What should be the minimum hardware specifications for web developer machines? And Why?

Question

I have been using my old upgraded Acer Travelmate 3273 for quite some time now since I started for my current employer. I've been using my own laptop instead of the company's standard machines because they still use Pentium 4 with only 512 MB RAM, and I just can't work on those machines. Slow and doesn't quite work well with my preferred OS (Fedora).

And just recently, my laptop is showing the signs of its age and I think it's about to die. Since I do not have the budget for buying a new laptop yet, I decided to request for a decent machine (2GB RAM, Core 2 Duo). I was told that we only have P4s.

The usual apps that I use are Netbeans, Firefox, VirtualBox with Windows XP for testing cross-browser compatibilities, Epiphany and Opera for testing multiple user scenarios, Gnome terminal, GIMP, MySQL Workbench, FreeMind.

Note: They even use 15" monitors.

Am I too demanding with the hardware specifications that I want? Is it reasonable to still use P4s? What should be the minimum hardware specs for web developer machines?

Answer 1

No, you aren't out of line. You can pick up a laptop with the specs you want for between 3 and 5 hundred. That's nothing.

Good hardware is such a no brainer. I feel for ya man, it's time to start the job hunt.

Answer 2

Wouldn't care too much about the processor, as long as it had 2-4 GB of ram (in your case you're running a VM, so probably closer to 4 is better). 15 inch monitors are fairly ridiculous though.

It's a big red flag for corporate dumb-think when a company is unwilling to spend less than $1000/yr to improve the productivity of people they're paying tens of thousands a year. A lot of places are knuckling down with the current economic climate, but judging from the vintage of the hardware this is a longstanding issue.

Answer 3

if math doesn't work, nothing will -

calculate the build time per day in hours times the number of working days times the hourly fully-burdened labor cost using the current machine and a proposed new machine

[make sure they understand that "build less often" is not a realistic option!]

for example, suppose you build the current web site five times a day, taking one minute each time = 5 minutes per day times 250 working days (just to make the math simple) = 20.83 hours times (low estimate) $50/hour labor cost = $1,041.50

this is how much they pay you to watch your old machine compile

suppose a new machine could compile the current web site in 6 seconds - 10 times faster. This would save the company over $900/year. If the new machine lasts 4 years, that's $3600. If the new machine costs $1000, or even $1500, it's a no-brainer, unless the company has terminal short-term thinking. Or no cash. Neither case bodes well ;-)

good luck!

Answer 4

For development you clearly need faster machine, but opportunity to test your sites (especially those heavy JavaScript using sites, or using Flash animations with lots of transparencies) on slower computer allows you to see, which parts of code could be improved.

People these days often don't pay attention to efficiency of their code. Fast and cheap hardware is good excuse for that, but still having in mind that code execution takes time, and with small effort it could be shortened ― well, no-one suffers if something works faster, but some people do suffer, if something works slow ;)

Answer 5

That doesn't seem so out of line, especially since RAM is cheap and the programs you use are memory hungry.

Answer 6

If you really are stuck with the P4 and 512K I would ditch Netbeans completely and get used to vim or emacs.

But seriously I how old are these machines? Last time I saw a P4 it had a Y2K certified sticker on it. I know its not the best time what with the credit crunch etc. but maybe you should consider moving jobs. It costs about $500 half decent desktop machine which would pay for itself in a matter of weeks in reduced build times etc.