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Ask HN: Are there any reasonable alternatives to MacBook Pro for developer?

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Re: Ask HN: Are there any reasonable alternatives to MacBook Pro for developer?

#451

Post by Light2Yellow »

CoffeeOnWrite wrote: post #194

I’m on my 4th Thinkpad T-series - T520, T530, T450s, T460s - each one was a a winner. I ditched the T5XX series when they borked the keyboard layout by adding a numpad. Used to run Ubuntu, now I run Debian, stable or testing depending on point in release cycle at install time. I plan to take another look at Ubuntu now that they gave up on Unity. A coworker is happily on the T470s (first USB-C in the series). I always…

Regarding Infinality: note that it's long deprecated and unmaintained, and it will break freetype2 stuff.

See " rel="nofollow">https://gist.github.com/cryzed/e002e7057435f02cc7894b9e748c5...

Re: Ask HN: Are there any reasonable alternatives to MacBook Pro for developer?

#452

Post by SZJX »

aviraldg wrote: post #223
CoffeeOnWrite wrote: post #194

I’m on my 4th Thinkpad T-series - T520, T530, T450s, T460s - each one was a a winner. I ditched the T5XX series when they borked the keyboard layout by adding a numpad. Used to run Ubuntu, now I run Debian, stable or testing depending on point in release cycle at install time. I plan to take another look at Ubuntu now that they gave up on Unity. A coworker is happily on the T470s (first USB-C in the series). I always…

Do your co-workers not have issues with HiDPI support on Linux? I've heard it's not the best experience and can require quite some fiddling to get working correctly.

It's actually quite OK, with just some minor annoyances. Three scenarios for my use case:

1. Use the laptop screen only. This is easy. Just change the DPI value in my ~/.Xprofile and everything is solved.

2. Use external monitors only. Just use the default DPI value.

3. Use laptop screen in combination with external monitors. This doesn't occur hat often. But when I have to do this, there are also some ways to make it work. You can refer to https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/HiDPI for some reference.

- The first way is to increase the DPI in ~/.Xprofile and actually scale up the external monitor instead. I don't like this method since the external monitor just looks blurry for some reason.

- Or you can keep the DPI and downscale your internal monitor.

- Or, and this is what I do currently, use apps that support manually setting DPI in their settings, e.g. Firefox and Thunderbird, on the laptop display. You can also manually change font sizes of apps that you're going to use on the laptop display. This is a bit inconvenient but the display result will look totally natural.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any reasonable alternatives to MacBook Pro for developer?

#453

Post by SZJX »

linkmotif wrote: post #264
CoffeeOnWrite wrote: post #194

I’m on my 4th Thinkpad T-series - T520, T530, T450s, T460s - each one was a a winner. I ditched the T5XX series when they borked the keyboard layout by adding a numpad. Used to run Ubuntu, now I run Debian, stable or testing depending on point in release cycle at install time. I plan to take another look at Ubuntu now that they gave up on Unity. A coworker is happily on the T470s (first USB-C in the series). I always…

I don’t really understand how people overlook the whole Chinese government thing with regard to Lenovo. Can someone shed light on this? I would be very uncomfortable using Lenovo, and I’m not even a huge privacy person. But Lenovos must be bugged by the Chinese. How could they not be?

> But Lenovos must be bugged by the Chinese. How could they not be?

Instead of that, why don't you say Google must be bugged by the Americans. How could it not be? In fact, the main reason why the Chinese government banned Google is that all the data e.g. Gmails would be stored in a US server, which can be inspected by the American government any time if they want. It would be a nightmare for Chinese national security. Some other governments e.g. South Korea are realizing the same danger and are following suit by requiring their government/military officials to not use American services.

Compared with that, I'd say using Linux and having full control over the software is as private as you can get.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any reasonable alternatives to MacBook Pro for developer?

#454

Post by zelo »

I'm working on Xiaomi Notebook Pro 15" i7-8550U/16GB/256SSD (+ one empty slot for ssd)/Nvidia MX150. I'm using it with Ubuntu for python development and it costed me around 1200$. Battery life is around 8h of work in PyCharm (Jetbrains IDE based on the same technology as android studio). I know that some people overclock gpu under windows because of cooling capacity. I'm overally very satisfied and recommend it if you are willing to have notebook without warranty.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any reasonable alternatives to MacBook Pro for developer?

