12 Years ago I had a Sony Vaio. I quite liked it. Then in my next job, 2017 or so, I went for a Toshiba Portege, and absolutely loved it.
Guess what the above two have in common? Yup, they stopped making laptops for the professional market. So now I’m a bit at a loss. Any recommendations?
Requirements:
- Lightweight and easy to carry around.
- 13-15" display, preferably
- Decent battery life
- It absolutely must have an RJ45
- Works well with linux
- Good keyboard quality
- ISO keyboard availability
- Touchpad. Bonus points if it has the touchpad buttons ABOVE the pad itself.
Look into the Framework 13. There are no touchpad buttons but otherwise it has everything you need and is fully upgradable and customizable. The laptop has four expansion ports that can hold a variety of hotpluggable expansion cards. The manufacturer offers USB-A, USB-C, HDMI, DisplayPort, 2.5G ethernet, microSD, audio and SSDs. There are also some community-made ones like LTE and dual USB-C.
When I eventually need to upgrade I won’t even consider anything that isn’t repairable on a similar level. Hopefully they will be sticking around until then, but it’s looking good on that front right now
Framework if you want to repair it yourself and Lenovo if you don’t. Lenovo makes a good machine and has very reasonably priced on-site support options.
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I’ve used Macbooks in networking / programming and construction environments for over fifteen years. They’ve been incredibly solid in my experience. In fact, the first week I was given a Thinkpad, I broke it because it was so much more fragile than a Mac. I always used USB adapters for Ethernet and serial connections without issue. They also run Windows and Linux.
They also run Windows
They no longer do (since the switch to ARM) - unless you count running under a VM.
Right. I use Parallels.
Windows supports ARM https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/arm/overview
I know, but you can’t install it directly on a MacBook - you have to use a VM like Parallels or UTM.
Honestly, unless you need Solidworks or something else highly resource heavy and windows only, VMs work well with M chips. They’re surprisingly fast.
I’ve got an M1 MBA - it’s fast for sure, but the issue isn’t the processing power, it’s the RAM. Basemodel MacBooks, like the one I’ve got, still come with only 8GB RAM which is barely enough for macOS alone, never mind running Windows on top.
But nothing supports windows arm
Their Linux support is so bad it might as well be unsupported.
I run Asahi on my 2023 m2pro mbp; performance-wise it’s closer to a contemporary i7 than the actual performance of the M chip on macos, but a lot of what I need is there, a surprising amount of stuff is compiled for Arm64 actually. Feels like normal Fedora in most every aspects. Coming from thinkpads / latitudes, keyboard is shit tho, really. Screen is great, sound is quite good, device feels sturdy but sleep eats 50% battery a day. Air vents are placed just right to gulp any spilled drink, like, vacuuming it off the table, a puzzling design choice. Prices took a dive with the advent of the m3 so I’m not really angry, a 2023 i7 thinkpad would have cost me the same.
Premium product experience at a premium price. Whether the cost premium is worth it is a judgment call for the user.
Premium product experience
The hardware is pretty premium, but the software is such a pain. As a result the overall experience is just “okay”.
Thinkpad T, W, X series.
Also the P series (succesor of W). X series, just avoid the X1 Carbon.
We found the carbon to be okay, but the fan ramped up to TOGA mode super fast.
Bonus points for the aviation reference
Why?
Glued or soldered components, lots of issues as far as I’ve heard. You don’t find them refurbished (or rarely) which is a bad sign.
Hmm. Well I hope mine doesn’t break, then…
There’s a reason dells are everywhere
Sorry, but no, they’re shit.
And for the price they still them at, they’re double shit.
The Dell Latitude I got from work is really the worst laptop I’ve ever used. Do not buy.
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I can’t really fault that logic. I like the keyboard, the screen, any many other things with them. It’s just some minor annoyances with some of the Fn keycombos that I don’t like.
But one thing that I can say for sure: It will never be as durable as my Toshiba. It fell between two ships decks. It slid off the roof of a car and syraight into asphalt. It has pieces missing from it. The RJ45 port has been torn out of the mainboard. But it still works, and I bought it out for 50$ when I left my previous employer, and I still use it from time to time to this day.
Lenovo X1 carbon is what you are looking for. I got one (10th Gen) and slapped fedora on it and it’s been absolutely awesome.
Battery life could be better, but I haven’t tweaked it.
Good luck finding a quality new laptop with Linux support that also has a rj45 port. Framework might be an option though. But I just use a gigabit Ethernet usb3 adapter and it works fine
You’d get more battery & performance out of AMD, but the X1 is Intel. Looks like they don’t even offer OLED on that line either.
I’ve got a cheaper 6th gen, and it’s absolutely wonderful. It was ~$100 in EBay, because I’m broke
uhh… what kind of work?
the panasonic toughbook and apple macbook air are two wildly different laptops i have seen extensively in the field but not at the same workplaces.
Also a matte screen.
Novacustom, System76. Doesnt tick everything but has Coreboot support.
Tuxedo, if in EU
They use proprietary firmware, dont they?
They use coreboot, at least mine has it.
Thats cool!
Vaio still exists
It’s just its own brand now
The HP elitebooks might be nice for you
Dell.
Basically any Lenovo Thinkpad. They’re cheap, strong and easy to repair/upgrade
I’m a thinkpad person. Best keyboard. Very repairable. Never ran into issues installing Linux.
But they aren’t usually the kind of laptops people like. For them I suggest the Dell XPS line. Mostly for the build quality.
A lot of laptops are mostly plastic and will flex just from typing. The XPS is made from machined alumninum and is just generally a better user experience.
Thinkpad W541
