Author Topic: Notebooks built to be carried  (Read 3675 times)

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Offline Warhawk

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #25 on: August 03, 2023, 03:44:42 pm »
I used to be a fan of IBM/Lenovo Thinkpads. As the matter of fact, I collect them. I have unhealthy number of various models, from X to T series. Lenovo has the unique talent of fu*ki*g at least one thing up. My last ThinkPad was P1 gen2. That laptop was expensive, had system issues (known keyboard bug) and did not excel in anything. I am happy that I sold that laptop and switched to a different brand after ~14 years of Thinkpad loyalty. I use framework laptop now. Not that the laptop is perfect but I like the philosophy. I also like the performance of the 12th gen Intel P core. I believe this is a great compromise for engineers. It kicks ass of my previous i7-9850 and has full linux support.

In my opinion, times when paying extra for a laptop are gone. The only thing I miss is the trackpoint. If the price is right, then a Thinkpad is still a good solution. However, I would not pay extra. Elitebooks, Travelmates or Latitudes should be also in consideration. What I ultimately hate is the rubberized coating on new thinkpads. The palmrest looks like a table from MC Donalds after few hours....

PS: There is still a strong community on u/Thinkpads , P1 gen5 often pop up with issues (overheating, dying MoBos, etc.).

Offline ebastler

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #26 on: August 03, 2023, 04:31:35 pm »
Lenovo has the unique talent of fu*ki*g at least one thing up.

You mean beyond the wrong positions for the Fn and Ctrl keys?  :P
 

Offline Warhawk

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #27 on: August 03, 2023, 05:05:53 pm »
Lenovo has the unique talent of fu*ki*g at least one thing up.

You mean beyond the wrong positions for the Fn and Ctrl keys?  :P

Afaik you can change it in Bios/UEFI

Offline ebastler

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #28 on: August 03, 2023, 07:17:49 pm »
Afaik you can change it in Bios/UEFI

Yes you can; that's what I did for the couple of Thinkpads I had as company computers. (I used to switch between built-in and external keyboards, as well as different notebook brands, a lot, and the varying Fn/Ctrl positions drove me nuts.)

But I couldn't swap the keycaps since they were different sizes -- which would then drive others crazy when they occasionally had to type on my computer...
 

Offline Warhawk

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #29 on: August 03, 2023, 07:24:54 pm »
Afaik you can change it in Bios/UEFI

Yes you can; that's what I did for the couple of Thinkpads I had as company computers. (I used to switch between built-in and external keyboards, as well as different notebook brands, a lot, and the varying Fn/Ctrl positions drove me nuts.)

But I couldn't swap the keycaps since they were different sizes -- which would then drive others crazy when they occasionally had to type on my computer...

Now imagine me. A Czech in Germany in a US company with a Slovak QWERZ keyboard with QWERTY layout. The look of an IT guy once typing on my keyboard was priceless  :-DD

Offline nctnico

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #30 on: August 05, 2023, 03:47:08 pm »
I'm actually typing this on a decade old Dell Vostro. Still works like a charm, original battery is OK, no problems even though it has travelled hundreds of thousands kilometers in airplanes, cars, trains and in a bag attached to my bike. It is getting a bit slow for today's standards though so it needs replacing with a faster model. Which will be a Dell again.
The Vostros are perfectly nice machines for home use. I wouldn't put one in a rucksack every day, and carry it around, though.
That is exactly what I have been doing with my Vostro. It has made hundreds of rides in a bag attached to the luggage carrier of my bike (in a Samsonite laptop bag). But it seems there are differences between versions so I could be lucky and got the sturdier model. For my next laptop I'm looking at a Dell Precision 7780 (which is also available with Ubuntu Linux so the hardware should be Linux compatible). I will be using Linux as the primary OS.

Still, what is also important is stability of the platform. Nothing sucks more than dealing with weird crashes and hardware that doesn't work.
« Last Edit: August 07, 2023, 08:10:23 am by nctnico »
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Offline TopQuark

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #31 on: August 07, 2023, 03:38:00 am »
I got the 10th gen X1 Carbon around 5 months ago (i7, 16GB, 1TB, 2k screen). Before that, I was using a 5th gen x1 carbon that got me through uni, and gave it to my mum after refurbishing it, loved that machine.

