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Ask HN: Ultrabook for programming?

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Ask HN: Ultrabook for programming?

#1

Post by drKarl »

I was considering buying an Ultrabook for a long trip. I don't want to make a big investment, so something like a Surface Pro is too expensive, but I would like to be able to use it both as a tablet and as a desktop while travelling, with a keyboard.

I have found 2 options with similar specs and prices, the Chiwi Hi10 (with variants, Plus, Pro), and the Teclast x98 (with variants Plus, Pro).

Both have a decent 4 core Cherry Trail Z8300 CPU, 4Gb of RAM, 64 Gb of ROM, a decent screen (1080p Hi10 and Retina-level the Teclast). Both dual-boot Android and Windows 10 (and probably you can install Linux on both).

The Hi10 has a dock for a keyboard, and 2 full size USB ports, and is 10.1", while the Teclast has a better battery life, better screen resolution and is 9.7".

They both seem to have specs that in my opinion would be capable for programming. My question is, would they be good enough for programming? Is it possible to install any desktop app on Windows 10 in a tablet, i.e. IntelliJ IDEA? Is it possible to enable WPS (Windows Subsystem for Linux, aka Bash on Ubuntu on Windows) on Windows 10 in a tablet?

Also there is a version of the Hi10, the Hi10 Plus, which is slightly bigger (10.8") has better battery and screen resolution and comes with RemixOS instead of Android. Can you install any Android application on RemixOS?

Re: Ask HN: Ultrabook for programming?

#2

Post by osullivj »

You mention IntelliJ IDEA and Win10, so I'm guessing you want a Windows based Java dev env. 4Gb RAM won't be enough for that. I use a 4 year old Samsung Ultrabook: i5, 6Gb RAM, 500Gb disk, Win8. I'm building a cloud system with Angular GUI, RethinkDB and Python/C++ servers using Visual C++ and PyCharm. I can't run all that at once. Chrome, especially running dev tools, and PyCharm are real memory hogs. I'd love to switch to a Surface Pro with 16Gb RAM, but it's too expensive. My view: 8Gb RAM minimum for a dev env.

Re: Ask HN: Ultrabook for programming?

#4

Post by drKarl »

osullivj wrote: post #2

You mention IntelliJ IDEA and Win10, so I'm guessing you want a Windows based Java dev env. 4Gb RAM won't be enough for that. I use a 4 year old Samsung Ultrabook: i5, 6Gb RAM, 500Gb disk, Win8. I'm building a cloud system with Angular GUI, RethinkDB and Python/C++ servers using Visual C++ and PyCharm. I can't run all that at once. Chrome, especially running dev tools, and PyCharm are real memory hogs. I'd love to sw…

Thanks, that's the kind of feedback I need. For developing while not travelling I currently use a Macbook Pro 2015 with 16Gb of RAM and I'm happy with it, and I've previously used Windows or Linux desktops and laptops, so I'm OS agnostic, I can be productive with any OS (on Windows I'd just install cygwin with console2, or cmder, or lately Babun which is a preconfigured cygwin with a package manager).

I remember the time years ago when I was programming with 1Gb of RAM (that was the normal for computers at the time) and it was a painful experience with Eclipse and other tools. As computers evolved with Moore's Law, 2Gb was a better experience and I think 4Gb was fine at the time. Then 8Gb should definitely be good and 16Gb is plenty even to run VMs.

Thinking that it would not be for a full time developing environment, just to be able to do some work while travelling in a long trip where I don't want to bring an expensive laptop like a Macbook Pro, I thought 4Gb might be enough, so your feedback is really appreciated.

Re: Ask HN: Ultrabook for programming?

#5

Post by mindrunner »

Don't even bother with those Chinese tablets. They are passable for media consumption, but absymal for anything else.

Buy something like a refurbished Dell Latitude series instead. Keyword here is you said "long trip'. When you buy something that made a lot of tradeoffs to achieve that price point, you are going to be frustrated.

Re: Ask HN: Ultrabook for programming?

