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Chuwi Minibook X

tylercipriani.com

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Re: Chuwi Minibook X

#141

Post by Zardoz84 »

pizza234 wrote: post #135
derefr wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Bigger screen" (i.e. being bigger on the length/width dimension) is a bad thing in this discussion. Some people want a programming/writing laptop that fits in a handbag, so that they don't have to decide to bring it, but can just leave it in their bag the way many people do with an iPad.

Confirmed. Minibooks are amazing in cramped locations (for example, airplane seats), or just to always keep in the bag for support. There's nothing in the market like them, which is a shame - I think a slightly better quality Minibook (Chuwis are plain crap) would be a very solid laptop.

a Steam deck with a small form factor keyboard?

Re: Chuwi Minibook X

#142

Post by petesergeant »

hyperhello wrote: post #132
bergie wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely. The 11" MacBook Air was the best laptop Apple ever made.

It was nice, but the screen bezel was huge. The latest 13 is about the same size and weight.

The _feel_ is very different though, even if the dimensions aren’t numerically. It was around half a cm at its thinnest, it was 250g lighter, and 23mm less deep.

I think at those sizes, what reads as small differences give an outsized experiential factor.

Re: Chuwi Minibook X

#143

Post by pdhborges »

vachina wrote: post #106
dnlzro wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm starting to see 2020 M1 MacBooks CA$350 on Facebook Marketplace. That's the device I'm using to type this out. It still lasts all day, and it's still the only computer I use.

The fact that it’s listed is meaningless. You need to ask the seller what’s wrong with it.

Could be boot locked to the original owner Apple account.

Re: Chuwi Minibook X

#144

Post by lexicality »

I have one of these. It's an awful piece of shit and I love it.

I bought it because I was going on holiday and didn't want to take a real laptop both in case it got stolen and to dissuade me from using it. I ended up using it more than I would have a normal laptop because it's so small and easily carried.

My current use case is for my commute into the office, it easily fits on the microscopic train tables and doesn't add much weight to my bag. Highly recommended.

Re: Chuwi Minibook X

#145

Post by kennywinker »

rkomorn wrote: post #133
hyperhello wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was nice, but the screen bezel was huge. The latest 13 is about the same size and weight.

I loved mine but I'd be lying if I said it gave me three years of acceptable performance. Sure, I can blame Chrome and JS, but ultimately, the core 2 duo and 8GB RAM did not keep up very long.

There was an 11” air with an i5/i7 - i splurged for 16gb of ram when i bought it in 2015 and it lasted me 10 years.

It still works, but a few specific apps started to really drag on it.

Re: Chuwi Minibook X

#146

Post by ai_fry_ur_brain »

Marsymars wrote: post #31
drum55 wrote: post #4

I miss my Sony Vaio P series which fitted in a similar sort of niche, the cellphone radio made it just by far the best laptop I've ever used. Modern laptops don't seem to have provision for a LTE/5G radio which always confuses me a bit, in this form factor it would be ideal. I'm surprised nobody has cloned this actually, with phone screens being the right aspect ratio it seems obvious. https://www.zdnet.com/a/img/201…

Probably a lot of people who care about this niche just get an iPad. (Which is what I've done - 5G iPad is great for travel - if I need something with a real OS, it waits until I'm home.)

Its also very useful to have an 5G connection for CGNAT for various reasons, for me its very useful for web scraping to avoid WAFs and rate limits. Currently you have to proxy through your phone, use a 5G base station (although these use static IPs often) or pay $6.00 a gb for mobile proxy bandwidth. Having a 5G connection on a laptop would be clutch, and is definately a priority of mine on my next laptop.

Re: Chuwi Minibook X

#147

Post by iainmerrick »

bee_rider wrote: post #127
segphault wrote: post #21

I bought one of these last year, specifically looking for a modern take on the netbook form factor. I run PopOS on mine and absolutely love the machine. It’s a perfect travel laptop and it has largely replaced the iPad mini that I previously used as my travel companion. I sometimes use it with XReal glasses, which is great. I’ve found that a 35 watt phone charger is sufficient to charge it over USB C, so I don’t even…

The complaints about the keyboard sound more significant than the screen.

Yes, I’d be wary of going anywhere near this for that reason alone. You can’t just say “the keyboard is terrible” but then that you still like it overall -- more detail needed!

Re: Chuwi Minibook X

#148

Post by iainmerrick »

matthewn wrote: post #123

I got one of these a couple of years ago, put Linux on it, and was pleased as punch: https://www.mahnamahna.net/blog/linux-chuwi-minibook-x/ It's actually the keyboard that surprises me the most: I think it's really good (and I consider myself a bit of a keyboard snob). I've never had any issue like the author describes, of having to strike keys just-so.

Very different reports of the keyboard in this thread. Are there different builds of this or something? Or is it just a very polarising keyboard?

Re: Chuwi Minibook X

#149

Post by kennywinker »

LoganDark wrote: post #138
derefr wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Bigger screen" (i.e. being bigger on the length/width dimension) is a bad thing in this discussion. Some people want a programming/writing laptop that fits in a handbag, so that they don't have to decide to bring it, but can just leave it in their bag the way many people do with an iPad.

A "programming" laptop should be powerful enough to run code, no?

If your code won’t run on this machine, you’re the problem not the machine (outside of niche processor heavy stuff like video editing and ai crap).

Re: Chuwi Minibook X

#150

Post by onli »

matthewn wrote: post #123

I got one of these a couple of years ago, put Linux on it, and was pleased as punch: https://www.mahnamahna.net/blog/linux-chuwi-minibook-x/ It's actually the keyboard that surprises me the most: I think it's really good (and I consider myself a bit of a keyboard snob). I've never had any issue like the author describes, of having to strike keys just-so.

With those brands it's quite possible they changed it later without listing that anywhere. Same for the Linux support, which they also specifically not provide officially (and there is a developer post somewhere that they dont ever test on Linux). Made me not buy this when I searched for a travel notebook last year.
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