I've been using a Dell XPS 13" 9310 for a year now with Endeavour OS/Gnome. It's perfect, IMO.
Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?
491–500 of 813 posts
Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?
#492** "I don't want to use a Mac" ** "I've had these problems with Mac" Reasonable response: Cool, use what works for you. EDIT> Here are some suggestions that match your constraints. Annoying response 1: You should reconsider because Mac works great for me. Annoying response 2: Your problems aren't real problems. Annoying response 3: Let's live debug your problems in this thread to see if they're real problems. Guys. I…
I don't think they said they've had problems with Macs. They simply said their intention is not to use Windows or Mac OS. To me, that still leaves room to recommend a Mac.
It's not a cult, it's the free market at work.
Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?
#493Forget anyone who says just use a Mac or Windows. They probably haven't used Linux in awhile because most of their "issues" don't exist anymore.
My experience: Ubuntu and Fedora "just work" on almost any machine. If your hardware is super new use the newest version or beta for the first release cycle.
I used to have a ThinkPad, now have an Acer Swift 3, both "just worked". Dells seem to be good. System76 of course. Razer sells a dev machine these days. And so on.
Tip on maintaining battery life: charge from 20% to 90% and don't leave it plugged in, use appropriate brightness, realize that GPU heavy stuff, multiple monitors, etc... all use more battery. Stay away from discrete GPUs unless you know you need/want them, integrated is fine for most gaming these days.
Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?
#494Only drawback of P14s is battery which you can't upgrade, otherwise great to have an AMD Ryzen with 16 cores and 48 gigs or RAM.
Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?
#495Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why Mac seems to attract so fanatic behavior? They seem to want to push everyone to use Mac, like religious fanatics try to push everyone to their "truth". I think this is a result of some marketing tactics Apple employed for decades, and it only pushes me away from this brand.
Macs have a certain set of features which is not even close to being matched by any other laptop, as far as I'm aware. Not everyone values these features, and for them, the Mac is just overpriced. - solid and beautiful chassis, no plastic-y uninspired 2008-Dell design here. - large, beautiful, high-DPI screen looks great and has crisp text. You can seamless rescale the UI to get effectively a 17" resolution or 13", d…
> some girl did not know how to free up disk space
Would you reconsider this wording, so that we can focus on your story rather than a flippant mention of their gender?
“Some girl” is definitely not nice phrasing and only furthers gender stereotypes.
Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?
#496** "I don't want to use a Mac" ** "I've had these problems with Mac" Reasonable response: Cool, use what works for you. EDIT> Here are some suggestions that match your constraints. Annoying response 1: You should reconsider because Mac works great for me. Annoying response 2: Your problems aren't real problems. Annoying response 3: Let's live debug your problems in this thread to see if they're real problems. Guys. I…
It's every Ask HN thread, every time I want to ask a question here I give up because I find myself listing the obvious, requirement-breaking answers that I know will come but that I don't want to see. It's not like stack-overflow where often the users are beginners and don't know what they want and it's sometimes helpful to point out XY problems. Here people are technically literate and know what they want yet the re…
Because there is no answer to this question.
Failure rates are pretty much the same given normalized manufacturing and part sourcing.
And the fit and finish debate have been semantically mined to death.
User knows constraints, just pick one!
This is not the sort of choice that needs a support group.
Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?
#497Have you considered System76? https://system76.com/laptops Another one i found interesting is the framework laptop. Its completely modular. https://frame.work/ And apparently their firmware is opensource. https://frame.work/blog/open-sourcing-our-firmware That said if you are looking to play games or have a dedicated graphics card your options will be severely limited.
Hi. OP here. I read some of the previous HN threads on System76 and just laptops generally and it seems like these won't be a good fit for me now. Maybe later when both products are a bit more mature.
Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?
#498M1 MacBook Air and use a linux VM, docker container or remote in to a linux machine. You can't beat the hardware for the price even with the extra hassle of having to work inside a Guest OS for whatever reason. Don't torture yourself with some Libre Laptop hardware just for an OS.
Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?
#499Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why Mac seems to attract so fanatic behavior? They seem to want to push everyone to use Mac, like religious fanatics try to push everyone to their "truth". I think this is a result of some marketing tactics Apple employed for decades, and it only pushes me away from this brand.
It's part guilt. Doubting your expensive purchase, thus reinforcing it with this behavior. Apt comparison with religion, especially with recent converts. That's not to say all Apple products are bad.
> Doubting your expensive purchase
Except, there is not a single Windows/Intel based laptop that can offer the same performance as say, for example, an M1 Macbook air ($750).
There really is no comparison and there is nothing that comes close on the Windows side at that price point. If there is, please link me because I would love to know.
M1 has made Macbooks not only superior in performance, but also more economically viable than Windows.
Re: Ask HN: What’s a good laptop for software development at around $2k?
#500Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why Mac seems to attract so fanatic behavior? They seem to want to push everyone to use Mac, like religious fanatics try to push everyone to their "truth". I think this is a result of some marketing tactics Apple employed for decades, and it only pushes me away from this brand.
> Why Mac seems to attract so fanatic behavior? The same reason console wars exist. If there are multiple choices, and it's not practical to take/use/buy all the options, people feel the need to justify the choice that they did make. When someone's starting from a defensive position, unemotional rationality is uncommon. AKA, it's human nature.
it's really not the same as console wars. You touch and interact with a laptop far more often than a video game console. That alone makes the comparison invalid.
While i am no apple fanatic, i will readily admit that much of their hardware is designed extremely well from an ergonomic standpoint. Barring obvious failures like their push to make things needlessly thin, a lot of their hardware is durable and holds its value well. Personally, i have a macbook from 2014 that i still use daily for basic tasks and its keyboard is very well built.
While some user behaviour is fanatical, one cannot deny that apply invest a lot into usability of their hardware and software and it shows. Can't say the same for a lot of windows laptops.