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Ask HN: Is Dell XPS Developer Edition a Good Replacement of Macbook Pro?

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Re: Ask HN: Is Dell XPS Developer Edition a Good Replacement of Macbook Pro?

#101

Post by caleblloyd »

sliken wrote: post #100
caleblloyd wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't know 540 had eDRAM! That's awesome. Their naming sceme is very confusing.

IRIS = edram

For Skylake, yes. For Haswell and Broadwell, no. A small "e" on the graphics generation denotes eDRAM. Iris 5100 (Haswell) and Iris 6100 (Broadwell) were GT3, no eDRAM. Iris Pro 5200 (Haswell) and Iris Pro 6200 (Broadwell) were GT3e with eDRAM.

For Skylake they switched it up so that Iris 540 and Iris 550 are both GT3e, and Iris Pro 580 is GT4e. All with eDRAM. My comment above is incorrect, Iris 550 is not the "pro" version, Iris Pro 580 is.

Re: Ask HN: Is Dell XPS Developer Edition a Good Replacement of Macbook Pro?

#102

Post by rstuart4133 »

dolguldur wrote: post #90

No. I had the Dell XPS 15 9550 and there were several issues. • Trackpad much worse than on a Mac • Coil whine • Bad fan control means it was sometimes noisy in near-idle contitions (though in idle it was very silent) • there were some flicker issues with the GPU (might have been resolved though) • one key was bouncy, meaning it sometimes triggered twice • it woke up from sleep randomly, sometimes while in my bag, of…

This I think is the Windows perspective. The Linux perspective (Debian in my case) is somewhat different:

- Hardware wise the Trackpad is identical in performance to the Mac. All the same gestures are recognised - but the software doesn't use most of them. In fact the software side was terrible until libxinput took over from the old synaptics driver. Now if it works, it works well - but it's still a little lacking on the gesture front.

- Coil whine should be no different - but I've never heard it.

- Fan control is perfect, which is weird. Maybe it was old BIOS?

- Intel's GPU firmware & driver has been a 18 month long cluster fuck. It's the same cluster fuck on Windows and Linux. It still isn't perfect, but it's much better. At the rate they are going, they may get it right 2 years after the initial release of the CPU. Here's hoping. I don't know how Apple could escape this mess. Maybe they knew they couldn't, so escaped it by not upgrading the CPU's for donkey's years.

- Oddly the wakeup problem happened on Linux too. Once I opened by bag and it was so hot I though I'd destroyed it. The issue has gone now.

- Linux has the same issues a Windows when it comes to mixing HIDPI and normal displays. In Linux it's a fundamental limitation of X. It can be fixed in Wayland.

One piece of advice: update the BIOS religiously. At least until Intel fixes their Skylake GPU issues.

Re: Ask HN: Is Dell XPS Developer Edition a Good Replacement of Macbook Pro?

#103

Post by Tepix »

bnewton wrote: post #41

Unfortunately XPS Developer Edition does not support external 4k displays @ 60Mhz like Dell's own P2715Q. If that kind of thing matters to you. Otherwise I think it a great machine.

Afaik, the 6th gen XPS 13 supports even two 4k 60Hz monitors...

Re: Ask HN: Is Dell XPS Developer Edition a Good Replacement of Macbook Pro?

#104

Post by 086421357909764 »

troyk wrote: post #59
086421357909764 wrote: post #4

14" Razer Blade 1060, grab a dbrand matte skin to cover the hideous Razer logo. No problems with Ubuntu 16.10 currently installed. Also have a 13" Dell XPS dev edition used for specific work. It's a nice system as well. The Razer def has more power if you want a full replacement.

I'm considering moving from a macbook pro to the blade and adding the core to get a beefed up desktop experience with the ability to unplug and take work anywhere it needs to go. I'm assuming I would need to stay in windows land with linux via Hyper-V. Besides iMessage, all my apps run on linux (more-so) or windows (less-so). Any thoughts?

The only loss i've felt so far is my documents that were written / design in pages & keynote. Still have a older mac around to handle them. Otherwise i'm back to Windows 10 fT with the Hyper-V bash and docker. So far so good (going on a month now).

Re: Ask HN: Is Dell XPS Developer Edition a Good Replacement of Macbook Pro?

#105

Post by 086421357909764 »

sliken wrote: post #81
086421357909764 wrote: post #4

14" Razer Blade 1060, grab a dbrand matte skin to cover the hideous Razer logo. No problems with Ubuntu 16.10 currently installed. Also have a 13" Dell XPS dev edition used for specific work. It's a nice system as well. The Razer def has more power if you want a full replacement.

Any idea on battery life? Can't find anything printed about it.

Gaming, it's pretty short, if you set the intel graphics power settings right though you can get 6 hours give or take. I rarely use the laptop more than an hour without access to power anyway so the whole battery life issue mac or pc doesn't seem as big an issue for me.

Re: Ask HN: Is Dell XPS Developer Edition a Good Replacement of Macbook Pro?

#106

Post by 086421357909764 »

ryanlol wrote: post #67
086421357909764 wrote: post #4

14" Razer Blade 1060, grab a dbrand matte skin to cover the hideous Razer logo. No problems with Ubuntu 16.10 currently installed. Also have a 13" Dell XPS dev edition used for specific work. It's a nice system as well. The Razer def has more power if you want a full replacement.

How do you live with the bezel?

Adapt and Survive. Seriously the only cosmetic issue I have is the Razer logo. They really need to offer alternatives.

Re: Ask HN: Is Dell XPS Developer Edition a Good Replacement of Macbook Pro?

#108

Post by arekx »

If you go for XPS then really be careful about coil-like noise (google for "dell xps coil whine forum"). Dell doesn't consider this to be a fault - it's "normal" from their point of view. And for you such coil whine could be like chinese water torture - constant pain.

Re: Ask HN: Is Dell XPS Developer Edition a Good Replacement of Macbook Pro?

#109

Post by arekx »

If you go for XPS then really be careful about coil-like noise (google for "dell xps coil whine forum"). Dell doesn't consider this to be a fault - it's "normal" from their point of view. And for you such coil whine could be like chinese water torture - constant pain.

Re: Ask HN: Is Dell XPS Developer Edition a Good Replacement of Macbook Pro?

#110

Post by runamok »

wolfkabal wrote: post #26

I went with a ThinkPad P50. It's not nearly as bulky as some think. I specked mine with the Xeon processor, and 1080p screen (but 4k is an option). Also specked everything else as low as possible (HDD/SSD, RAM). I upgraded these items myself after. I now have a server grade processor, have put two 512 SSD in it (one M.2 NVMe), and 64GB of RAM. It's a beast. I can also swap out the LCD panel directly for the 4k panel…

Probably a silly question but I imagine its battery life is pretty short with that much power...
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