I have always been a Windows / Linux (Manjaro) guy, dual booting depending if I'm doing more electronics or software at the time. I (used to) love thinkpads, often recommending it to people around it. Hell, I even bought thinkpad branded keyboards for all my other computers as I liked the trackpoint so much. I don't like Macs and Apple in general, didn't like the ethos, nor how locked-down their machines are.

The 10 gen X1 carbon is CRAP. It is slow, battery life is atrocious, and performance is disappointing. One time I was working on a simple CAD model in Fusion 360 (Windows) and had to jump on a google meet call, so I unplugged the laptop, minimised Fusion and went into a quiet room. Immediately the whole machine lagged, moving windows around was like clicking through a power point slide, fans ramped up, machine got hot, and the battery drained from full to 20-ish% in 2 hours.

Sleep doesn't work properly, apparently a common Windows bug. Linus Tech Tips made a whole video around it (Microsoft is Forcing me to Buy MacBooks - Windows Modern Standby). Closing the laptop lid and opening it again next morning will usually result in the whole battery drained.

I installed the officially supported Fibocom LTE/5G module as the needed antennas were already installed from the factory even if the machine didn't come with the 5G option initially. On windows it worked fine. On Linux, it doesn't work at all, and on the Lenovo forums, Lenovo "promised" they would add LTE/5G module support to Linux, but they still haven't publish the drivers for the 9th gen, so my 10th gen is of course SOL. Also getting Windows 11 to work nicely with Linux dual boot is a nightmare, but I digress.

I got really fed up with the thinkpad, and ended up selling it. It is not reliable, it does not do what a laptop is supposed to do (be "usable" while on the go). And seeing how well my co-workers' macs worked, I decided to give macbooks a shot. I bought a 14-inch macbook pro (M2 pro, 32 GB, 1TB) a month ago.

The hardware is wonderful. My old habit was to use my laptop on the go, and switch to desktop at home, as the laptop was too under-powered for the stuff I need to do. The Macbook is powerful enough that I don't mind using the same machine at home, without thinking I'm "compromising" performance. Battery lasts around 8-10 hours on a charge doing moderately demanding tasks (simple CAD, PCB design, embedded programming etc.) with no slowdown while un-plugged. The machine is heavier than the thinkpad for sure, but the size is similar and fits into the same bag. The only thing I hate is the retarded notch on the screen. Apple is probably the only company in the world that could do that and get away with it, as every developer who develops for MacOS will work with it, so they just went "whatcha gonna do 'bout it" and put the stupid notch there.

Software is meh. Windows management is crap, imo worse than Windows or even Linux KDE or Gnome, which says a lot. The file explorer (Finder) is quite limiting. Switching between windows is retarded. Quite a lot of plug-ins (some paid, some free) is needed to get it closer to what I'm used to, but you can get it to work more like Windows / KDE / Gnome at the end and be happy with it. Running other OS through virtualisation with the Parallels app is better than I imagined. Altium runs fine on Windows VM, Buildroot compiles in Linux VM. So far I haven't found anything that I need to run but couldn't. Having a functional UNIX shell is great, but there will still be issues if you compile projects with a lot of Linux deps.

Machine is expensive, very expensive. There's zero after-market upgradability and the upgrade options when you order the machine is borderline robbery. I'm well aware of the lengths Apple will go to discourage 3-rd party repairs, so I caved-in and got Apple care, as I use my laptops rough.

Do I regret the purchase? Absolutely not. I wish I've gotten it sooner without the (mis)adventure with the 10th Gen Thinkpad. It has great battery life, I can run all the stuff I need to run, it is quite performant. It is what I think an "ideal" laptop should be like.

That said, if one day Intel / AMD / Windows / Lenovo pulls their sh*t together, or someone who's not Apple come up with an ARM laptop chip that's as good as Apple silicon, I wouldn't think twice and jump back to Windows/Linux laptops when my Mac gets too old.

