Depending on how you define “directly observe,” but here’s a “picture” of a black hole.

You just gotta know who to buy from. This is a current item on eBay. Specs are solid for a good price, you can get newer generations for more money, and eBay’s protections are heavily weighted towards the buyer.

That said, I just got a Thinkpad X1 Carbon from eBay and those have soldered memory, if that helps alleviate your RAM worries.

For those who don’t know, Bari Weiss founded Free Press and is current editor-in-chief of CBS news.