XPS 13 developer edition 7th generation available • Hacker News Board

Re: XPS 13 developer edition 7th generation available

#211

Post by crdoconnor » Thu, Jan 04, 2018, 10:12 PM UTC

ndesaulniers wrote: post #178

torgard wrote: post #98

Max 8gb for regular display... I mean, who uses touch screens for development? I can't really imagine a scenario where it would be helpful for me. Maybe when doing work in Illustrator and Photoshop, but I usually use a different machine for that anyhow, because of Adobe's lack of Linux support. I don't want to pay for something I won't use. I am otherwise actively looking for a laptop. System76 does not have European…

There's no simple/easy way to disable the touchscreen in Linux distro's, too.

You can just turn it off in the BIOS.

Re: XPS 13 developer edition 7th generation available

#212

Post by oliwarner » Thu, Jan 04, 2018, 10:14 PM UTC

gattr wrote: post #209

I settled on the 13.3" form factor 6 years ago, but the lack of all dedicated PgUp, PgDown, Home, End, Ins, Del keys puts me off (I'm very used to copy/paste with Ctrl/Shift-Ins and whole line selection). Well, I'm sticking with the small ProBooks and Lenovos for now.

Keyboards are variable beasts, even at 13.3".

My ThinkPad 13 has all those buttons.

Re: XPS 13 developer edition 7th generation available

#213

Post by randyrand » Thu, Jan 04, 2018, 10:16 PM UTC

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #143

randyrand wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't need 32GB, but considering my 15" Lenovo W520 from 6.5 years ago has 16GB too what on earth has happened to computer innovation!? 6.5 years without a DRAM increase for 15" laptops is bonkers. It was $1500 for the laptop, it wasn't even crazy expensive back then. On top of that it even supported 32GB. All in a rather sleek 15" form factor. (6.2 pounds vs 2018 XPS 15 4.6 pounds). Sources: https://forums.…

The W520 was and is an outlier in just about every category, though. Not exactly a fair comparison... Also, if you're going to be talking about the form factor and weight, you should probably mention the power adapter...The XPS takes a 45W, 0.2 pound little USB C device. The W520 requires you to lug around a 1.7 lbs, 170W beast that definitely qualifies as a brick. That and a lack of support for the latest NVMe drive…

The power adapter is a good point! It really is a beast.

Including the AC adapter, the XPS 15 is 40% lighter than the W520 for roughly equal performance and similar battery life. Not too bad.

It's still a bit sad though. After 5.5 years I moved to a macbook pro 13" 2016 and the performance was a drastic downgrade from it (the w520 finally broke...).

Moore's "law" is clearly, finally, gone.

Re: XPS 13 developer edition 7th generation available

#214

Post by kdamica » Thu, Jan 04, 2018, 10:17 PM UTC

examancer wrote: post #81

ascendantlogic wrote: post #11

Only 16 gigs of RAM? Why do companies still hold that limit in 2018? I was hoping for 32 gigs back in 2015.

Expected the new XPS to have a developer flavor soon, but also expected it to be limited to 16GB still. Was not surprised since the Windows version has the same limit. Went ahead and purchased a 32GB System76 Galaga Pro last week with the same i7-8550U available on the XPS. It's a slightly larger 13", but feels a lot closer to my 5th gen XPS 13 than the MacBook Pro the Galaga replaces. Comes with a retina-like matte…

I also recently bought a Galago Pro, primarily since it was the only reasonably priced laptop I could find with 32GB ram. I'd say overall I'm happy but it's a mixed bag.

Pros: - Gorgeous screen, lightweight, Ubuntu 16 feels snappy. - System76 customer service is amazing. - Sub $2000 machine with 32GB RAM and i7. (Mine was $1850 after shipping & tax.) - Lots of ports! The fold-out ethernet port is especially nice, for those rare times when you need one.

Cons: - I dislike the keyboard layout quite a lot, but I'm hoping I get used to it. The right-hand column of home/end/etc gets hit quite a lot by accident when I'm trying to hit enter, tab, etc. Also, the center of my space bar has a dead spot unless pressed very hard. - Battery life is bad. If you're just browsing, you get maybe 4 hours. Anything intensive will run the battery down in under an hour. I mostly use it at home so this isn't a big problem for me. - As stated above, the touch pad feels unresponsive, esp. if you're used to a macbook pro. Not sure whether this is a hardware or software issue. - They charge you $77 (after shipping & tax) for a second charger. (It also seems to be a nonstandard size, so good luck finding one from an OEM.)

