Laptop screen size for people with presbyopia (age related long sightedness)?

[NotAllThere]

Have your wife considered Refractive Lens Exchange? Both me and SWMBO are at the stage we have computer glasses and varifocals. Where as I don't mind swapping around and quite like wearing glasses she hated it and being a tad scatty was forever forgetting one or the other pairs. We looked in to RLE and as she was the one that was most frustrated I let her go first (cough). I think it was about 7K at a place called Optegra in Manchester and she's over the moon with it. Had halos when looking at light points in the ceiling or car lights for awhile and still gets it a little bit but apart from that she's not regretted it for a second. She can even read most of the small print on medicine and the like which they said she might not be able to do so real bonus.

I got effectively that when I had my cataracts treated. One of my eyes is good from 0.5m to 2m - I need reading glasses for close work. The other eye is good for long distance, but anything closer than 1m is blurry.

For driving and most day to day things I don't need glasses. I had a toric lens in one eye to correct astigmatism - that cost 1000 - but otherwise all covered by my medical insurance. I get halos etc. at night, but it's not bothersome.

I'm intrigued that your wife's seem to work at all distances. What lenses did she get?

[hobnob]

Did a quick search. Didn't know you could get all-in-one desktops.

The problem with those is similar to a laptop - you have to replace the main unit (motherboard etc.) and the screen at the same time. For instance, I know someone with an all-in-one device that runs Windows 10, and it's not compatible with Windows 11. The screen is working fine, but they'll have to get rid of that if they want to upgrade.

[malvolio]

The problem with those is similar to a laptop - you have to replace the main unit (motherboard etc.) and the screen at the same time. For instance, I know someone with an all-in-one device that runs Windows 10, and it's not compatible with Windows 11. The screen is working fine, but they'll have to get rid of that if they want to upgrade.

Assming its not an antique, first check two bios settings, Secure Boot and TPM 2.0. Set them on and Win 11 is available. Might save replacing it...

[woody1]

The problem with those is similar to a laptop - you have to replace the main unit (motherboard etc.) and the screen at the same time. For instance, I know someone with an all-in-one device that runs Windows 10, and it's not compatible with Windows 11. The screen is working fine, but they'll have to get rid of that if they want to upgrade.

Thanks, worth bearing in mind.

[northernladuk]

I got effectively that when I had my cataracts treated. One of my eyes is good from 0.5m to 2m - I need reading glasses for close work. The other eye is good for long distance, but anything closer than 1m is blurry.

For driving and most day to day things I don't need glasses. I had a toric lens in one eye to correct astigmatism - that cost 1000 - but otherwise all covered by my medical insurance. I get halos etc. at night, but it's not bothersome.

I'm intrigued that your wife's seem to work at all distances. What lenses did she get?

I'd have to check but I think there were about 6 different choices. I'll ask her but I think she was considering with Multifocal / Trifocal Lenses which do short medium and long or Extended Depth of Focus (EDOF) Lenses which does long and medium and is for computer work specifically. The fact that reading really small stuff being a bonus I'd guess the latter.

[Snooky]

Were it me (and it is, I have presbyopia) for that use case I would do what LadyMuck and others suggest.
I have a setup in my workshop with a surplus Lenovo corporate desktop box about the size of a small cigar box.
It's not the latest spec, but plenty powerful enough for years to come. Ryzen processor of some kind, and SSD, wifi card and lots of memory (before it was expensive).
And quiet... Cost me just under a hundred Squid. Look on Fleabay.

My home desktop came from AliExpress, it's a N100 with 16Gb RAM and 500Gb SSD, about the area of a beer mat and 3-4 cm tall, almost completely silent. It cost me just over £100 and came with Win10 installed. There are loads of similar models on AliExpress, the great thing is that you can attach it to the rear of your monitor if you want.

I only use it for browsing & admin (MS Office etc) so the spec is easily high enough for that.

For actual dev work I use the work-supplied laptop.

[woody1]

Thanks.

Did a quick search and mini PC + monitor is a lot cheaper* than an all-in-one. Sounds like it might be the way to go. Only slight downside is the extra power cable for the monitor.

Still not sure what screen size to go for though.

* less so for win 11 rather than 10

[ladymuck]

How much space do you have? I'd go for a high res monitor with good contrast that fits the space you have.

[northernladuk]

For actual dev work I use the work client-supplied laptop.

FTFY

[woody1]

My home desktop came from AliExpress, it's a N100 with 16Gb RAM and 500Gb SSD, about the area of a beer mat and 3-4 cm tall, almost completely silent. It cost me just over £100 and came with Win10 installed. There are loads of similar models on AliExpress, the great thing is that you can attach it to the rear of your monitor if you want.

There are similar on eBay.

Regarding Win10, how long do you think this is good for? I know support stopped last year but, if it's anything like Win8, it might be ok for a few years. I stuck with Win8 longer than I should have but eventually there were too many issues with browsers/web sites.

I could get a Win11 mini but they seem to be twice the price.