Yeah, that is one of the several disadvantages of all laptops, which is regarding your neck, spine, and sometimes wrists. I sometimes get worried that I'm just hurting my neck whenever I use a laptop, but sometimes when I feel that I had my head down on the laptop for long enough, I would either lower my chair down or just sit on my knees to have my head straight while using the laptop 🤣 As for your wrists, laptops don't always affect those body parts, so that's an exception I guess.

I've never (well in the last 10 years) used a laptop for any extended amount of time without wrist pain.

It is certainly possible to use laptops ergonomically, but it requires giving more thought to the initial setup as well as ongoing attention to one's posture. It's far too easy to succumb to bad habits.

ZellSF wrote:

Not really a laptop user, but if I were I would never want an optical drive in it. That's a lot of space that could be used for more battery.

Almost every laptop I've owned with a DVD drive, I've replaced the drive with a SATA caddy. SSD + HDD <3

And the good laptops also have an option to have a bay battery there, so you can enjoy the best of all worlds.

ZellSF wrote:

I've never (well in the last 10 years) used a laptop for any extended amount of time without wrist pain.

I don't always get wrist pain when I use my laptop. But younger people like me don't usually have their body parts affected by being motionless in positional purposes.

dr_st wrote:

And the good laptops also have an option to have a bay battery there, so you can enjoy the best of all worlds.

I heard you can use a laptop without the battery. But if you do that, you'll have to have the laptop plugged in to its charger, or it won't operate. And on the taskbar, you will see the battery icon have an X on it, which indicates that no battery is present.

oeuvre wrote:

ZellSF wrote:

Not really a laptop user, but if I were I would never want an optical drive in it. That's a lot of space that could be used for more battery.

Almost every laptop I've owned with a DVD drive, I've replaced the drive with a SATA caddy. SSD + HDD <3

I did it to my 2010 MBP and so did my dad too with his MBP

JonathonWyble wrote:

dr_st wrote:

And the good laptops also have an option to have a bay battery there, so you can enjoy the best of all worlds.

I heard you can use a laptop without the battery. But if you do that, you'll have to have the laptop plugged in to its charger, or it won't operate. And on the taskbar, you will see the battery icon have an X on it, which indicates that no battery is present.

Well... yes, but does it have anything to do with what I said?

dr_st wrote:

JonathonWyble wrote:

dr_st wrote:

And the good laptops also have an option to have a bay battery there, so you can enjoy the best of all worlds.

I heard you can use a laptop without the battery. But if you do that, you'll have to have the laptop plugged in to its charger, or it won't operate. And on the taskbar, you will see the battery icon have an X on it, which indicates that no battery is present.

Well... yes, but does it have anything to do with what I said?

Probably not? I guess I was just saying something interesting that sort of had to do with your comment, that's all. Sorry if I drifted from the discussion a little bit.

You've just won this thread.

I want that belt

dr_st wrote:

It is certainly possible to use laptops ergonomically, but it requires giving more thought to the initial setup as well as ongoing attention to one's posture. It's far too easy to succumb to bad habits.

I'm not sure it is. The problem with my laptop -- and any other I've ever used -- is that my wrists are down here, while my eyes are way up here. It is physically impossible to put the keyboard low enough and the screen high enough without the top half of the clamshell being torso-height tall. That typically means, if one were to put the unit atop a lap... that the neck gets the short straw.

And that is why there are docks. For most people, most of the time, there is no significant compromise to mobile CPUs and GPUs, so there is no real need for a traditional desktop or workstation. (Not that I want to see them gone, mind...)

There's also occupational health and safety regulations to consider. I'm technically not allowed to use a laptop at work for an extended period of time without plugging in a monitor and external mouse/keyboard.

Which is funny because working in an academic library means that at any time there's big rooms full of hundreds of students hunched over their laptops all day...

SirNickity wrote:

The problem with my laptop -- and any other I've ever used -- is that my wrists are down here, while my eyes are way up here. It is physically impossible to put the keyboard low enough and the screen high enough without the top half of the clamshell being torso-height tall. That typically means, if one were to put the unit atop a lap... that the neck gets the short straw.

I feel that with the right desk setup (a good chair with adjustable seat, back and arm rests), it is possible to sit in more than a single posture without incurring discomfort/strain. However, it must be different on the individual level. We have those folks that say that they are comfortable in any position, and then there are those that cannot sit even in the most ergonomic environment for more than a short while, and everything in between.

dr_st wrote:

Which business laptops dropped docking stations? I don't think many did, if any. Home laptops never had them to start.

Got a HP Probook 4525s on my desk at work now as an example. Others exist as well but I only really notice the rare times someone asks for a docking station, find out they don't have one, think "that sucks" and forget all about it.

And I knew I was forgetting a draw back of USB-C vs traditional docking station's DRIVERS!!!! (and lesser extent PXE boot)
Although I am prepared to sacrifice both of these vs a docking station that can be used on multiple laptops models

chinny22 wrote:

Got a HP Probook 4525s on my desk at work now as an example.

ProBook series was always hit-n-miss in terms of docking; some had it, some didn't. 4525s is a 2010 model. Whereas even today you can find modern ProBooks with docking support (some with proprietary ports, some with USB-C/TBT only). I don't think it's correct to say that there was any trend towards removal of docking ports in this model line.

If anything, it's true that there is a trend towards replacing bottom-mounted docking ports for side-mounted ones, again, in order to support slimmer chassis. HP was one of the first with this approach (maybe the first, don't know). Lenovo recently followed suit (with **80 line). As a bonus point - now the same mechanical docks can also be used for X1 Carbon series, which previously was limited to USB-C/TBT only).

chinny22 wrote:

And I knew I was forgetting a draw back of USB-C vs traditional docking station's DRIVERS!!!! (and lesser extent PXE boot)

That's a good point. I only used my USB-C dock with laptops running Win10, which has all the drivers built-in already, but I can imagine drivers being a problem for old Windows, Linux or pre-boot, as you noticed.

^^^
I guess it depends what you consider "modern" I just remember, maybe wrongly, "back in the good old days" say XP era it seemed like every business laptop had a docking station port.
but your right, also on my desks are newer, smaller, Probook 650's that have the side mounted docking port.

We also have 2 ZBook Studio G3 "Mobile Workstation" admittedly only the base model but it's still a high end laptop which only supports USB-C docking stations which cause all sorts of trouble if you look online.
It's bigger brothers support a "proper dock" that seems to work out of the box, but I guess we are still in early days of USB-C docking stations, and it does supply power at least 😀

and credit where its due, it was cyclone3d that mentioned the driver/pxe thing on a above post that jogged my memory

The nice thing is the Elitebook 840 and 850 line... 6 generations now, all can use the same dock.

chinny22 wrote:

I guess it depends what you consider "modern" I just remember, maybe wrongly, "back in the good old days" say XP era it seemed like every business laptop had a docking station port.

I don't think you are wrong, but you need to take into account that back in the XP era there were fewer business lines to begin with, and they cost and arm and a leg. $3000 for a basic configuration in some cases. The mid-range "small business" lines came later with the introduction of the DELL Vostro, HP ProBook, Lenovo Thinkpad SL/Edge lines, and most of them had no docking ports from the start.