Slant community chat on Discourse| 10 Recommended Products | Recommendations | RAM | CPU | GPU |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| #1 Dell XPS 13· · · | 2 | 0 | 8 GB | Intel Core i7 | Intel HD Graphics 5500 |
| #2 Dell Precision 5510· · · | 1 | 0 | – | Intel Xeon E3 - 1505Mv5 /// Intel i7 - 6820 HQ /// Intel i7 - 6700 HQ /// Intel i5 - 6440 HQ /// Intel i5 - 6300 HQ | – |
| #3 Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon· · · | 1 | 0 | 8GB/16GB LPDDR3 1866Mhz | – | Intel HD 620 Graphics |
| #4 System76 Oryx Pro· · · | 1 | 0 | 8GB-64GB DDR4 @ 2400 MHz | i7 7th Gen | Nvidia GTX 1060/1070 |
| #5 System 76 Lemur· · · | 1 | 0 | 8GB | – | Intel 520 HD |
| #6 Dell XPS 15· · · | 0 | 0 | 8 / 16 / 32GB DDR4 at 2400MHz | Intel Core i3-7100H /// Intel Core i5-7300HQ /// Intel Core i7-7700HQ | Intel HD Graphics 630 /// NVIDIA GTX 1050 with 4GB GDDR5 |
Pro One of the best Windows trackpads available
The Dell's trackpad is one of the best Windows trackpads available. It has smooth and precise tracking and even supports three-finger gestures similar to the Macbook's.
Pro Decent speakers
The Dell XPS 13 has above average speakers for a laptop, they get very loud but at max volume tend to distort the music a little too much.
Pro Great Linux support
You can configure the XPS 13 to come with Linux out of the box. Even if you pick the Windows version, the XPS 13 has Linux drivers for all of its features and most users have reported that the whole process of installing a Linux distribution on a Dell XPS 13 is very simple.
Con Phone support from Dell Customer Service could be better
Phone support is very slow. Customers have reported waiting for up to 15 minutes to get connected to someone who will be able to help solve their issue.
Con The touchscreen reflects light making it hard to see unless the lighting on the display is properly set
The screen for the touch-screen model is glossy instead of matte (non-touch screen). For what is a Linux notebook this does not make a lot of sense since most Linux users are the more tech savy who program. A glossy screen is more for multimedia, something Linux is not really known for excelling i...
Con Webcam located in an odd place
Due to the narrow bezel of the infinity display, Dell moved the webcam to the bottom left corner. This results in an odd viewing angle and the webcam getting blocked while typing.
Pro Reasonable battery life
With the Ultra HD screen the battery lasts for about 4 hours of general usage. This is with the smaller 3-cell (56Wh) battery. Note that, if you’re choosing the bigger 6-cell (81Wh) battery, the hard drives are limited to the M.2 PCIe drives with no secondary storage option.
Pro Remarkable screen
There’s a choice between a Full HD and an Ultra HD screen. The Full HD is a matte-type screen with a native resolution of 1920 x 1080 while the Ultra HD has a glossy, touch-enabled surface which supports resolutions up to 3840 x 2160. Both screens have a very accurate color portrayal with approxi...
Con Lacks certain keys
It has no numpad which would typically ease the input of numbers. It even has enough space for it. In addition, the navigation keys (arrows) are replaced with Page Up, Page Down, Home, and End keys.
Con Palm rest gets greasy
The carbon fiber coating is very susceptible to the sweat of your hands. The continuous contact with the skin can make the palm rest greasy and uncomfortable. It has to be cleaned regularly in order to avoid it.
Pro Very portable
At around 2lbs this is a very light laptop. Especially when you compare it to other Thinkpads. It's light enough to carry in one hand and when it's carried in a backpack it's easy to forget that you are carrying a laptop because of how light it is.
Pro Great build quality
The Carbon X1 is a very light and durable laptop. It has the characteristic raven-black finishing of other Thinkpads on top of a carbon-fiber reinforced chassis. The carbon fiber increases the overall durability of the laptop, making it a great fit for people who travel a lot since it can withstand...
Con Extended dual battery adds weight
6-cell extended battery adds 0.4 pounds to take this ultrabook's weight far above that of the ultrabook standard (<3 pounds).
Con Missing an Ethernet port
The X1 Carbon is missing an Ethernet port, so people who prefer having that option as well are forced to use Wifi only.
Pro Good display
Has a 1080p matte display with an optional IPS matte display version. With great colors and brightness and almost no eye strain even when it's used for extended periods.
Pro Good speakers
One of the bonuses of having a larger body is that you get to use good speakers instead of some small ones stuck underneath the laptop. They are also angled toward the user and the sound is crisp and loud enough, even though it lacks some bass.
Con Very heavy and bulky
Weighing at 5.5lbs for the 15.6" version it's relatively heavy and it's one inch thicker than the XPS 13. But the extra space is not put to waste, considering how it has an Ethernet port, SD card slot, 2 Mini DisplayPrts, HDMI port, 2 USB 3.1 Type-C ports, 3 USB 3.0 Type-A ports and he...
