Actually, my main development tower is about nine years old.
And in that time, I've upgraded the processor, doubled the memory, upgraded the hard drive to an SSD, switched the video card twice, upped the number of connected monitors from one to three, and upgraded the OS from 32-bit Vista to 64-bit Windows 10.
It was pretty leading edge when I built it, and it's still pretty leading edge today. What's sad is the expectation that I should throw my computer away every 18 months.
I try to overspend on my computers to ensure that I have a computer that can last at least five years.
I loved the Macbook Pro unibodies because they were expandable. My 2011 MBP had its memory upgraded and maxed out as prices came down, and its storage upgraded to larger and faster drives and SSDs as prices came down.
If it weren't for one thing, it would have still been my main computer and delayed my switch to Windows.
The infamous overheating problem with my model of MBP turned it into a brick a few months before Apple acknowledged the defect and announced a repair program. The replacement part was known to have the same defect (I already had my logic board replaced once), and being out of AppleCare, there was no way in hell I was paying >500 out of pocket for yet another defective board. So I just switched to a Windows machine since nothing I did was OS dependent anyways.
Granted I would have switched when the Macbook Pro got unusable (unibodies are gone and don't like the new soldered on approach), but I think that wouldn't have happened until at least 2018.
Unless he's on AMD and the processor upgrade was very minor, he almost certainly did.
It's odd when people say "my computer is a decade old and I've only had to replace every single part multiple times over look at how green I'm being". It's the exact same thing as buying a new computer a couple times, just in smaller increments and with parts that are less likely to be recycled on their own.
And in that time, I've upgraded the processor, doubled the memory, upgraded the hard drive to an SSD, switched the video card twice, upped the number of connected monitors from one to three, and upgraded the OS from 32-bit Vista to 64-bit Windows 10.
It was pretty leading edge when I built it, and it's still pretty leading edge today. What's sad is the expectation that I should throw my computer away every 18 months.