« Last Edit: August 07, 2023, 03:44:02 am by TopQuark »
 

Offline Warhawk

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #32 on: August 07, 2023, 12:42:34 pm »
I'm actually typing this on a decade old Dell Vostro. Still works like a charm, original battery is OK, no problems even though it has travelled hundreds of thousands kilometers in airplanes, cars, trains and in a bag attached to my bike. It is getting a bit slow for today's standards though so it needs replacing with a faster model. Which will be a Dell again.
The Vostros are perfectly nice machines for home use. I wouldn't put one in a rucksack every day, and carry it around, though.
.....For my next laptop I'm looking at a Dell Precision 7780 (which is also available with Ubuntu Linux so the hardware should be Linux compatible). I will be using Linux as the primary OS......

Just be careful, Dell and Lenovo likes to claim compatibility with Linux. What they mean is that you can boot linux. Every couple years Lenovo makes a big announcement "we network with e.g. Fedora". It is just marketing thing. They pushed like once a fingerprint driver to the kernel. That was it. My ex. P1 gen2 was too "linux certified". In reality, linux was not usable with that machine, mainly thanks to the hybrid graphics (nVidia). Either battery life was terrible or the laptop did not recognize type-c docking, etc. Most of the time it failed both. If you want full linux support, stay away from nVidia-enabled laptop and go with an OEM with "real" linux support (Tuxedo, Framework, etc.).

Additionally, some linux configurations were literally more expensive than the same hardware with windows license.

Offline coppiceTopic starter

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #33 on: August 07, 2023, 01:24:31 pm »
I'm actually typing this on a decade old Dell Vostro. Still works like a charm, original battery is OK, no problems even though it has travelled hundreds of thousands kilometers in airplanes, cars, trains and in a bag attached to my bike. It is getting a bit slow for today's standards though so it needs replacing with a faster model. Which will be a Dell again.
The Vostros are perfectly nice machines for home use. I wouldn't put one in a rucksack every day, and carry it around, though.
.....For my next laptop I'm looking at a Dell Precision 7780 (which is also available with Ubuntu Linux so the hardware should be Linux compatible). I will be using Linux as the primary OS......

Just be careful, Dell and Lenovo likes to claim compatibility with Linux. What they mean is that you can boot linux. Every couple years Lenovo makes a big announcement "we network with e.g. Fedora". It is just marketing thing. They pushed like once a fingerprint driver to the kernel. That was it. My ex. P1 gen2 was too "linux certified". In reality, linux was not usable with that machine, mainly thanks to the hybrid graphics (nVidia). Either battery life was terrible or the laptop did not recognize type-c docking, etc. Most of the time it failed both. If you want full linux support, stay away from nVidia-enabled laptop and go with an OEM with "real" linux support (Tuxedo, Framework, etc.).

Additionally, some linux configurations were literally more expensive than the same hardware with windows license.
I've been running Linux on various ThinkPads for at least 20 years. I think I had a problem with a new wifi chip on one, where I had to wait for the Linux driver to show up. For my use that was no big deal. I can't remember anything else causing me any problems. I've never had one with Linux preinstalled, though. I've just got a Windows machine, and either wiped or swapped out the disc on day one.
 

Offline Warhawk

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #34 on: August 07, 2023, 02:08:58 pm »
I'm actually typing this on a decade old Dell Vostro. Still works like a charm, original battery is OK, no problems even though it has travelled hundreds of thousands kilometers in airplanes, cars, trains and in a bag attached to my bike. It is getting a bit slow for today's standards though so it needs replacing with a faster model. Which will be a Dell again.
The Vostros are perfectly nice machines for home use. I wouldn't put one in a rucksack every day, and carry it around, though.
.....For my next laptop I'm looking at a Dell Precision 7780 (which is also available with Ubuntu Linux so the hardware should be Linux compatible). I will be using Linux as the primary OS......