Con Customer service could be much better
System76's technical support is pretty bad. When there's a problem that should be solved by them, they usually resort to sending replacement parts instead or blaming third-parties (even if those third-parties are not at fault) of something that they should be fixing.
Pro Ubuntu just works out of the box
System76 machines come with Ubuntu 16.04 LTS pre-installed with all drivers and necessary software ready to go. For Ubuntu users there's no need to install their distro of choice from scratch.
Pro Choice of version of Ubuntu
System 76 allows the user to choose between the LTS release of Ubuntu and the latest release as the installed OS of the shipped device.. While installing a new version of the OS is done easily at home, it is convenient to see that System 76 will do it for you.
Con Terrible battery life
Even when just web browsing, the battery will last five hours tops.
Con Screen brightness doesn't go low
Even at minimal brightness, the screen is too bright to comfortably use at night.
Pro Solid keyboard and trackpad
The keyboard and trackpad are reliable and solid all-around. The keyboard is responsive but is not super “clicky”, rather a bit soft. It has a white backlight on black keys that illuminates them at night. The touchpad is rather large while having no buttons. Despite this, the XPS 15 can reliably di...
Pro Operates well on a Linux system
All essential things, like network connectivity, ports and sound, work right “out-of-the-box” with a Linux operating system. There is a compatibility issue on the new 9560 model with its graphics card but the laptop is still very usable with its integrated Intel graphics card.
Con Some ghosting in games
The display is not intended for gaming purposes so it can produce an effect called “ghosting”. Ghosting is when the pixels are not able to change their colors fast enough, so the color of the preceding frame can still be slightly seen on the next frame. This causes a blurring effect. Note that it o...
Con Noisy fans
The laptop is very quiet during idle and light usage but when there is some workload, the fans get quite loud and distracting.
Pro Capable of serious multitasking and productivity work
With 8-16 Gigs of RAM and with an SSD, this laptop is capable of doing some serious multitasking without experiencing any lag whatsoever.
Pro Excellent keyboard
The T460 has an excellent keyboard which provides a very pleasant typing experience. The keys have and overall 2.33mm of vertical travel, which is pretty deep for laptops (1.5mm-2mm is typical). The keyboard is also spill-resistant, which is not surprising, considering the length Lenovo has gone...
Con The display does not have very rich colors
Even though the 1080p display is very accurate and produces a sharp image, it struggles a bit with displaying accurate colors. Tests show that the T460 reproduces only 67 percent of the sRGB color gamut with both touch and non-touch panels.
Pro Good keyboard
HP put a lot of effort in the creation of this keyboard and it shows. With 60 gram actuation weight and a travel length of 1.3mm, typing on the Spectre x360 is a great experience, reminiscent of typing on a mechanical keyboard.
Pro Excellent performance
Performance of course depends on the configuration, but a medium-powered configuration with 8GB RAM and i5 provides an excellent performance. Multitasking is a breeze and the laptop doesn't stutter or lag even with 20 Chrome tabs open simultaneously. The SSD is also extremely fast and is able...
Con Has some bloatware
While it's less than HP usually has, there are still apps like Netflix, The Weather Channel, Hearts Deluxe, Connected Photo etc.
Con Can easily trap heat and overheat
The extremely thin chassis is a drawback as far as heat management goes. Even a relatively simple activity like streaming HD videos will overheat the laptop and put the internal heat at about 105 degrees Fahrenheit which is 10 degrees higher than the 95 degrees "comfortable" threshold.
Pro Great minimalistic design
The chassis has a simple matte black coating that surrounds the whole laptop. The only dashes of color are provided by the red trackpoint on the keyboard and the red dot on the logo on the back of the lid. The minimalistic look makes this laptop a perfect fit for business and productivity environm...
Pro Excellent performance for non-gaming activity
The T470s provides excellent performance for anything non-GPU related. It's extremely fast and responsive and provides more than enough power for business or development related work. It can also play some games that are not resource intensive at relatively high framerates with medium or high...
Con Display not suitable for picture editing
The T470s display has a low sRGB color gamut at 95% which is quite low for this category which makes it a poor choice for people that would use it for picture editing.
Pro Good performance for the price
The HP Envy 13 offers good performance for its price. It can handle up to 16 Chrome tabs open simultaneously without even a bit of lag. Daily mainstream activities such as web browsing, editing files and even development work can be done on this laptop without any particular issues.
Pro People who usually use their laptop on a desk will feel very comfortable with this
The Envy 13 has a hinge on the back which gives the laptop a slight extra boost in keyboard height. This puts the keyboard at a much more comfortable typing position and reduces RSI and finger-fatigue from extensive periods of typing.
Con Poor battery life
The Envy 13 has a relatively poor battery life. You may get about 9 hours out of it if you use it for general web browsing and some productivity work, but anything more than that (watching videos, light gaming) and you will start noticing that the battery life is considerably lower.
Con No touchscreen version
HP does not provide a touchscreen version of this laptop.
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