== The sensible update for my vintage 2011 home machine As it happens, I think that there is a sensible, boring answer to what I should do about [[my current home computer HomeMachine2011]], one that bypasses all of [[my ../tech/PCTechnologyChurn2016]] [[concerns WaylandGraphicsUncertainty]] over a potential replacement machine. It's just an answer I've been somewhat reluctant to do, partly because it's nowhere near as interesting as putting together a new machine and partly because it's going to require some awkward gyrations. What I should really do is get a pair of 500 GB SSDs and use them to replace the current pair of system disks. A relatively small amount of space would go to an ext4 software RAID mirrored root filesystem ([[with all system stuff in it EverythingInRootFS]]); the majority of it would go to a new ZFS pool where I would put my home directory and a few other filesystems where I want fast access (for example because I compile source code there). This would get me both ZFS and a speedup on a bunch of things that I do. (At this point, some people are probably incredulous that I haven't already shifted my primary storage to SSDs.) Following my experience with my work machine, I should probably also take a deep breath and switch my machine from 16 GB of RAM to 32 GB, because this will make ZFS happier. The RAM will not be reusable in a future machine, unlike the SSDs, and it's still surprisingly expensive, so it's tempting to skip this and see if I can make do (especially with [[ZFS on Linux ARC improvements ZFSOnLinuxARCNowWorksRight]]). While upgrading my entire machine is the attractive thing to do, at this point it seems very likely that the largest single practical speedup I could do is moving frequently used data to from HDs to SSDs. And I don't need a whole new machine to do that, by any means. There are limitations to what this will do for me (it won't speed up processing photos, for example), but I think it's likely to make a difference. (Having looked at [[the CPU compatibility list for my Asus P8P67 LE motherboard https://www.asus.com/Motherboards/P8P67_LE/HelpDesk_CPU/]], I don't think there's any point in trying to upgrade the CPU. In fact it basically seems like the [[LGA 1155 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGA_1155]] CPUs that my motherboard uses are now so old that they're basically legacy hardware that you pay extra for. Even if my perception here is wrong, it doesn't look like I can get much of a CPU upgrade.) PS: My plan to put the root filesystem on the SSDs comes partly from necessity (it's currently on the HDs that the SSDs would replace) and partly because that's what I wound up doing on my work machine after contemplating [[my dilemma about this SSDRootDilemma]]. === Sidebar: the irrational reason I've been avoiding doing things like this For no particularly good reason, I've always found it easier to talk myself into buying a whole new machine every so often instead of progressively upgrading a machine piece by piece. As best I can figure it out, spending more money on something that's progressively becoming more and more obsolete just feels like a waste. (As you may guess, I'm not one of the people who enjoys progressively upgrading machines piece by piece. In fact I think the only hardware changes I've done in machines to date has been replacing dead HDs.)