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Ask HN: Best development laptop?

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Re: Ask HN: Best development laptop?

#4

Post by copperx »

schappim wrote: post #3

Marco has an opinion on this: http://marco.org/2017/11/14/best-laptop-ever

And he's not wrong. I've been holding to this 2012 rMBP because I can't stomach paying $1600+ for a downgrade. I would just be getting more RAM, better CPU and GPU (but who cares if you don't game), but the same screen, worse connectivity, worse keyboard, no F-keys, no Esc key, no Magsafe.

When this 2012 breaks I hope Apple has either come up with a pro laptop worth upgrading to, or I'll jump ship to an ugly, heavy, unsightly PC laptop; but at least I trust will be functional.

Re: Ask HN: Best development laptop?

#5

Post by atmosx »

If you can live with 8GB RAM and a dual-core i5 at 1.8Ghz, I'd argue that the MBA is one of the best laptops to work with. The selling points for me are:

* OSX - still the best all around OS to work with.

* Lightweight, it is a laptop that weights ~ 3 pounds

* Battery life is decent

* Build quality is above average

I believe that it's an excellent choice for web development.

Re: Ask HN: Best development laptop?

#6

Post by otalp »

atmosx wrote: post #5

If you can live with 8GB RAM and a dual-core i5 at 1.8Ghz, I'd argue that the MBA is one of the best laptops to work with. The selling points for me are: * OSX - still the best all around OS to work with. * Lightweight, it is a laptop that weights ~ 3 pounds * Battery life is decent * Build quality is above average I believe that it's an excellent choice for web development.

I second this. If you're not into intensive video editing etc. it's probably the best laptop for the price. Battery life being "decent" is underselling it - it has the best battery life of any mainstream laptop, easily lasts 19-20 hours under light workload and 12-13 under intensive work. And for a laptop imo battery life is a very crucial factor.

Re: Ask HN: Best development laptop?

#9

Post by sitepodmatt »

A few months ago I would of said a new Asus zenbook with ubuntu LTS 16.04 as everything works out the box and 10hr battery life with Linux, however I had to take to service center recently so they could hard reset it because I switched it off and on too quickly (my taxi arrived just as I switched it on, so immediately held button down again) and it never switch on since. Service center being a bunch of idiots wanted to book it in for 2 weeks, I pleaded (with some profanity laced in as they pushed me beyond frustration with their robotics responses) with them to do a hard reset there and then (they needs opening to remove the bios battery), they caved, and surprise surprise 10mins later I have a working laptop again. I probably wouldn't buy Asus again because service centers are truely shit and obviously there is a race condition with the on switch and bios or whatever that isn't fully tested. In fact I bought some torx screwdrivers to do it myself next time.

Dell XPS next I think.

Re: Ask HN: Best development laptop?

#10

Post by derwiki »

copperx wrote: post #4
schappim wrote: post #3

Marco has an opinion on this: http://marco.org/2017/11/14/best-laptop-ever

And he's not wrong. I've been holding to this 2012 rMBP because I can't stomach paying $1600+ for a downgrade. I would just be getting more RAM, better CPU and GPU (but who cares if you don't game), but the same screen, worse connectivity, worse keyboard, no F-keys, no Esc key, no Magsafe. When this 2012 breaks I hope Apple has either come up with a pro laptop worth upgrading to, or I'll jump ship to an ugly, heavy,…

I had a 2013 MBP and just upgraded to 2017 when I took a contract that required a more powerful dev env. I don’t miss function or escape keys, and Touch ID to unlock/auth 1Password is fantastic. I really don’t understand the dislike of the new models, but YMMV and you’re certainly entitled to your opinion.
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