How is "It's right there in the fucking start menu" not apparent? o.O

Obviously this, but what sort of an update are we talking about here anyway? Actual spec changes? Support for new standards? Because it really sounds like an upgrade for the sake of being able to keep a support contract going - why not just renew the contract for cash and be done with it?

Are you trolling, or do you actually believe this is true? Do you not care about things like... oh... warranty on a highly integrated device that's hard to fix if something breaks? Support? Software updates?

I like me some China-junk too, but I tend to limit myself to things I can fix myself in case something goes wrong - flashlights and other little gadgets and such. No way I'd risk it for more than $100.

Unfortunately, HTC is one of the biggest culprits here. Check out a few posts above - the person having issues with his phone not being updated already has an HTC Desire S.

Just buy the current Nexus (in this case, the Nexu 4) phone. CyanogenMod is pretty much tweaked stock Android, which is exactly what you get on a Nexus, and the CM team develops on the current flagship Nexus, so you'll be getting the latest CM versions for as long as possible, and installation of CM on a Nexus is easy as pie.

"Why should we accept that we won't even get security patches for slightly older devices?"

You shouldn't. Your anger should be directed at HTC though - not the CM team.

Probably not TOR either...

Have you taken a look at the Atom Z2760? Running full Windows 8, it feels noticeably faster than most mainstream ARM SoCs... definitely faster than my Galaxy Nexus and Nexus 7. That may be down to the RAM though.

To be fair though - even current Clover Trail Atom SoCs are astoundingly low power. It's one of the few good things about the Win8 tablet I bought. The (30Wh) battery lasts surprisingly long... I haven't gotten below 50% in a day (and that's with extremely heavy use, with nearly permanent inking in OneNote). I'd say I'm averaging less than 2W total power consumption (that's including the display and network connections).

" I don't usually hammer out many multi-paragraph emails or forum comments on it, but I have no problem doing so, if necessary."

How exactly do you do that though? I own a tablet as well, and I'm having incredible difficulty with this. Unless I put the thing on a desk or am lying in bed with my knees pulled up so I can put the tablet down in my lap, I either have to hold the tablet in one hand and type with the other (which pisses me off because it's so inefficient) or try to do the smartphone-style thumb-type in portrait mode, which is next to impossible because the device is just way too big.

I find myself reaching for my phone more often than my tablet, simply for the reason that text input is easier - 2 thumbs and off you go.

Wow, exactly the opposite for me. My tablets are gathering dust (except for text entry with a stylus) while my smartphone and laptop get all the actual usage.

Any chance this is because you have a tablet that's actually an Android subnotebook with a detachable keyboard? How much time do you spend in actual "tablet mode"?

"There is some stuff you Just. Cant Do. On a phone. The screen is too small."

Such as what exactly? I've got a ~5" phone (Galaxy Nexus), a 7" tablet (Nexus 7) a ~12" tablet (a Samsung Windows 8 device) and my choice of 12", 14" and 15" laptops... I find that the tablets are both completely useless. The 7" tablet can't do more than the phone (same resolution, similar processing power, input is similarly crappy) and the 12" tablet is too big for anything other than text entry with a stylus.

It always needs a stand or a flat surface on which you can place it, because unless you want to type with a single finger while holding the tablet with your other hand, there's just no way to use it without some place to put it down. Even worse: Putting it on your lap when you're sitting isn't an option, because the angle is completely screwy - sure, the IPS display doesn't really wash out much, but reading text at such a shallow angle feels really weird.

I can't think of ANYTHING that my tablets can do better than my phone... maybe video playback and battery life. Other than that? Nothing whatsoever.

Is anyone else here plagued by stuttering issues with Silverlight video? All my machines (mostly Win7 Pro 64bit with relatively potent hardware) have the same issue - when I fullscreen a Silverlight video, the motion is never entirely smooth - it stutters ever so slightly about once a second. CPU and GPU load are below 5-10% on most machines at this point, so I'm at a loss as to what's wrong. I've also tried both Chrome and Firefox, and it's all up to date (browsers, plugins, drivers, Windows updates)...

Is it because Silverlight is just inherently crap?

"In general, magazines (either print or online) are still where one goes to get well-researched, long-form articles."

Unless you know anything at all about the topic at hand, in which case it quickly becomes apparent that "well-researched" is hardly ever the case. This becomes especially apparent when you're reading tech magazines as someone who regularly browses Slashdot. *shudders*

This. The only things that will actually use a modern CPU to near its full extent are computationally intensive tasks like rendering, encoding HD video or other stuff now normal person ever does on their home computer. OK, Starcraft 2 is pretty taxing on a single core, and Battlefield 3 64-player uses a fair bit of CPU... but other than that?

If I were you I'd focus on power usage - replace those Phenoms with Ivy Bridge Celeron dualcores with IGP and drop your machines' power consumption down to a quarter of what they're currently using.