#6

Post by Somebodywashere »

I'd recommend against the Teclast and Chuwi hardware. They're cheap and they look like it works well (and spec wise it isn't too bad), but the user experience isn't the best. If I recall correctly their touchpad experience is pretty lacking (I think Chuwi one lacks the pressure sensitivity). While they are Cherry Trail Z8300 Atom CPUs, they're mostly for lightweight usage, like web browsing and youtube max. Also they should be using a brand of eMMC for storage which doesn't have the best I/O rate.

It's nice as a gimmick, but not a great one for development. If you're on a budget, I've seen fairly cheap but great second-hand hardware on ebay or craigslist. Maybe check those out. A few years ago I bought a Thinkpad X240 for around 200 dollars, it was an i5 with 8 GB RAM and I bought my own SSD to put in it. That laptop has been fairly solid for me especially with the expanded battery pack I purchased.

Re: Ask HN: Ultrabook for programming?

#7

Post by jagtesh »

If you are a power multi-tasker (20+ browser tabs at any given time) running IntelliJ with a couple of electron apps (Slack, Spotify), it will slow down your system with constant disk-thrashing on a 8 GB machine even with an SSD. I use a Macbook Pro 2015 (8GB RAM/128 GB SSD) and I cannot run a fully featured IDE anymore. No more WebStorm or RubyMine. Vim is the only way to go!

You're a little bit in luck as Windows machines are considerably cheaper. Go for at least an i5/16GB/256GB SSD.

Re: Ask HN: Ultrabook for programming?

#8

Post by drKarl »

jagtesh wrote: post #7

If you are a power multi-tasker (20+ browser tabs at any given time) running IntelliJ with a couple of electron apps (Slack, Spotify), it will slow down your system with constant disk-thrashing on a 8 GB machine even with an SSD. I use a Macbook Pro 2015 (8GB RAM/128 GB SSD) and I cannot run a fully featured IDE anymore. No more WebStorm or RubyMine. Vim is the only way to go! You're a little bit in luck as Windows m…

I use Vim on the command line, but for Java programming I also like to use the features of an IDE like IntelliJ (or at least Eclipse). I always use Vim plugins for those (Vrapper for Eclipse or Idea-Vim for Idea).

Re: Ask HN: Ultrabook for programming?

#9

Post by syntheticnature »

drKarl wrote: post #4
osullivj wrote: post #2

You mention IntelliJ IDEA and Win10, so I'm guessing you want a Windows based Java dev env. 4Gb RAM won't be enough for that. I use a 4 year old Samsung Ultrabook: i5, 6Gb RAM, 500Gb disk, Win8. I'm building a cloud system with Angular GUI, RethinkDB and Python/C++ servers using Visual C++ and PyCharm. I can't run all that at once. Chrome, especially running dev tools, and PyCharm are real memory hogs. I'd love to sw…

Thanks, that's the kind of feedback I need. For developing while not travelling I currently use a Macbook Pro 2015 with 16Gb of RAM and I'm happy with it, and I've previously used Windows or Linux desktops and laptops, so I'm OS agnostic, I can be productive with any OS (on Windows I'd just install cygwin with console2, or cmder, or lately Babun which is a preconfigured cygwin with a package manager). I remember the…

Also worth noting the Z8300 is an Atom device. Here's a comparison of the processor in these devices vs. what I believe to be the lowest-end processor from a 2015 MBP: http://cpuboss.com/cpus/Intel-Core-i5-5257U-vs-Intel-Atom-x5...

Re: Ask HN: Ultrabook for programming?

#10

Post by aelmeleegy »

I am currently using a retina Macbook Pro 2015, but I am getting to the point of needing something with stronger specs and more configurability.

Here's what I think I'll, and let me know if you think that would work for you, I am thinking of buying a slightly used lenovo X1 Carbon. So it would cost less, but has great battery life and very decent specs, specially for such a small footprint. I'll then install linux (probably Ubuntu) and run that as a dev machine.

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