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Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : New laptops - no ethernet plug
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| zeitfest Guru  Joined: 31/07/2019 Location: AustraliaPosts: 581 |
Looking at new laptops I see often there is no ethernet socket (RJ45).. Are we being herded into forced wifi now ? Maybe we have to use usb converters ?? Yuk. |
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Gizmo Admin Group  Joined: 05/06/2004 Location: AustraliaPosts: 5119 |
I think its a height issue. My new laptop only has 3 USB, power and a mini-hdmi port. All those old school ports like serial, VGA, Ethernet are physically to big to fit into modern laptops. Glenn The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago, the second best time is right now. JAQ |
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palcal Guru Joined: 12/10/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1993 |
And mine (Dell) has no CD/DVD drive. "It is better to be ignorant and ask a stupid question than to be plain Stupid and not ask at all" |
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jirsoft Guru Joined: 18/09/2020 Location: Czech RepublicPosts: 533 |
Some have RJ-45 with tilt female. Jiri Napoleon Commander and SimplEd for CMM2 (GitHub), CMM2.fun |
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Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 7937 |
They lost the plot when they took the Centronics printer connector off. :( At least you could get a decent capacity (removable and replaceable) battery then. Not a fan of super-skinny laptops at all. Form over function innit? Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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| robert.rozee Guru Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 2442 |
but imagine taking one of the slim modern laptops and making the body 1/2 an inch thicker to add extra batteries! i use HP Stream 11 Pro laptops, which can be picked up for well under $100 second-hand because they can no longer run windows (4gb RAM, 64gb flash). these would be well suited to someone 3D printing a replacement to the base with an extra battery compartment underneath, and would then be able to run for perhaps 2 days continuously. with a bit of trickery it may even be possible to wire the extra cells into the existing battery pack. cheers, rob :-) Edited 2021-08-23 18:39 by robert.rozee |
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| Tinine Guru Joined: 30/03/2016 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1646 |
@robert.rozee  Also, have a look on eBay for Panasonic Toughbook CF-18 or CF-19. This is what I use for programming MCUs on the factory floor. -Magnesium shell with rubber protectors -Swivel touchscreen that can fold flat to form a tablet (great for Pico Scope) -Removable battery and hard-drive, protected by locking metal doors -2 X USB, RS232, VGA, Ethernet, PCMCIA -WiFi, Bluetooth -Spill-proof keyboard -Fan-less Centrino based so a dog of a performer, generally but these things just don't die  |
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| circuit Senior Member  Joined: 10/01/2016 Location: United KingdomPosts: 277 |
RJ45 LAN to Thunderbolt connector for laptop - currently around 10 UK Pounds on Amazon; what's the problem? But look carefully, a lot of ultrathin laptops come with a small port extender anyway - not always obvious when browsing the top page. I am writing this on a super thin ASUS i7 ZenBOOK which has a 4K screen and three USB-C-Thunderbolt ports. This makes it super easy to drop into a briefcase. This comes with a port extender for standard USB, additional USB3 and full size 4K HDMI connection. I bought an extra port extender which has 4KHDMI, LAN, VGA, 4 full-size USB, SD card reader, both standard and micro. The Thunderbolt standard is fantastic; 40 Gbit/s; 8K monitors and so forth. The only thing that bothers me about Thunderbolt is the mechanical robustness/electrical integrity of the rather minute connectors. |
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| robert.rozee Guru Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 2442 |
a few of these have turned up on TradeMe (was like a local version of eBay, but has gone to the dogs as has opened up to overseas sellers and drop-shippers), but the prices they went for were insanely high. since you mention the industrial use, perhaps this is why. the HP Stream 11s, being a fair bit more modern, run with quite good performance. they ship with windows 10 pre-installed, and run it pretty well until they are connected to the internet and start trying to update themselves. then they get stuck in a 'failed update' loop that i've never been able to break one out of (i have tried many times on several different Stream 11s). thereafter they slow down to a crawl, becoming an 'internet zombie vampire' that sucks bandwidth as they download the same set of updates over and over again. i had one that was turned off. it somehow managed to turn itself backon, and proceeded to consume my entire allocation of bandwidth for the month (over fibre) within about 10 days  i only found out when my isp emailed me.cheers, rob :-) Edited 2021-08-23 19:13 by robert.rozee |
