Rizoid
I was one of those old purchasers. There was a huge uproar on the subreddit back in the day cause they said everyone who purchased the app before the subscription model would only get like 1 or 2 years of subscription access instead of lifetime. People got so pissed they changed it to lifetime.
I purchased pocketcasts years ago when it was a one time fee and when they moved to a subscription model they gave everyone who purchased a lifetime pass on the subscription model but that rubbed me so wrong I moved away from it. Currently I run Audiobookshelf on my server and have all my podcasts in a library on there. Works really well and I have control over it.
I think what Apple has done with their M series of chips is actually incredible and very interesting. However actually purchasing their hardware is just out of the question when I’m just going to run a Linux distro on whatever I purchase.
I remember at a point limewire or frostwire had movies you could download. Young me downloaded the little mermaid but it was a porn parody and I scared myself for life.
A few years ago I would have said every day, but I got a really good pair of Bluetooth Bose headphones that have wireless charging so I don’t have to worry about anything anymore. After work they get put on a charging pad then in the morning I grab them and they’re ready to go.
This type of shit with Amazon is partly what made me switch to just using audiobookshelf. It supports ebooks and podcasts as well as audiobooks and is all self hosted. It’s a high recommend for anyone who has a bunch of digital books like myself. I just have an old tablet instead of a kindle.
I use a GPU but that’s only because my CPU is a first gen ryzen with no graphics. I highly recommend any recent Intel CPU that supports quick sync. You’ll have an easier time and pull way less power. i7 might even be a bit much honestly I’d look at i3’s or even celerons. They’re easily capable of what you want but you can always get something better just for future use.