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Ask HN: What does one look for in a laptop these days?

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Re: Ask HN: What does one look for in a laptop these days?

#321

Post by roland35 »

Sanguinaire wrote: post #266

0. Linux support, specifically with the option to purchase without paying the Windows tax for an OS I'll never boot. This is a deal-breaker for me, meaning Dell are one of the few main-stream manufacturers I'd go with. 1. No touchscreen (I'd rather have a higher quality, low glare non-touch display). That's about it, actually. Practically all modern laptops seem to meet my expectations on battery life and performance…

Sounds like the framework laptop might be a good option for you! I am looking into it myself, plus I like the 3:2 screen ratio.

Re: Ask HN: What does one look for in a laptop these days?

#322

Post by harshitaneja »

foobarbaz33 wrote: post #119

> if I'm missing on any new developments since 2015 Yes, you missed something huge. Apple Silicon M1 or nothing. It's just too good. Low power consumption allows the laptop to actually be used as a laptop. The power use-to-performance ratio is unmatched by anything on the market. Apple is breaking us free from decades of stagnation on the hardware front. Nothing else on the market comes close. I expect this to change…

Agreed. I hate that M1 is so good. I got an M1 macbook pro when my older laptop broke and I needed to temporarily deal with some iOS work. I bought it thinking I would regret it and have to replace it with another machine especially being used to 15inch devices. But it turned out to be such a great experience using this device without ever worrying about charging and rosetta2 worked so much better than expected.

I hate that this device is so great that when I look at other options with linux support I just get drawn back to this. It is really frustrating to have such a great hardware be limited by the software, rather the userspace(kernel and drivers seem solid). MacOS is just so frustrating at times. Asahi team's linux support can't come fast enough.

Re: Ask HN: What does one look for in a laptop these days?

#324

Post by bo1024 »

1. FOSS support and free + open + user-controlled, user-repairable, user-upgradable hardware.

2. Webcam and microphone with kill switches.

3. Battery life.

4. (added) Portable: about 13-14" screen, not too heavy.

5. Longevity, durability (sustainability).

6. Other factors: keyboard, touchpad, screen, wifi, quiet.

I'm fortunate that I don't need a GPU or extreme power for my daily laptop driver (and if I do, I have a desktop).

I'm also fortunate financially to be able to own both a Purism Librem 14 and a Framework DIY edition. It feels good to have my money support those causes, and the laptops are both perfect (except the Framework's battery life, so far).

https://puri.sm/products/librem-14/

https://frame.work/

Re: Ask HN: What does one look for in a laptop these days?

#325

Post by nyxaiur »

grandpoobah wrote: post #46
hiisukun wrote: post #27

1. S3 Standby/suspend support. If your laptop supports that, you can close the lid and it will power ~everything except the RAM down (sometimes a USB port still charges). In 'new' laptops, including almost everything Tiger lake and Intel, S3 is being phased out for Microsoft's "Modern Standby", known as S0ix (or sometimes InstantGo). This is much more like a mobile phone, where it stays on but attempts to use as litt…

Was going to post the same thing (albeit far more poorly explained). Isn't Microsoft embarrassed about this? This has been an issue for my last two laptops over the last 5 years. How is it acceptable for this problem to still exist? My Lenovo supports S3 sleep, but I didn't discover it until probably a year into having bought it, so at that point my battery's ability to hold charge had already been sufficiently degra…

The implementation of the none S3 sleep on most windows laptops these days is not microsofts fault. Critical updates (firmware) always have priority and even on mac's you get negging pop-ups for updates all the time. That said you can fix everything what you said with one checkbox. It's not the pc which sucks it's you the user.

For all the people downvoting. He is the equivalent of people making "screenshots" with their mobile phone instead of using printscrn. I bet you are complaining about your own users all the time and here you defend someone who can't even be bothered to look at the options he has. smh

Re: Ask HN: What does one look for in a laptop these days?

#327

Post by tomrod »

yodelshady wrote: post #36

XPS 13 currently, and probably next as well. I look for: - track record of linux compatibility. If it's Windows or out, I'm out. - good keyboard. - good screen, > 1920x1080 although 4K is overkill, preferably 16:10. Macbooks look tempting, but I just don't trust Apple to not break any workflow that isn't editing videos about how great Apple products are. The current keys are good but - sorry, the (pre-butterfly!) key…

I recently picked up a Mac for client work. I have a hard time with the muscle memory on keyboard mapping. I get there are legacy reasons for the differences, but would love a toggle option to switch mappings to Linux.

Re: Ask HN: What does one look for in a laptop these days?

#328

Post by secondcoming »

I got myself a Dell Precision 7750, but without the discrete GPU option as the price was getting ridiculous.

My main requirements were similar to yours:

- SIM card: Supports 4G but you have to disassemble the laptop to insert the SIM. A dongle may have been a better option, as I doubt the SIM module can be upgraded to a 5G one when they come available.

- I quite like the keyboard

- Screen is great

- Fast charging with the Dell adapter only

- Loads of GPU options

- Standard components are user upgradable. I installed 128GB RAM (max) and another SSD myself. It supports a total of 4 SSDs

- There was no AMD CPU option at the time I bought it, but those seemed rare/unavailable from other vendors too.

Re: Ask HN: What does one look for in a laptop these days?

#329

Post by tomrod »

smoyer wrote: post #271
yodelshady wrote: post #36

XPS 13 currently, and probably next as well. I look for: - track record of linux compatibility. If it's Windows or out, I'm out. - good keyboard. - good screen, > 1920x1080 although 4K is overkill, preferably 16:10. Macbooks look tempting, but I just don't trust Apple to not break any workflow that isn't editing videos about how great Apple products are. The current keys are good but - sorry, the (pre-butterfly!) key…

I went from one XPS15 (2017) version to the next (2020) and found that in the interrim the S3 sleep has disappeared.

Yes I find it very frustrating on Linux. XPS 2020 here as well.

Re: Ask HN: What does one look for in a laptop these days?

#330

Post by lostlogin »

DiabloD3 wrote: post #274
lostlogin wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is absolutely zero reason to adopt Intel CPUs I’d live to ditch Intel, but quicksync is just so good for video transcoding. 10 or 20 high bitrate video streams can be attacked without any noticeable load on the system. Its excessive from what I need, but it’s just so good. Maybe I’m too easily impressed.

AMD and Nvidia's encoding engines can handle more load, do it in lower latency, and also be higher quality in less bits. The last time Intel impressed me with Quicksync was in the Haswell days.

I’d far prefer to user onboard graphics, and AMD is ahead as you describe, more so than I’d appreciated. I am impressed with the UHD630, but AMD beats it easily. https://www.tomshardware.com/amp/features/amd-vs-intel-integ...
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