Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition review • Hacker News Board

Re: Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition review

#41

Post by bpeebles » Tue, Jan 07, 2014, 4:33 PM UTC

surge wrote: post #16

I own this laptop, had it for almost a year. I love it except after a while I noticed random hard freezes, basically the display freezes in place and the system doesn't respond. I would have to hold down the power button to force an unexpected reboot (in the words of Moss). It would happen after a day, or a week of use. Turns out it's a problem with the kernel in 12.04 and the Intel 4400 chipset. The only solid fix i…

You can use https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Kernel/LTSEnablementStack to get a newer X server and kernel while otherwise staying on 12.04 LTS.

Re: Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition review

#42

Post by mseebach » Tue, Jan 07, 2014, 4:34 PM UTC

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #36

A laptop targeted to developers should have a TrackPoint to move the cursor without taking the hands off the keyboard, a non-shortscreen monitor to see more lines of code, a matte screen to read the code better, and a numpad to, well, type numbers. OK, I guess I'm asking too much for today's standards, even if all these things were common ten years ago (sigh...), but when I saw "developer edition" I thought I would s…

The operative word is "Linux", not "Developer".

Re: Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition review

#43

Post by nfoz » Tue, Jan 07, 2014, 4:38 PM UTC

> First boot: Ubuntu animation, Dell User Agreement, then the standard Ubuntu installer.

Seriously?

Re: Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition review

#44

Post by old-gregg » Tue, Jan 07, 2014, 4:39 PM UTC

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #36

A laptop targeted to developers should have a TrackPoint to move the cursor without taking the hands off the keyboard, a non-shortscreen monitor to see more lines of code, a matte screen to read the code better, and a numpad to, well, type numbers. OK, I guess I'm asking too much for today's standards, even if all these things were common ten years ago (sigh...), but when I saw "developer edition" I thought I would s…

Logged in to upvote you. I would also add that a proper keyboard which doesn't resemble typing on mashed potatoes would also be my requirement. Even Thinkpads have degraded to a calculator-quality cheap uniform keyboard without oversized keys copied from Sony/Apple... Ugh...

Re: Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition review

#45

Post by grigio » Tue, Jan 07, 2014, 4:39 PM UTC

I think it should be cheaper compared to a MBA with Linux.. anyway the competition is good

Re: Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition review

#46

Post by thirdsight » Tue, Jan 07, 2014, 4:40 PM UTC

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #36

A laptop targeted to developers should have a TrackPoint to move the cursor without taking the hands off the keyboard, a non-shortscreen monitor to see more lines of code, a matte screen to read the code better, and a numpad to, well, type numbers. OK, I guess I'm asking too much for today's standards, even if all these things were common ten years ago (sigh...), but when I saw "developer edition" I thought I would s…

Someone who gets it! I'm doomed to stay with a 2010 vintage Lenovo T-series by the looks.

Re: Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition review

#47

Post by rayiner » Tue, Jan 07, 2014, 4:41 PM UTC

surge wrote: post #32

rayiner wrote: post #24

6 hours isn't great, it's shitty for a 13" laptop with Haswell.

Yeah, but not one that thin (small battery).

It's not particularly thin. It's about the same thickness at its thickest point at the MBA. In terms of size and weight, it's about in the middle for an ultrabook. It's battery is a little smaller than the MBA's, but not that much smaller (47 watt-hours versus 54 watt-hours). Dell's own XPS 12, which has a very marginally larger battery (50 watt-hours), gets almost 9 hours of Wi-Fi surfing at about 50% brightness.

Re: Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition review

#48

Post by ytdtty » Tue, Jan 07, 2014, 4:44 PM UTC

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #36

A laptop targeted to developers should have a TrackPoint to move the cursor without taking the hands off the keyboard, a non-shortscreen monitor to see more lines of code, a matte screen to read the code better, and a numpad to, well, type numbers. OK, I guess I'm asking too much for today's standards, even if all these things were common ten years ago (sigh...), but when I saw "developer edition" I thought I would s…

A numpad? Wth?

Re: Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition review

#49

Post by rayiner » Tue, Jan 07, 2014, 4:45 PM UTC

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #36

A laptop targeted to developers should have a TrackPoint to move the cursor without taking the hands off the keyboard, a non-shortscreen monitor to see more lines of code, a matte screen to read the code better, and a numpad to, well, type numbers. OK, I guess I'm asking too much for today's standards, even if all these things were common ten years ago (sigh...), but when I saw "developer edition" I thought I would s…

I quite disagree. A touchpad doesn't require appreciably more movement off the keyboard than a trackpoint (I used a trackpoint Dell machine for years). Matte screens are bad for reading code, because they create a layer of gritiness that reduces the sharpness of text. Glossy screens with good room lighting are far superior. Finally, a wide-screen 13" display is just about the right size to fit two 80-character Emacs windows side-by-side.

Re: Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition review

#50

Post by supergauntlet » Tue, Jan 07, 2014, 4:49 PM UTC

smackfu wrote: post #34

rsynnott wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thunderbolt is seeing some take-up on the high end; it solves a different set of problems to USB3.

I don't disagree... on a Mac. On a PC, I'm not sure what else there is to plug in to a Thunderbolt port other than storage.

The thing is, Thunderbolt manages to be this amalgamation of miniDP and PCIe x4. It is actually entirely possible to run PCIe devices on a thunderbolt connection, which means things like external graphics cards are now again viable (since almost no consumer computers have expresscard slots now).