement equipment, and I think that laptop like that could be useful for the second use case, especially with it’s multitude of ports.
Having said that, I’d probably prefer Panasonic Toughbook, due to dust and water resistance. I’ve had problems with my current laptop after aluminum chips made their way to the mainboard, and I’ve seen Thinkpad being damaged by carbon fiber dust.
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If you take security seriously you’ll want a hardened administrative workstation.
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This is why I like Display Port. It can do HDMI, DVI, DP, or VGA from the same small port (obviously a dongle is required for anything other than DP to DP).
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Can it play Red Dead Redemption 2?
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HI Timmh,
This is exactly what crowdfunding is supposed to be for. Unfortunately hardware crowdfunding has been utilized mainly by naive and inexperienced people, who think that raising $50,000 is enough, and they can also brag that they achieved 500% their funding goal, while still being completely underfunded.
The proper way to do this, would be to set a goal of say $2,000,000 which would actually be somewhat in the ballpark of bringing this through DVT, EVT, and PVT.
So, get in touch, if you like 
cheers,
Jeffrey
When you work in the cloud you believe that the cloud infrastructure is admined by goblins.
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Good for you. This is for the people who work on the cloud.
Cyrillic keys for example? Why? Yes I see the part about how, “See you can put more than one alphabet on there” part. But honestly, who TF ever needs to do that as an admin.
Almost everyone who doesn’t have English as a first language at least has accents that they need to type. Have a look at all the different types of keyboard layouts, and multiply them by the number of people who live in countries that would use them. All of those countries have admins.
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Yech! A Frankenstein monster useful for those still doing Sysadmin work like it was 2005. The one and only useful trick this monstrosity would have had a decade ago is VGA input but every server I’ve installed for more than the last decade has had DRAC/ILO/… BIOS level screen display over network rendering even that almost useless.
Had a lenovo for years. Tried to use it for months including disabling the trackpad to force me to use it, it was never better than a mouse. I ended up removing the rubber on the nipple and disabling it in the BIOS so it wouldn’t cause further problems.
I’ve been using rMBPs for all my needs since 2012 (including datacenter sysadmin). The multitouch gestures in the Mac trackpads are much more powerful than a mouse and even though I still carry my ageing but still perfectly functional Dell BT mouse from my last non-Mac purchase around I rarely use it anymore (Image editing being the only task where I still find it better).
This monster is for those that romanticize early aughts sysadmins like it was steampunk. There aren’t enough of them around to make crowdfunding viable.
If I was going to buy a performatively undesigned computer with reactionary hardware features, I’d at least want a 4:3 display. I mean, I want a 4:3 display anyway.
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“Yeah, just type the password and hit shakti excess. Oh, didn’t it work? Uh, make sure you don’t have pranic lift turned on. Yeah, the last character is hum+druze.”
(Semiotic standard <3)
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Indeed. Do we really need an JTAG header on the back of the thing?
For my admining tastes, it’s a little too busy. Besides, if I’m having to plug in a JTAG or do somethign wacky with banana jacks or ‘gator clips, the misbehaving gear is getting swapped with a spare and hauled back to the ol’ healing bench for some quality time with a logic probe.
And then there’s the 4 keyboard setup that Taran from Linus Tech Tips uses for his video editing.
In any conditions, it makes me want to cry at how much time people waste moving their hands from the keyboard to wherever. That is why nipple mice are so great.
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