Re: XPS 13 developer edition 7th generation available

#215

Post by metaphor » Thu, Jan 04, 2018, 10:17 PM UTC

paulmd wrote: post #117

kingosticks wrote: post #80

My XPS 13 9350 is undoubtedly the best computer I've ever owned. I don't seem to have this coil whine thing or I just don't notice it. The 8GB of RAM has served me well and I'd never want to sacrifice any of the battery life for increasing that - it's an ultrabook after all. I've always run Ubuntu and while I did have problems with WiFi and resuming when it first came out, they are both rock solid now. I have never t…

Coil whine can easily be tested with this website (probably not a good link if you have epilepsy or Chiari malformations) https://thume.ca/screentunes/ In my experience virtually all LCD displays have it to some degree, you just don't notice it except with certain patterns (like that one) that interact with the scanout mechanism.

To be sure, what you're hearing from that website is not coil whine (inductor phenomena), but mechanical resonance caused by piezoelectric effect on solid state MLCCs[1] charging/discharging in your monitor during frame refresh.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceramic_capacitor#Microphony

Re: XPS 13 developer edition 7th generation available

#216

Post by 52804375092485 » Thu, Jan 04, 2018, 10:19 PM UTC

I'm optimistic about this product line but I don't think it's there yet. I have a 13" 9360 and while the price was good, it does feel under-powered, specifically the 8G maximum memory configuration with the non-touchscreen.

Mine does have the "coil whine" thing, although it doesn't really bother me since I'm usually wearing headphones when I use it. But overall, the build quality is just pathetic compared to my Macbook, and this is supposed to be a competitor. The touchpad is way worse, the carbon fiber thing is cheesy, the awkwardly fat bezel at the bottom of the display is silly, the fact that you need a $100 dock to connect to external monitors is ridiculous, the webcam is weirdly placed in the bottom left of the display, there are just a bunch of strange/bad design choices.

That was all the bad things - otherwise it's better than any non-Macbook I've used. It's lightweight, small, gets the "little notebook you can take anywhere" niche fairly well. I hope they listen to feedback and iterate, but I can't say I'd eagerly recommend it.

Re: XPS 13 developer edition 7th generation available

#217

Post by kdamica » Thu, Jan 04, 2018, 10:22 PM UTC

dijit wrote: post #164

examancer wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Expected the new XPS to have a developer flavor soon, but also expected it to be limited to 16GB still. Was not surprised since the Windows version has the same limit. Went ahead and purchased a 32GB System76 Galaga Pro last week with the same i7-8550U available on the XPS. It's a slightly larger 13", but feels a lot closer to my 5th gen XPS 13 than the MacBook Pro the Galaga replaces. Comes with a retina-like matte…

You could go precision though. Which is what I did. Precision 5520 has an Ubuntu option and works flawlessly with Linux. 32-64g of DDR4 and 12h of battery with the 9cell upgrade I should know. I’ve been using one for nearly a year.

The Precision is a great option if you're looking for a 15" laptop.

Re: XPS 13 developer edition 7th generation available

#218

Post by megy » Thu, Jan 04, 2018, 10:23 PM UTC

claar wrote: post #184

Comments on this thread say that less memory helps battery life. Are there motherboards that would allow the OS to power-save memory modules at times, and power them back up at others (perhaps user-configured)? If not, I wonder why..

Having more of the same type of memory would not make a lot of difference.

Using different types or ram (such as you have to do to get 32gb) which is not low power will make a difference.

Re: XPS 13 developer edition 7th generation available

#219

Post by julesallen » Thu, Jan 04, 2018, 10:27 PM UTC

I can't tell you how much I would love a Linux laptop, so much has been solved around power consumption and battery life, wifi stability, and so on. The one show stopper continues to be spotty HiDPI support for essential apps like The GIMP — the menu and fonts stubbornly stayed at 1x resolution and the icons were teeny. Ugh. Had a 9360 for a short time before reluctantly returning it.

So for me it's a Samsung Pro Chromebook as a daily driver and a 2015 Macbook Pro for development and graphics work.

How are things six months forward? Any better to completely working vs. 'closer and it'll be done soon'?

Re: XPS 13 developer edition 7th generation available

#220

Post by Someone1234 » Thu, Jan 04, 2018, 10:27 PM UTC

deckard1 wrote: post #172

Someone1234 wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I mean, who uses touch screens for development? Web developers who want to test using real touch input events rather than the quirky emulation found in a few browsers. If you're developing for touch, in particular things like drag & drop, you want a real device. Even if you have an iPad or smartphone test device too, it is nice to have that ability on your main development machine rather than jumping around.

eh? You're not running Android on iOS on the thing. It's still emulation (or "virtualized" environment), and it's still largely going to be crap.

Windows touch devices are a device type we target.

Typically testing using Chrome on Windows using a touch screen gives you a reasonable frame of reference for how iOS and Android behave since all are WebKit-like (at least until fine tuning, when you're of course testing on real devices).