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Well it is the best netbook I've seen in eight years. With the exception of the meager number of ports and the glossy screen, the hardware is wonderful. Every
by keenerd 11y ago
Well it is the best netbook I've seen in eight years. With the exception of the meager number of ports and the glossy screen, the hardware is wonderful.
Everything else comes down to software. Some of the difficulties were because I prefer to do things a difficult way. Eg, Arch is going to require more configuration and sound Just Works if you use Pulse. Having ALSA correctly autoconfigure everything except a single boolean flag is pretty good in my book. The warning about burning out hardware is just me passing on the advice from an engineer who actually works on these boards.
Suspend/resume is in fact flawless. It has never failed to come out of suspend, unlike quite a few thinkpads I've used. However linux does the wrong thing here with the bluetooth module. Trivial to fix, and it happens on other hardware too. Not the fault of the Flip.
Chromium doesn't run on Arch Linux ARM at all. Any hardware, regardless. So you can't hold that against the Flip. And I don't use Chromium, so this is a non-factor.
Almost everything else is the usual crap you have to put up with using garbage closed source video drivers and a kernel hacked out of ChromeOS. But I spend the majority of my time in the terminal, so the graphics are nothing I am concerned about. Similarly, I don't care about the webcam or multitouch, or HDMI because I don't own an HDMI monitor. I feel they are irrelevant details hardly worth mention, but they sound like dealbreakers to you.
Literally all I do is typing, reading, listening to music. I wanted fanless, all-day battery life, that weighs under a kilogram and is under $300. The Flip delivers and overall it has been a better experience than running Linux on a thinkpad. There are very few netbooks that could meet those requirements, and none that do it as elegantly as the Flip does. Therefor it is the best in my regard. If you disagree, it is up to you to name something superior according to the given criteria.
- ggreer 11y agoOur use-cases are similar, but if you value your time at anything reasonable, your budget should be much higher. Let me explain. I spend about 10 hours a day on my main computer. If I upgrade every 18 months, even a $1500 machine only costs 28 cents per hour. Set aside frustration with drivers or software bugs; expensive laptops win for purely economic reasons. If a $1500 laptop makes me even 10% more productive, it's worth buying. This is the case for practically anyone who works in tech. My current laptop is a base model 12" MacBook. It is, without a doubt, my favorite computer ever. It's small. It's light. The screen is gorgeous. It resumes before I'm done opening the lid. It has an amazing trackpad, excellent battery life, and a wonderful keyboard. With current technology, it could scarcely be improved upon. I wish there was a combination of hardware and software that could compete with it, but so far, nothing I've seen has come close.
- keenerd 11y agoNah, for $1500 I could have five of these machines. Or two laptops and a powerful headless build box. You can do a lot better than a mere 10% gain with that sort of budget. You are throwing good money at diminishing returns.
- ggreer 11y agoI think you misinterpreted my point. I didn't say a nicer laptop made me 10% more productive. The real number is likely much higher than that. I gave 10% as an example where it would still be worthwhile to pay $1500 for. Considering the hourly wage of a programmer, 28 cents is a rounding error. Yes the returns are diminishing, but they're still totally worth it. With regards to being able to buy more equipment: I do have a powerful rack-mount server in addition to my MacBook. But being able to buy five ordinary laptops for the price of an amazing one? That's not very relevant. I can only type on one keyboard at a time. If anything, more laptops would slow me down. I'd have to keep all of their software up-to-date, sync data between them, ensure their batteries were charged, etc. Imagine making the same argument in other domains. For the price of one plane ticket, I could buy five Greyhound bus tickets to the same destination. For the price of one quality memory-foam mattress, I could buy five innerspring mattresses. For the price of one Aeron chair, I could buy five AmazonBasics office chairs. So what? I don't want more. I want better.
- keenerd 11y agoIf you are paying for Applecare, you are paying for "more not better". A second laptop is zero (amortized) overhead: every night your real laptop rsyncs back to the spare. Battery floats at 70% charge, nothing to worry about there either. Now when you spill coffee all over your laptop, you have a hot spare ready to go. If you are accident prone you can do this "for free" up to four times. Imagine the productivity gain not having to visit a store and deal with the Geniuses. It is irresponsible to always buy the "best" when you should be looking for the best value per dollar. Your own bank account is zero-sum, be more effective with it.
- purismcomputer 11y ago