#455

Post by SZJX »

shazow wrote: post #89

I switched from a 2014 13" Retina MBP to a 2018 Thinkpad X1 Carbon (6th gen) and I'm extremely happy with it. https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-X1-Carbon-2018... is the most objective/detailed review I've seen. One of my biggest anxieties was the fear of "upgrading" to an inferior device after a decade of being on Apple devices. Thankfully, that has not been the case. - The 14" WQHD HDR screen is remarkab…

Exactly my case as well. Though I'd say I don't really find the keyboard much better than the MBP keyboard. Maybe it's because I'm used to using a mechanical keyboard in my workspace. But everything else surely is a joy to work with. It feels much lighter than the MBP 13'' even though the screen is larger.

I actually bought the XPS 13 first since it's much cheaper. But Dell messed up by having the keyboard totally unusable for fast typists. See the post at https://www.dell.com/community/XPS/XPS-13-9370-Keyboard-Skip.... Thinkpad's build quality does seems reliable still.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any reasonable alternatives to MacBook Pro for developer?

#457

Post by SZJX »

anotheryou wrote: post #93

A warning about Dell XPS (13") screens: if you take the matte display and like coding with dark color schemes it's horrible (but there might be a fix). It does loose all contrast on dark images. Saving battery they brighten the displayed image and lower the back light. This lowers 100% white to maybe a 80% white and makes for horrible contrast. For those affected: - you can test if you have this issue here: http://ty…

The adaptive brightness issue is fixed. But Dell messed up with the keyboard on the latest XPS 9370 and made it unusalbe for any fast typists. See the post at https://www.dell.com/community/XPS/XPS-13-9370-Keyboard-Skip.... I'd strongly recommend Thinkpad over XPS. The build quality is much more trustworthy.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any reasonable alternatives to MacBook Pro for developer?

#458

Post by ianai »

gilbetron wrote: post #269
ianai wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With frequent bad reports regarding windows hardware, what’s the hardware to run wsl? I really did not like my experience with the XPS13

I have a Dell Precision 15", and it works great, as far as I can tell. I do ML stuff in docker Jupyter notebooks without a problem. Docker builds seem fast, definitely as fast as my previous laptop (a macbook pro retina from ...2014?).

And how are the keyboard/trackpad?

Re: Ask HN: Are there any reasonable alternatives to MacBook Pro for developer?

#459

Post by hungerstrike »

hungerstrike wrote: post #88

Absolutely. Just about any Windows laptop with Windows 10 will be faster, cheaper and give you a better user experience in my opinion. I vastly prefer it over a Mac or a Linux desktop because I find the Mac UI to be sorely lacking and I've never had a desktop Linux machine that didn't break itself over time. I've done Node.js based development on Windows since Node very new (~ v0.4 or so). I build Android apps with R…

I love how the Windows haters never really sell you on their choice by telling you how good their favorite OS is, instead they only talk up their bullshit negative views on Windows.

If you just say that your opinion is that Windows is the best desktop, you’ll be attacked here on HN. It’s fucking amazing how people just cannot stand another person having an opinion.

Then, once you bring up how widely used Windows is compared to their OS and how many more drivers and hardware you have compared to their OS – they clam up and just do the most pathetic, cowardly thing they can...on this page.

Well fanboys or should I say anti-fanboys, fuck you. My opinion remains unchanged despite using every single desktop operating system that I could get my hands on over the past 20 years.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any reasonable alternatives to MacBook Pro for developer?

#460

Post by detaro »

hungerstrike wrote: post #459
hungerstrike wrote: post #88

Absolutely. Just about any Windows laptop with Windows 10 will be faster, cheaper and give you a better user experience in my opinion. I vastly prefer it over a Mac or a Linux desktop because I find the Mac UI to be sorely lacking and I've never had a desktop Linux machine that didn't break itself over time. I've done Node.js based development on Windows since Node very new (~ v0.4 or so). I build Android apps with R…

I love how the Windows haters never really sell you on their choice by telling you how good their favorite OS is, instead they only talk up their bullshit negative views on Windows. If you just say that your opinion is that Windows is the best desktop, you’ll be attacked here on HN. It’s fucking amazing how people just cannot stand another person having an opinion. Then, once you bring up how widely used Windows is c…

You've been "attacking" way more here than being attacked. Yes, the reply to you wasn't perfect, but brought arguments for their opinion... which you just dismissed as "weak arguments", and now you are the one lashing out against everyone disagreeing with you as a "fanboy". You are doing your case not any favor and please try to stay civil.

Sent from my Windows 10 Thinkpad.

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