Well … it seemed polite to let others have a go at it, first. Besides … after reading Phil and Steve’s posts, I feel sorta like a poor relation country bumpkin.
1.) My “daily driver” computer is a custom desktop. (ASUS M5A99X mobo / AMD FX-8300 “Bulldozer” / 16G RAM / 8 1T SSDs / GeForce GT 740)
2.) It is a home-built system specifically researched and designed for creative endeavors such as writing, generating graphics and general photography use. Oddly enough, unless you are going to do video editing, it doesn’t take a whole lot of horsepower for those tasks. It does, however, require a decent graphics card and a large color corrected monitor.
3.) All of my desktop systems are custom purpose built. They were also built with slow aging processes in mind.
That is a trap, though. Just like rent control or over-valuing equity, sooner or later you get caught. When you can no longer get parts for older gear, the expense of the full techno-re-investment cycle hurts like a cactus covered seat cushion.
4.) The key elements for graphics work are the video card and the monitor. Ergo, each machine only has one monitor. However, as bad as my eyes are these days, the smallest is a 42 inch running @ 1080p, and the largest 50 inches running @ 4K.
5.) All of my machines are over ten years old, including my 2 laptops. The desktops are all AMD powered, and the laptops are Intels. The i5s are better for battery longevity.
6.) I do run a LAN, and machines are connected to it on an as-needed basis. When you get down to brass tacks, few defense plans beat air-gap security. That said, the LAN here is buttoned up tighter than a bull’s bumpkus in fly season. It only takes one good solid scare to make a smart man more than a little paranoid.
7.) The operating system in use depends on when you ask. Typically, I run a RedHat based Linux product, but there may be Fedora, RHEL6~8, Debian, Mint, Bohdi, Open Indiana (OpenSolaris), FreeBSD, or a derivative of any of the afore mentioned. Much to my chagrin, I also have one laptop which dual-boots F-29 and Windows 7. The Windows is there strictly to emergency back-up my KOBO book collection and account, and to program radios. Generally I use a linux box to just pull a disk image of my KOBO reader card twice annually, but some redundancy is a good idea.
8.) Which operating system is my favorite? Well … that kinda depends on what I need to use it for, but the daily driver runs a dual boot of Fedora 29/MATE-Compiz/E16, and Fedora 36/MATE-Compiz/E16. That being said, by preference, there aren’t *any* versions of Windows in that favorites list. Nor are there any Mac versions there. I maintain a legacy Mac OS-10 partition in the MacBook Pro Iinherited from my brother, but I can count the times I’ve booted into it in the last five years on the fingers of one hand.
9.) My phone? Meh. It’s just for calendar function, texting and phone calls. Although I do maintain (as current as I can get) a working copy (pdf) of the NAERG, and a current version of QRZ and ham-tools.
P.S. The cooling solution in *any* computer is the vital key consideration for longevity. In that regard, you could call me a certifiable Noctua fan. The only time I’ve ever seen CPU temps reach as high as 100F, was on a particularly hot day last summer whilst running all 8 cores (at 95~99%) transcoding a 3 hour video.