Just be careful, Dell and Lenovo likes to claim compatibility with Linux. What they mean is that you can boot linux. Every couple years Lenovo makes a big announcement "we network with e.g. Fedora". It is just marketing thing. They pushed like once a fingerprint driver to the kernel. That was it. My ex. P1 gen2 was too "linux certified". In reality, linux was not usable with that machine, mainly thanks to the hybrid graphics (nVidia). Either battery life was terrible or the laptop did not recognize type-c docking, etc. Most of the time it failed both. If you want full linux support, stay away from nVidia-enabled laptop and go with an OEM with "real" linux support (Tuxedo, Framework, etc.).

Additionally, some linux configurations were literally more expensive than the same hardware with windows license.
I've been running Linux on various ThinkPads for at least 20 years. I think I had a problem with a new wifi chip on one, where I had to wait for the Linux driver to show up. For my use that was no big deal. I can't remember anything else causing me any problems. I've never had one with Linux preinstalled, though. I've just got a Windows machine, and either wiped or swapped out the disc on day one.

Hybrid graphics solutions are well known for problems. The internal screen uses both, the discrete + integrated GPU. However, external monitor (HDMI, DP over Type-C, etc.) uses only the dedicated card. Windows is able to select whatever is right. In linux, it is troublesome (not a problem of Linux but a problem of nVidia). When Lenovo marketed their P1 for linux support they actually used a version without the dedicated GPU. It is important to say, that P1 workstation with integrated GPU only for the price it was sold did not make any sense.
Th second problem is fingerprint readers.

PS: I too use linux on older thinkpads (x230, t61, x301, x61, x60...) but new hardware is always challenging. I want to try linux on my Framework 12th gen core i tonight. We will see.
Fedora should work out of the box.


Offline Howardlong

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #35 on: August 20, 2023, 11:12:20 pm »
On my second LG Gram now, first was a 10th gen i7 1065g7 17” with 40GB RAM and two 2TB NVMe drives.

Newer one, a 16” i7 1260p is 32GB with a 4TB NVMe.

Super lightweight, but as a result they do thermal throttle under heavy load, but both have a decent selection of ports.

I did go through a few 2-in-1s before these, including a 10th gen i7 1065g7 XPS13 2in1 with 32GB & 2TB, and before that an 8th gen ZBook G5 x360 i7 8850H with 64GB & two 2TB in RAID 0. The XPS screen real estate was too little for me, but at least you could put it on an airline tray table unlike the LG Grams I have. The ZBook while super powerful is just too heavy for lugging about, but the 15.6” 4k screen is gorgeous.

The daily drivers for travel/work for the past three years have been the LG Grams, and for a commute with a small table area or lap use I have also take a 10” GPD notebook with a 6800U and 32GB RAM plus 2TB NVMe.

I’ve come to realise there’s no one single solution, finding that 2in1s are too much of a compromise in terms of weight penalty and crippled use in tablet model
 

Online SiliconWizard

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #36 on: August 21, 2023, 02:05:02 am »
There are lots notebook computers which work well for home or light portable use, but for the last few years if you wanted something to carry around for business day in and day out the choice has been a Thinkpad or a Dell Latitude. After 20 years of owning the Thinkpad brand, and keeping it like it was in the IBM days, Lenovo seems to have suddenly trashed it. The newest machines feel cheap and flimsy, and IT people are complaining about absurd failure rates. So, how is Dell doing? What other choices currently make sense?

Apple? ;D
 

Offline Warhawk

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Re: Notebooks built to be carried
« Reply #37 on: August 21, 2023, 07:39:45 am »
There are lots notebook computers which work well for home or light portable use, but for the last few years if you wanted something to carry around for business day in and day out the choice has been a Thinkpad or a Dell Latitude. After 20 years of owning the Thinkpad brand, and keeping it like it was in the IBM days, Lenovo seems to have suddenly trashed it. The newest machines feel cheap and flimsy, and IT people are complaining about absurd failure rates. So, how is Dell doing? What other choices currently make sense?

Apple? ;D

Just for information, our company switched from Dell to HP to now switch to Thinkpads... They all suck in their own way.


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