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| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 7937 |
Sounds like they might be a better linux candidate, Rob. I use a fanless "baby" PC that runs Windows 10 with 4GB RAM and 64GB flash remarkably well so it can definitely be done (I have 2 with similar specs). Additional storage is preferable (and can be added with a M.2 card in this case) but it's not essential. The processor isn't suitable for Windows 11 though. Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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| Tinine Guru Joined: 30/03/2016 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1646 |
The CF-18 and CF-19 appear to be popular with the auto-service shops and I suspect on some kind of lease deal because eBay sellers usually have batches to dispose of. I bought 2 of these for a total of less than 300 quid For when I need W10, I have a couple of Fusion5 tablets (4G/64G) with rubber protectors. I paid 160 quid each for these. I haven't had any updating issues with these and I'm wondering if it's because I went through the extensive optimization routine for digital audio performance(?) In theory, these things are way underpowered but they actually perform like champs. The optimization involved delving-deep and disabling a whole bunch of crap and the only thing that I have appeared to have lost is the ability to "Sleep" because I have forced it to be permanently 100% performance. Prior to optimizing, I had no-end of pops and crackles. |
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| Volhout Guru Joined: 05/03/2018 Location: NetherlandsPosts: 5089 |
W10: You can patch the registry, so they don't update anymore. I've had that done to my 32Gb emmc netbook. It is far behind in updates now... but runs fine. Use it for my laser etcher. PicomiteVGA PETSCII ROBOTS |
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| zeitfest Guru Joined: 31/07/2019 Location: AustraliaPosts: 581 |
I experimented a bit, bought from Kogan "Atlas mini-PC", not bad. Runs on 12v - useful for off-grid. Very small in size. Obviously not intended for heavy crunching but useful as screenscraper or light embedded controller. It was originally destined to utilise an old VGA but the HDMI is nice. The 300/400 models have a VGA socket, not always advertised. Definitely not for net connections. My main worry is will SSD type memory wear out in continuous write use (?). |
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| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 7937 |
Oh, it'll very likely wear out eventually. But will there still be an OS that will run on those specs when it does? It's used to store the OS and programs so doesn't have to get hammered like RAM does. Mine are similar to this https://www.amazon.co.uk/Beelink-T4-X5-Z8500-Ultra-Quiet-Computer/dp/B085ZJ31KH/ref=sr_1_9?dchild=1&keywords=beelink+fanless+pc&qid=1629727282&s=computers&sr=1-9 but both are older models with a bit less on them. I rarely use anything else now. Not a gamer's machine, but fine for web browsing, emails, a bit of general word processing, 2D CAD etc. Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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lew247 Guru Joined: 23/12/2015 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1702 |
USB Dock   |
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| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 7937 |
Very nice... I'd like to see the 100W power distribution tested though. :) Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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| danielkos Newbie  Joined: 10/07/2021 Location: AustraliaPosts: 25 |
Lenovo USB Thinkpad docks are another option, I got a second-hand one from eBay which works well, but the market now seems flooded with a weird type that requires a strange connector. (Also the display connector on mine doesn't seem to be detected in Linux Mint out of the box) Or cheap garbage-tier USB hubs that have an integrated ethernet port. I have one that does the job when I'm on the move (pre-covid at least) although USB devices connected to it seem to disconnect at random times. I've made a habit of sending a question to the vendor before I buy a laptop, printer, etc. to ask if it has an ethernet connector, even if it seems it doesn't. I don't expect them to change their ways any time soon, but I want them to know that there are at least some people out there who won't blindly buy what the vendor offers. Some stores have a poor calibre of sales rep who will outright lie since they don't know what "ethernet" means. |
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