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Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?

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Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?

#1

Post by kellogs_aran »

Hi HN!

I am looking to buy a laptop for software development in the 0 to $2000 (USD) range.

What I am looking for: 1. Durability: battery life is important to me as well as general longevity of the hardware i.e. I would like it to last a long time.

2. Linux support: I use Linux as my OS of choice and I have no intention of using Windows/MacOS

3. Optimized for intensive computing usage.

Other things of note:

I looked into the Framework laptops and so far it looks like they are still a bit beta.

However, I am curious about users' experiences with:

* the KDE Slimbook 15: https://slimbook.es/en/store/slimbook-kde/kde-slimbook-15-comprar

* the Purism Librem 14: https://puri.sm/products/librem-14/

* Kubuntu Focus: https://kfocus.org/order/order-m2.html

* the StarBook 14-inch – Star Labs®: https://starlabs.systems/pages/starbook

Also tips about maintaining battery life would be appreciated. I've read too much conflicting advice about that lately :) Thanks.

Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?

#4

Post by francis-io »

The professional (T series) line of the Thinkpads are my go to.

I've been running ubuntu 20.04 for the past few years. You can have hot swap batteries and an inbuilt SIM slot if you choose. Not sure if the fingerprint is working (I didn't select that option) but everything else works flawlessly.

Side note: I have been maintaining an Ansible playbook for years now that sets up my developer workstation. I do know Ansible already, but I think it's a worthwhile weekend project if you are starting from scratch. You just need to be consistent and have all changes go through Ansible.

Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?

#5

Post by watersb »

secperkinsstan wrote: post #3

If the intensive computing is GPU use a lambda machine might be a good choice.

A quick announcement on Ars Technica -- the Lambda is nVidia CUDA, Linux beast laptop with very nice Razer design.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/04/razer-designed-linux...

Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?

#6

Post by adhesive_wombat »

Second hand ThinkPad T series gets a lot of bang for the buck (maybe not as good as they used to be, but still good, repairable, generally upgradable and very available as ex-enterprise machines). Good matte displays, good hinges and great keyboards.

Don't sweat the battery, they're removable, upgradeable to larger ones if you have to go a longer time on a charge and easy to replace. For the change left over from $2000, you can buy lots of them!

Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?

#9

Post by pizza234 »

If you're going for small(er) brands, another entry to the list is the [Penguin J4](https://www.thinkpenguin.com/gnu-linux/penguin-j4-gnulinux-l...), which has a replaceable battery.

Speaking of big brands, the Dell XPS developer edition is on paper very Linux compatible, although in pratice, it's (insulting) marketing fluff (I've had one). I second the Thinkpads compatibility (I had several, I think they were T/W).

Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?

#10

Post by bebna »

Battery Life Lipo:

- Run it in by fully charge it 2-3 times, (deplete it with normal use)

- Normal use keep it between 20-80%, write yourself a script or something to stop charging manually/automatically

- Deplete/fully charge it quarterly or twice a year to give the bms a change to balance the cells.

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