zlacker

In my old office I used to be able to tell if any of the machines in the lab were having issues just by walking in; the machines were old enough that if there was any issue (too much load, hard drive failing,etc) the difference in background noise was noticeable. My new office is unfortunately too loud by default and everything is too new for me to do it anymore.

Similar issue with the newer laptops that include power buttons as part of the keyboard. The power button no longer has a noticeable change when pressed, and if the laptop is fanless or just very quiet, it can be impossible to tell if the damn thing is turned on or not.

Sometimes I wonder if the manufacturers are doing this on purpose, to make the customer feel more distant from their devices and willing to part with them easier.

>>stryan+(OP)
I have a Dell XPS 13 with an OLED screen (so no backlight). It has one of those power buttons in the keyboard. Luckily, however, Dell has included a "sign-of-life" option in the BIOS that will turn on the keyboard backlight, turn on the large white LED on the front edge of the case, and spin up the fans to max immediately after pressing the power button, if the computer is off and not in sleep mode. The instant feedback is so good.

Meanwhile, I used to have a Surface Pro 3 that did none of those. Pressing the power button did nothing for several seconds, and sometimes I would have to push the power button again after some seconds, for some reason. Quite irritating.